We have isolated wound-inducible genes from soybean using suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH) method and were able to obtain the full-length clone of GmDjp1 gene encoding DnaJ-like protein. The full-length cDNA of GmDjp1 is 689 bp with an open reading frame (ORF) consisting of 163 amino acid (aa). Genomic southern blot confirmed that soybean genome has two copies of GmDjp1 gene. Northern blot analysis showed that the RNA expression of GmDjp1 gene is specifically induced by heat, NaCl, wounding and drought stresses. It was demonstrated that GmDjp1-GFP was targeted to the nucleus in tobacco cell. GmDjp1 overexpression plants showed more susceptible to salt and heat stress compared to WT. RNA expression level of Hsp18.2 and Hsp25.3-P was lower than that of WT during recovery after heat hock in plants. This indicates that GmDjp1 may play a negative regulator to stress responses in plants.