Inventor of the LED honored...

Details here.

Thank you for the link.
I added the link to my website's Museum entry page. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

LEDs were invented in 1962? Wow.

Way to go Nick Holonyak, your my hero! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/blush.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/buttrock.gif

I won't dimish the achievement, but is was more an engineering issue than a science issue. The LED is kind of like the Field Effect Transistor. The theory was well understood, but it took almost 40 years to figure out to build it. The LED theory was also very well understand, the challenge was how to actually make the thing. It was understood that you ought to be able to get a Junction with a .7v volt band gap to produce photons instead of heat for the .7 volts drop, and it was understood that it would be a near monchromatic light source.

There was however a pretty long leap between knowing it could be done and figuring out how to do it.

Engineering is a lot more work than science. Remember the old saying about genius being 10% inspiration, 90% perspiration? Engineering is the 90% /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Of course, without the 10% we would be engineering new flint arrowheads rather than cool flashlights...