Protein / target
Platelet-derived growth factor receptor alpha
Protein at a glance
Biological role
Transmembrane receptor protein tyrosine kinase activity
Primary system
Cardiovascular system
Strongest disease association
GIST-plus syndrome
Therapeutic maturity
Clinically validated target
Druggability
Small molecule
Clinical development
15 approved · 18 in clinical development
Derived from structured UniProt, Open Targets and literature data on this page.
Protein profile
Canonical identity and biological annotation from UniProt.
Function
Tyrosine-protein kinase that acts as a cell-surface receptor for PDGFA, PDGFB and PDGFC and plays an essential role in the regulation of embryonic development, cell proliferation, survival and chemotaxis. Depending on the context, promotes or inhibits cell proliferation and cell migration. Plays an important role in the differentiation of bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells. Required for normal skeleton development and cephalic closure during embryonic development. Required for normal development of the mucosa lining the gastrointestinal tract, and for recruitment of mesenchymal cells and normal development of intestinal villi. Plays a role in cell migration and chemotaxis in wound healing. Plays a role in platelet activation, secretion of agonists from platelet granules, and in thrombin-induced platelet aggregation. Binding of its cognate ligands - homodimeric PDGFA, homodimeric PDGFB, heterodimers formed by PDGFA and PDGFB or homodimeric PDGFC -leads to the activation of several signaling cascades; the response depends on the nature of the bound ligand and is modulated by the formation of heterodimers between PDGFRA and PDGFRB. Phosphorylates PIK3R1, PLCG1, and PTPN11. Activation of PLCG1 leads to the production of the cellular signaling molecules diacylglycerol and inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate, mobilization of cytosolic Ca(2+) and the activation of protein kinase C. Phosphorylates PIK3R1, the regulatory subunit of phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase, and thereby mediates activation of the AKT1 signaling pathway. Mediates activation of HRAS and of the MAP kinases MAPK1/ERK2 and/or MAPK3/ERK1. Promotes activation of STAT family members STAT1, STAT3 and STAT5A and/or STAT5B. Receptor signaling is down-regulated by protein phosphatases that dephosphorylate the receptor and its down-stream effectors, and by rapid internalization of the activated receptor
Subcellular location
Domains and Gene Ontology detail (58)Hide
Domains & features
Gene Ontology
- Ccilium
- Ccytoplasm
- Cendoplasmic reticulum membrane
- Cexternal side of plasma membrane
- CGolgi apparatus
- Cmembrane
- Cmicrovillus
- Cnucleus
- Cplasma membrane
- Cprotein-containing complex
- Creceptor complex
- FATP binding
Biological roles
What this protein does, drawn together from its UniProt function, Gene Ontology terms and Reactome pathways.
View supporting evidenceHide supporting evidence
Kinase signalling
- ·Tyrosine-protein kinase that acts as a cell-surface receptor for PDGFA, PDGFB and PDGFC…
- ·protein kinase activity
- ·transmembrane receptor protein tyrosine kinase activity
- ·peptidyl-tyrosine autophosphorylation
Haemostasis
- ·Tyrosine-protein kinase that acts as a cell-surface receptor for PDGFA, PDGFB and PDGFC…
- ·platelet-derived growth factor alpha-receptor activity
- ·platelet-derived growth factor binding
- ·platelet-derived growth factor receptor binding
View underlying pathways (13)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.
Drugs targeting this protein
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.
Platelet-derived growth factor receptor alpha inhibitor
Appears in clinical studies involving gastrointestinal stromal tumor, renal cell carcinoma, gastrointestinal stromal tumor, neuroendocrine neoplasm
Platelet-derived growth factor receptor inhibitor
Appears in clinical studies involving colorectal cancer, metastatic colorectal cancer, colorectal neoplasm, neoplasm
ChEMBL mechanism, action type and target identity. Open Targets clinical status and indications.
Translational evidence
Why this target matters therapeutically — disease associations, drugs in development, tractability and safety, from Open Targets.
Strongest genetic associations
Human genetic evidence — the most direct causal link between this target and a disease.
Highest-confidence therapeutic associations
Diseases where a drug acting on this target has already reached clinical development.
Highest overall evidence
Remaining associations by Open Targets' aggregated evidence score.
Show all associationsHide all associations
Open Targets ranks 4,767 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 · 33 total
breast cancer · neoplasm
colorectal adenocarcinoma · non-small cell lung carcinoma · gastrointestinal stromal tumor
neoplasm · peritoneum cancer · colorectal cancer
sarcoma · soft tissue sarcoma · neoplasm
renal cell carcinoma · endometrial cancer · triple-negative breast carcinoma
gastrointestinal stromal tumor · gastrointestinal stromal tumor · neoplasm
renal cell carcinoma · neoplasm · renal cell carcinoma
hepatocellular carcinoma
renal cell carcinoma · gastrointestinal stromal tumor · neuroendocrine neoplasm
Tractability
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.
Show remaining trials (24)Hide
ClinicalTrials.gov via the drug-target graph.
Related literature
Papers indexed under “Receptor, Platelet-Derived Growth Factor alpha” — a subject heading that covers this protein without being specific to it. Shown as context; not counted as this protein's own research activity.
Europe PMC literature, reached through a MeSH descriptor linked to this protein.
Forefront confidence
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.
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
Recent activity around this target, drawn from one canonical event stream. Every item is reached through 2 drugs that target this protein, so each event is news about that drug rather than about the protein directly.
- New publicationEfficacy of pembrolizumab in microsatellite-stable, tumor mutational burden-high metastatic colorectal cancer: genomic signatures and clinical outcomes.
- 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 publicationGenomic profiling in GIST: Implications in clinical outcome and future challenges.
- New publicationNivolumab plus Cabozantinib versus Sunitinib for Advanced Renal-Cell Carcinoma.
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Sunitinib Accord (EMA)
- New publicationTargeted therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma.
- New publicationLiver transarterial chemoembolization and sunitinib for unresectable hepatocellular carcinoma: Results of the PRODIGE 16 study.
- New publicationUpdated efficacy results from the JAVELIN Renal 101 trial: first-line avelumab plus axitinib versus sunitinib in patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma.
- New publicationMolecular targeted and immune checkpoint therapy for advanced hepatocellular carcinoma.
- New publicationNivolumab plus ipilimumab versus sunitinib in first-line treatment for advanced renal cell carcinoma: extended follow-up of efficacy and safety results from a randomised, controlled, phase 3 trial.
- New publicationRandomized Double-Blind Phase II Study of Regorafenib in Patients With Metastatic Osteosarcoma.
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.