Barbara Polla, born March 7, 1950, is a Swiss medical doctor, gallery owner, writer.
Contents |
After studying medicine in Geneva Barbara Polla obtains her degree with a specialization in inner medicine, pneumology and immunoallergology.[1] She then conducted research at Harvard Medical School (HMS), Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) in Boston.[1]
She is back in Switzerland in 1989 and takes the helm of the unit of study of allergies at the Cantonal Hospital.[1] She also steers the laboratory of respiratory physiology of the Cochin Faculty of Medicine, Paris V University from 1993 till 2000 as research director of the INSERM.[1] Her main focuses are the stress proteins (HSP) and oxygen free radicals.[1] She wrote and co-wrote about a hundred of original research articles published in reviews such as Proceedings of the National Academy of Science USA, The Journal of Clinical Investigation, The Americal Journal of Physiology, as well as numerous chapters of review specialized in stress proteins, oxidants and antioxidants.[1]
Getting involved in the Swiss national politics in 1991, she is at first member of the Geneva city council until 1993, then canton of Geneva deputee from 1993 to 1999[2] and eventually member of the national parliament from 1999 to 2003.[3] She leaves the Geneva liberal Party in 2007.
Barbara Polla is an entrepreneur in the field of beauty : Forever Laser Institute[4](institute of medical aesthetics) and Alchimie Forever (skin care products).[1]
Since 1991 she also pursues gallery owner's activity in Geneva. Analix Forever Gallery is notably characterized by an international programming of contemporary artists, its publications on art, interest for any domain of art and any medium, multiple collaborations with international art critics and curators.[5]
She regularly gives lectures on connections between art and fashion at the Institut Français de la Mode (IFM) in Paris and at the Geneva University of Art and Design (HEAD).
Barbara Polla is a writer and a columnist for numerous newspapers among which Les Quotidiennes,[6] Agefi, La Tribune de Genève and 24 heures (Switzerland),[1] Citizen K,[7] Nuke[7]] and Blast (Paris)[7] or Bariqaldana (Kuwait).[7]