Male and female Swiss Webster (SW) mice, age 13 to 14 weeks, were exposed by inhalation for 4 hr per day, 5 days per week, for 14 weeks, to either room air, 0.5% nitrous oxide, 5.0% nitrous oxide, or 50% nitrous oxide. Murine germ cells were examined for evidence of injury after this exposure. A group of male mice were treated with methyl methanesulfonate (MMS) as a positive control for sperm abnormalities while a group of female mice were treated with 3-methylcholanthrene (3-MC) as a positive control for oocyte destruction. There were no significant differences among the four inhalation exposure groups in testes weight, percentage of abnormally shaped sperm, sperm count, or histologic appearance of the testes; the mean percentage (+/- SE) of abnormal sperm ranged from 8.9 +/- 2.4 (5.0% nitrous oxide) to 13.5 +/- 0.5 (50% nitrous oxide) with a concurrent control value of 10.4 +/- 2.3%. In the positive control experiment, 25.2 +/- 4.1% of sperm from mice treated with MMS were abnormal compared with 2.5 +/- 0.3% of sperm from mice treated with saline (p less than 0.001), indicating that sperm of SW mice are sensitive to chemical damage. There was no significant difference between the mean number of oocytes in mice treated with 50% nitrous oxide (33.3 +/- 14.4) and in control mice (29.8 +/- 8.0). In the positive control experiment, mice treated with 3-MC had significantly fewer (p less than 0.001) primordial oocytes, 67.2 +/- 19.5 compared with control mice, 222.4 +/- 21.9, indicating that this strain is sensitive to chemical damage of the ovary. Thus, murine germ cells showed no evidence of toxic effects due to prolonged exposure to nitrous oxide.