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All algebras considered in this paper are commutative with 1. Let baℓ be the category of bounded Archimedean ℓ-algebras. We investigate Dedekind completions and Dedekind complete algebras in baℓ. We give several characterizations for A ∈ baℓ to be Dedekind complete. Also, given A, B ∈ baℓ, we give several characterizations for B to be the Dedekind completion of A. We prove that unlike general Gelfand-Neumark-Stone duality, the duality for Dedekind complete algebras does not require any form of the Stone-Weierstrass Theorem. We show that taking the Dedekind completion is not functorial, but that it is functorial if we restrict our attention to those A ∈ baℓ that are Baer rings. As a consequence of our results, we give a new characterization of when A ∈ baℓ is a C*-algebra. We also show that A is a C*-algebra if and only if A is the inverse limit of an inverse family of clean C*-algebras. We conclude the paper by discussing how to derive Gleason's theorem about projective compact Hausdorff spaces and projective covers of compact Hausdorff spaces from our results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]