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The life and times of the LED — a 100-year history

Nature Photonics volume 1, pages 189–192 (2007)Cite this article

Many people believe that the LED was discovered by US researchers working in the 1960s. In fact, Henry Round at Marconi Labs noted the emission of light from a semiconductor diode 100 years ago and, independently, a forgotten Russian genius — Oleg Losev — discovered the LED.

The semiconductor light-emitting diode, or LED, is a key component of today's technology. Modern households have numerous tiny glowing indicators — provided by LEDs — that are used for reading CD and DVD disks in computer and games-console drives, or for transmitting signals to electronic equipment from remote controls. Increasingly, cars are equipped with LED indicator and brake lights. Most crucially, however, the LED is a vital link between electronics and photonics: semiconductor lasers based on LEDs send modulated optical signals into telecom fibres, serving the ever-growing demand for broadband telecommunication and Internet. Over the next decade the value of the burgeoning LED market is predicted to exceed $15 billion per year.

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Acknowledgements

The author is thankful to M. A. Novikov and V. S. Letokhov who provided valuable references and K. F. MacDonald for help in preparing the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Nikolay Zheludev is at The Optoelectronics Research Centre, University of Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK. n.i.zheludev@soton.ac.uk,

    Nikolay Zheludev

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Zheludev, N. The life and times of the LED — a 100-year history. Nature Photon 1, 189–192 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2007.34

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