Initial-rate kinetic studies of the activation of plasminogen by epithelial activator were performed in the absence and in the presence of fibrinogen and CNBr-digested fibrinogen, under assay conditions similar to those described by Hoylaerts et al. (J Biol Chem, 257, 2912, 1982). In the purified system, and in the absence of any stimulator, Lys-plasminogen is more readily activated than Glu-plasminogen, with catalytic rate constants of 0.01 s-1 and 0.0034 s-1 and Michaelis constants of 1.2 microM respectively. With Glu-plasminogen, double reciprocal plots deviated from linearity at low concentrations of plasminogen, in agreement with the findings reported for melanoma activator. In the presence of fibrinogen, activation rates for both Lys and Glu-plasminogen were increased. (kcat = 0.017 and 0.041 s-1 and km = 1.4 and 41 microM, respectively). In the presence of CNBr-fragments of fibrinogen, the Michaelis constant is lowered for both forms of plasminogen, (km = 0.3 microM) thus indicating high affinity and efficient activation of plasminogen on fibrin clot. Comparison of the kinetic data with those reported for melanoma activator suggest that even though the values of the kinetic constants are different, epithelial activator has a similar mechanism of action for the activation of plasminogen as the melanoma enzyme.