Live Science reports on the “Accidental Invention Points to End of Light Bulbs”.
Michael Bowers, a graduate student at Vanderbilt University, was just trying to make really small quantum dots, which are crystals generally only a few nanometers big. That’s less than 1/1000th the width of a human hair…When you shine a light on quantum dots or apply electricity to them, they react by producing their own light, normally a bright, vibrant color. But when Bowers shined a laser on his batch of dots, something unexpected happened.
“I was surprised when a white glow covered the table,” Bowers said. “The quantum dots were supposed to emit blue light, but instead they were giving off a beautiful white glow.”
Then Bowers and another student got the idea to stir the dots into polyurethane and coat a blue LED light bulb with the mix. The lumpy bulb wasn’t pretty, but it produced white light similar to a regular light bulb. The new device gives off a warm, yellowish-white light that shines twice as bright and lasts 50 times longer than the standard 60 watt light bulb.
LED lights have been limited to green, red, blue, and yellow light, and the capability to produce a white light may revolutionize lighting in the future. LEDs produce twice as much light as a regular 60 watt bulb, and according to the Department of Energy, can burn for over 50,000 hours, reducing energy consumption in the US by 29 percent by 2025.
If these new white LED lights pay off, expect to see white LED lights in airplanes, offices, and even inside the home very soon.
