US Patent 8227817 - Elevated nanowire LED

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/8227817.html

The light production of conventional solid state LEDs is limited to a planar growth layer so that a considerable amount of produced light will not contribute to illumination. This patent from QuNano teaches a nanostructured approach which includes bulb structures on vertical nanowires to improve the illumination efficiency. Claim 1 reads:

1. Upstanding nanostructured LED comprising a substrate and a nanowire protruding from the substrate, wherein a bulb is arranged in connection with the nanowire and at an elevated position with regards to the substrate, the bulb having a larger diameter than the nanowire, and the bulb comprising an active region to produce visible or longer wavelength light, wherein a distance from a lower end of the bulb to the substrate is equal to or greater than a quarter of a wavelength of the light emitted by the LED.