Investigators at the University of Colorado, Boulder and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a new sensor array-based instrument that offers ultra-low noise detection of small amounts of energy for a number of applications. The new device allows for the collection of data from many more detectors than was previously possible. The advance, reported in this week’s issue of Applied Physics Letters, is expected to allow applications in fields as diverse as nuclear materials accounting, astrophysics and X-ray spectrometry.