Though the scalextric is fun, there are plans to use mind-control power in far more sophisticated ways. “If you’ve had an accident or are paralysed then your brain could still work even if your body can’t. There’s quite a lot of research that goes into that area, and trying to control things just by thinking about them,” says Dr Sigurnjak. “The goal would be that you could think about turning left in a wheelchair and automatically turn left. And in the future you might be able to translate your thoughts. So you could think about what you want to write and a computer would type it out.”