12.08.17
Since February 2017, five research institutes and companies have been working on “UV Power,” a collaborative project funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). The partners have made it their goal to provide high-power UV LEDs to cover a wide variety of applications.
These LEDs will eventually replace conventional UV light sources, which often contain toxic mercury, in areas such as production, disinfection, the environment, life sciences and medicine. UV LEDs are also likely to open up new areas of application.
As part of “Advanced UV for Life,” a consortium of research institutes and companies which is being funded under the federal Zwanzig20 program, Osram Opto Semiconductors is working with four partners on high-power UV LEDs for the mass market: the Ferdinand-Braun-Institut, Leibniz-Institut für Höchstfrequenztechnik (FBH), the Technical University of Berlin, LayTec AG and UVphototonics NT GmbH. Prototype LEDs and the technology for producing high-power LEDs for the UVB and UVC spectrums on the basis of the aluminum gallium nitride (AlGaN) material system are scheduled to be presented by 2020.
Development of the high-power LEDs is taking place along the entire technology chain for LED production. “The various tasks have been distributed among the partners on the basis of their strengths – everything from the production of structured sapphire substrates, epitaxy and chip processing to packaging and analytics,” said Dr. Hans-Jürgen Lugauer, head of UV development at Osram Opto Semiconductors.
These LEDs will eventually replace conventional UV light sources, which often contain toxic mercury, in areas such as production, disinfection, the environment, life sciences and medicine. UV LEDs are also likely to open up new areas of application.
As part of “Advanced UV for Life,” a consortium of research institutes and companies which is being funded under the federal Zwanzig20 program, Osram Opto Semiconductors is working with four partners on high-power UV LEDs for the mass market: the Ferdinand-Braun-Institut, Leibniz-Institut für Höchstfrequenztechnik (FBH), the Technical University of Berlin, LayTec AG and UVphototonics NT GmbH. Prototype LEDs and the technology for producing high-power LEDs for the UVB and UVC spectrums on the basis of the aluminum gallium nitride (AlGaN) material system are scheduled to be presented by 2020.
Development of the high-power LEDs is taking place along the entire technology chain for LED production. “The various tasks have been distributed among the partners on the basis of their strengths – everything from the production of structured sapphire substrates, epitaxy and chip processing to packaging and analytics,” said Dr. Hans-Jürgen Lugauer, head of UV development at Osram Opto Semiconductors.
