Hydrogen sulfide signaling in regulation of cell behaviors

Recent advances in the biomedical importance of H₂S have help us understand various cellular functions and pathophysiological processes from a new aspect. Specially, H₂S has been demonstrated to play multiple roles in regulating cell behaviors, including cell survival, cell differentiation, cell senescence, cell hypertrophy, cell atrophy, cell metaplasia, and cell death, etc. H₂S contributes to cell behavior changes via various mechanisms, such as histone modification, DNA methylation, non-coding RNA changes, DNA damage repair, transcription factor activity, and post-translational modification of proteins by S-sulfhydration, etc. In this review, we summarized the recent research progress on H₂S signaling in control of cell behaviors and discussed the ways of H₂S regulation of gene expressions. Given the key roles of H₂S in both health and diseases, a better understanding of the regulation of H₂S on cell behavior change and the underlying molecular mechanisms will help us to develop novel and more effective strategies for clinical therapy.