 Carl Flügge was a native of Hanover.He studied medicine in Göttingen, Bonn, Leipzig and Munich, and in 1878 was a lecturer of hygiene in Berlin.In 1881 Flügge became the first chair of hygiene at the University of Göttingen, and afterwards a professor at the Universities of Breslau and Berlin, where he succeeded Max Rubner at the Department of Hygiene.