Otto Heinrich Warburg

Otto Heinrich Warburg was a German physiologist, medical doctor and Nobel laureate who made significant contributions to the field of biochemistry. He was the son of physicist Emil Warburg and the nephew of botanist and Zionist leader Otto Warburg. He studied chemistry at the University of Berlin and medicine at the University of Heidelberg, where he obtained his doctorate in 1911. He then worked as an assistant to Emil Fischer, a renowned chemist and Nobel laureate, at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Chemistry in Berlin. During World War I, he served as an officer in the elite cavalry regiment Uhlan and was awarded the Iron Cross for bravery.¹ After the war, he returned to the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute and became the director of its physiology department in 1918. He focused his research on cellular respiration, the process by which cells use oxygen to produce energy from organic molecules. He discovered several enzymes involved in this process, such as cytochrome c oxidase and hexokinase, and developed methods to measure the oxygen consumption and carbon dioxide production of cells. He also identified the difference between normal cells and cancer cells in terms of their metabolic pathways. He proposed that cancer cells switch from aerobic respiration to anaerobic glycolysis, a less efficient but faster way of generating energy. This phenomenon is known as the Warburg effect or Warburg hypothesis.¹ Warburg was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 47 times during his career, but he only received it once, in 1931, for his discovery of the nature and mode of action of the respiratory enzyme.¹ He was also awarded other prestigious honors, such as the Pour le Mérite (Civil Class) in 1952 and the Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize in 1962. He was elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Society in 1953.² Warburg survived under the Nazi regime despite being Jewish by descent and having many enemies within the scientific community. He was protected by his former military comrades and by Adolf Hitler's personal physician, who admired his work on cancer. He refused to leave Germany even after being offered positions at Oxford and Harvard. He continued his research until his death from a stroke in 1970 at the age of 86.¹ Warburg was one of the most influential biochemists of the 20th century. His discoveries paved the way for further studies on cellular respiration, metabolism, and cancer. His legacy is honored by the Otto Warburg Medal, an award given annually by the German Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology to outstanding scientists in this field.