Otto Warburg, an outstanding biochemist, was born in Freiburg, Germany. His Jewish father was a physics professor from an old family of bankers, philanthropists, scholars, and businessmen. The family of his Christian mother was filled with public officials, lawyers, and soldiers. When Warburg was twelve, the family moved to Berlin; Germany's leading scientists, musicians, and artists were frequent visitors to their home. Warburg studied chemistry under Emil Fischer at the University of Berlin, earning his Ph.D. in 1906, and then received a medical degree from the University of Heidelberg in 1911.

In 1913 Warburg became head of his own laboratory at the Kaiser Wilhelm (later Max Planck) Institute for Biology in Berlin. Here he devoted himself entirely to research topics of his own choosing. A tireless and innovative experimenter, Warburg made a number of important biochemical discoveries during his long career at the Institute; the Dictionary of Scientific Biography lists...