Lamination workers are exposed to large amounts of styrene. A postlabelling method was developed in order to detect DNA adducts in white blood cells from such workers. First, styrene oxide was reacted with DNA, and the adducts were characterized by the nuclease P1 version of the 32P-postlabelling technique. The adducts in human samples were transferred magnetically during chromatography. The 2'-deoxyguanosine 3'-monophosphate (dGMP) adduct standards, including N2 and O6 adducts, were shown to be resistant to the action of nuclease P1. The O6 adducts were detected in the femtomole range at about 10% labelling efficiency. In lamination workers, the level of O6 adducts, adjusted for adduct recovery, was 5/10(8) nucleotides, which was five times the level in controls.