Project MOCCA

Project MOCCA (Multi-Omics Oral Cancer Cells Archives) is Pakistan’s federally-funded precision medicine pilot. The study has recruited a cohort of treatment-naive and biopsy-confirmed oral squamous cell carcinoma patients in tertiary care hospitals in Peshawar, Pakistan. Initially setting out to be an exome study, the study has grown into a multiomic stack for the same patient cohort with a biorepository at the back end that is storing all biological samples as well as primary patient-derived cell lines, thanks to a growing consortium of partners. Initial analysis unravels novel mutations in the local population, which are accepted for presentation at the AACR Annual Meeting in 2025.