Protein / target
Folate receptor alpha
Protein at a glance
Biological role
Folic acid receptor
Strongest disease association
Neurodegenerative syndrome due to cerebral folate transport deficiency
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
Binds to folate and reduced folic acid derivatives and mediates delivery of 5-methyltetrahydrofolate and folate analogs into the interior of cells.
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Binds to folate and reduced folic acid derivatives and mediates delivery of 5-methyltetrahydrofolate and folate analogs into the interior of cells (PubMed:19074442, PubMed:23851396, PubMed:23934049, PubMed:2527252, PubMed:8033114, PubMed:8567728). Has high affinity for folate and folic acid analogs at neutral pH (PubMed:23851396, PubMed:23934049, PubMed:2527252, PubMed:8033114, PubMed:8567728). Exposure to slightly acidic pH after receptor endocytosis triggers a conformation change that strongly reduces its affinity for folates and mediates their release (PubMed:8567728). Required for normal embryonic development and normal cell proliferation (By similarity)
Subcellular location
Domains and Gene Ontology detail (34)Hide
Gene Ontology
- Capical plasma membrane
- Cbasolateral plasma membrane
- Cbrush border membrane
- Ccell surface
- Cclathrin-coated vesicle
- Cendoplasmic reticulum membrane
- Cendoplasmic reticulum-Golgi intermediate compartment membrane
- Cendosome
- CER to Golgi transport vesicle membrane
- Cexternal side of plasma membrane
- Cextracellular exosome
- CGolgi membrane
Biological roles
What this protein does, drawn together from its UniProt function, Gene Ontology terms and Reactome pathways.
View supporting evidenceHide supporting evidence
Cell migration
- ·cardiac neural crest cell migration involved in outflow tract morphogenesis
- ·neural crest cell migration involved in heart formation
Immune signalling
- ·cardiac neural crest cell migration involved in outflow tract morphogenesis
- ·neural crest cell migration involved in heart formation
View underlying pathways (3)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.
2 medicines meet Open Targets' target-level approved-medicine definition; the 1 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.
Folate receptor alpha binding agent
Indicated for Carcinoma, Ovarian Epithelial, Fallopian Tube Neoplasms, Peritoneal Neoplasms, Neoplasms
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 FOLR1
Gene-level evidence surfaced through the gene FOLR1that 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
4 compounds recorded · 2 approved · 2 in clinical development
View all recorded compounds (4)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 — Emerging
Antibodies — Strong
Protein degraders — Emerging
Other modalities — Strong
View underlying tractability evidence (8)Hide
Raw Open Targets tractability assessment buckets, by modality.
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 (16)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 a drug that targets 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.
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Elahere (EMA)
- New publicationMirvetuximab soravtansine-gynx: first antibody/antigen-drug conjugate (ADC) in advanced or recurrent ovarian cancer.
- New publicationEfficacy and Safety of Mirvetuximab Soravtansine in Patients With Platinum-Resistant Ovarian Cancer With High Folate Receptor Alpha Expression: Results From the SORAYA Study.
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.