Trends

Trends

White Paper | Technology | Oct 23, 2013
Latest LRC Program Aims to Fine Tune Light for Greenhouse Crops & Medicinal Plants
Light and plants expert Tessa Pocock, Ph.D., recently joined the Lighting Research Center (LRC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute as a senior research scientist, leading the development of a new plant physiology lighting program. Her research focuses on plant photosynthesis, and plant development and regulation by light for traditional greenhouse crops and the emerging field of medicinal plants. Read more »
White Paper | Technology | Oct 08, 2013
Two-Switch Flyback Solution for LED Street Lighting
Two-Switch Flyback Solution for LED Street Lighting LEDs provide high efficiency and long life compared to conventional lighting sources. Therefore, they are becoming first priority of lamp types to reduce energy consumption for internal or external lighting. This is also the case in street lightings where better efficiency and longer life are essential for less cost. A switching power supply designed to power up LED lamp should also have high efficiency and robustness to assure maintenance free lifetime as long as LED lamp. Resonant converters are one of the most popular power supply topologies here since their performance delivers increased power efficiency. LLC resonant converter has drawn attention thanks to its features such as high power conversion efficiency and low voltage stress on secondary rectifier. However, complicated design and high manufacturing cost of LLC resonant converters have been obstacles to fast time-to-market and cost reduction. Another problem of LLC resonant converter is large circulating current that is required to maintain zero voltage switching (ZVS). It causes relatively high power consumption at light load. LLC resonant converter also has potential failure issue when MOSFET with poor body diode performance is used. Two-switch flyback converter is proposed as an alternative solution to overcome the limitations of the LLC resonant converter. With additional switch on the high side, leakage inductance energy is clamped and recycled back to input to improve efficiency. The dissipative snubber circuit is no longer needed. A 120W rated switching power supply is designed utilizing two-switch flyback topology. The details of design specification and test results are presented. Read more »
White Paper | Technology | Oct 08, 2013
Why Pin Fin LED Coolers Perform Better Under Tilted Position?
Why Pin Fin LED Coolers Perform Better Under Tilted Position? For the experiment we compare the ModuLED 9980 with the LPF11180-ZHE. The ModuLED 9980 is a passive LED cooler from extruded aluminium with a diameter. of 99mm and a height of 80 millimeter, thermal resistance under vertical position 1.02°C/W. The LPF11180-ZHE is a passive LED cooler with pin fin structure with a diameter of 111mm and a height of 80mm, thermal resistance under vertical position 1.07°C/W. Read more »
White Paper | Technology | Aug 28, 2013
PI's New Reference Design, DER-350 for PAR38 LED Spotlight, Promises Excellent Dimming Performance with TRIAC Dimmers
PI's New Reference Design, DER-350 for PAR38 LED Spotlight, Promises Excellent Dimming Performance with TRIAC Dimmers Power Integrations, the leader in high-efficiency, high-reliability LED driver ICs, today announced a reference design for a dimmable PAR38 spotlight, developed in collaboration with Cree, Inc., a leading LED lighting company. The new reference design, described in DER-350, uses Power Integrations’ new LYT4317E, a member of the company’s LYTSwitchTM-4 family of single-stage drivers, along with Cree’s MT-G2 EasyWhite® LEDs. Read more »
Technology | Aug 27, 2013
“1 bin” Wavelength LED Wafer Is Demonstrated by Azzurro
“1 bin” Wavelength LED Wafer Is Demonstrated by Azzurro Azzurro LED Technologies announced the breaking news during a talk at ICNS-10 today. While showing production values of less than 3 nm wavelength uniformity, the 1.0 nm result came straight from development. The record 1.0 nm result demonstrates the capability to achieve “1 bin” GaN-on-Si LED wafers with Azzurro’s technology. Read more »
White Paper | Technology | Jul 31, 2013
Rensselaer Researchers Identify Cause of LED “Efficiency Droop”
Rensselaer Researchers Identify Cause of LED “Efficiency Droop” Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute researchers have identified the mechanism behind a plague of LED light bulbs: a flaw called “efficiency droop” that causes LEDs to lose up to 20 percent of their efficiency as they are subjected to greater electrical currents. Efficiency droop, first reported in 1999, has been a key obstacle in the development of LED lighting for situations, like household lighting, that call for economical sources of versatile and bright light. Read more »
Technologies | Thermal Management | Jul 30, 2013
NRL Researchers Discover Novel Material for Cooling of Electronic Devices
NRL Researchers Discover Novel Material for Cooling of Electronic Devices A team of theoretical physicists at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) and Boston College has identified cubic boron arsenide as a material with an extraordinarily high thermal conductivity and the potential to transfer heat more effectively from electronic devices than diamond, the best-known thermal conductor to date. Read more »
