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Shedding some light on the biggest thing since silicon
“It came from nothing, it was a material that was never going to do anything for us,” says chief scientist of Macquarie University’s newest spinoff company BluGlass Pty Ltd, Dr Scott Butcher. “And then, about 12 years ago, a group in Japan used it to make a blue light-emitting diode (LED). Ever since then there’s been a big explosion in devices made from this material, using blue LEDs, green, ultraviolet and violet ones.”
Gallium nitride and its uses
A compound of gallium and nitrogen, gallium nitride’s most interesting characteristic is that it emits intense light. As a semiconductor, it’s therefore tipped to be the biggest thing since silicon. Devices using gallium nitride that emit visible light when an electrical current pass through them – known as light-emitting diodes – are already used in everything from football stadium scoreboards, digital clocks and traffic lights. Gallium nitride is also used in the newest generation of high-density DVD players, mobile phones and military radar systems.
The most obvious use of gallium nitride, however, will be in room lighting where it will produce LED ‘light bulbs’ that use a lower voltage, are more efficient, and last 100 times longer than conventional bulbs.
“It’s forecasted by the US Department of Energy that over the next 20 years solid state lighting is going to make a big impact on room lighting, lowering electrical costs quite significantly and lowering the greenhouse outputs as well,” Butcher says.
A competitive edge
The only thing slowing the lighting revolution is the current high cost of producing gallium nitride. It is not a naturally occurring material, rather it is grown at temperatures of around 1000 degrees Celsius using a process called metal organic chemical vapour deposition. This greatly increases production costs as all the materials used, including the synthetic sapphire the gallium nitride is grown on, must be able to withstand extreme heat. This is where Butcher and BluGlass come in.
BluGlass Pty Ltd was set up by the University to commercialise a cheaper way of producing gallium nitride .
“We’ve been trying to grow it at much lower temperatures using different techniques, down around the 650 degrees Celsius region,” says Butcher, who doubles as an Australian Research Council Research Fellow in Macquarie’s Department of Physics. “At that temperature you can start growing it on materials that are a lot cheaper, like glass and silicon.”
Savings in production will naturally flow on to the consumer, which is why all the major electrical goods manufacturers are currently investing in gallium nitride research.
“You can buy next generation high-density DVD players at the moment which cost just under US$2000,” Butcher says. “Most of that cost is because of the high price of the gallium nitride-based laser diode, which costs about US$1000 off the shelf.”
Blueglass Pty Ltd is currently being commercialised through Macquarie University’s commercial arm, Macquarie Research Ltd. For more information, contact MRL Project Manager Technology, Commercialisation, Warren Bailey at [email protected].
