Merck KGaA recently announced that it has launched a project called "New materials for OLEDs from solutions" (NEMO) together with renowned partners from industry and science. The objective of this project, which is being co-funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, is to develop innovative, soluble materials for use in large-area organic light-emitting diode (OLED) components for devices such as televisions, electronic traffic signs or lighting systems.

The Department of Energy recently announced $151 million funding for 37 ambitious research projects to pursue breakthroughs that could fundamentally change the way we use and produce energy. One of the selected projects includes the development of low cost crystals for LED lighting.

OSRAM Opto Semiconductors announced it has developed new transparent OLED prototypes which are only a few hundred micrometers thick and do not need separate encapsulation. The samples have a luminous area of 210 cm² and are already showing the enormous potential of OLED light sources.

After introducing LED power supplies with aluminum casing (CLG family) and fully enclosed plastic casing (PLN, PLC, ELN, LP family), MEAN WELL launched another LED product category, AC/DC open frame type for the “low cost” and “built-in” installation of LED lighting related applications. With the new PLP-45(45W), in addition to its existing PLP-30(30W) and PLP-60(60W) series, MEAN WELL offers LED system designers three different wattage options – 30W, 45W and 60W, which fully satisfies the low power wattage required.

LEDtronics® announces its first series of energy-efficient LED replacements of wall-pak luminaires for wall washing and security lighting. The high-power WWL20-24X2W-XPW-001W floodlight runs on a wide range of voltages, from 100 to 277VAC, consuming only 56 watts of power.

Toshiba Lighting & Technology Corp will release high-output LED light bulbs with a total flux equivalent to that of a 60W incandescent lamp. (Left) Components of the light bulb. (Right) An LED package developmed by Toshiba Lighting & technology.

Visible Light Solar Technologies is tackling a huge and urgent problem.  Commercial and industrial lighting accounts

Scientists at the University of Washington are working on a human machine interface where LEDs are embedded into contact lenses in order to display information to the wearer. This human machine interface will use custom-built transparent circuitry in a polymer lens that is roughly 1.2 millimeters in diameter.

Plextronics, Inc., a U.S.-based technology company focused on OLED and organic solar technology, announced last week that it has completed a $14 million Series B-1 financing round to commercialize its technology in the LED lighting and solar markets.

Philips Lumileds continues to advance its core LED technology and recent breakthroughs implemented in the latest LUXEON Rebel LEDs for illumination applications improve efficacy and light output performance at luminaire operating temperatures. Hot/Cold Factor compares the light output of the LED at 100°C Tj and at 25°C Tj—which is how LEDs are specified on a datasheet. LEDs in a luminaire are operated at very high junction temperatures, often between 80°C and 110°C.

(Photo by D. Stevenson and C. Conway, Beckman Institute, University of Illinois) Stretchable micro-LED display, consisting of an interconnected mesh of printed micro LEDs bonded to a rubber substrate.

Of all LED TV backlight modules currently on the market, there are two main types of configuration for backlight source: direct-type and edge-type configuration. As for backlight sources, 4 variations can be formed by different combinations of RBG LED and white LED; if the slim design, high- and low-power LED, as well as other types of LED backlights are taken into consideration, it may generate a wide variety of combinations. 

SRI International, an independent nonprofit research institute, and Showa Denko K.K. (SDK), a Japan-based chemical industry company in partnership with Itochu Plastics Inc. (CIPS), have achieved record-breaking results using SRI’s new cavity organic light-emitting diode (COLED) technology and SDK’s light-emitting polymers to produce a highly efficient light source that could one day replace incandescent and fluorescent light bulbs.

Mixing luminescence phosphor with silicone and dispensing it on a blue light emitting chip is a common LED package method in producing white light. The quality of white light depends heavily on the uniformity of phosphor on the blue die. Often times, when coupling secondary lens on white LED, it will reveal yellow circling. Such yellowing greatly shadows the quality of white light.

OSRAM Opto Semiconductors today announced a major breakthrough in the laboratory with its direct emitting green indium-gallium-nitride laser. It achieves an optical output of 50 mW and emits light in true green with a wavelength of 515 nm. Compared with semiconductor lasers based on current technology that operate with frequency doubling, direct emitting green lasers are more compact, offer greater temperature stability, are easier to control and have higher modulation capability, according to the company.

