Walter Dieckmann (1869-1925)

German chemist, born in Hamburg. He studied in Munich, where he worked with Adolf von Baeyer and spent his whole career.

In 1894 he described the base-induced cyclization of diesters, the intramolecular version of the Claisen condensation now known as the Dieckmann condensation, which gives five- and six-membered cyclic β-keto esters.