The first white laser was invented at Arizona State University in the past year, according to research published in Nature. Researchers successfully developed a laser that emits the complete spectrum of visible light, hence white light.
Red, blue or green lasers have been around for some time and each emits its color because it is composed of a certain semiconductor. The team was able to craft an alloy, mixing semiconductors, that emits a full spectrum rather than just one color of light. Their semiconductor sheet is much smaller than the human hair.
Lead researcher and ASU professor, Cun-Zheng Ning, highlights the potential of this laser breakthrough explaining how much more energy efficient lasers are relative to the widely used LED lighting. White lasers could also provide better contrast and more vivid colors when applied to video.
Lasers can also encode data much faster than LED, so the possibility for white laser development in the new field of Li-Fi, communication with visible light, is promising Ning believes.
Sources: IEEE Spectrum, Nature
Image: Nature
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