Lasers have long been used for everything from communication to microscopy, but scientists had failed to figure out how to get them to produce the white light needed to illuminate a room until very recently. The successful researchers named their paper “A Monolithic White Laser” (because why not take a victory lap), and they just published it in the journal Nature Nanotechnology. In essence, they’ve figured out how to produce the entire visible color spectrum and blend it together using a nanosheet.
White lasers could potentially offer huge improvements over the current LED systems we use to light our homes. Laser light is brighter, more energy efficient, and can produce more vivid colors for displays — up to 70 percent more colors than the current standard. Its benefits don’t stop there: It’s possible that lasers used for lighting could double as a means of communication. White laser-based Li-Fi (short for light-based wireless communication) would do the same things as Wi-Fi, but ten to a hundred times faster. Your internet connection and your nightlight could be one and the same.
White lasers are still in the proof-of-concept stage, but you better expect that this tech will be hustled to market. This could be the idea that kills light bulbs.
