Quality of stored grain of corn in different conditions

Resumen

The growing necessity to improve the quality of agricultural and processed products encourages the development of research aiming to obtain new methods and techniques that enable the maintenance and preservation of products in storage. The objective of this study was to evaluate the quality of deteriorated corn cornels in two different storage conditions, low temperatures and high relative humidity (10% and 90⁰C) and high temperatures and low relative humidity (30% and 40⁰C), featuring two producing regions of Brazil, a part of Brazilian Cerrado and a large part of southern Brazil, during winter. The experiment was conducted at The Federal University of Viçosa, MG, Brazil. The storage of corn cornels in warm and dry air reduce the risk of incidence of fungi, regardless the initial quality of the stored product. The incidence of insect was greater at the same condition. Regardless of storage condition, bacterial growth was directly related to the quality of the initial product and the storage period. Over time increased the risk of aflatoxins and fumonisins, reaching levels above acceptable limits for the quality of silage corn. Concluding, to maintain the nutritional quality of corn cornels under conditions of 30⁰C and 40% of RH is recommended to store them at most for six months, whereas in regions with average temperatures of 10°C and 90% RH it is not recommended to store corn cornels for a period greater than three months.