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So could you just have a microarray of millions of these to get a practical amount of light at an insanely-low electricity cost? (And given jnhnum1's clarification, also be cooling the room slightly?)


No, per the laws of thermodynamics the devices would have to be hotter than the room they illuminate.

So you would not be cooling the room - you would be cooling the oven you put the devices into.


I may be way off, but I don't think that's how multipliers work. That is, even if you had a bunch of them, they should still have the same aggregate efficiency, no?


My thought wasn't about changing the efficiency, but making it useful. The article mentioned the effect was only evident at very low power levels, creating very small amounts of light. Light, I believe, does 'add up' so millions of such devices might provide a useful amount of light while still having an attractive efficiency. (At least, inside an oven-like environment.)




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