Sequence analysis of Chinese hamster V79 lung fibroblast cDNA clones, which code for UV radiation-inducible transcripts, revealed that many of the clones corresponded to metallothioneins (MTs) I and II. A third cDNA clone, DDIU4, was found also to code for a similar-size UV-inducible transcript which was unrelated to MT by both sequence analysis and kinetics of induction. MTI and MTII RNAs rapidly increased in V79 cells within 1 h after UV irradiation, and maximum induction was seen by 4 h. This rapid induction of MT RNA by UV irradiation was not observed in human fibroblasts. MTI and MTII were coordinately induced in both time course and dose-response experiments, although the induction of MTII, up to 30-fold, was three to four times greater than that of MTI. The induction of MT did not appear to be a general stress response, since no increase occurred after exposure to X rays or H2O2.