Heavy metal (HM) stress is a major hazard, which significantly affects plant growth and development. In order to confront HM stress, plants directly or indirectly regulate the levels of endogenous nitric oxide (NO), a redox-related signaling molecule involved in wide range of plant growth and development as well as in response to HM stress. In addition, there is now compelling experimental evidence that NO usually mediates signaling processes through interactions with different biomolecules like phytohormones to regulate HM tolerance. Apart from phytohormones, NO partly operates through posttranslational modification of proteins, notably via S-nitrosylation in response to HM stress. Recently, the roles of S-nitrosylation as a regulator of plant responses to HM stress and S-nitrosylated candidates have also been established and detected. Here, we describe the roles of NO in confronting HM phytotoxicity in plants with a particular focus on the presentation and discussion of recent data obtained in this field, which involves in the function of various phytohormones and S-nitrosylation during plant responses to HM stress. Additionally, both importance and challenges of future work are outlined in order to further elucidate the specific mechanisms underlying the roles of NO in plant responses to HM stress.

重金属（HM）胁迫是主要危害，严重影响植物的生长发育。为了应对HM胁迫，植物直接或间接调节内源性一氧化氮（NO）的水平，内源性一氧化氮相关的信号分子参与广泛的植物生长发育以及对HM胁迫的响应。此外，现在有令人信服的实验证据表明，NO通常通过与不同生物分子（如植物激素）的相互作用来介导信号传导过程，从而调节HM耐受性。除植物激素外，NO部分通过蛋白质的翻译后修饰（特别是通过响应HM胁迫的S-亚硝基化）起作用。最近，S-亚硝基化作为植物对HM胁迫和还建立和检测了S-亚硝基化的候选物。在这里，我们描述了NO在对抗植物中HM植物毒性方面的作用，特别着重于该领域中最新数据的呈现和讨论，这涉及植物对HM胁迫反应期间各种植物激素和S-亚硝基化的功能。此外，概述了未来工作的重要性和挑战，以进一步阐明NO在植物对HM胁迫的反应中的作用背后的具体机制。