Measurements performed using cell lines or animal tissues have shown that the progesterone receptor (PR) can be induced by estrogens. By use of immunohistochemistry we studied the effects of estrogens on the PR levels in the individual cell types of the target organs uterus and breast. In the uteri of rats, ovariectomy induced a decrease in PR immunoreactivity within the myometrium and outer stromal cell layers. In contrast, in the uterine luminal and glandular epithelium and surrounding stromal cell layers the PR immunoreactivity was significantly enhanced. The same picture emerged when intact rats were treated with the pure estrogen receptor antagonist, ZM 182780 (10 mg/kg/d). Treatment of ovariectomized rats with estradiol resulted in high PR levels in the myometrium and stroma cells but low PR immunoreactivity in the epithelial cells. The ER-mediated repression of the PR immunoreactivity was evidently restricted to the uterine epithelium, as we found that in the epithelial cells of the mammary gland and in cells of N-nitrosomethylurea-induced mammary carcinomas the PR expression was induced by estrogens and was blocked by the pure antiestrogen ZM 182780. These results clearly show that in the rat the activated ER induces diverging effects on PR expression in different cell types even within the same organ.