Utilizing metal heat sink, Liquidleds invents Liquid Immersed Thermal Management Solution (LITMS) that subverts conventional solution of heat dissipation and creates the first liquid-filled LED lightbulb in the world.

Showa Denko K.K. (SDK) recently announced that it had developed a new structure for its organic electroluminescent (organic EL) devices achieving approximately 40% in light output, which represents the highest level in the world.           

Researchers with Philips Lumileds have developed a monochromatic nitride diode that closes the yellow light-emitting diode (LED) gap. The phosphor-converted (PC) amber LED demonstrated by Regina Mueller-Mach and her colleagues uses the down-conversion of blue light from an indium-gallium-nitride (InGaN) LED to longer-wavelength light by a phosphor, in a variation of a well-established process for producing cold or warm white light from blue LED light.

Hague Corp.'s wholly owned subsidiary Solterra Renewable Technologies announced an exclusive worldwide licensing agreement with the University of Arizona for the patented, intellectual property covering screen-printing techniques for the fabrication of organic light emitting diodes.

Researchers at the University of Connecticut have made a new material that emits bright white light by adding fluorescent dyes to DNA and then spinning the DNA strands into nanofibers, according to a paper published online in the journal Angewandte Chemie. The researchers create white-light-emitting devices by coating ultraviolet (UV) light-emitting diodes (LEDs) with the material. They are even able to fine-tune the white color tone to make it warm or cold.

Dialog Semiconductor and TridonicAtco, a member of the Zumtobel Group, have established a joint development centre for next generation energy efficient lighting technology.

Researchers from National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan have developed an organic light-emitting diode (OLEDs) with a range of color temperatures that fully covers those of daylight at different times and regions (2300K to 8200 K).

IMEC announces the launch of a new industrial affiliation program (IIAP) that will focus on the development of GaN technology for both power conversion and solid state lighting applications. An important goal of the program is to lower GaN technology cost by using large-diameter GaN-on-Si and hence by leveraging on the Si scale of economics.

Milton Feng and Nick Holonyak have constructed a light-emitting transistor that has set a new record with a signal-processing modulation speed of 4.3 gigahertz. Researchers have constructed a light-emitting transistor that has set a new record with a signal-processing modulation speed of 4.3 gigahertz, breaking the previous record of 1.7 gigahertz held by a light-emitting diode.

Five-year research project called “UC-Light” will take advantage of communication capabilities of lights. Imagine a world where bright, energy sipping, cheap, durable LEDs light the world. A world where if you have enough light to see, you are connected.

Today Dow Corning Corporation’s Electronics group introduced its newest silicone encapsulant, Dow Corning ®OE-6636, designed for overmolding (compression molding) and dispensing processes. The product provides for a high refractive index (RI) of 1.54 which enables better light output (see Appendix 1, below), has a low moisture uptake, improves thermal aging  and light resistance, and possesses better adhesion to typical substrate for LED packages such as Poly Phthal Amid.

Nanometrics Incorporated (Nasdaq:NANO), a supplier of advanced process control metrology systems used primarily in the manufacturing of semiconductors, solar photovoltaics and high-brightness LEDs, today announced orders for one VerteX(TM) and multiple RPMBlue(TM) photoluminescence (PL) mapping metrology systems. The VerteX system is expected to be qualified into a new HB-LED development line, and the RPMBlue systems are expected to be qualified into the high-volume manufacturing line of a different customer.

Yasufumi Fujiwara, professor of Osaka University in Japan, has recently created a prototype red LED element by using gallium nitride (GaN) semiconductor. Though blue and green LED elements using GaN semiconductor have already been commercialized, this is the first time that a red LED element has been prototyped by using GaN semiconductor, Fujiwara said.

New developments in gallium nitride (GaN) LEDs could lead to a revolution in lighting for the home and office in five years, says a leading UK materials scientist, Professor Colin Humphreys of Cambridge University.

Edison Opto, a Taiwan based high power LED packaging manufacture, will debut the latest Federal module series.