dracodraconis | Cheap, super-efficient LED lights on the horizon - tech - 29 January 2009

Cheap, super-efficient LED lights on the horizon - tech - 29 January 2009 - New Scientist

Researchers in the UK have cracked a limitation to making LED lights as cheaply as compact fluorescent lights (CFL). The problem was the wide difference in temperatures at which gallium nitride (GaN) and silicon are deposited, which results in the GaN cracking during cooling. the group added an aluminum gallium nitride layer that takes up the stresses so that the GaN doesn't crack. As a result, they can produce LED lights, which have no warm-up time and can burn for more than 100,000 hours, as cheaply as CFLs.