A reduced chemical kinetic mechanism for the oxidation of primary reference fuel (PRF) has been developed and applied to model internal combustion engines. Starting from an existing reduced reaction mechanism for n-heptane oxidation, a new reduced n-heptane mechanism was generated by including in additional five species and their relevant reactions, by updating the reaction rate constants of several reactions pertaining to oxidation of carbon monoxide and hydrogen, and by optimizing reaction rate constants of selected reactions. Using a similar approach, a reduced mechanism for iso-octane oxidation with built and combined with the n-heptane mechanism to form a PRF mechanism. The final version of the PRF mechanism consists of 41 species and 130 reactions. Validation of the present PRF mechanism was performed with measurements from shock tube tests, and HCCI and direct injection engine experiments available in the literature. The results show that the present PRF mechanism gives reliable performance for combustion predictions, as well as Computational efficiency improvements for Multidimensional CFD Simulations. (C) 2008 The Combustion Institute. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.