The effects of dietary exposure to 0.125% (w/w) p-chlorophenoxyacetic acid, 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid or 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid on the content of peroxisomes and levels of certain xenobiotic-metabolizing enzymes in mouse liver have been investigated. In agreement with the literature on rat liver 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid and 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid were found to cause extensive proliferation of peroxisomes (as judged by the total levels of "mitochondrial" protein, carnitine acetyltransferase, cyanide-insensitive palmitoyl-CoA oxidation and catalase) in mouse liver. On the other hand, exposure to p-chlorophenoxyacetic acid did not significantly affect any of these parameters. As with certain other peroxisome proliferators, 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid and 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid increased total cytochrome oxidase activity as well. In addition, dietary exposure to 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid and to 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid resulted in increases in the activities of cytosolic and microsomal epoxide hydrolases in mouse liver and generally less pronounced increases in the total cytosolic glutathione transferase activity and microsomal content of cytochrome P-450. In the case of cytochrome P-450, this process can be said to be a true induction (i.e. the amount of enzyme protein is increased), because the assay procedure for cytochrome P-450 measures holoenzyme amount. Immunoquantitation demonstrated that this was also the case for the changes in cytosolic epoxide hydrolase. The dramatic differences in proliferation of peroxisomes and induction of xenobiotic-metabolizing enzymes seen here with compounds differing relatively little in structure may indicate that a receptor mechanism of some kind is involved.