arXiv:2512.10044v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Neutron-source identification is central to nuclear physics and its applications, from planetary science to nuclear security, yet direct discrimination from neutron spectra remains fundamentally elusive. Here, we introduce a Bayesian protocol that directly infers source ensembles from measured neutron spectra by combining full-spectrum template matching with probabilistic evidence evaluation. Applying this protocol to recoil and time-of-flight spectroscopy, we recover single- and two-source configurations with strong statistical significance ($>!!4sigma$) at event counts as low as $sim!!10^{3}$. These results demonstrate that neutron spectral signatures can be leveraged for robust source identification, opening a new observational window for both fundamental research and operationally driven applications.