ABSTRACT
Inammation underlies many common physiologic and pathogenic conditions. While acute inammation is protective against infection and injury, the failure to resolve the inammation at an early stage can cause pathologic conditions, such as rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn’s disease, diabetes, obesity, asthma, cardiovascular diseases, and neurodegenerative disorders (Chapkin et al. 2009). Chronic inammation is also closely linked to some types of human cancer. The emerging role of inammation in multistage carcinogenesis has been extensively investigated in recent years at the cellular and molecular levels (Kundu and Surh 2012). It is becoming more evident that the classical mediators of inammation, such as eicosanoids and cytokines, contribute to carcinogenesis, especially in the promotion stage.
