Acute intermittent porphyria (AIP), an autosomal dominant inborn error of heme biosynthesis, results from the half-normal activity of the heme biosynthetic enzyme hydroxymethylbilane synthase (HMB-synthase). Heterozygous individuals are prone to life-threatening acute neurologic attacks, which are precipitated by certain drugs and other metabolic, hormonal, and nutritional factors. Since the biochemical diagnosis of heterozygous individuals has been problematic, recent efforts have focused on the identification of mutations and diagnostically useful restriction fragment length polymorphisms (RFLPs) in the HMB-synthase gene. To facilitate these endeavors, the human HMB-synthase gene, including 1.1 kg of the 5' flanking region, was isolated and completely sequenced in both orientations. The 10,024-bp gene contained 15 exons ranging in size from 39 to 438 bp and 14 introns ranging from 87 to 2913 bp. All intron/exon boundaries conformed to the GT/AG consensus rule. There were six Alu repetitive elements, one of the J and five of the Sa subfamilies. Analysis of the 1.1-kb 5' flanking region revealed putative regulatory elements for the housekeeping promoter including AP1, AP4, SP1, TRE, ENH, and CAC. This region contained 10 HpaII sites and had an overall GC content of 54%. Intron 1, which contained the erythroid-specific promoter, had putative regulatory motifs for NF-1, NF-E1, NF-E1(b), NF-E2, AP1, AP4, TOPO, CAAC, CAC, CAAT, and TATA. The locations and variant nucleotides for the known RFLPs in intron 1 were identified [MspI, nucleotide 1345 G/A; PstI, 1500 C/T; ApaLI, 2377 C/A; and BstNI, 2479 G/A] and improved polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based detection methods for each were established.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)