Indigenous Andeans in Peru may be able to digest potatoes and other starches more easily than anyone in the world, a new study finds.

Scientists discovered that Indigenous Andeans have more copies of the gene for saliva-based starch digestion enzymes — called amylase — than any other population worldwide. Natural selection drove the surge in amylase genes following the local domestication of potatoes around 10,000 years ago, according to the study published May 5 in the journal Nature Communications.