Abstract:
With the intent of investigating natural verses synthetic pharmaceuticals, the underlying political battle of pharmacology emerges as a complex issue in today's society. Pain is a fundamental sensation experienced by every human being in existence. Whether this pain is mental or physical, it has the ability to test our body's limits. It is the very protective mechanism that is essential to our survival, and without it we would die. With pain comes the body's defensive mechanism to numb our senses of perception. Many times, this form of palliative relief is seen through substance abuse, such as Heroin. This proposal attempts to create a relationship between the physical and psychological effects of heroin dependency through investigation, firstly through cellular motility, and secondly through emotional responses to the phenomenology of space, time, movement and light when under the influence of heroin. The physical representation of heroin on cellular motility shows a shift in geometries, and meeting at the cusp of design, computation and biology, this implementation of shifting edges brings arise to a more complex understanding of dynamic cellular structure in an architectural language. This negotiates and integrates changes in the external forces of heroin with internal cellular mechanics, resulting in the exploration of translating molecular data to an architectural scale. The sensory environment, based on human experience is aimed to firstly provide a stimulating atmosphere, in which exposure of the incomplete perceptions of the human body aid in driving addicts towards a journey of rehabilitation. The unknown aspect of illicit drug taking to the general public sparks the need for education, in order to help those with addiction, a need for understanding by all is necessary. Stimulation of a heroin environment, represented at the various stages of the experience, is designed to arouse public curiosity. Although the programme encourages safety and knowledge in terms of intravenous drug use, it is the architecture which inherently works as a placebo to numb the perception of pain. Ultimately resulting in the safety or the abstinence of opiate abuse it will lead to a decrease in adverse health, social and economic consequences.