New copper surface eliminates bacteria in two minutes

Coat a surface with a copper-magnesium alloy (amalgam?).

Then remove the magnesium. The microscopic voids in the solid material, where the magnesium used to be, dramatically increase the effective area of the copper.

This caught my attention as I was thinking about making my own vapor chambers for heat sinks. A vapor chamber is basically a sealed tube of copper with a rough interior surface, charged with a few drops of distilled water.

I still haven't figured out how to make such things, but it might lead to a fun project.