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August 05, 2007



Real interesting except from a business perspective. Turns that when you dope a tungsten filament with a few quantum dots it does not emit in the infrared. Thus no heat, very efficient, and cheap. Same factories, same tech. I'm not investing there for certain.


new site for Online TV


Where do we get all the silicon? Wide adoption must require vast amounts.

Silicon is about 100 times more abundant than tungsten in the earth's crust. The question is rather how we can continue to make conventional light bulbs.

Paul Dietz


The ratio there is too low by several orders of magnitude. Tungsten is rather rare. Silicon, on the other hand, is the second most abundant element in the Earth, by mass (after oxygen).

David R.

Don't worry about silicon - the amount being developed for solar use will drawf any demand for lighting.


Mike, could you offer a source on the doping of tungsten with quantum dots? I haven't seen that, and I'd like to learn more.


It's been way to long for true cite. It probably came from Nanotechnology News but that is a guess, and I've only seen the one reference. The way it works is the doping sets up a band-gap that excludes IR from the spectrum. Thus no heat, and little power required. For obvious reasons the light bulb folks don't want to ship these types of bulbs. Notice that GE has announced a 'new' high efficiency technology that is just good enough to keep market dominance.



The micro dot on the filament concept sounds a little like the 500 mile per gallon carburetor. Ha-ha. Oh sure the filament dot was invented but just like the carburetor, some space alien saw it when cutting circles in a corn field and decided to take the technology back to their world. Of course they erased the minds of those who knew about both. Now it’s all gone.


This is likely the story behind the quantum dot light bulb


nanoscale fab of the tungsten. Could boost incandescent filament bulbs to 60% efficiency or more. Making them inexpensive enough could be a challenge.

Susanne McAllister

On a related energy front--I'm an expat based in Dublin and a friend sent me the the following links about work some bright sparks in Dublin have been doing in the field of magnetic energy for endless 'free energy' supply for myriad applications. Not that we should stop looking at improvement of energy efficiency & lifespan issues. But these guys have put a completely different spin on things. Take a look--I guanantee you'll be fascinated.
Steorn Sky News cover
Steorn Fox News cover
BBC interview with inventor Sean McCarthy
UCD lecture - part 1
UCD lecture - part 2
UCD lecture - part 3
UCD lecture - part 4
UCD lecture - part 5
I also like that these guys are completely moral--intending to make their technology available to 3rd world nations for free.
Kudo's to them. Slan, Susanne.


Susanne McAllister,
Free energy would be great, but Steorn is another one of these companies that could do the impossible if somebody would just fund them. Simpler explanation would be that they can't really do what they say, like cold fusion or hydrogen from water would any energy input. Steorn has been around for at least a few years. How come their prototypes aren't blowing potential investors away, anabling them to steadily expand their financing? It's blarney lass!

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LED Mini Christmas Lights

I recommend using of LED lightning because it's last longer than the light that we are using before and it's conserve the consumption of the energy.

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