Image copyright PA Image caption Dara O Briain will host the show alongside Angela Scanlon

Dara O Briain is to host the new series of Robot Wars alongside Irish broadcaster Angela Scanlon.

The pair will be at the helm when the show returns to BBC Two after an absence of more than 10 years.

The series will be filmed at a purpose-built fighting arena in Glasgow.

Mock the Week presenter and comedian O Briain said he was "thrilled", while Scanlon said she could not wait to "see the robots in all their metallic glory playfully destroying each other".

'Squeal with joy'

The six-part series will be shown on BBC Two with Jonathan Pearce commentating - as he did on the original series, fronted initially by Jeremy Clarkson and then Craig Charles.

O Briain said: "For too long, the schedules have cried out for a show in which dedicated amateurs, toiling day and night, handcraft sophisticated automatons built on the delicate interplay of hand-wired servo motors with custom-built circuit boards and fingertip motion control, just to see them get smashed to pieces by a dustbin carrying a massive hammer.

"It's war, and how I love it so."

Image caption The new logo for Robot Wars has also been unveiled

The new Robot Wars will see inventors pitting their robots against each other, as well as having to avoid the more powerful house robots.

It promises technological advances from the original series, which ran on the BBC from 1998 to 2002, as well as state-of-the-art cameras showing the fights in detail.

Scanlon, who has worked for Irish broadcaster RTE, said: "I'm so excited to be joining such a legendary show that, after all this time, still manages to make people squeal with joy.

Pearce, a commentator on Match of the Day, said he was "delighted to be involved and back among the cut and thrust of the robot battles".

BBC Two channel editor Adam Barker said the presenters were "the perfect team to bring to life all the excitement and drama from the arena".

The series was last broadcast from 2003 to 2004, on Channel 5.