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When cars are involved in a crash, they risk being thrown on the scrapheap, wasting lots of materials.

But in the future, we could grow new parts and vehicles could heal themselves.

This is the vision of an artist who has imagined the benefits of creating cars from biological materials that could change and adapt to their environments.

Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, artist in residence at Warwick University, is working with synthetic biologists at Imperial College London to develop parts for a car of the future. 

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Could we grow cars? An artist thinks that biological cars built from living materials could evolve and mutate. This is a sketch imagining how if Minis were made from biological materials, their design may start to diversify and evolve depending where they are made, used and repaired

Synthetic biologists aim to develop new materials that behave like living organisms.

Ms Ginsberg believes that synthetic biological cars built from such materials could evolve and mutate so they could adapt to their environments like living organisms and has showcased her ideas at the Dezeen and Mini Frontiers exhibition.

She told Dezeen: My concept is around "repair ecologies". Would cars that are repaired in a hot place be different to cars that are repaired in a city full of pollution, or cars repaired somewhere humid?'

While the development of such a car may take decades, Ms Ginsberg says that scientists are already researching and developing new materials so her vision could be possible one day.

She is not only concerned with new materials, but in understanding how a car's design might change if industrial manufacturing was replaced with a biological process.

Ms Ginsberg told MailOnline: 'I'm not saying that this is the future, rather I'm asking what values we might want in a biological future and what best sustainable practice might be if we could design living things.

The future? Ms Ginsberg (pictured) has imagined an alternative vision for sustainable car production.'Instead of being built centrally and distributed globally, car shells would be fabricated using local biological materials, processes, feedstocks and expertise,' she said

'Should we reimagine what it means to design things? Instead of buying and throwing away as we do today, could products have different lifecycles that would change our expectations of how we consume things?

She explained that scientists are already researching materials such as chitin, which is a biological plastic found in insects and crab shells, as well as bioplastics from corn.

'Others are looking at self-healing materials like concrete infused with bacteria that secrete limestone on contact with water. Some of these new materials are starting to be used imperceptibly today.'

If such materials were combined with synthetic biology – a new approach to genetic engineering – car parts and other objects could have their origins in biology.

This might be radical, or the technology could be incorporated gradually so that consumers barely notice.

Ms Ginsberg has imagined an alternative vision for sustainable car production.

'A car company would distribute only a chassis and a form for the shell of the car to its workshops around the world. Instead of being built centrally and distributed globally, car shells would be fabricated using local biological materials, processes, feedstocks and expertise.

So in areas there there are woods, a car might have a wood-based body, factories with access to corn may make cars from bioplastic, while places near the sea might build cars from seaweed or other local resources. 

'These shells could be as simple as being built from wood, or perhaps they could be grown from bioengineered materials that don't yet exist,' she explained.

A car crash idea? Ms Ginsberg said that her concept centres around 'repair ecologies. Would cars that are repaired in a hot place be different to cars that are repaired in a city full of pollution, or cars repaired somewhere humid?' Currently, cars are repaired with metal after a crash (pictured) or put on the scrap heap

'I'm interested in thinking about how a single design might diversify, mutate and "inherit" traits over generations.

'If the shell of your car was disposable, you might alter it depending on the climate you live in, or how often you drive or even better, in response to what the neighbours have done with their car!

'In this project, I'm modelling a small one-person car that diversifies in over a hundred ways over 13 generations.'

Because materials such as wood are less durable than metal, Ms Ginsberg thinks they will need repairing more often.

'The availability of local materials, the local repair traditions and climate differences would encourage design diversity.

'Perhaps it would become desirable to make visible repairs, celebrating things ageing, getting damaged? You might customise the car for non-practical reasons, simply to show your individuality.' 

Last year, a British designer came up with a concept for a pair of shoes (pictured) made from 'cells' that regenerate so they don't wear out - but just like the car, they cannot be put into production at present