Technology | Jul 18, 2013
LDS Process Allows for New LED Lighting Product Layouts
LDS Process Allows for New LED Lighting Product Layouts Due to technical progress with LEDs, ever more luminous semiconductors are coming onto the market. However, in order to replace the conventional light bulb, there are still some obstacles to be faced. One of them is now being overcome: MID technology and laser direct structuring are being presented with interesting new concepts at the “International LED professional Symposium.” Read more »
Technology | Jun 04, 2013
MIT Demonstrates New Method for Fine-Tuning Emissions from Quantum Dots
MIT Demonstrates New Method for Fine-Tuning Emissions from Quantum Dots Tiny particles of matter called quantum dots, which emit light with exceptionally pure and bright colors, have found a prominent role as biological markers. In addition, they are realizing their potential in computer and television screens, and have promise in solid-state lighting. New research at MIT could now make these quantum dots even more efficient at delivering precisely tuned colors of light. Read more »
Technology | May 24, 2013
New Family of Tiny Crystals Glow Bright in LED Lights
New Family of Tiny Crystals Glow Bright in LED Lights Light-emitting diodes, better known as LEDs, offer substantial energy savings over incandescent and fluorescent lights and are easily produced in single colors such as red or green commonly used in traffic lights or children's toys. Developing an LED that emits a broad spectrum of warm white light on par with sunlight has proven tricky, however. LEDs, which produce light by passing electrons through a semiconductor material, often are coupled with materials called phosphors that glow when excited by radiation from the LED. Minuscule crystals that glow different colors may be the missing ingredient for white LED lighting that illuminates homes and offices as effectively as natural sunlight. Read more »
Technology | May 08, 2013
Strain Engineering Improves Light Output from Green LEDs
Strain Engineering Improves Light Output from Green LEDs The Chinese Academy of Science reports that researchers in China have used strain engineering to improve the light output power of 530nm green light-emitting diodes (LEDs) by 28.9% at 150mA current injection [Hongjian Li et al, Appl. Phys. Express, vol6, p052102, 2013]. The research was carried out by Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Semiconductors, Beijing, and University of Hong Kong. Read more »
Technology | May 02, 2013
HD Retina, Martini's World Exclusive New LED Light for an Unmatched Color Perception Quality
HD Retina, Martini's World Exclusive New LED Light for an Unmatched Color Perception Quality All truly great inventions, the ones that really have affected the course of history and people’s lives, have changed the context of a world that was not ready to welcome them. Small and large objects have introduced new solutions and unprecedented perspectives that previously only existed in the minds of their creators. They are innovative, surprising, revolutionary products: in a word unexpected. Read more »
Technology | LpR Article | Apr 05, 2013
Interview - Optics Production Technology for Customizing LED Luminaires
Interview - Optics Production Technology for Customizing LED Luminaires Siegfried Luger and Arno Grabher-Meyer from LED professional discuss future trends and challenges of the LED lighting business with Richard van de Vrie, CEO of LUXeXceL, a young company that is growing quickly. Van de Vrie owes much of his 25 years of experience in the lighting business to the family owned lighting company that he worked in. Read more »
Technology | Apr 03, 2013
Cambridge Invests £1 million to Accelerate GaN-on-Silicon LED Research
Cambridge Invests £1 million to Accelerate GaN-on-Silicon LED Research Gallium nitride has been described as “the most important semiconductor since silicon” and is used in energy-saving LED lighting. A new £1million growth facility will allow Cambridge researchers to further reduce the cost and improve the efficiency of LEDs, with potentially huge cost-saving implications. Read more »
Technology | Mar 01, 2013
KIT Demonstrates Light from Silicon Nanocrystal LEDs
KIT Demonstrates Light from Silicon Nanocrystal LEDs ilicon nanocrystals have a size of a few nanometers and possess a high luminous potential. Scientists of KIT and the University of Toronto/Canada have now succeeded in manufacturing silicon-based light-emitting diodes (SiLEDs). They are free of heavy metals and can emit light in various colors. The team of chemists, materials researchers, nanoscientists, and opto-electronic experts presents its development in the “Nano Letters” journal. Read more »
White Paper | Technology | Feb 27, 2013
PI's New LED-Downlight Reference Design Achieves High-Performance Dimming While Further Reducing Component Count
PI's New LED-Downlight Reference Design Achieves High-Performance Dimming While Further Reducing Component Count Power Integrations, a world leader in high-efficiency, high-reliability LED driver ICs, today announced RDR-347, an LED-downlight reference design. The new circuit demonstrates the capabilities of the recently launched LYTSwitch™ IC family, which offers the industry’s best high-end dimming performance from a single-stage LED driver– together with all the associated efficiency, space and cost benefits that the single-stage approach brings. Read more »
