Funding and licence deal
Merck is to provide €370,000 annually until 2011 for the development of light-emitting diodes (LEDs) at the Münster University of Applied Sciences, Germany. The company will receive exclusive rights to the resulting products.
The research team at the Merck Lab, led by Professor Thomas Juestel, is aiming to develop an inorganic light source that retains the energy-saving properties of conventional LEDs in addition to being comparable to natural, or “white”, light.
Juestel and team have developed LEDs that emit the colour spectrum of white light. This technology avoids having to transform blue light from inorganic semi-conductor LEDs into yellow, green and red light, the mixture to form white light.
Light-emitting diodes emit narrow-spectrum light to which optics can be added to shape their radiation pattern. They can be used instead of high energy-consuming incandescent light bulbs, and are characterised by energy-efficiency and longevity.
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