The wonders of LED
Theo Boshoff
With the strides made in lighting technology and the development of the smaller, brighter and less power cionsuming light-emitting diodes or LED lights, Valerie Poyurs, director of marketing at Radiant Lighting, believes that LEDs will become the standard source of illumination for the 21st Century.

So, what is an LED light and how does it differ from Thomas Edison's light bulb? Poyurs explains: "It is essentially a diode that emits light and is based on chip technology. Current is applied to the cathode lead which then excites the atoms to a higher energy level. They release this energy through the bonding wire as the atoms shed electrons to the material used in the LED chip.

During this energy transfer light is created. The lens focuses the light created from the chip into the beam shape and defined direction, while the thermal Heatsink draws heat away from the chip."

Interesting to note says, Poyurs, is that LEDs produce monochromatic radiation and thus their colours are defined by the dominant wavelength according to the type and composition of the semiconductor crystal used in the LED chip.

LEDs are available in red, orange, yellow, green and blue and to get white light red, blue, green are combined.

The advantages of using LEDs, according to Poyurs, include the lights using less energy to produce light. Current white LEDs produce over 30 lumens/Watt, but Poyurs says diodes yielding up to 100lm/W will be available soon.

LEDs are also lasts longer than traditional light bulbs and their life expectancy is about 50 000 over an 11 year period. Together with this is the benefit of the LEDs requiring less maintenance and costs associated with it, lasting 10 times longer with no need to replace the light source.

"The lights are also more environmentally friendly, containing zero mercury and they don’t produce high heat output," Poyurs adds.

Contrary to popular belief LEDs are fully dimmable, and can be dimmed over 1000 times without sacrificing any characteristic of the light.

Because of their small size and flexibility these LEDs can also be used in multiple ways, for lighting in homes or even in traffic lights.

It seems that Poyurs belief that LEDs are become the standard source of illumination for the 21st Century, could well be true. Unless something better comes along, that is.