Google's artificial intelligence program AlphaGo took on the Chinese world number one of ancient board game Go on Tuesday, the second time it has gone head-to-head with a master Go player.

In the first of three planned games at an event in the eastern Chinese water town of Wuzhen, AlphaGo, which is part of Google's DeepMind project, competed against Ke Jie, currently ranked as the top player in the world.

AlphaGo, which made history when it beat a top South Korean professional player last year, will go up against Ke Jie in two more matches slated for Thursday and Saturday this week.

The AlphaGo match comes amid a Chinese government push to compete internationally in artificial intelligence.

Baidu in March launched an AI lab in cooperation with China's National Development and Reform Commission.

Google pulled its search engine from China seven years ago after it refused to self-censor internet searches, a requirement of the Chinese government. It has since been rendered inaccessible behind the country's firewall, maintaining only a limited presence through a joint venture in the country.

In March Google announced Chinese users would be able to access the Translate mobile app.