Could the Teeny Tiny Tic Tac Lightbulb Be The Light Of The Future?

Sometimes smaller is better, if it performs better than the rest. No I’m not talking about men. I’m talking about a tiny little light bulb from Luxim, a Sunnyvale, California Company.

Luxim “is a pioneer and volume manufacturer of energy-efficient lighting solutions that offer reliable and extraordinarily compact technology for high-intensity applications.”

The light bulb is about the size of a Tylenol pill or a Tic Tac, so it isn’t very big, but it emits light equivalent to 140 lumens per watt. An ordinary light bulb emits about 15 lumens per watt and a high end LED emits about 70 lumens per watt. In other words, this tiny bulb is ten times more efficient than traditional incandescent lamps, and it is twice as efficient as a CFL.

Argon gas inside the small light bulb is electrified inside a metal ring called a puck. The puck heats the gas in the bulb into plasma and this produces light. The gas inside the bulb reaches 6000-degrees Kelvin. Because the energy becomes light rather than released as heat the tiny bulb produce a more natural spectrum of light.

The life expectancy of the light bulb is at least 20,000 hours before reaching half-life. Watch the Tic Tac light bulb light up the screen in the video link below. Michael Kanellos talks to the Luxim about the Silicon Valley Company’s plans for the future, http://news.zdnet.com/2422-13568_22-192842.html.