The Microsoft research department has been hard at work with a new type of gesture recognising keyboard that could be the death of the mouse. The Type-Hover-Swipe keyboard is a bit like combining a keyboard and a really advanced Leap Motion.

The Type-Hover-Swipe keyboard uses a 16x4 array of infrared sensors interspersed between the usual keys. Combined with smart algorithms it is able to recognise hand movements and gestures. That way a user can go from typing to pinching to zoom without moving their hands far from the keyboard.

Other gestures that can be recognised include a pointer shape to maximise a window, a finger tap to index up and down, or a hand hover up and down to switch between all windows and one. Plenty of other gestures can be recognised but since it's still at the developmental stage not everything is set to an end result.

Fingertip tracking is also an option that will allow for full touch-based interaction. This will mean there is no real need for a mouse.

The Type-Hover-Swipe keyboard is clearly still in the developmental stage but we can't wait to see it built into laptops and available as a stand-alone keyboard in the near future.

READ: Leap Motion's Freeform app helps your 3D printing, next-gen tracking coming January 2014