[3] Nakamura specializes in the field of semiconductor technology, and he is a professor of materials science at the College of Engineering of the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB).

[4] Together with Isamu Akasaki and Hiroshi Amano, Nakamura received the 2014 Nobel Prize for Physics "for the invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes, which has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources".

In 2015, his input into the commercialization and development of energy-efficient white LED lighting technology was recognized by the Global Energy Prize.

Previously, J. I. Pankove and co-workers at RCA put in considerable effort but did not make a marketable GaN LED in the 1960s.

The company under Eiji's direction ordered him to suspend work on GaN, claiming it was consuming too much time and money.

[13][12] Despite these circumstances, once Nakamura succeeded in creating a commercially viable prototype, 3 orders of magnitude (1000 times) brighter than previously successful blue LEDs, Nichia pursued developing the marketable product.

[21] In 2008, Nakamura, along with fellow UCSB professors Dr. Steven P. DenBaars and Dr. James Speck, founded Soraa, a developer of solid-state lighting technology built on pure gallium nitride substrates.