> it does seem like they were seen as growing surfaces rather than containers for water purification. > So, I guess it was observed for a long time, scientific

> it does seem like they were seen as growing surfaces rather than containers for water purification. > So, I guess it was observed for a long time, scientifically studied fairly recently, and not in particular whether it was viable in a practical setting? It's pretty likely that no one really looked into the antimicrobial properties of copper surfaces until the advent of biofilm research (essentially Bill Costerton's paper(s) [0][1]). Without that idea, there wasn't a way to talk about or study what was happening, and there was no funding. So, yeah, the better studies would've come out around ~2000. I don't see a very practical use for suspensions of copper compounds as antimicrobials (maybe topical treatments only), but lots of uses for copper surfaces. [0] http://www.nature.com/nrmicro/journal/v12/n11/full/nrmicro3343.html http://www.nature.com/nrmicro/journal/v12/n11/full/nrmicro33... [1] http://jb.asm.org/content/194/24/6706.full http://jb.asm.org/content/194/24/6706.full