The production of interleukin-5 (IL5) and interleukin-4 (IL4) by activated T-cells is important in the pathogenesis of helminth infections and allergy. Human Jurkat cells express IL4 but one of the main factors restricting studies of human IL5 expression has been the lack of human T-cell lines which express significant levels of IL5 in an inducible fashion. We report that the human T-cell leukemia cell line (PER-117), previously shown to produce IL2, also produces IL5 and IL4, and is a useful model for the study of the regulation of IL5 and IL4 gene expression. We show that expression of IL5 and IL4 mRNAs in PER-117 cells is stimulation dependent. IL5 and IL4 reporter constructs are also transiently expressed in these cells in an inducible fashion. IL5 production in the PER-117 cell line can be activated by phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate alone and further enhanced by calcium ionophore A23187, cyclic adenosine 3', 5'-monophosphate or anti-CD28 antibodies. The conditions used to stimulate the PER-117 cells determined whether IL5 production was inhibited by cyclosporin A or dexamethasone. These data indicate that the PER-117 cell line is a model to study signal transduction and transcriptional activation of the human IL5 gene in human T-cells.