Diglycerides derived from the phospholipase C-mediated hydrolysis of phosphoinositides are implicated as important mediators of agonist-induced responses, including the stimulation of cell division. alpha-Thrombin-stimulated proliferation of fibroblasts is associated with a sustained increase in cellular diglycerides, while the hydrolysis of phosphoinositides is transient (Wright, T. M., Rangan, L. A., Shin, H. S., and Raben, D. M. (1988) J. Biol. Chem. 263, 9374-9380). A rigorous assessment of this apparent discrepancy requires an analysis of the molecular species of the lipids involved. In this report, we have analyzed the molecular species of 1,2-diglycerides present in quiescent and alpha-thrombin-stimulated IIC9 Chinese hamster embryo fibroblasts. The molecular species profiles of the stimulated diglycerides were compared to the profiles of molecular species contained in cellular phospholipids. We demonstrate that 1) stimulation of IIC9 cells by alpha-thrombin results in an increase in the levels of diglyceride molecular species already present in control, quiescent cultures, without the addition of new species or the complete loss of existing species; 2) the diglycerides present in control cultures as well as in cultures stimulated with alpha-thrombin are all ester-linked; and 3) while the phosphoinositides contribute a significant proportion of the diglycerides generated 15 s following alpha-thrombin addition, phosphatidylcholine contributes most of the diglycerides generated after 5 min and 1 h.