Lamp technologies

In gas discharge lamps atoms in a plasma are excited by the electric current through the plasma. When the atoms return to their original state, a photon is emitted. This emission is generally in the form of one or more spectral lines in the visible and /or UV area.

• Low pressure Low pressure lamps can be distinguished in fluorescent lamps, UV lamps and sodium lamps.
• Medium / high pressure lamps These lamps are also referred to as HID (high intensity discharge) lamps. They produce much more light per unit of lamp volume than low pressure lamps.
• Xenon flash lamps Xenon flash lamps are not, like other discharge lamps, operated with series impedance (ballast) to cope with the negative resistance of the arc discharge.
• LED's LED’s are semiconductor devices, containing a p-n junction. When current flows through this junction the recombination of an electron and a hole results in the emission of a photon. The emitted light can be in the infrared, visible or near UV range.