A human tyrosinase gene containing a 5'-flanking region and the first exon was isolated from a normal human liver library using mouse tyrosinase cDNA as a probe for screening. In the 5'-upstream region of transcriptional start sites, there is a putative TATA box and CAAT box and some palindromic sequences. A characteristic sequence of (GA:TCn, which can assume a hinged-DNA structure, was present from -869 nt to -633 nt in this 5'-flanking region.