Twenty-four hours after acute administration of cocaine HCl (25 mg/kg, i.p.) to male C57BL/6ByJ mice, there was no hepatotoxicity as measured by plasma aspartate aminotransferase (AST) activity. In contrast, daily administration of cocaine (25 mg/kg, i.p.) for 14 days induced marked hepatotoxicity, as characterized by a greater than 400% increase in plasma AST activity when assayed 24 hr after the last injection. Concomitantly, the liver had increased levels of cysteine, gamma-glutamylcysteine, glutathione, cysteinylglycine, glutamate, methionine, taurine, and aspartate. The effect appeared to be selective for compounds of the glutathione metabolic pathways, because repeated cocaine exposure did not affect other amino acids such as leucine, isoleucine, phenylalanine, serine, and valine. There was a positive correlation between the magnitude of the elevation of cysteine and the extent of liver damage. Daily cocaine administration did not affect striatal or frontal cortex glutathione. A final cocaine challenge (50 mg/kg, i.p.) did not affect either hepatic or cerebral glutathione metabolism. The increase in hepatic cysteine and glutathione upon daily cocaine administration is a potentially important compensatory mechanism against cocaine-induced hepatotoxicity.