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Bacteria can survive on the surface of the object for several hours, and then move to another place as we go, continue to grow and reproduce, but when bacteria come into contact with copper with a bactericidal effect, it will kick in recently on the “plate of iron”. American scientists have further enhanced the sterilizing effect of copper through simple laser technology.
“Bronze door handles and copper handles can be sterilized” This sounds like a rumor that will spread on the Internet, but in fact, the medical use of copper dates back to the Egyptian era of 2600 BC, when it was used in wounds and drinks. Sterilizing water did not slowly reduce the medical use of copper until antibiotics appeared in 1932.
So why can copper be sterilized? Firstly, copper has excellent electrical and thermal conductivity, second only to silver, and is currently commonly used in electrical cables, and due to its excellent electrical conductivity, when copper contacts bacteria, the microcurrent of the The cell membrane will short-circuit, causing a hole in the cell membrane. In this way, copper ions can enter the cell and be extensively destroyed, rendering bacteria unable to breathe, absorb nutrients and metabolism, and eventually die slowly. Generally speaking, the higher the copper content of the alloy, the higher the relative humidity of the environment and the higher the ambient temperature, the greater the sterilization capacity.
At first glance, it is very powerful, but it is not without reason that copper is replaced by antibiotics for medical purposes. Rahim Rahimi, an assistant professor of materials engineering at Purdue University, said it usually takes several hours to kill bacteria.
This is because the surface of copper metal is generally very smooth and it is difficult to kill bacteria with a small contact area. For this reason, Purdue University wants to increase the attack power of copper metal on bacteria. Using a simple laser treatment, the nano surface is scratched. The high-level pattern improves the surface area of bacteria exposed to copper, speeding up the speed of sterilization. At the same time, the study also noted that this improves the hydrophilicity of the copper (hydrophilic) surface. For plastic surgery, this allows bone cells to adhere more firmly to it. The degree of fusion of the implant and bone.
According to research published by the team in “Advanced Material Interfaces,” copper metal treated with Laser Surface Texturing can be completely destroyed in 40, 90, 60, and 120 minutes for different bacterial strains. This simple method can accelerate the speed of copper that kills superbugs such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA).
Just to mention here, bacteria are not the same as viruses. The size of bacteria is a thousand times greater than that of the virus, and they have a basic structure. The virus has only genetic material and is covered with a layer of protein. It can not be played. There is no way in this study to allow metallic copper to kill viruses like Wuhan’s pneumonia (COVID-19).
(Source of the first image: Purdue University)
New technology, always updated.
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