Hiroshi amano biography channel

Take a look at a nocturnal satellite image of earth and the planet – or much of it, at least – seems lit up like a Christmas tree. A quarter of the world’s electricity supply is generated to keep those lights burning.

Yet there are also vast areas left in darkness, whether through poverty, lack of population or poor national grid coverage.

The winners of the 2014 Nobel Prize for Physics – Amano, his university mentor Isamu Akasaki and Shuji Nakamura – could not only slash the electricity bill (along with waste, pollution and greenhouse gases into the bargain) but also bring light into the darkness.

Hiroshi amano biography channel 7

The three men, all Japanese, have helped create the blue light-emitting diode (LED) which, combined with existing red and green LEDs, produces white light. LEDs are already up to 19 times brighter per watt of electricity than conventional incandescent bulbs and last up to 100 times longer - and they are constantly being improved.

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