After five years spent working at his uncle's pharmacy in Dresden, he moved to Berlin, where he worked for two and a half years in the laboratory of chemist Johann Gottfried August Helming (1770–1830). In 1830 he became an assistant to Eilhard Mitscherlich at Berlin, subsequently receiving his doctorate with a thesis on pollen, Dissertatio de plantarum polline (1833). In 1844 he became an associate professor in St. Petersburg, where in 1852 he attained a full professorship.[1][2]
He is credited with coining the term "aniline" from the Sanskrit word for the indigo plant. In 1841 he obtained aniline by distilling indigo with caustic potash.[4] The mineral "fritzscheite" in named in his honor.[5]