The technology of LEDs started with electroluminescents. This was experamented in 1907 by a experamenter by the name of H.J Round in Marconi Labs in England. He experamented with a single peice of the element, silicon (which i will explain later) and a cat's whisker detector which consisted of a thin peice of wire that connected to the anode and the base of the semiconductor connected to a cathode. A voltage was applied and light was produced in the form of electro luminescence. however the LED was not fully introduced. The idea was abandoned. In 1961, the first real LED was born. Two Texas instrument experimenters made the first infra-red light produced by a single piece of Gallium arsenide. This is a material that consisted of gallium and arsenic. They received a patent for the LED and they were introduced to the world. The first visible spectrum LED was made in 1962 by Nick Holonyak Jr in GE electronics. Back then LEDs were horribly expensive costing $200 a unit. That was... until 1968. A company by the name of the Monsanto Company first mass-produced these red LED indicators using the Gallium Arsenic that was used before. In that same year, HP also mass produced LEDs with the GaAs (gallium arsenic) that Monsanto supplied them with. Hp used them in their calculators instead of LCD screens. In 1970 Fairchild Optoelectronics ( with the help of Fairchild semiconductor) manufactured the LED for only 5 cents! Using the planar process invented by Dr. Jean Hoerni at Fairchild Semiconductor and innovative packaging, optoelectronics pioneer Thomas Brandt led the team at Fairchild semiconductor and they were successfully producing LEDs for low prices. Later on down the track, companies use different materials other than GaAs and produced different colours. The first High Output blue LED was created by Shuji Nakamura of Nichia Corporation in 1993. He used a combination of different materials to create this LED. Later, the high brightness White LED was made by this same man and he received many awards. Today, you can get almost and LED to suit your needs. LEDs are truly awesome!!