Objective:To investigate the methylation inactivation and the clinical signiifcance of Parkin gene mRNA expression in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC). Methods: The methylation-speciifc PCR (MSP) and semi-quantitative reverse transcription PCR (RT-PCR) were used to detect methylation and the mRNA expression level of Parkin gene in 54 cases of NPC tissues and 16 cases of normal nasopharyngeal epithelial (NNE) tissues.The mRNA expression of Parkin gene in two NPC cell lines (CNE1 and CNE2) were detected before and after treatment with the methyltransferase inhibitor 5-aza-2-deoxycytidine so as to analyze the effects of Parkin gene methylation and demethylation on Parkin gene mRNA expression and the relationship between Parkin gene mRNA expression and clinical factors. Results: The methylation frequency of Parkin gene in human NPC tissues was 62.96% (34/54), but didn’t happen in any of 16 cases of NNE tissues. The mRNA expression level was (0.3430±0.4947) in 54 cases of NPC tissues and (1.0052±0.4911) in NNE tissues, showing that the mRNA expression level of NPC tissues was significantly down-regulated (P