Scientists claim the computer keyboard could be a powerful new tool in their battle against Parkinson 's disease . Researchers in Massachusetts believe a person 's keystrokes may reveal a huge amount of information about their motor skills . Now they 're working on creating a keyboard that can tell doctors if someone has the neuron impairment , simply by analysing the way they type . Scroll down for video . Scientists claim the common computer keyboard could be a powerful new tool in their battle against Parkinson 's disease . Researchers in Massachusetts say a person 's keystrokes may reveal a huge amount of information about their motor skills . For the body to begin moving , the brain 's primary motor cortex sends signals through several other brain regions , including the supplementary motor area , cerebellum , and basal ganglia . These brain areas activate spinal neurons that stimulate muscles to execute the movement . But many factors can interfere with motor ability , including sleep deprivation , which reduces dexterity . In people with Parkinson 's disease , dopamine-producing cells in part of the brain called the substantia nigra are killed off , leading to tremors , slowness of movement , and difficulty walking . Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have now created an algorithm that can tell how effectively someone is striking a keypad . For instance , it can distinguish between typing done in the middle of the night , when sleep deprivation impairs motor skills , and typing performed when fully rested . It does this by analysing something known as 'key hold time ' - a measure of how long a key is pressed before being released . The study is based on the premise that 'there might be hidden information in the way that we type , ' says Ian Butterworth , one of researchers . 'At the moment , pretty much all of the other information in typing is thrown out . We just pay attention to what keys are being pressed , not when or for how long . ' Scientists have developed a six-minute test which could give an early diagnosis of Parkinson 's disease . Currently Parkinson 's patients only discover they have the debilitating neurological problem when the symptoms have already taken hold . But last year Oxford University academics have come up with a new way of spotting the disease at an early stage . The researchers were able to detect early Parkinson 's disease with a remarkable 85 per cent accuracy . The technique uses an MRI scanner to monitor the neural connections in a concentrated area at the very centre of the brain . Even at a very early stage , Parkinson 's patients had much weaker connections in the basal ganglia region of the brain , which is associated with motor control . The study , which has been published in the journal Neurology , found that by taking 180 pictures in six minutes they could spot the poor connections . They also found that the test had a very low chance of incorrectly diagnosing healthy people with the disease . This study focused on the effects of fatigue , but the researchers say they could diagnose conditions that impair motor function , such as Parkinson 's disease , much earlier than is now possible . Preliminary results from a study of about two dozen Parkinson 's patients suggest that the researchers ' algorithm for analysing keystrokes can also distinguish people who have the disease from those who do n't . The team is now planning a larger study of Parkinson 's patients . They are also working on smartphone apps that could be used to gather the same kind of data from mobile devices . 'We thought this was a unique opportunity to have a window into the brain using your normal interactions with an electronic device , ' says MIT researcher Alvaro Sanchez-Ferro . 'You already have the hardware . You just have to let someone evaluate the information you collect every day when you use the device , and try to pull it out for health-related purposes . ' People are usually diagnosed with Parkinson 's disease five to 10 years after the beginning of the disease , and lot of the damage has already been done , the researchers say . John Growdon , director of the Memory and Movement Disorders Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital , says it will be important for the researchers to demonstrate in future studies that the typing deficiencies correlate with the severity of Parkinson 's disease . 'Overall , it strikes me that this has great potential to detect subtle motor impairments even in advance of a clinician 's ability to find them , ' adds Growdon , who was not involved in the study . The researchers believe this strategy could also be used to evaluate patients with other diseases that affect motor skills , such as rheumatoid arthritis . 'This might have applications in any disease producing a motor impairment , whether it 's in your hands and muscles or the brain , ' Sanchez-Ferro says . The team are working on smartphone apps that may be used to gather the same type of data from mobiles .
MIT 's algorithm reveals how effectively someone is striking keys . It does this by studying how long key is pressed before being released . Team are working on an app that gathers same data from a smartphone . It could detect other problems that affect movement , such as arthritis .