On the trail of an oral cancer treatment

Prof Cheong examines one of the 16 unique oral cancer cell lines (displayed on the screen) she and her team developed and grew. — Photos: KAMARUL ARIFFIN/The Star

Malaysian researchers, in collaboration with scientists in the United Kingdom, are on track to identify potential drugs to treat oral cancer.

The first part of the job is already done: three years of hard laboratory work using 16 unique Malaysian oral cancer cell lines and the Crispr-Cas9 gene editing technology, has resulted in a list of 918 genes critical for the survival of the cancer.