As he reports in Nature this week, Dr Blanke then systematically applied additional electric currents to the woman's right angular gyrus.

ECONOMIST: Out-of-body experiences

When the current was first applied to the right angular gyrus, the woman reported that she was sinking into the bed, as if falling from a height.

ECONOMIST: Out-of-body experiences

Five years ago Dr Blanke found he could induce such experiences at will in one such person by stimulating a particular part of her brain the right angular gyrus with an electric current.

ECONOMIST: Consciousness

Presumably this will include the right angular gyrus.

ECONOMIST: Consciousness

While probing the brain of a woman who suffered from epilepsy, Olaf Blanke and his colleagues at the University Hospital of Geneva found that stimulating the right angular gyrus (a point about an inch above and slightly behind the right ear, and just inside the skull) caused her to feel that she was travelling out of her own body.

ECONOMIST: Out-of-body experiences