The somatic cell hybrid method has been used to study the number and different types of human genes involved in the expression of adenosine deaminase (ADA; adenosine aminohydrolase, EC 3.5.4.4) in normal cells and cells from a patient with ADA-deficient severe combined immunodeficiency disease (SCID). Genetic and biochemical characterization of ADA in SCID and the ADA tissue-specific isozymes in normal human cells indicates that additional genes, besides the ADA structural gene on chromosome 20, are involved in ADA expression. Human chromosome 6 encodes a gene, ADCP-1, whose presence is necessary for the expression of an ADA-complexing protein in human-mouse somatic cell hybrids [Koch, G. & Shows, T. B. (1978) Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 75, 3876-3880]. We report the identification of a second gene, ADCP-2, on human chromosome 2, that is also involved in the expression of the ADA-complexing protein. The data indicate that these two ADCP genes must be present in the same cell for that cell to express the complexing protein. Human-mouse somatic cell hybrids, in which the human parental cells were fibroblastss from an individual with ADA-deficient SCID, also required human chromosomes 2 and 6 to express the ADA-complexing protein, indicating that neither ADCP-1 nor ADCP-2 is involved in the ADA deficiency in SCID. The SCID-mouse hybrid cells expressed no human ADA even when human chromosome 20 had been retained. The deficiency of human ADA in these hybrids maps to human chromosome 20, and therefore is not due to the repression or inhibiton of ADA or its product by unlinked genes or gene products. We propose that the expression of the polymeric ADA tissue isozymes in human cells requires at least three genes: ADA on chromosome 20, ADCP-1 on chromosome 6, and ADCP-2 on chromosome 2. A genetic scheme is presented and the different genes involved in ADA expression and their possible functions are discussed.