Genotype and allele frequency of the polymorphic 27-bp repeat, a variable number of tandem repeats (VNTR) located in intron 4 of the endothelial nitric oxide synthase gene, were analyzed in 316 healthy Chinese individuals. Four genotypes, namely 6/5-repeats heterozygous, 5/5-repeats homozygous, 5/4-repeats heterozygous and 4/4-repeats homozygous, were identified. Both observed genotype and allele frequencies of this VNTR in Chinese were similar to those of Japanese, while the 4/4-repeats genotype differed significantly from that of Caucasians in Spain, and all ones did from those of African-American in United States.