Science of LED Lighting

Have never tried LED Lighting BUT have been giving it some thought and, consequently doing a lot of research. During my research I came across a site I thought might be of interest to the 'educated LED grower' .... for me, it is kind of Light Science 101 and a lot for me to absorb. So any help I can get will be appreciated.

Hope it is ok to post links to informational sites (I did not see any sort of advertisement or even a manufactuer's name) IF not, I apologize and will immediately delete my post. Not even sure I know how to post a link to another site but will give it a shot.

Just looking for some feedback from anyone that has knowledge of LEDs to see if this site seems legit.

http://ledgrolight.tumblr.com/post/11953688370/come-join-us

http://ledgrolight.tumblr.com/post/12514168859/light-and-photosynthesis

http://ledgrolight.tumblr.com/post/13506637507/enough-of-the-right-kind-of-light

links didnt work for me?

As I said, I wasn't even sure how to post a link .... BUT I think I have it right now. Thanks for the heads up.

Contacted the site and have to admit they were very quick to respond. They seem to very knowledgeable and genuinely interested in my questions. But I don't even know enough about lights to ask the right questions. From what they told me, I would describe them as sort of a 'cyber think tank'. They have a passion for LED lighting and are frustrated with the bad reputation LEDs have (they believe it is because people do not really understand the science), marketing misrepresentations by guys out to make a quick buck and the over priced under delivering units on the market ... there are some legit units (but they are very expensive) and a whole bunch of junk out there. While they said they have tested several units currently on the market, they said they are not interested in endorsing or trash talking currently available units. Their quest is to invent their own PERFECT mousetrap - if you will.

They are trying to get potential grass (pun intended) root users to provide some input & feedback during their developmental phase because they said their goal is to educate and give growers what they want / need in lights. They indicated they are working with several groups: Orchid Growers (who knew??? ... I think a Sativa 100 days into flower is a thing of beauty), coral growers (really?), agriculture, etc. and would like to get input from the Medical Marijuana community as they recognize us as representing a significant percentage of artificial light users.

As I said (and have been saying since 2009) I know virtually nothing about indoor growing & artificial lights but from everything I read on sites like this, I need to catch up with the times, get motivated and actually try indoor growing instead of just talking about it. This, unfortunately, makes me a very poor candidate for providing them the input they are looking for. So if there is anyone out there that would be interested in helping develop a lighting system customized to our needs this looks like it may be a good opportunity.

I dunno, right now my head is spinning ... paralysis through over analysis .... everyone seems to be very loyal to the type (T5, HID, LED etc) and brand of lighting they use and it is difficult for me to tell what is marketing hype and what is fact when it comes to deciding how to approach lighting for an indoor grow - so for now "Green acres is the place to be. Farm living is the life me. Land spreadin' out so far and wide. Keep indoor growing, just give me that countryside."

yes you can/do grow corals with LED's before LED was a creditable light source you had to use HID's!

LED's are great for growing, only advise I can offer is aim for a mixed red and blue LED and obviously the higher wattage the better! there is a lot of crap out there and a lot of the time its a gamble on whether or not your getting 'the real deal', there is an LED thread in the indoor growing section which could probably shed more light than I can.

If your going for your first indoor grow why don't you roll out the CFL's to begin with? and once you have some experience growing this wonderful plant you can start to experiment with other things! or grab an LED half way thru the grow, it will only do good!

As per the science, to be honest, I think everything has been done and/or is in development, in the sense of what the plant needs. it's now specified down to an exact spectrum of light, UVA and UVB are good additions to better simulate the suns rays, and now they're just developing higher wattage Diodes for instance the 3w Cree LED's (or something to that effect).