A NOBEL NOD FOR LIGHTING THE WORLD

摘要

The 2014 Nobel Prize in Physics was jointly awarded to Nagoya University's Isamu Akasaki and Hiroshi Amano, and Shuji Nakamura from the University of California, Santa Barbara, for the invention of the blue light-emitting diode - a technology that has already initiated a global lighting revolution and has the potential to bring light to hundreds of millions of homes across the developing world. "The importance of the blue light-emitting diode (LED) should not be underestimated," says Nagoya University President Michinari Hamaguchi."Visible-light LEDs have been around since the 1960s, but with colours that are unsuitable for general lighting.The blue LED is indispensable for obtaining a'white'spectrum amenable for room lighting and electronic displays. Without the blue LED, computer displays and smartphones would not be as they are today, and the emerging revolution in LED room lighting would never occur."