The Economist: Making medical clothing that kills bugs

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What is needed, reckons Liu Xuqing of the University of Manchester, in England, is a way to make antibacterial coatings for fabrics that, quite literally, hold tight.

Instead of gold or silver, Dr Liu’s metal of choice is copper. This exhibits the same bug-killing properties but has the benefit of being an awful lot cheaper than those two precious metals, making a commercial coating process easier to devise.