Three scientists won the Nobel Prize in physics on Tuesday for their discovery of blue light-emitting diodes that catalyzed the development of LED lighting.

It wasn't until the early 1990s that Japanese scientists Isamu Akasaki and Hiroshi Amano and Japanese-born American scientist Shuji Nakamura found blue LED, which is crucial for white light, according to a report from The Associated Press.

"They succeeded where everyone else had failed," the Nobel committee said. "Incandescent light bulbs lit the 20th century; the 21st century will be lit by LED lamps."

It hasn't taken long for LED lights to be used in a litany of items, like computers, televisions, smartphones and streetlights, but it took science a while to determine how to create the white LED light.

Red and green light-emitting diodes have been used since the 1950s in products like watches and calculators, but the blue LED needed -- in combination with red and green -- is of a shorter wavelength and was harder to produce.

LED lights use less energy and have longer lifespans than their incandescent and fluorescent counterparts.

"It is very satisfying to see that my dream of LED lighting has become a reality," Nakamura said in a statement released by the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he is a professor. "I hope that energy-efficient LED light bulbs will help reduce energy use and lower the cost of lighting worldwide."

The Nobel committee said LEDs help save the Earth's resources because about one-fourth of world electricity consumption is used for lighting. LED lights often last 10 times longer than fluorescent lights and 100 times longer than incandescent light bulbs.

LED lighting could reduce the amount of world electricity spent on lighting to 4 percent, according to a report from BBC.

"The blue LED is a fundamental invention that is rapidly changing the way we bring light to every corner of the home, the street and the workplace -- a practical invention that comes from a fundamental understanding of physics in the solid state," said H. Frederick Dylla, the executive director and CEO of the American Institute of Physics.