Protein / target
Vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2
Protein at a glance
Biological role
Transmembrane receptor protein tyrosine kinase
Primary biology
EGFR/ERBB growth-factor signalling
Strongest disease association
Neoplasms
Therapeutic position
Established drug target
Research activity
Emerging research
Derived from structured UniProt, Open Targets and literature data on this page.
Protein profile
Canonical identity and biological annotation from UniProt.
Function overview
Tyrosine-protein kinase that acts as a cell-surface receptor for VEGFA, VEGFC and VEGFD.
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Tyrosine-protein kinase that acts as a cell-surface receptor for VEGFA, VEGFC and VEGFD. Plays an essential role in the regulation of angiogenesis, vascular development, vascular permeability, and embryonic hematopoiesis. Promotes proliferation, survival, migration and differentiation of endothelial cells. Promotes reorganization of the actin cytoskeleton. Isoforms lacking a transmembrane domain, such as isoform 2 and isoform 3, may function as decoy receptors for VEGFA, VEGFC and/or VEGFD. Isoform 2 plays an important role as negative regulator of VEGFA- and VEGFC-mediated lymphangiogenesis by limiting the amount of free VEGFA and/or VEGFC and preventing their binding to FLT4. Modulates FLT1 and FLT4 signaling by forming heterodimers. Binding of vascular growth factors to isoform 1 leads to the activation of several signaling cascades. Activation of PLCG1 leads to the production of the cellular signaling molecules diacylglycerol and inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate and the activation of protein kinase C. Mediates activation of MAPK1/ERK2, MAPK3/ERK1 and the MAP kinase signaling pathway, as well as of the AKT1 signaling pathway. Mediates phosphorylation of PIK3R1, the regulatory subunit of phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase, reorganization of the actin cytoskeleton and activation of PTK2/FAK1. Required for VEGFA-mediated induction of NOS2 and NOS3, leading to the production of the signaling molecule nitric oxide (NO) by endothelial cells. Phosphorylates PLCG1. Promotes phosphorylation of FYN, NCK1, NOS3, PIK3R1, PTK2/FAK1 and SRC
Subcellular location
Domains and Gene Ontology detail (76)Hide
Domains & features
Gene Ontology
- Canchoring junction
- Ccell junction
- Ccytosol
- Cearly endosome
- Cendoplasmic reticulum
- Cendosome
- Cexternal side of plasma membrane
- Cextracellular region
- CGolgi apparatus
- Cmembrane raft
- Cnuclear membrane
- Cplasma membrane
Biological roles
What this protein does, drawn together from its UniProt function, Gene Ontology terms and Reactome pathways.
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Cell migration
- ·cell migration
- ·positive regulation of blood vessel endothelial cell migration
- ·positive regulation of cell migration
- ·positive regulation of cell migration involved in sprouting angiogenesis
Growth-factor signalling
- ·growth factor binding
- ·vascular endothelial growth factor binding
- ·vascular endothelial growth factor receptor signaling pathway
Receptor tyrosine kinase signalling
- ·transmembrane receptor protein tyrosine kinase activity
- ·cell surface receptor protein tyrosine kinase signaling pathway
Cell proliferation & survival
- ·positive regulation of cell population proliferation
Apoptosis & cell death
- ·negative regulation of endothelial cell apoptotic process
- ·negative regulation of neuron apoptotic process
View underlying pathways (7)Hide underlying pathways
Concepts derived from UniProt GO Reactome — each badge above shows which sources supported that role.
Interaction neighbourhood
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.
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.
Approved medicines with mapped indications
Approved therapies targeting this protein, grouped by what they are approved to treat — the disease-first view of the medicines below. Relationships come from the canonical approved-indication graph (ChEMBL phase-4), the same source as the drug cards.
Broader indication categories (1)Hide
Broad umbrella indications (e.g. “Neoplasms”). Shown here because every medicine also appears under a more specific disease above — kept for completeness, de-emphasised for clarity.
24 medicines meet Open Targets' target-level approved-medicine definition; the 5 shown here are those on this page with a canonical approved disease indication in the graph. Approved indications from ChEMBL (phase-4), via the canonical drug→disease graph.
