The oldest form of mineral processing practiced since the Stone Age is hand-picking. Georgius Agricola also describes hand-picking is his book De re metallica in 1556. Sensor-based sorting is the automation and extension to hand picking. In addition to sensors that measure visible differences like color (and the further interpretation of the data regarding texture and shape), other sensors are available on industrial scale sorters that are able to measure differences invisible for the human eye (EM, XRT, NIR).
The principles of the technology and the first machinery has been developed since the 1920s (. Nevertheless, widely applied and standard technology it is only in the industrial minerals and gemstone segments. Mining is benefiting from the step change developments in sensing and computing technologies and from machine development in the recycling and food processing industries.
In 2002, Cutmore and Eberhard stated that the relatively small installed base of sensor-based sorters in mining is more a result of insufficient industry interest than any technical barriers to their effective use 
Nowadays sensor-based sorting is beginning to reveal its potential in various applications in basically all segments of mineral production (industrial minerals, gemstones, base-metals, precious metals, ferrous metals, fuel). Precondition is physical liberation in coarse size ranges (~) to make physical separation possible. Either the product fraction, but more often the waste fraction needs to be liberated. If liberation is present, there is good potential that one of available detection technologies on today's sensor-based sorters can positively or negatively identify one of the two desired fractions.