Protein / target

Bcl-2-like protein 2

BCL2L2Q92843Homo sapiensSwiss-Prot
Clinically validated
Therapeutic maturity
1
Approved medicines
24
Clinical trials
Small-molecule tractable
Druggability
Advanced Clinical

Protein at a glance

Biological role

Disordered domain specific binding

Strongest disease association

neurodegenerative disease

Pathway evidence · score 0.53

Therapeutic maturity

Clinically validated target

1 approved medicine against this target

Druggability

Small molecule

Open Targets tractability · Advanced Clinical

Clinical development

1 approved · 2 in clinical development

24 linked trials

Derived from structured UniProt, Open Targets and literature data on this page.

Protein profile

UniProt 2026_02

Canonical identity and biological annotation from UniProt.

Function

Promotes cell survival. Blocks dexamethasone-induced apoptosis. Mediates survival of postmitotic Sertoli cells by suppressing death-promoting activity of BAX

Subcellular location

Mitochondrion membrane
Domains and Gene Ontology detail (14)

Gene Ontology

  • CBcl-2 family protein complex
  • Ccytosol
  • Cmitochondrial outer membrane
  • Cmitochondrion
  • Fchannel activity
  • Fdisordered domain specific binding
  • Fidentical protein binding
  • Pextrinsic apoptotic signaling pathway in absence of ligand
  • Pintrinsic apoptotic signaling pathway in response to DNA damage
  • Pnegative regulation of apoptotic process
  • Ppositive regulation of apoptotic process
  • Pregulation of apoptotic process

193 aa · 21 kDa · 2 isoforms

Biological roles

What this protein does, drawn together from its UniProt function, Gene Ontology terms and Reactome pathways.

Apoptosis & cell deathGO
View supporting evidence

Apoptosis & cell death

  • ·negative regulation of apoptotic process
  • ·positive regulation of apoptotic process
  • ·regulation of apoptotic process

Concepts derived from UniProt GO Reactome — each badge above shows which sources supported that role.

Interaction neighbourhood

STRING v12.0

Proteins with the strongest functional or physical association. Node size and line weight reflect STRING confidence; hover or select a partner to inspect one association.

BCL2L11PMAIP1BMFBIKMCL1BECN1HRKBBC3BAK1BADBCL2L2

10 strongest partners — larger node and heavier line mean higher confidence

Functional and physical associations from STRING v12.0. Only associations with this protein are drawn — partner-to-partner links are not part of this evidence.

Drugs targeting this protein

1

Whether each drug engages this protein directly or through a complex, and how many other targets are recorded for it. Direct binders with few recorded targets are listed first.

navitoclax
Narrow target profileApprovedInhibitor

Apoptosis regulator Bcl-W inhibitor

Appears in clinical studies involving neoplasm, myelofibrosis, B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia, diffuse large B-cell lymphoma

Direct interaction with this protein · 1 of 3 recorded protein targets — narrow recorded profile

ChEMBL mechanism, action type and target identity. Open Targets clinical status and indications.

Translational evidence

Open Targets 26

Why this target matters therapeutically — disease associations, drugs in development, tractability and safety, from Open Targets.

Highest-confidence therapeutic associations

Diseases where a drug acting on this target has already reached clinical development.

neoplasm0.63

Clinical · overall 0.41

myelofibrosis0.60

Clinical · overall 0.36

small cell lung carcinoma0.47

Clinical · overall 0.29

B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia0.18

Clinical · overall 0.11

acute lymphoblastic leukemia0.17

Clinical · overall 0.11

Highest overall evidence

Remaining associations by Open Targets' aggregated evidence score.

neurodegenerative disease0.53

Pathway

acute myeloid leukemia0.10

Literature

lymphoblastic lymphoma0.10

Clinical

lymphoma0.09

Literature

myelodysplastic syndrome0.09

Clinical

Show all associations
neurodegenerative disease0.53
neoplasm0.41
myelofibrosis0.36
small cell lung carcinoma0.29
acute lymphoblastic leukemia0.11
B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia0.11
acute myeloid leukemia0.10
lymphoblastic lymphoma0.10
lymphoma0.09
myelodysplastic syndrome0.09

Open Targets ranks 327 associations for this target and we store the top 10 by aggregated score. The long tail is largely literature co-mention and RNA-expression evidence, not evidence that this target drives those diseases.

Known drugs · 3 total

OBATOCLAXPhase 2

follicular lymphoma · acute myeloid leukemia · small cell lung carcinoma

NAVITOCLAXApproval

neoplasm · myelofibrosis · B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia

OBATOCLAX MESYLATEPhase 3

small cell lung carcinoma · Hodgkins lymphoma · myelofibrosis

Tractability

SM · Advanced ClinicalSM · High-Quality LigandSM · High-Quality PocketSM · Druggable FamilyAB · UniProt loc high confPR · Database UbiquitinationPR · Small Molecule Binder

Clinical trials

24

Trials of drugs that target this protein — reached indirectly through those drugs, so a trial listed here studies the drug, not the protein.

Show remaining trials (18)

ClinicalTrials.gov via the drug-target graph.

Forefront confidence

Synthesis

Our own weighting of the evidence behind each disease association. Human genetics and clinical evidence count for most; literature co-mention counts for little, because two entities sharing an abstract is not evidence that one drives the other.

neoplasmModerately supported
0.53
agreement 0.370.68
Clinical83%Literature17%

Open Targets aggregate 0.41 · 2 independent evidence families

myelofibrosisLimited support
0.45
agreement 0.280.61
Clinical100%

Open Targets aggregate 0.36 · 1 independent evidence family

small cell lung carcinomaLimited support
0.35
agreement 0.200.51
Clinical99%Literature1%

Open Targets aggregate 0.29 · 2 independent evidence families

neurodegenerative diseasePreliminary
0.35
agreement 0.120.57
Pathway100%

Open Targets aggregate 0.53 · 1 independent evidence family · no direct causal or clinical evidence

lymphomaPreliminary
0.17
agreement 0.010.32
Literature54%Clinical46%

Open Targets aggregate 0.09 · 2 independent evidence families

This ranking differs from Open Targets' own: re-weighting moves genetically-evidenced diseases above more heavily co-mentioned ones. The evidence agreement range shows how closely the independent evidence families agree — it is not a statistical confidence interval, and nothing here is fitted to outcome data. Derived from Open Targets evidence types under Forefront weighting; the underlying per-type scores are shown above so the calculation can be checked.

What's happening now

1

Recent activity around this target, drawn from one canonical event stream. Every item is reached through a drug that targets this protein, so each event is news about that drug rather than about the protein directly.

  1. New publication2024-04-04
    The Differential Effect of Senolytics on SASP Cytokine Secretion and Regulation of EMT by CAFs.

    International journal of molecular sciences · 2024 · 20 citations · Europe PMC · via navitoclax

Objective event titles are shown unmodified; the event kind and significance line are derived from structured fields. Forefront AttentionEvent stream aggregating Europe PMC Regulatory filings ClinicalTrials.gov.