The history of the LED, light emitting diode dates back to some of the earliest days of wireless technology - a time when little was understood about semiconductors themselves and even less about the possibility of using them to generate light.

LEDs have been commercially available since the 1960s, but the LED history extends many years before this. The LED took many years to develop for a number of reasons - the first discoveries were well ahead of their time, other discoveries were lost as a result of war. It was only when the allied technologies were sufficiently mature that the LED could be fully developed and marketed.

Even after the first devices appeared, LED history was not finished - new developments have been made and LEDs are addressing new markets, never really envisaged before.

Early LED history

The first recorded effects of the light emitting diode effect were noticed back at the beginning of the twentieth century. A British radio engineer named H J Round who working for Marconi undertook some experiments using crystal detectors. At the time radio detectors were one of the major limiting factors within the early wireless of radio sets. He was a very talented engineer and helped advance the science of radio in many ways.

The early detectors were often made using crystals of what we would call semiconductors. A thin wire was placed onto the surface and a point contact diode was made. These were called "Cat's Whiskers" for obvious reasons.

In trying to investigate the effects and improve their performance, Round had passed a current through some of his detectors. He noted that one of them emitted light when a current was passed through it. Although he did not understand the mechanism for the effect, he published his findings in 1907 in a magazine of the day named Electrical World.

LEDs investigated by Losov

The history of the LED shows the idea remained dormant for many years. Then it was observed again by a Russian engineer named Oleg Vladimirovich Losov. He was the son of a Russian Imperial Army Office - born into a noble family. This would have counted against him in the post revolution Russia era.

Losov has attended a number of university lectures but never undertook any formal university education, but instead was a technical at the Leningrad Medical Institute.

Losov made some major advances and is a key person in the LED history. He undertook a considerable amount of work investigating light emission from Cat's Whisker style detectors. He observed and investigated the light emission from zinc oxide and silicon carbide crystal rectifiers.

As a result of his observations and investigations, Losov published a number of papers in the technical press of the day between 1924 and 1930. His first paper was entitled: "Luminous carborundum detector and detection crystals" which was published in a Russian journal. Soon he published his findings in other British and German. Losov detailed a variety of aspects of these diodes including the spectra of their light emission as well as many other aspects of their operation. In one article published in the Philosophical Magazine in 1928 he detailed the I-V characteristics of a carborundum diode along with the onset of light emission. This formed part of his work on investigating the nature of the diode emission - recognising it was not a thermal effect, but arising from the semiconductor action.

In further work, Losov investigated the temperature relationships of the effect, cooling the semiconductors down to very low temperatures. He also modulated the LED to see the effects of frequency of any current applied to the diode.

Losov went on to investigate further ideas associated with diode and what would alter be called semiconductor technology. Sadly though, he lived in Leningrad and he was killed during the siege of Leningrad during the Second World War. He had published a total of four patents between 1927 and 1942, but all this work was lost as records were destroyed in Leningrad.

LED history: semiconductor technology advances

During the Second World War, radar was seen as a major enabler. Accordingly a large amount of development of practical devices was initiated. This utilised much of the materials science work that had been undertaken in the 1920s and 1930s.

As a result of the work new point contact diodes were developed. These were able to provide better performance than thermionic valve / vacuum tube diodes. As a result of the research into semiconductor diodes, the idea for the light emitting diode re-surfaced in 1951. This time work was to be more successful, although it took some years to reach completion. One research team was lead by Kurt Lehovec. He applied for a patent in 1952 for Silicon carbide diodes that emitted light. However this was only the first phase of the work that was needed.

Following the work by Kurt Lehovec, others also started to work on LED technology. The work took many years and involved a number of companies and researchers. Even Shockley became involved.

Although LEDs did not become commercially available for a number of years, several people made some significant discoveries and improvements. Lehovac himself investigated introducing different impurities to change the colour of the light making blue, green/yellow, and pale yellow from different combinations.

Also researchers working at RCA patented a green LED in 1958. All of these LED developments added more to LED technology, furthering the technology within the overall LED history.