Protein / target
Toll-like receptor 7
Protein at a glance
Biological role
Pattern recognition receptor activity
Primary system
Immune system
Strongest disease association
systemic lupus erythematosus 17
Therapeutic maturity
Clinically validated target
Druggability
Small molecule
Clinical development
3 approved · 9 in clinical development
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
Endosomal receptor that plays a key role in innate and adaptive immunity (PubMed:14976261, PubMed:32433612). Controls host immune response against pathogens through recognition of uridine-containing single strand RNAs (ssRNAs) of viral origin or guanosine analogs (PubMed:12738885, PubMed:27742543, PubMed:31608988, PubMed:32706371, PubMed:35477763). Upon binding to agonists, undergoes dimerization that brings TIR domains from the two molecules into direct contact, leading to the recruitment of TIR-containing downstream adapter MYD88 through homotypic interaction (PubMed:27742543). In turn, the Myddosome signaling complex is formed involving IRAK4, IRAK1, TRAF6, TRAF3 leading to activation of downstream transcription factors NF-kappa-B and IRF7 to induce pro-inflammatory cytokines and interferons, respectively (PubMed:27742543, PubMed:32706371). In plasmacytoid dendritic cells, RNASET2 endonuclease cooperates with PLD3 or PLD4 5'->3' exonucleases to process RNA and release 2',3'-cyclic guanosine monophosphate (2',3'-cGMP) and cytidine-rich RNA fragments that occupy TLR7 ligand-binding pockets and trigger a signaling-competent state
Subcellular location
Domains and Gene Ontology detail (36)Hide
Domains & features
Gene Ontology
- Ccytoplasm
- Cearly phagosome
- Cendolysosome membrane
- Cendoplasmic reticulum
- Cendoplasmic reticulum membrane
- Cendosome
- Cendosome membrane
- CGolgi membrane
- Clysosome
- Cplasma membrane
- Creceptor complex
- Fdouble-stranded RNA binding
Biological roles
What this protein does, drawn together from its UniProt function, Gene Ontology terms and Reactome pathways.
View supporting evidenceHide supporting evidence
Immune signalling
- ·Endosomal receptor that plays a key role in innate and adaptive immunity (PubMed:1497626…
- ·inflammatory response
- ·innate immune response
- ·positive regulation of inflammatory response
Transcriptional regulation
- ·Endosomal receptor that plays a key role in innate and adaptive immunity (PubMed:1497626…
- ·positive regulation of transcription by RNA polymerase II
View underlying pathways (11)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.
Toll-like receptor 7 agonist
Appears in clinical studies involving actinic keratosis, keratosis, basal cell carcinoma, anogenital human papillomavirus infection
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 1,226 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 · 12 total
melanoma · cutaneous melanoma · hematopoietic and lymphoid cell neoplasm
malaria · graft versus host disease · temporal arteritis
rheumatoid arthritis · psoriasis · psoriasis
lupus erythematosus · systemic lupus erythematosus · cutaneous lupus erythematosus
hepatitis B virus infection · hepatitis B virus infection · chronic hepatitis B virus infection
rheumatoid arthritis · cutaneous lupus erythematosus · malaria
actinic keratosis · primary cutaneous T-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma · common wart
systemic lupus erythematosus · cutaneous lupus erythematosus
asthma · allergic rhinitis · allergic respiratory disease
primary cutaneous T-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma · 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.
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.
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 a drug that targets this protein, so each event is news about that drug rather than about the protein directly.
- Label change
Label change: IMIQUIMOD (ANDA091308)
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Zyclara (EMA)
- New publicationTopical TLR7 agonist imiquimod can induce immune-mediated rejection of skin metastases in patients with breast cancer.
- Regulatory approval
Approval: IMIQUIMOD (ANDA091308)
- New publicationEnhanced port-wine stain lightening achieved with combined treatment of selective photothermolysis and imiquimod.
- New publicationImiquimod-induced psoriasis-like skin inflammation in mice is mediated via the IL-23/IL-17 axis.
- New publicationImmunization of malignant melanoma patients with full-length NY-ESO-1 protein using TLR7 agonist imiquimod as vaccine adjuvant.
- Regulatory approval
Approval: Aldara (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.