History and Modern Usage
Xenon short-arc lamps were invented in the 1940s in Germany and introduced in 1951 by Osram. First launched in the 2 kW size (XBO2001), these lamps saw wide use in movie projection, where they replaced the older, more complicated carbon arc lamps. The white, continuous light generated by the xenon arc is spectrally similar to daylight, but the lamp has a rather low efficiency in terms of lumens of visible light output per watt of input power. Today, almost all movie projectors in theaters employ these lamps, with power ratings ranging from 900 watts up to 12 kW. Omnimax (Imax Dome) projection systems use single xenon lamps with ratings as high as 15 kW.
Read more about this topic: Xenon Arc Lamp
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