2 Japanese and 1 American Share Nobel Prize in Physics for Work on LED Lights
From left, the researchers Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamura were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for “the invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes, which has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources.”
RANDALL LAMB / AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES
By DENNIS OVERBYE
OCTOBER 7, 2014
The Nobel Prize in Physics for 2014 was awarded to Isamu Akasaki and Hiroshi Amano of Japan and Shuji Nakamura of the University of California, Santa Barbara, for “the invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes, which has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources.”
The Nobel committee said that light-emitting diodes, or LEDs, would be the lighting source of the 21st century, just as the incandescent bulb illuminated the 20th.
It said that the new light source is brighter, cleaner and longer-lasting than previous sources and would save energy as well as improve the quality of life of millions of people around the world.
They will split a prize of $1.1 million, to be awarded in Stockholm on Dec. 10.
Dr. Akasaki, 85, of Meijo University and Nagoya University, and Dr. Amano, 54, of Nagoya University, are Japanese citizens. Dr. Nakamura, 60, is an American citizen. Awakened at 3 a.m. his time by a phone call from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which awards the prize, Dr. Nakamura described the news as “unbelievable.”
In remarks accompanying the presentation, the academy recalled Alfred Nobel’s desire that his prize be awarded for something that benefited humankind, noting that one-fourth of the world’s electrical energy consumption goes to producing light. This, it said, was a prize more for invention than discovery.
The three scientists, working together and separately, found a way to produce blue light beams from semiconductors in the early 1990s.
Others had produced red and green diodes, but without blue diodes, white light could not be produced, the academy said in its prize citation. “They succeeded where everyone else had failed,” the academy said.
The prize was announced Tuesday morning in Stockholm by Staffan Normark, permanent secretary of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.
In just 20 years, the Nobel committee said, the invention has revolutionized lighting. For the same amount of energy consumption, LED bulbs produce four times the light of a fluorescent bulb and nearly 20 times the light of a standard incandescent bulb.
“The LED lamp holds great promise for increasing the quality of life for over 1.5 billion people around the world who lack access to electricity grids,” the committee said. “Due to low power requirements, it can be powered by cheap local solar power.”
LED bulbs are also more durable than either fluorescent bulbs, lasting 10 times longer, or incandescent bulbs, 100 times longer.