In 1912, Lo transferred to Shanghai Nanyang Middle School and graduated in 1917.

After graduation, he entered the Hokkaido Imperial University, and majored agricultural science.

In the summer of 1944, Lo became the director of the Botany Research Institute of Academia Sinica in Chongqing, which was the wartime capital of China during the Second Sino-Japanese War.

In October 1946, the Botany Research Institute of Academia Sinica was moved from Chongqing to Shanghai, with Lo still assigned as its president.

After the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, Lo became the first president of the Research Institute of Plant Physiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.