Technology | Feb 27, 2013
Bluglass Produced p-GaN Films that Meet Industry Benchmark for the First Time
Bluglass Produced p-GaN Films that Meet Industry Benchmark for the First Time Australian clean technology innovator, BluGlass Limited (ASX: BLG) announced today that it has succeeded in producing p-type gallium nitride (GaN) films with industry equivalent electrical properties using its breakthrough low temperature Remote Plasma Chemical Vapour Deposition (RPCVD) technology when grown on top of MOCVD GaN templates. Read more »
White Paper | Technology | Feb 14, 2013
Cree Sets New R&D Performance Record with 276 Lumen-Per-Watt Power LED
Cree, Inc. delivers another industry first with a barrier-breaking 276 lumen-per-watt white R&D power LED. This significant milestone exceeds Cree’s previous R&D industry record of 254 lumens per watt and demonstrates Cree’s continued commitment to innovate and accelerate the adoption of LED lighting. Read more »
Technology | Feb 11, 2013
New Atomic Layer Deposition Process for Nitride LED Reflector Structures
New Atomic Layer Deposition Process for Nitride LED Reflector Structures Although some groups have developed DBRs for increasing output power of LEDs before, this approach is claimed as the first proposal and demonstration of DBRs grown using ALD rather than electron-beam (EB) evaporation. The advantages of ALD over EB evaporation include better thickness uniformity over large-diameter substrates and thickness control at the atomic level. Read more »
Standardization + Regulation | Technology | Feb 08, 2013
LEDOTRON: Digital Dimming Technology for a New World of Lighting Convenience
LEDOTRON: Digital Dimming Technology for a New World of Lighting Convenience LEDOTRON is the name of the new digital standard for dimming systems designed for LED and compact fluorescent retrofit lamps. The innovative digital dimming and regulation technology was developed in collaboration with OSRAM and is to be passed as the IEC 62756-1 standard end of this year.The participants at the LEDOTRON press conference at the BAU trade fair in Munich in January 2013 were presented with the advantages of the LEDOTRON technology. Read more »
White Paper | Technology | Jan 30, 2013
New Options for Transparent Contact Electrodes
New Options for Transparent Contact Electrodes Found in flat screens, solar modules, or in new organic light-emitting diode (LED) displays, transparent electrodes have become ubiquitous. Typically, they consist of metal oxides like In2O3, SnO2, ZnO and TiO2 . Read more »
Technology | Jan 10, 2013
Dimming with Warmer, Cozier White Light - NXP Transforms LED Color Quality
Dimming with Warmer, Cozier White Light - NXP Transforms LED Color Quality When comparing LEDs to incandescent light bulbs, there is a noticeable difference in light quality: LED lamps when dimmed are perceived to be “colder” than incandescents. At CES 2013 this week, NXP Semiconductors (NASDAQ: NXPI) is demonstrating a groundbreaking solution that allows LED lamps to closely mimic the traditional incandescent light bulb, to produce a warmer, cozier white light as they are dimmed. Featuring “sensorless sensing” technology, developed and patented by NXP, this solution also has the advantage of driving down LED system costs by eliminating external temperature sensors, reducing the size of the heat sinks required for LED system cooling, and significantly improving reliability. Read more »
White Paper | Technology | Jan 09, 2013
Scientists Mimic Fireflies to Make Brighter LEDs
Scientists Mimic Fireflies to Make Brighter LEDs The nighttime twinkling of fireflies has inspired scientists to modify a light-emitting diode (LED) so it is more than one and a half times as efficient as the original. Researchers from Belgium, France, and Canada studied the internal structure of firefly lanterns, the organs on the bioluminescent insects’ abdomens that flash to attract mates. The scientists identified an unexpected pattern of jagged scales that enhanced the lanterns’ glow, and applied that knowledge to LED design to create an LED overlayer that mimicked the natural structure. The overlayer, which increased LED light extraction by up to 55 percent, could be easily tailored to existing diode designs to help humans light up the night while using less energy. The work is published in a pair of papers today in the Optical Society’s (OSA) open-access journal Optics Express. Read more »
Technology | Dec 13, 2012
Nature Materials Study: Boosting Heat Transfer with Nanoglue Might also Improve LED Cooling
Nature Materials Study: Boosting Heat Transfer with Nanoglue Might also Improve LED Cooling A team of interdisciplinary researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has developed a new method for significantly increasing the heat transfer rate across two different materials. Results of the team's study, published in the journal Nature Materials, could enable new advances in cooling computer chips and lighting-emitting diode (LED) devices, collecting solar power, harvesting waste heat, and other applications. Read more »
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