Incandescent light bulb Small variations in resistivity along the filament cause "hot spots" to form at points of higher resistivity; a variation of diameter of only 1% will cause a 25% reduction in service life. These hot spots evaporate faster than the rest of the filament, which increases the resistance at that point—this creates a positive feedback that ends in the familiar tiny gap in an otherwise healthy-looking filament. Irving Langmuir found that an inert gas, instead of vacuum, would retard evaporation. General service incandescent light bulbs over about 25 watts in rating are now filled with a mixture of mostly argon and
Incandescent light bulb 1914, 88.5 million lamps were used, (only 15% with carbon filaments), and by 1945, annual sales of lamps were 795 million (more than 5 lamps per person per year). Of the power consumed by typical incandescent light bulbs, 95% or more is converted into heat rather than visible light. Other electrical light sources are more effective. Luminous "efficacy" of a light source may be defined in two ways. The radiant luminous efficacy (LER) is the ratio of the visible light flux emitted (the "luminous flux") to the total power radiated over all wavelengths. The source luminous efficacy (LES) is the