Introducing Nichia Optisolis LEDs: Harnessing the Full Spectrum of Sunlight for Various Applications

Introducing Nichia Optisolis LEDs: Harnessing the Full Spectrum of Sunlight for Various Applications

The world market leader in LED development, Nichia, has unveiled its latest innovation: the Optisolis™ technology. Optisolis™ LED emitters provide a natural light source with a spectrum that achieves the industry's closest match to that of standard illuminants, sunlight, and incandescent artificial light, boasting a color rendering index (CRI) of over 98.

The Optisolis family of LEDs are classified as Ultra-High CRI light sources, as they have maximum scores for all 16 color samples used in the color rendering index metric. The 5000K Nichia NF2L757G-F1 Optisolis LED can even achieve a Ra of 99 out of 100. Similarly, the scores with the new IES TM-30-15 light quality tests are equally high, with Rf at 98 and Rg at 99.

As these tests demonstrate, the Nichia Optisolis has the highest light quality on the market at the time of this article. This extraordinary result is achieved by using a revolutionary new phosphor technology in combination with a special blue LED chip. The blue chip's spectrum, at 420nm, contains almost no UV emissions and, when combined with the phosphor technology, makes possible the aforementioned CRI values. The lack of violet or ultraviolet (UV) spectral energy in the emission and reduced blue light peak are essential aspects in various lighting applications such as human-centric lighting, museum and art gallery lighting, and horticulture.

Human-Centric Lighting: Adapting to the Human Biorhythm

Human-centric lighting is a specialized type of lighting that adapts to the human inner clock and thus to the biorhythm. The Optisolis natural light spectrum is an ideal fit for human-centric lighting applications because of its ultra-high CRI. The absence of UV light and reduced blue peak ensures that overall health and sleep patterns are positively influenced.

Museum and Art Gallery Lighting: Faithful Color Reproduction and Preservation

For museum and art gallery lighting, the Optisolis LEDs deliver the most faithful color reproduction and the best understanding of an artist's message due to their near-maximum CRI and TM-30-15 light quality scores. The absence of UV light helps protect precious works of art from light-related damage.

Horticulture and Other Applications: Achieving Optimal Conditions

In horticulture, the daylight spectrum provided by Optisolis LEDs promotes optimal plant growth in greenhouses or enclosed spaces. Additional applications include color evaluation (e.g., painting, printing), commercial lighting (e.g., retail), and other instances where ultra-high CRI is desired.

Harnessing the Power of Light: Impact on Mood and Well-Being

'Human-centric lighting' describes lighting designed to work with the human body's natural rhythms. It relies on the well-established fact that the human eye detects the presence of a particular wavelength of blue light in the spectrum that makes up sunlight and uses this to judge what time of day it is. In this way, light helps regulate our sleep-wake cycles and other bodily rhythms, significantly impacting our mood and well-being.

Human-centric lighting harnesses this effect by adjusting its brightness and color temperature during the day to mimic natural light. To achieve its purpose, human-centric lighting must have a spectrum that resembles that of real sunlight, with just the right level of the crucial blue wavelength that triggers the body's response. Most solutions described as human-centric do not have a spectrum that resembles that of real sunlight, so they end up providing too much or too little blue.

Nichia Optisolis LEDs are different, as their light is closely matched to real sunlight, so they have the right level of blue that triggers the desired biological stimulus.

 

Commercial Lighting: Revealing the True Color of Merchandise

Nichia Optisolis light fixtures ensure that merchandise appears under natural light, with the same color and contrast. The high-quality light spectrum is expressed by both the traditional color rendering index (CRI) and the new Color Fidelity Index. Tests confirm CRI values at 99+ and TM30 Fidelity Index at 96, indicating the high accuracy of reproducing original colors from 99 representative color indexes.

Light to Reveal True Color and Depth for Works of Art

The Nichia Optisolis LEDs' uniform spectral power distribution, enabled by a three-phosphor mix, renders art naturally, ensuring that visitors fully experience color and texture. Paintings, frescoes, mosaics, sculptures, and various other exhibits will have a lifelike appearance with more realistic color tones relative to any prior lighting. Moreover, the light from Optisolis LEDs results in a high contrast ratio, enabling viewers to better perceive depth and texture in works of art.

Early Adopters: Museums in Germany

The first institutions to implement Nichia Optisolis lighting are museums in Germany: the Zeppelin Museum in Friedrichshafen, the Ludwig Museum in Koblenz, and the Picasso Museum in Münster. The difference between the previous lighting system, with CRI80 LEDs (LEFT), and the new Nichia Optisolis CRI98+ (RIGHT) is clearly visible in the case of the paintings housed in the Zeppelin Museum Friedrichshafen.

Manufacturers should choose Optisolis™ when they want to deliver a lighting product with a spectrum where all colors are reproduced as seen under a standard light (Figure 1). As such, they will offer a solution with a color rendering index significantly improved compared to current products for general lighting (Figure 2). Most importantly, since UV emission is essentially non-existent in the spectrum, the degradation of irradiated materials will be dramatically reduced compared to other light sources containing UV emission, including other market-available LEDs.

The Optisolis family consists of two series, the NF2W757G-F1 and NF2L757G-F1. Both series are housed in a 3 x 3 x 0.65 mm package.

Features:

• CRI: up to 99
• Typical luminous flux:
  - NF2W757G-F1: 23.0lm at 65mA
  - NF2L757G-F1: 24.1lm at 65mA
• Max. forward voltage: 3.3 V
• Radiation angle: 120 °
• +120°C maximum junction temperature

Applications of the Optisolis full-spectrum LED

• Museums and art galleries
• Hospitals
• Retail lighting
• Commercial Lighting

In conclusion, Nichia Optisolis LEDs offer a versatile and innovative solution for various lighting applications, including human-centric lighting, museum and art gallery lighting, and horticulture. By closely matching the full spectrum of sunlight and offering ultra-high CRI values, these LEDs provide optimal lighting conditions that promote well-being, protect valuable art, and enhance the visual appearance of merchandise and spaces. The future of lighting is bright with Nichia Optisolis LEDs leading the way.

With our LumiBar Nichia Optisolis LED strips you can easily build linear lighting fixtures thanks to the plug & play connection and Zhaga format.