George Frederick Barker was born on July 14, 1835, in Charlestown, Massachusetts.

He was an American physician and scientist. In 1858, he graduated from the Yale Sheffield Scientific School. He became a chemical assistant at Harvard Medical School in 1858–1859 and in 1860–1861, professor of chemistry and geology in Wheaton College, Illinois. In 1864, he became the professor of natural science at the Western University of Pennsylvania, now known as the University of Pittsburgh, where he undertook experiments to produce electric light by passing the current through a resisting filament. He subsequently went to Yale as a professor of physiological chemistry and toxicology, and later was a professor of physics at the University of Pennsylvania, in 1879–1900, when he became emeritus professor. He served as president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1879; president of the American Chemical Society; vice-president of the American Philosophical Society; a member of the United States Electrical Commission; and for several years an associate editor of the American Journal of Science. He lectured in many cities and wrote several textbooks on chemistry and physics.

He died on May 24, 1910, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.