First white laser!

Science
#1

Well, it really is not the first ever white laser. however it is the first to have the 3 primary colors (Red, Green, Blue) on a single substrate. That is amazing. Means inexphnsive white lasers. Which are much more efficient than LED based lighting. If they can get the efficacy of 683 Lm/wt as with green 555nm lasers that will be incredible. Imagine an efficient and durable 5000 lumen flashlight that runs on a single 18650. OMG is right!

@Opcode I thought you would jump for joy at the news, you might have missed it. So, I am posting for you.

Also An interesting short read, to put some of the info above in proper context.

…X…

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#2

I wouldn’t think a laser would be particularly useful as a replacement for LED lighting, or any kind of general lighting. But I am now looking forward to a white laser pointer.

#3

Yes, this is a good find. Thank you for bringing it to my attention.

No, this is not the first-ever white light laser. Some metal vapor lasers and maybe even some variations of Ar+/Kr+ lasers produce “full-spectrum” visible light. Ironically, the laser system in your image is yet another “white-light” laser that predates the laser mentioned in the article. The articles might be correct that they are reporting on the first white-light semiconductor lasers; at least, I don’t know of any others.

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#4

This definitely looks like a great move forward in laser technology. The current diode based “white” laser combine arrays off of RGB diodes to output a white beam, whereas this sounds like it is all 3 in one chip. There are lots of white diode based lasers out there in use as entertainment display lasers, but the prices on them are not cheap, especially the 30 watt+ units.
As far as the gas lasers go, the Spectra Physics 171 laser could output a white beam, but it also required something like 460v 3phase at 60 amps to run, and a water cooling supply.

Also, 5 or 6 years back I new a guy who was supposedly funding a very high wattage diode laser system with the intent to use it for theatrical lighting, but supposedly the could not find a scanner that would hold up and not overheat from the laser output. I think the whole thing ended up being an overly optimistic idea that fell on it’s face when they couldn’t make it work, but the links posted above sound very similar to what was being discussed design wise back then.

#5

Suspect this will be of interest for projectors, vehicle lighting, and any other field where precision control of the output and/or a near-point source are critical.

For general lighting, I suspect they’re going to find it difficult to beat LED on cost and efficiency. Yes, I realize they claimed “up to 400 lumens per watt” … but is that electrical watts or the radiated watts that laser manufacturers and experimenters so often talk about? Are any inexpensive solid-state diodes in the visible range as efficient as the >50% that blue LED die are hitting? With the simple blue die + yellow phoshpor system hitting nearly 100 lumens per watt system efficiency at the consumer level, 150 lumens per watt with a little more engineering, and 200 lumens per watt in the R&D pipeline, I’m not sure there’s a very wide niche for laser in the cost-sensitive general-purpose lighting market.

#6

LEDs in all their AWESOME glory, did not come to prominence overnight. It has been a ~40 year journey from commercial niche items to household ubiquity. If Moore’s law is loosely applied, we should have the White Laser Lights(produced on a single substrate) where LEDs are today in about 20 years.

And if what I have read on white laser light tech is true, then White Laser Light is a major step forward.

And I am dreamy eyed just thinking about what the future may hold, there are some thing we do with LEDs that no one predicted, and we continue to push the enveloped. If the same holds true for this TECH, it is very exiting news indeed…after all,

If a pocket portable, color/intensity tunable RGB laser than can output thousands of usable white lumens on relatively little power does not make you a little bit exited, nothing will.

…X…

#7

Could very well happen. But 20 years is a long time in the technology field and it’s a bit earlier than I like to make predictions on these matters.

In the meantime, I’m just glad to be rid of the light-emitting resistor and working the last of the detested CFL’s out of my residence.

#8

Inexpensive is in the eye of the beholder. I’ve read that some lab test specimens have surpassed 80% wallplug efficiency. I don’t know what the current commercially-available market is, though.

#9

Inexpensive as in suitably priced for general-lighting products at any place in the market.

80% WPE is far better than what a quick google search turned up on laser diode efficiency, but if it requires grams of unubtanium per unit and produces an oddball IR frequency requiring an exotic pump arrangement to up it to the visible range … a little ways to go.