Scientists Devise Brighter LEDs via Nano-imprint Lithography

[Jerry — MacSolutions]

Gadgets
Scientists Devise Brighter LEDs via Nano-imprint Lithography
Wolfgang Hansson (Blog) - January 1, 2008 9:10 AM
	Print			E-mail			del.icio.us								26 comment(s) - last by Surak..  
on Jan 1 at 6:38 PM

Brighter LEDs pave the way for a new type of home interior lighting

The LED, or Light Emitting Diode, has been around since the late 60’s  
but only over the last few years have LEDs made headway into  
commercial mainstream use.

Some new vehicles now use LED’s in headlights and taillights. The  
benefits of this are brighter light and much improved life span for  
the bulbs. Some stop lights also use LEDs to combat against the hazard  
of a stop light burning out.

Of more interest to technophiles is the advent of LEDs for use as  
backlighting in our notebook computers, such as the recently announced  
Dell Latitude XT tablet PC, and other personal electronic devices.  
LEDs promise less power consumption in out notebooks thereby  
increasing battery life. LEDs are also slowly making their way into  
our flat panel TVs such as the Samsung 31-inch OLED panel DailyTech  
reported on last week.

Scientists also have their eye on LEDs for use in the home to replace  
the incandescent and florescent light bulbs. The big benefit for  
consumers to using LED lighting in the home is much greater lifespan  
and less power consumption.

While some scientists are hard at work on methods to add more natural  
spectrums to current LED lights, other scientists announced a  
breakthrough last week to help defeat the problem with low light  
output from
LEDs.

A new method for increasing the light output from LEDs involves a  
process called nano-imprint lithography. Scientists at Glasgow  
University along with the Institute of Photonics at the University of  
Strathclyde invented a process that makes millions of microscopic  
holes on the surface of a LED bulb, which increase the amount of light  
the LEDs give off.

Project leader Dr. Faiz Rahman who told the BBC, “As yet, LEDs have  
not been introduced as the standard lighting in homes because the  
process of making the holes is very time consuming and expensive.  
However, we believe we have found a way of imprinting the holes into  
billions of LEDs at a far greater speed, but at a much lower cost."

According to Rahman the days of the humble light bulb may soon be over.