Career
In 1895 he received his medical doctorate from the University of Strasbourg, and subsequently worked at a private mental health institution in Pankow-Berlin. In 1896 he was an assistant to Eduard Hitzig (1838–1907) at the psychiatric hospital in Halle. In 1899 he began work at the psychiatric clinic of the Berlin-Charité, where he worked under Friedrich Jolly (1844–1904) and Theodor Ziehen (1862–1950).
After his habilitation in 1901, he became a lecturer at the University of Berlin.
In 1906 he became a titular professor Today, his name is associated with the "Rydel-Seiffer tuning fork", an instrument used for monitoring and diagnosis of nervous disorders.