The study by Nordborg et al. (2005) investigates the pattern of polymorphism in *Arabidopsis thaliana*, a selfing species, using a large sample of 96 individuals from various populations and stock center accessions. The researchers resequenced 876 short fragments, covering 0.48 Mbp of the genome. They found that, despite the selfing nature of *A. thaliana*, the polymorphism patterns align with those expected for a widely distributed, sexually reproducing species. Linkage disequilibrium decays rapidly within 50 kb, and variation is shared globally, although population structure and isolation by distance are evident. The data do not fit standard neutral models, with an excess of rare alleles and significant variation in polymorphism levels between genomic regions. Local polymorphism is negatively correlated with gene density and positively correlated with segmental duplications. The findings highlight the utility of *A. thaliana* as a model for evolutionary functional genomics, despite the challenges posed by its selfing nature. The study also emphasizes the importance of genome-wide surveys to identify regions under selection, as standard tests of selection may not be valid in this species.The study by Nordborg et al. (2005) investigates the pattern of polymorphism in *Arabidopsis thaliana*, a selfing species, using a large sample of 96 individuals from various populations and stock center accessions. The researchers resequenced 876 short fragments, covering 0.48 Mbp of the genome. They found that, despite the selfing nature of *A. thaliana*, the polymorphism patterns align with those expected for a widely distributed, sexually reproducing species. Linkage disequilibrium decays rapidly within 50 kb, and variation is shared globally, although population structure and isolation by distance are evident. The data do not fit standard neutral models, with an excess of rare alleles and significant variation in polymorphism levels between genomic regions. Local polymorphism is negatively correlated with gene density and positively correlated with segmental duplications. The findings highlight the utility of *A. thaliana* as a model for evolutionary functional genomics, despite the challenges posed by its selfing nature. The study also emphasizes the importance of genome-wide surveys to identify regions under selection, as standard tests of selection may not be valid in this species.