NEW DELHI: Scientists from Germany and Spain have discovered a way to create a BioLED by packaging luminescent proteins in the form of rubber .This device gives off a white light which is created by equal parts of blue, green and red rubber layers covering each LED much like the traditional inorganic LEDs. But the cost is comparatively low.
Increasingly popular LEDs, or light-emitting diodes, are the light of choice today as LEDs are more efficient than traditional incandescent bulbs and more stable than energy-efficient CFLs.
However, LEDs are manufactured using inorganic materials that are expensive and in short supply -such as cerium and yttrium.
Additionally, white LEDs produce a colour that is not optimal for eyesight since they lack a red component that can psychologically affect individuals exposed to them for long periods of time.
A German-Spanish team of scientists has drawn inspiration from nature’s biomolecules in search of a solution.
Their technique consists in introducing luminescent proteins into a polymer matrix to produce luminescent rubber.
This technique involves a new way of packaging proteins which could end up substituting the technique used to create LEDs today.
“We have developed a technology and a hybrid device called BioLED that uses luminescent proteins to convert the blue light emitted by a ‘normal’ LED into pure white light”, explains Rubén D Costa to Sinc, a researcher at the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg (Germany) and co-author of the study published in the journal ‘Advanced Materials’.
It is always necessary to have either a blue or an ultraviolet LED to excite the rubbers that are put over the LED in order to make it white.
”In other words, we can combine blue LED/green rubber/red rubber, or ultraviolet LED/blue rubber/green rubber/red rubber,” the researcher said.
The result is the first BioLED that gives off a pure white light created by similar parts of the colours blue, green and red, all while maintaining the efficiency offered by inorganic LEDs.
Blue or ultraviolet LEDs are much cheaper than white ones, which are made of an expensive and scarce material known as YAG:Ce (Cerium-doped Yttrium Aluminium Garnet).
“The Bio-LEDs are simple to manufacture and their materials are low-cost and biodegradable, meaning that they can easily be recycled and replaced”, points out Costa, while also highlighting the high stability of these proteins that have “luminescent properties that remain intact during the months of storage under different environmental conditions of light, temperature and humidity”.
Agency News.
