Question is as in the title:
What is the motivation and applications of barycentric subdivision of a simplicial complex?
Given a simplicial complex $K$, the barycentric subdivision of $K$ is another "better behaved" simplicial complex $sd(K)$. Moreover, this construction is a functor from the category of simplicial spaces to itself. Furter, this construction does not change the topology, in the sense that, the simplicial map $sd(K)\rightarrow K$ induce a homeomorphism, when passed through geometric realization, $|sd(K)|\rightarrow |K|$.
So, what was the motivation for this construction? I have checked in some references but could not get it completely. Moreover, what are some applications of this construction?