Giving Thanks to Mister Nakamura

…and the light he spreads across the world.

It’s 07:02 in the morning and the snow is cold and sparkling. It squeaks beneath my feet.

With two hundred meters left to the bus stop I feel the cold crawl right into the marrow of my bones.

Together with eight other daring bus passengers, I try to keep warm by small means. Not standing still, not moving too much.

Four minutes later I see, peeking from under my hood, the snowy wheels of the bus rolling up. Shivering, the company walks in a proper Swedish line on to the bus.

One seat is vacant. It’s next to a middle-aged woman who has gotten on a few stops earlier and already thawed. She reads a thick pocketbook in the pleasant light. Shantaram, I note.

Almost the entire bus is veiled in darkness. Only the reading lights, blue and white in mild unison, are lit. With the light a pleasant feeling envelops me as my marrow slowly warms. I wonder how many people know it is thanks to Shuji Nakamura?

Up until 1993, we had largely relied on an invention over a hundred years old: Thomas Alva Edison's incandescent light bulb, invented in 1879.

Then, in the early nineties Nakamuras hard work produced a worlds first, a working blue LED that was also suitable for mass production.

Blue made it possible to reach the Holy Grail, the white light diode, which Nakamura managed to achieve with a secret spelled gallium nitrate.

Today we have a world bathing in light, requiring one-tenth of the power of previous technologies and lasting a 100 times longer.

2017 LED bulbs contributed to a reduction of 570 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

Thanks Mister Nakamura, I say to myself as the light from the bus plays in the snowy road outside the window.

The least I can do is to write a post in honor of you.