In topology, the Tietze extension theorem (also known as the Tietze–Urysohn–Brouwer extension theorem) states that continuous functions on a closed subset of a normal topological space can be extended to the entire space, preserving boundedness if necessary. Formal statement If is a normal space and is a continuous map from a closed subset of into the real numbers carrying the standard topology, then there exists a of to that is, there exists a map continuous on all of with for all Moreover, may be chosen such that that is, if is bounded then may be chosen to be bounded (with the same bound as ). History L. E. J. Brouwer and Henri Lebesgue proved a special case of the theorem, when is a finite-dimensional real vector space. Heinrich Tietze extended it to all metric spaces, and Pavel Urysohn proved the theorem as stated here, for normal topological spaces. Equivalent statements This theorem is equivalent to Urysohn's lemma (which is also equivalent to the normality of the space) and is widely applicable, since all metric spaces and all compact Hausdorff spaces are normal. It can be generalized by replacing with for some indexing set any retract of or any normal absolute retract whatsoever. Variations If is a metric space, a non-empty subset of and is a Lipschitz continuous function with Lipschitz constant then can be extended to a Lipschitz continuous function with same constant This theorem is also valid for Hölder continuous functions, that is, if is Hölder continuous function with constant less than or equal to then can be extended to a Hölder continuous function with the same constant. Another variant (in fact, generalization) of Tietze's theorem is due to H.Tong and Z. Ercan: Let be a closed subset of a normal topological space If is an upper semicontinuous function, a lower semicontinuous function, and a continuous function such that for each and for each , then there is a continuous extension of such that for each This theorem is also valid with some additional hypothesis if is replaced by a general locally solid Riesz space. See also References External links Weisstein, Eric W. "Tietze's Extension Theorem." From MathWorld Mizar system proof: http://mizar.org/version/current/html/tietze.html#T23 . Theory of continuous functions Theorems in topology