By the year 2020, you won't need a keyboard and mouse to control your computer, say Intel Corp. researchers. Instead, users will open documents and surf the Web using nothing more than their brain waves.

In the last few years, patterns in brain activity have been used to successfully predict what pictures people are looking at, their location in a virtual environment or a decision they are poised to make. The most recent results show that researchers can now recreate moving images that volunteers are viewing - and even make educated guesses at which event they are remembering.

Distinctive brain patterns could become the latest subject of biometric scanning after EU researchers successfully tested technology to verify ­identities for security checks.

Neuroscience research into how we think and what we're thinking is advancing at a stunning rate, making it possible for the first time in human history to peer directly into the brain to read out the physical make-up of our thoughts, some would say to read our minds.

India has become the first country to convict someone of a crime relying on evidence from a controversial brain scanner that produces images of the human mind in action and is said to reveal signs that a suspect remembers details of the crime in question.

A team of world-leading neuroscientists has developed a powerful technique that allows them to look deep inside a person's brain and read their intentions before they act.

Interest in using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) brain-scanning technology as a lie-detector by government agencies and criminal defense lawyers is increasing although there are still many scientific and ethical questions left to be resolved.

Scientists say they have been able to monitor people's thoughts via scans of their brains. Teams at University College London and University of California in LA could tell what images people were looking at or what sounds they were listening to.

It is possible to read someone's mind by remotely measuring their brain activity using functional MRI scanning, researchers have shown. The technique can even extract information from subjects that they are not aware of themselves.

Researchers have developed ever more sensitive ways of peering into the brain to seek out explanations for brain disease. In most cases these technologies are good news for patients, bringing new ways of understanding health and treatment options. However, standards defining ethical ways of moving forward with the new technology are needed in order to prevent abuse