We have cloned and sequenced a cDNA encoding human liver carnitine palmitoyltransferase (CPTase; palmitoyl-CoA:L-carnitine O-palmitoyltransferase, EC 2.3.1.21), an inner mitochondrial membrane enzyme that plays a major role in the fatty acid oxidation pathway. Mixed oligonucleotide primers whose sequences were deduced from one tryptic peptide obtained from purified CPTase were used in a polymerase chain reaction, allowing the amplification of a 0.12-kilobase fragment of human genomic DNA encoding such a peptide. A 60-base-pair (bp) oligonucleotide synthesized on the basis of the sequence from this fragment was used for the screening of a cDNA library from human liver and hybridized to a cDNA insert of 2255 bp. This cDNA contains an open reading frame of 1974 bp that encodes a protein of 658 amino acid residues including 25 residues of an NH2-terminal leader peptide. The assignment of this open reading frame to human liver CPTase is confirmed by matches to seven different amino acid sequences of tryptic peptides derived from pure human CPTase and by the 82.2% homology with the amino acid sequence of rat CPTase. The NH2-terminal region of CPTase contains a leucine-proline motif that is shared by carnitine acetyl- and octanoyltransferases and by choline acetyltransferase. The gene encoding CPTase was assigned to human chromosome 1, region 1q12-1pter, by hybridization of CPTase cDNA with a DNA panel of 19 human-hamster somatic cell hybrids.