 In 1871 he became a clinical director at the University of Freiburg.In 1877 Czerny was appointed professor at Heidelberg, where he succeeded surgeon Gustav Simon (1824–1876).In 1906 he founded the "Institut für Experimentelle Krebsforschung" (Institute for Experimental Cancer Research), which was a forerunner to today's German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg.