To determine the effect of tenascin on forming periodontal pocket and pseudopocket, the ginival tissues were surgically obtained from the patients with adult periodontitis(10) and non-inflammatory phenytoin-associated gingival hyperplasia(5). The excised tissue specimens were fixed in neutral formalin for $6{sim}24$ hours, embedded with paraffin, sectioned at 4-6m in thickness, mounted on glass slides coated with 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane(Sigma Chemical Co., St. Louis, MO, U.SA.) and immunohistochemically processed by Avidin-Biotin peroxidase complex method for the localization of tenascin, using monoclonal mouse anti-human tenascin antiboday(Chemicon-International Inc., Temecula, CA, U.S.A., 1: 5,000) as the primary antibody. Regardless of periodontal pocket and pseudopocket, tenascin was localized along the connective tissue subjacent to basement membrane of gingival epithelium, and strong positive reactivity was obviously noted in the papillary projections of gingival connective tissue. The results suggest that tenascin may affect the development of papillary projections and the proliferation of epithelial cells.