The objective of this paper was to estimate the genetic divergence among 49 soybean ( Glycine max L. Merrill .) genotypes to assist grain quality-focused breeding programs in the choice of progenitors. The genetic divergence was estimated using the Mahalanobis generalized distance from the percentages of protein, oil, and fatty acids oleic, linoleic and linolenic after cultivation of genotypes in different environments. Genotypes were grouped by agglomerative methods and the two and three-dimensional projections of the distance matrix were obtained. The average protein and oil contents in the four environments ranged from 34.25 to 45.18% and from 16.48 to 23.01%, respectively. The average contents of the fatty acids oleic, linoleic and linolenic ranged from 20.2 to 42.41%, from 44.17 to 63.18%, and from 5.89 to 10.39%, respectively. The genetic distances ranged from 0.11 to 251.02 and indicated genetic variability among the accessions. The most divergent pair of accessions was PI417360/CD01RR8384, followed by PI417360/B3PTA213-3-4 and PI417360/BARC-8. The most similar par of accessions was CS3032PTA276-1-2/CS3032PTA190-5-1, followed by UFV18/M-SOY8914 and BRSMG Garantia/CD983321RR. In this study we indicated as promising in terms of genetic variability the hybridizations involving BARC-8, CD2013PTA, CD01RR8384, CS303TNKCA, PI181544, and PI417360. Among these genotypes we can stand out BARC-8 and CD2013PTA, with protein contents above 43%, and CD01RR8384 and CS303TNKCA, with oil contents above 20%. The use of these genetically divergent genotypes and with high phenotypic means in future crosses should produce desirable recombinants for grain quality.
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