Need a new nano light bulb?

Nano light bulb will last 50 times longer than a standard 60w bulb

Some of the best scientific breakthroughs have occurred by accident.

Rubber was supposed to have been invented when Charles Goodyear discovered the process, now known as vulcanisation, by accidentally dropping a piece on a stove in the 1840s. 

Penicillin was discovered when mould landed on a culture plate and killed off bacteria in Sir Alexander Fleming's lab at St Mary's Hospital Medical School in London. And more recently, Viagra was discovered after a hard search for an angina cure. 

This week Michael Bowers, a graduate student at Vanderbilt University, has created a process that could replace the need for light bulbs.

When Bowers shone a laser through some quantum dots he created nano-crystals less than 1/1000th the width of a human hair. They emitted a white glow rather than the expected blue.

By mixing the dots with polyurethane and coating a blue LED light bulb with the mix, Bowers and a fellow student produced a white light similar to a regular light bulb but which will last 50 times longer than a standard 60 watt bulb.

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