Light-emitting Diodes (LEDs)

LEDs light up when voltage is applied.

LEDs are composed of gallium arsenide phosphide semiconductor diodes that glow red when voltage is applied. In watches and clocks these diodes, arranged in segments and electrified in the appropriate sequence by the watch's integrated circuit, light up to display the time.

LED technology was developed by researchers in the semi-conductor industry.

These red digits we see on electronic watches and pocket calculators from the 1970s resulted from the work of independent groups of researchers exploring the properties of semiconductors in the 1950s and 1960s. Experimenters at Texas Instruments, Bob Biard and Gary Pittman, found in 1961 that gallium arsenide gave off infrared (invisible) light when electric current was applied.

A year later Nick Holonyak Jr., while at General Electric, demonstrated the first visible-light laser, a semiconductor he and colleague S. F. Bevacqua made of gallium arsenide phosphide that glowed red when charged with electric current.

At first a popular novelty, LED watches soon fell out of favor with consumers.

LED displays were available in 1964, but they were handmade and very expensive--about $10 per digit. These early light-emitting diodes became the basis of an important industry that complimented the integrated circuits in consumer microelectronics. Their intense brightness, long life, and miniature size made them attractive for use in digital watch displays.