The product of this gene belongs to the family of P2 receptors, which is activated by extracellular nucleotides and subdivided into P2X ligand-gated ion channels and P2Y G-protein coupled receptors. This family has several receptor subtypes with different pharmacological selectivity, which overlaps in some cases, for various adenosine and uridine nucleotides. This receptor, found on many cell types, is activated by ATP and UTP and is reported to be overexpressed on some cancer cell types. It is involved in many cellular functions, such as proliferation, apoptosis and inflammation. Three transcript variants encoding the same protein have been identified for this gene.