Swiss scientists have shown how a partially paralyzed person can control a robot using brain signals alone.

The team from the Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne say the experiment takes them a step closer to enabling immobile patients to interact with their surroundings through a robot “avatar.”

In a demonstration on Tuesday, a partially tetraplegic patient at a hospital in Sion imagined lifting his fingers to direct a robot at the university, 100 kilometres away.

Similar experiments have taken place in the United States and Germany, but they involved able-bodied patients or brain implants.

The Swiss team used only a simple head cap to record the brain signals.