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Comment by westurner | Hacker News Reader

Do the useful properties of copper change with oxidation?

Silver is also antimicrobial, and also expensive.

FWIU nanospikes in silicon achieved virucidal outcomes in small trials as well.

Is copper virucidal without nanospikes?

(On this topic, Hemp textiles are antimicrobial / bactericidal: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39196781#39197019 )

"Scientists create virucidal silicon surface without any chemicals" https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsnano.3c07099 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39196822

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Oxidation is a problem as is physical debris but touch surfaces are cleaned at least daily in a hospital setting anyway. Plain old Copper/brass that has been used since forever is virucidal without any special treatment.

Is the claim then that copper nanospikes on stainless steel are of no greater value than copper for healthcare applications?

Is that claim supported by evidence?

The claim is that spikes kill faster, but probably not fast enough to matter since spikes are destroyed with shear cleaning.

Copper and silver express the "oligodynamic effect," a tendency for antibacterial action, most strongly.

Brass is a useful alloy of copper that does not oxidize and also exhibits this effect.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oligodynamic_effect

A frequently touched surface isn’t going to have a problem with oxidation:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statue_rubbing

So the people rubbing breasts of statues to a shine were doing it for uh... serious reasons?

For medical reasons thank you very much

You should see the brass bull on wall st

I looked at the wiki article but it did not touch on the anti-bacterial effects. Are there any studies?

P.S. I am really curious (if just mildly) if anyone knows.

Edit: Ok it did touch on the subject.

"It is also possible to acquire a bacterial infection from touching statues."

The is even a reference to an article (https://atlasbiomed.com/blog/european-biome-monument-study-r...). Have not read yet but looks interesting.

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