In 1877 he earned his degree from University of Breslau, afterwards serving as an assistant to Pier Andrea Saccardo at the botanical garden in Padua.
[1][2] He edited the exsiccata-like series Selectae stirpes Liguriae issued without serial numbers for the participants of the International Botanical Congress 1892.
[3] Later he traveled to Ceylon and Java, where he conducted investigations of Myxomycetes in the laboratories at the Buitenzorg botanical gardens.
[1] The mycological genus Penzigia was named in his honor in 1888 by Pier Andrea Saccardo.
[4] His name is also associated with the genera Penzigina (botanist Otto Kuntze, 1891), which is now a synonym for Eriosphaeria Sacc.