Egypt. J. Bot. 3 rd international con 17-18 April, Helwan univ., pp. 33-48 (2013) Evaluation of Genetic Variation among Soybean (Glycine max L.) Cultivars using SDS-PAGE and RAPD Markers Aziza S. El-Kholy Botany Department, Faculty of Science, Kafr El-sheikh, University, Kafr El-sheikh, Egypt. E-mail: aziza.elkhouli@sci.kfs.edu.eg sing protein and DNA fingerprinting to study cultivars may provide information about genetic relationships between them that may be useful to plant breeders. The genetic diversity between eleven cultivars of soy bean was examined based on polymorphism using SDS-PAGE of seed protein and RAPD analysis. The protein banding pattern showed 59.1% polymorphism between the studied genotypes. Five primers generated a total of 47 RAPD markers of which 29 bands were polymorphic (61.7 %). The genetic relationships between the eleven cultivars based on variations in protein bands and RAPD fragments have been estimated by the NTSYS-pc software using UPGMA and Neighbor Joining (NJ) tree building methods. The two trees separated the studied cultivars into two main groups. The first group includes the two cultivars Dr101 and Clark and the second group is clustered in two subgroups; one comprising Giza 35 and Giza 111 and the other includes the remaining cultivars. In the NJ tree the two cultivars Giza 22 and Giza 82 were assigned to the first subgroup but UPGMA put them in the second subgroup with other varieties. Each of the following cultivars; Giza 21,Crawford and Holladay was clearly distinct in the second subgroup. The two cultivars Giza 83 and Toano are closely related in UPGMA and NJ trees. Key words: Glycine max, seed protein, RAPD, Genetic variation. Introduction Soybean (Glycine max L. ) is one of the most grain legumes in terms of its use as food, animal feed and industrial material with its seeds being characterized by a high content of protein and oil (Hwang et al. 2008).Soybean contains 40 to 42% good quality protein and 18 to 22 % oil compressing 85% unsaturated fatty acids and is free from cholesterol, so it is highly desirable in the human diet (Aslam et al. 1995). Therefore soybean represents one of the most important crops for protein and oil. U