| Sulfur mustard (SM) is an alkylating agent that causes severe damages to the skin, eyes, and the respiratory
system. DNA alkylation is one of the most critical lesions that could lead to monoadducts and cross-links, as well
as DNA strand breaks. In response to these adducts, cells initiate a series of reactions to recruit specific DNA
repair pathways. The main DNA repair pathways in human cells, which could be involved in the DNA SMinduced
DNA damages, are base excision repair (BER), nucleotide excision repair (NER), homologous recombination
(HR) and non-homologous end joining (NHEJ). There is, thus, a need for a short review to clarify
which damage caused by SM is repaired by which repair pathway. Increasing our knowledge about different
DNA repair mechanisms following SM exposure would lay the first step for developing new therapeutic agents to
treat people exposed to SM. In this review, we describe the major DNA repair pathways, according to the DNA
adducts that can be caused by SM. |