The addition of granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) to human neutrophils causes a rapid increase in the basal and fMet-Leu-Phe-stimulated Na+ influx and an increase in intracellular pH. The increase can be seen as early as 5 min after the addition of GM-CSF. Changes produced by GM-CSF are totally inhibited by amiloride and are significantly reduced in pertussis toxin-treated cells. The stimulation of the Na+/H+ exchange mechanism by GM-CSF inhibits further stimulation of this system with either fMetLeu-Phe or phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate. In addition, membrane preparations isolated from GM-CSF-treated neutrophils have higher basal and stimulated GTPase activities. The basal and the fMet-Leu-Phe-or platelet-activating factor-stimulated GTPase activities are reduced in pertussis toxin-treated cells. Cells pretreated with GM-CSF accumulate more radioactive phosphate than control cells, and this increase is diminished by pertussis toxin treatment. In addition, GM-CSF causes a rapid increase in the tyrosine phosphorylation levels of five proteins with molecular masses of 118 kDa, 92 kDa, 78 kDa, 54 kDa, and 40 kDa. These results clearly show that GM-CSF, on its own, can initiate several changes and that these changes are mediated in part by the pertussis toxin-sensitive guanine nucleotide regulatory protein.