The Latest and Greatest in Light Technology

With how fast technology is progressing, it’s easy to feel like you are light-years behind (pun intended). We want to make it easier for you to navigate your way around the newest lighting technology.

1. Common Connectivity

Now that LEDs are a lighting norm, the future lies in lighting controls. Tech such as dimmers and sensors, have been around for what feels like forever, but the goal now is to make them sleeker and more sophisticated and making them connect seamlessly with other devices using new tools such as wireless lighting. This leads into our next topic…

2. The Internet of “Things”

The internet of “things” is the term used to describe what happens when it’s no longer just computers and smartphones that are connected to the web, but to your everyday appliances and even your LED lights. Lighting is an ideal network for internet-of-things services to be built on, it’s already there in the ceiling of every building, just waiting to be utilized. You only have to add a few sensors or cameras and some kind of data connection.

3. Light Source Regularity

Since LED light sources do not have to be replaced frequently, there has become a standard of building them into fittings, rather than designing a fitting around the ease of replacement. Many organizations have been aiming to create a universal standard to utilize integrated modules that will have an easier changing process.

4. New Power Technologies

“Drivers”, the component of LED lighting that converts the main electricity supply into a form of light to be used, are often the first piece of an LED lighting system to fail. New power technologies are now advancing quickly to aim to fix this problem. Companies such as Isotera sells a power system for lighting using a central hub, which has each fitting all connected directly to a bus cable.

5. Influencing Our Daily Lives

Along with the rise of LEDs, came the rise of utilizing lighting adjustments to help influence how productive we are at work. These lighting adjustments can influence how well we learn to how quickly we get better after an illness.

6. Revolutionary Materials

Nobel Prize winner Shuji Nakamura (pictured) has moved from blue to violet LEDs. Nakamura’s violet LEDs put the gallium nitride on a base of some more gallium nitride rather than sapphire – ‘GaN-on-GaN’ in technical jargon. Not only do they render colors better, they also open up the possibility for longer lives and greater efficiency. Also set to revolutionize the world of LEDs is wonder material du jour graphene, which its proponents would have you believe will be used in everything from phones to buildings to water filters.

7. The Path to LED Quality

Now that people are utilizing LED lighting to enhance their buildings, they have a high focus on quality. This means they want their lighting to be stylish and help the “aura” of their location, while also being safe and environmentally friendly. It has been a long time coming, but the unknown frontier of LED lighting is a time of the past.

8. LightYears and Beyond

Lighting isn’t just about light any more. It’s about data. Technologies such as Li-Fi (like Wi-Fi, using light) and indoor positioning (that tracks people’s position using LED luminaires and their smartphones) are both based on visible light communication. It’s set to transform our shops, museums and indoor spaces, and to turn the industry on its head as lighting products are used for completely new purposes.