| Otto Warburg | |
|---|---|
Otto Warburg, 1911 |
|
| Born | July 20, 1859 Hamburg, Germany |
| Died | January 10, 1938 (aged 78) Berlin, Germany |
| Occupation | botanist |
| Spouse | Anna |
| Children | Edgar, Michael, Renate, Gustav, Gertrud |
Otto Warburg (1859–1938), was a German botanist and industrial agriculture expert, as well as an active member of the Zionist Organization (ZO). From 1911–21, he served as the president of the ZO, which among other things, sought 'for the Jewish people a publicly and legally assured home in Palestine."[1]
Otto Warburg was born in Hamburg on 20 July 1859 to a family whose ancestors came to Germany in 1566, possibly from Bologna. He completed his studies at the Johanneum Gymnasium in Hamburg in 1879, and continued his education in the field of botany at the University of Bonn which he left after one semester to move to the University of Berlin, and later to University of Strasbourg, where he received his Ph.D in 1883. He went on to study chemistry in Munich and physiology in Tübingen with Wilhelm Pfeffer. In 1885 he embarked on a 4 year expedition to Southern and Southeastern Asia, ending in Australia in 1889. His findings were later (1913–1922) published in three volumes titled Die Pflanzenwelt. Upon his return to Berlin he co founded Der Tropen Pflanzer, a journal specializing in tropical agriculture which he edited for 24 years. Realizing that as a Jew he would not be appointed full professor, he diverted his attentions to applied botanics, and founded several companies of tropical industrial plantations in Germany's colonies.
Taxa named include the Kei Apple (Dovyalis caffra), the pitcher plant Nepenthes treubiana, Virola peruviana, and Cephalosphaera usambarensis.