Irvine’s Lumenyte Puts Spotlight on the Cube

But soft, what light through yon window breaks?

If you’re near the new Discovery Science Center after it opens Dec. 19, it’ll probably be the glow from the lighted edges of the center’s signature metal Cube, the 8-foot tall, wide and deep cuboid structure that revolves above the center and serves as its sign.

The Cube originally was going to be lighted with neon, but when officials of Lumenyte International Inc. in Irvine read that little detail last year, they put their marketing team into overdrive.

As a result, the Cube will be outlined not with old-fashioned neon, but with 960 linear feet of Lumenyte’s futuristic fiber-optic lighting cable.

The clear plastic cable carries light much the way a hose carries water, the illumination coming from a light box at the base of each section of cable. Color wheels in the boxes (there will be 24 of them on the Cube) let the cable change color, and can be programmed for a variety of effects.

Lumenyte, which has helped pioneer fiber-optic lighting systems, is no novice. Its cable is widely used in Las Vegas, where hotel and casino owners know the value of a good show of light, and is used for a variety of commercial signage and lighting purposes.

Chris Bassett, Lumenyte’s director of education, says it took the company several months to make the sale after it went after the science center account.

Center officials were enthusiastic about fiber optics because of their low maintenance, and they like the fact that they could be programmed to change color, she said. “But what also sold them was that they are all about the future, and this is a product for the future,” Bassett said.

And it probably didn’t hurt that Lumenyte, which gets a lot of visibility for its product out of the deal, gave the nonprofit center a break on the price.

John O’Dell covers major Orange County corporations and manufacturing for The Times. He can be reached at (714) 966-5831 and at john.odell@latimes.com.