AFP/File – A hospital employee performs a magnetic resonance scan on a patient in 2009. A scan of brain activity …

Thu Mar 11, 12:41 pm ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) – A scan of brain activity can effectively read a person’s mind, researchers said Thursday.

British scientists from University College London found they could differentiate brain activity linked to different memories and thereby identify thought patterns by using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).

The evidence suggests researchers can tell which memory of a past event a person is recalling from the pattern of their brain activity alone.

"We’ve been able to look at brain activity for a specific episodic memory — to look at actual memory traces," said senior author of the study, Eleanor Maguire.

"We found that our memories are definitely represented in the hippocampus. Now that we’ve seen where they are, we have an opportunity to understand how memories are stored and how they may change through time."   http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100311/hl_afp/scienceresearchusbritainpsychology_20100311174114