Milnor–Thurston kneading theory

The Milnor–Thurston kneading theory is a mathematical theory which analyzes the iterates of piecewise monotone mappings of an interval into itself. The emphasis is on understanding the properties of the mapping that are invariant under topological conjugacy.

The theory had been developed by John Milnor and William Thurston in two widely circulated and influential Princeton preprints from 1977 that were revised in 1981 and finally published in 1988. Applications of the theory include piecewise linear models, counting of fixed points, computing the total variation, and constructing an invariant measure with maximal entropy.