Isamu Akasaki

was a Japanese engineer and physicist. He was best known for inventing the bright gallium nitride (GaN) p-n junction blue LED in 1989.
Akasaki was awarded the Kyoto Prize in Advanced Technology in 2009. He was also awarded the 2014 Nobel prize in Physics with Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamura "for the invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes, which has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources".
Akasaki died on April 1, 2021 at his home in Nagoya, Japan from pneumonia, aged 92.