International Journal of Oncology

Abstract

pioneered studies that elucidated the potent effects of stress on the organism at the behavioral, neuroendocrine, cellular and molecular levels, and performed groundbreaking research on human development, particularly in early life and the years of puberty and adolescence.Dr Chrousos has performed a body of influential original experimental, translational and clinical studies on the universally pathogenic impact of a chronically activated stress system on human health.He identified and functionally characterized the molecular mechanisms underlying the pervasive stress hormone-mediated effects of chronically disrupted homeostasis on human mental and somatic health.His discoveries of the pathogenic mechanisms through which chronic stress causes and/or aggravates the ʻchronic noncommunicable diseasesʼ, promotes inflammation, increases vulnerability to certain cancers and infections, and accelerates aging, have had a major impact on the science and practice of medicine.Dr Chrousos demonstrated that chronically disturbed homeostasis and chronodisruption -anytime during the entire human lifespan -lead to the over-production and/or increased action of stress and inflammatory mediators, and cause and/or exacerbate the progressively deteriorating with age ʻchronic stress and inflammation syndromeʼ.This nosological entity not only includes the classic chronic non-communicable diseases, but also a broad host of other disorders, affecting a large percentage of living individuals, amounting to hundreds of millions of human beings.This syndrome consists of