Some populations that might carry signals related to Checua ancestry were not included.

Ancient genomes from the Caribbean islands, from the Venezuelan highlands, from western Colombia, and from the Ecuadorian highlands were not available for the comparison.

Present-day communities from some of these regions were also not included.

It is possible — not certain, but possible — that expanding the comparison to include these populations would reveal specific affinities that the current analysis could not detect.

This caveat does not undermine the study’s core finding, but it does define its boundaries.