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Interest in using hermetic technologies as a pest management solution for stored grain has risen in recent years. One hermetic approach, Purdue Improved Crop Storage (PICS) bags, has proven successful in controlling the postharvest pests of cowpea. This success encouraged farmers to use of PICS bags for storing other crops including maize. To assess whether maize can be safely stored in PICS bags without loss of quality, we carried out laboratory studies of maize grain infested with Sitophilus zeamais (Motshulsky) and stored in PICS triple bags or in woven polypropylene bags. Over an eight month observation period, temperatures in the bags correlated with ambient temperature for all treatments. Relative humidity inside PICS bags remained constant over this period despite the large changes that occurred in the surrounding environment. Relative humidity in the woven bags followed ambient humidity closely. PICS bags containing S. zeamais-infested grain saw a significant decline in oxygen compared to the other treatments. Grain moisture content declined in woven bags, but remained high in PICS bags. Seed germination was not significantly affected over the first six months in all treatments, but declined after eight months of storage when infested grain was held in woven bags. Relative damage was low across treatments and not significantly different between treatments. Overall, maize showed no signs of deterioration in PICS bags versus the woven bags and PICS bags were superior to woven bags in terms of specific metrics of grain quality.

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Dedicated to Professor Andre Merbach on the occasion of his 65th birthday, for his excellent contributions to the field of inorganic chemistry and for his support and friendship were determined by X-ray diffraction (Fig. 3). Achiral [RuCl(PCP)(PPh 3 )] complexes and chiral [RuCl(P*CP*)(PPh 3 )] complexes were tested as catalyst in the H-transfer reduction of acetophenone with propan-2-ol. With the chiral complexes, a modest enantioselectivity was obtained.Introduction. ± The interaction of multidentate phosphine ligands with late transition metals has been extensively studied since these ligands can be modularly designed to tune the stereochemical and electronic properties of the corresponding metal species. Complexes of the platinum-group metals with monoanionic P-donor pincer ligands of the type [2,6-(R 2 PCH 2 ) 2 C 6 H 3 ] À (R Me,