Antibiotics and current sterilization methods can provide some respite from the spread of harmful bacteria, but they do have their pitfalls. Researchers have developed a new approach to killing off these germs that may provide a more efficient path forward, using porous gold nanodisks and infrared light to destroy them in a matter of seconds.

Based on earlier research, scientists at the University of Houston had known that gold nanoparticles are able to absorb light very well, swiftly turning the photons into heat to produce temperatures high enough to destroy nearby cells. In 2013, they crafted a gold disk-like nanoparticle littered with pores to further boost its heating efficiency. While a human hair measures between 50,000 and 100,000 nanometers in diameter, the microscopic disk measures just a few hundred.