The mouse alpha A-crystallin-encoding gene (alpha A-cry) is expressed in a highly lens-preferred manner. To date, it has been shown that this lens-preferred expression is controlled by four proximal positive-acting transcriptional regulatory elements: DE1 (-111/-97), alpha A-CRYBP1 (-66/-57), PE1/TATA (-35/-19) and PE2 (+24/+43). The present study extends our knowledge of mouse alpha A-cry transcriptional regulatory elements to the far upstream region of that gene by demonstrating that the -1556 to -1165 region contains negative-acting sequence elements which function in transfected lens cells derived from mouse, rabbit and chicken. This is the first negative-acting regulatory region identified in mouse alpha A-cry. The -1556 to -1165 region contains sequences similar to repressor/silencer elements identified in other genes, including those highly expressed in the lens, such as the delta 1-crystallin (delta 1-cry) and vimentin (vim) genes. The -1480 to -1401 region specifically interacts with nuclear proteins isolated from the alpha TN4-1 mouse lens cell line. Contained within this protein-binding region and positioned at -1453 to -1444 is a sequence (RS1) similar to the chicken delta 1-cry intron 3 repressor, and which competes for the formation of -1480 to -1401 DNA-protein complexes. Our findings suggest that lens nuclear proteins bind to the mouse alpha A-cry RS1 region. We demonstrate that the chicken delta 1-cry intron repressor binds similar nuclear proteins in chicken embryonic lens cells and mouse alpha TN4-1 lens cells.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)