[5] His research and advocacy laid the groundwork for modern conservation genetics, influencing global efforts to protect endangered plant species and ecosystems.
Frankel's distinguished career spanned several decades, during which he made significant contributions to both theoretical and applied genetics, earning him numerous accolades, including fellowship in the Royal Society (FRS) and the Australian Academy of Science (FAA).
Otto claimed to have had no education, as this was a classical rather than a modern school, with poor mathematics and next to no science but eight years of Latin and four of Greek.
In the autumn of 1922 he joined at the Agricultural University of Berlin, having been given credit for his earlier studies in Vienna, Munich and Giessen, as well as for his practical work on his family's farm.
He was challenged by Baur's claim to be able to work with genes and the genetic combinations of plants exactly like the chemist with his molecules and his formulae.
In this Otto was unlucky because, after an extensive crossing and back-crossing programme, he found that all but one of the mutations segregated independently of A, and to a large extent of one another.
However, the introduction to his thesis was a comprehensive review of linkage in plants that brought high praise from Baur and earned his doctorate from the University of Berlin in 1925.
Lewis Namier persuaded Otto to emigrate to Palestine to help establish a plant and animal breeding programme there and to act as a bridge between the Zionist Organization and the Empire Marketing Board under the direction of John Boyd Orr.
[1] Beginning in 1964 Frankel worked as a member of the International Biological Program (IBP) focusing on the issue of genetic resources.
In 1995 he co-wrote the book 'The conservation of plant biodiversity' with Anthony H. D. Brown and Jeremy James Burdon.