Potatoes have been central to life in the Andes for thousands of years, and a new study suggests that long reliance on the crop may have influenced human evolution as well, according to ScienceDaily.
Researchers co-led by UCLA and the University at Buffalo found that Indigenous people in Peru today carry more copies of the AMY1 gene, which helps break down starch, than any other population they examined. The study, published in Nature Communications, suggests natural selection began favoring higher AMY1 copy numbers around the time potatoes became established in the Andean highlands roughly 6,000 to 10,000 years ago.
The team analyzed DNA from Peruvian Andean Quechua speakers and compared those samples with genomic databases from dozens of present-day populations. They found that people with more AMY1 copies generally produce more amylase in saliva and may process starch more efficiently.
Researchers said the evidence points to diet-driven selection rather than the later population decline that followed European contact. They also found that high AMY1 copy numbers were already becoming more common in the Andes thousands of years before Europeans arrived.
According to the study, Indigenous Peruvians now average about 10 AMY1 copies, compared with six among the Maya and lower averages across the other populations included in the research.
