We isolated the 5' flanking region of a gene for phenylalanine ammonia-lyase (PAL; EC 4.3.1.5) from Pinus taeda, PtaPAL. To investigate the tissue-specific expression of the PtaPAL promoter, histochemical assay of GUS activity was performed using the transgenic tobacco expressing the PtaPAL promoter-GUS. The region of -897 to -420 in PtaPAL promoter showed high activities in the secondary xylem and response to bending stress. To characterize the cis-regulatory functions of the promoters for enzymes in phenylpropanoid biosynthesis, we examined the activity of chimeric promoters of PtaPAL and a 4-coumarate CoA ligase, Pta4CL alpha. The chimeric promoter showed similar activity as the Pta4CL alpha promoter. Electrophoretic mobility shift assays implicated -897 to -674 of PtaPAL promoter containing cis-elements of the expression in xylem of Pinus taeda. The results suggested that AC elements of PtaPAL have multiple functions in the expression under the various developmental stages and stress conditions in the transgenic tobacco.