Most CRC candidate drivers showed no evidence of essentiality (a measure of cell viability following gene perturbation) across the CRC cell lines of the DepMap dataset, whereas the two most likely under strong selection in our cohort, KRAS and PIK3CA, were significantly essential in many CRC cell lines and were found to be significantly differentially essential when contrasting mutant versus wild-type (WT) CRC cell lines (Student’s t-test P < 10−6; Supplementary Fig. 20). Here, PIK3CA is linked to colorectal carcinoma.