Killer robots of the future will need more powerful chips to allow them to process vast amounts of data.

The US military has now announced it is investing $900 million (£665 million) on advanced materials and technologies to make these processors a reality.

It hope its efforts will enable the 50 years of growth in micro-processing power to continue over the coming century.

This will allow for the creation of advanced AI systems, ranging from killing machines to cars, planes and other autonomous technology.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA) Electronics Resurgence Initiative's will create six new programs over the next four years.

These are aimed at ensuring the predictions made by Moore's law, which have governed the increases in microchip processing power, will continue to apply to chip development.

Three areas will be focused on, materials and integration, circuit design, and systems architecture.