Drugs targeting this protein
How approved and investigational drugs engage this protein — mechanism and action type, direct vs complex targeting, and how broadly each acts across other targets. A drug-first view (the section above groups the approved ones disease-first); direct binders with few recorded targets are listed first.
Vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2 inhibitor
Indicated for Carcinoma, Renal Cell, Gastrointestinal Stromal Tumors, Neuroendocrine Tumors, Neoplasms
Vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2 inhibitor
Vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2 inhibitor
Indicated for Leukemia, Myeloid, Acute, Mastocytosis, Mastocytosis, Systemic, Neoplasms
Vascular endothelial growth factor receptor inhibitor
Indicated for Carcinoma, Renal Cell, Neoplasms
Vascular endothelial growth factor receptor inhibitor
Indicated for Colorectal Neoplasms, Neoplasms
Vascular endothelial growth factor receptor inhibitor
Indicated for Colorectal Neoplasms, Neoplasms
View all 7 targeting drugsHide
Vascular endothelial growth factor receptor inhibitor
ChEMBL mechanism, action type, target identity and approved indications. Open Targets clinical status.
Translational evidence
Why this target matters therapeutically, strongest evidence first. Disease associations are gene-level (via the gene that encodes this protein) and open into the full confidence synthesis; the development universe, tractability and safety annotations are target-level, from Open Targets.
Strongest disease associations · via encoding gene KDR
Gene-level evidence surfaced through the gene KDRthat encodes this protein — not a direct protein–disease relationship. Ranked by Forefront's causal-directness weighting, so genetically- and clinically-evidenced diseases lead over ones that merely share the literature.
View evidence synthesis (5)Hide
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 per-type scores above show the calculation.
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Drug development
75 compounds recorded · 24 approved · 49 in clinical development · 2 earlier-stage
View all recorded compounds (10)Hide
Open Targets known-drugs universe. Drug name and highest clinical stage only — the disease relationship is NOT read from this slice (it carries trial-context noise); approved indications come from the canonical graph above.
Tractability
Small molecules — Strong
Antibodies — Strong
Protein degraders — Emerging
Other modalities — Strong
View underlying tractability evidence (14)Hide
Raw Open Targets tractability assessment buckets, by modality.
Safety-related annotations
Terms indexed against this target in Open Targets' safety data, with their datasource. These are annotations, not causal claims: the direction of effect (whether activation or inhibition is implicated), species and evidence strength are not captured here, so an entry does not mean that modulating this target is known to cause that condition.
Clinical trials
Trials of drugs that target this protein — reached indirectly through those drugs, so a trial listed here studies the drug, not the protein. Ranked by active status, then clinical phase and recency, and spread across the targeting drugs.
View all trials (26)Hide
ClinicalTrials.gov via the drug-target graph.
What's happening now
Recent therapeutic activity around this target — regulatory actions, clinical trials and safety signals for 5 drugs that target this protein, plus publications where such a drug is a genuine subject. Every item is reached indirectly through the drug, not the protein itself; incidental mentions (a paper that merely measures a drug) and press items are excluded.
- New publicationFecal microbiota transplantation plus pembrolizumab and axitinib in metastatic renal cell carcinoma: the randomized phase 2 TACITO trial.
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Axitinib Accord (EMA)
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Fruzaqla (EMA)
- New publicationLenvatinib Plus Pembrolizumab Versus Standard of Care for Previously Treated Metastatic Colorectal Cancer: Final Analysis of the Randomized, Open-Label, Phase III LEAP-017 Study.
- New publicationMachine-learning and mechanistic modeling of metastatic breast cancer after neoadjuvant treatment.
- New publicationThe more the merrier? Evidence and efficacy of immune checkpoint- and tyrosine kinase inhibitor combinations in advanced solid cancers.
- New publicationGenomic profiling in GIST: Implications in clinical outcome and future challenges.
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Sunitinib Accord (EMA)
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Rydapt (EMA)
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Stivarga (EMA)
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Inlyta (EMA)
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Sutent (EMA)
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.
Research activity
Papers linked directly to this protein. This is the protein's own literature — descriptor-derived papers are kept separate below.
Most cited
Recent
Europe PMC papers linked directly to this protein.