The effect of cholecystokinin (CCK) on cultured human meningioma derived cells was investigated. Exposure of meningioma cells for 6-12 days to CCK-8s (2-200 nM) resulted in a dose dependent stimulation of cell growth to a maximum of 1.1-fold over basal controls. A time course study showed stimulation of cell growth at day 3 followed by increase throughout day 6. The stimulatory effect of CCK on meningioma cell growth was completely abolished by a CCK-B specific receptor antagonist, L-365,260. Reverse-transcription of meningioma-derived RNA into cDNA followed by amplification by the polymerase chain reaction using specific primers for CCK peptide and its CCK-A and/B receptor revealed 100% presence of CCK peptide and CCK-B receptors mRNA whereas CCK-A receptor was expressed in 66% of the meningiomas. These results provide evidence that human meningioma cells possess CCK peptide and its receptors the activation of which leads to increase of cell growth possibly via an autocrine/paracrine mechanism.