Crosslinking of major histocompatibility complex class I (MHC-I) molecules on the surface of human B lymphoma cells was shown to induce protein tyrosine phosphorylation and mobilization of intracellular free calcium. Immunoprecipitations indicated that the protein tyrosine kinases p53/56lyn and p72syk are among the tyrosine-phosphorylated proteins. The kinetics of phosphorylation of these kinases after MHC-I crosslinking differ from the kinetics observed after crosslinking of the B cell antigen receptor (BCR). Additional experiments were performed with chicken lyn- and syk-negative DT40 B cells and the results indicate that these two kinases have different substrate specificity and regulate intracellular free calcium differently in response to MHC-I crosslinking. In addition MHC-I crosslinking of a sIgM-negative DT40 chicken B cell variant results in less activity of tyrosine kinases and less mobilization of intracellular free calcium compared with MHC-I crosslinking of wild-type DT40 cells. Thus, expression of BCR at the cell surface is likely to be important for the signal cascade initiated by MHC-I crosslinking. Our data suggest that signal transduction initiated through ligation of the MHC-I molecule plays a role in the regulation of B cell homeostasis.