Scientists on the Chinese mainland have recently developed the country's first diode which emits a very bright blue light.

The product, called high-brightness light-emitting diode (LED), was developed by a group of scientists headed by Luo Yi from Beijing-based Tsinghua University in cooperation with Incalcu Group Co. in Shandong Province, east China.

Professor Luo says LED is one of the key components of giant and colorful display panels, such as those used to display traffic information and is used in medical equipment and deep-sea telecommunications equipment.

He says mass production will begin soon, making their product equal to the advanced level of blue LEDs manufactured overseas.

To date, China has had to import blue LED for the production of large display monitors.

Earlier this year, researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) announced they had developed two varieties of LED, one capable of emitting a very bright red, orange and yellow light, and the other a white light.

There are over 100 plants in China assembling about 15 billion units of LED this year with imported parts. The demand for LED in the world market exceeds 100 billion units.

(Xinhua News Agency October 29, 2001)