Association between hypertension and molecular variants of angiotensinogen (AGT) has been confirmed in Caucasian populations. The present study was conducted in a Japanese population. Eighty-two hypertensive and eighty-three normotensive subjects were analyzed. The region of interest in the AGT gene was amplified by the polymerase chain reaction method, the molecular variant of T174M was detected with the use of a restriction enzyme Nco I, and the molecular variant of M235T was detected with the use of allele-specific oligonucleotide probes. The allele frequency of the M174 in the hypertensive group (HT) was 0.141, while that in the normotensive group was 0.079 (0.05<pppHypertens Res 1994; 17: 117-121)