Better Off LED

Find it difficult to relate to the work of most of those who take home the Nobel Prize for physics? Well, this year you’ll be able to relate (in fact, your benefiting from their work right now). Three researchers helped revolutionize lighting and more with the invention of the “blue light-emitting diode (LED), a technology now used in high-speed networking, data storage, smartphones, water purification, and efficient home illumination.”

+ Vox: The amazing progress of LEDs in one chart. (They really should give out a Nobel Prize for charts.)

+ Quartz: Today’s Nobel Prize-winning physicist only got $200 for his invention. (He would have been better off building a tool to share disappearing selfies…)