Pref ac e
Discrete wavelet transform (DWT) algorithms have become standards tools for pro-
cessing of signals and images in several areas in research and industry. The fi rst DWT
structures were based on the compactly supported conjugate quadrature fi lters (CQFs).
However, a drawback in CQFs is related to the nonlinear phase eff ects such as image
blurring and spatial dislocations in multi-scale analyses. On the contrary, in biorthogo-
nal discrete wavelet transform (BDWT) the scaling and wavelet fi lters are symmetric
and linear phase. The BDWT algorithms are commonly constructed by a ladder-type
network called li ing scheme. The procedure consists of sequential down and upli -
ing steps and the reconstruction of the signal is made by running the li ing network
in reverse order. Effi cient li ing BDWT structures have been developed for VLSI and
microprocessor applications. The analysis and synthesis fi lters can be implemented
by integer arithmetics using only register shi s and summations. Many BDWT-based
data and image processing tools have outperformed the conventional discrete cosine
transform (DCT) -based approaches. For example, in JPEG2000 Standard the DCT has
been replaced by the li ing BDWT.
As DWT provides both octave-scale frequency and spatial timing of the analyzed sig-
nal, it is constantly used to solve and treat more and more advanced problems. One of
the main diffi culties in multi-scale analysis is the dependency of the total energy of the
wavelet coeffi cients in diff erent scales on the fractional shi s of the analysed signal. If
we have a discrete signal x[n] and the corresponding time shi ed signal x[n-τ], where
τ ∈ [0,1], there may exist a signifi cant diff erence in the energy of the wavelet coeffi cients
as a function of the time shi . In shi invariant methods the real and imaginary parts
of the complex wavelet coeffi cients are approximately a Hilbert transform pair. The
energy of the wavelet coeffi cients equals the envelope, which provides smoothness and
approximate shi -invariance. Using two parallel DWT banks, which are constructed
so that the impulse responses of the scaling fi lters have half-sample delayed versions
of each other, the corresponding wavelets are a Hilbert transform pair. The dual-tree
CQF wavelet fi lters do not have coeffi cient symmetry and the nonlinearity interferes
with the spatial timing in diff erent scales and prevents accurate statistical correlations.
Therefore the current developments in theory and applications of wavelets are concen-
trated on the dual-tree BDWT structures.
This book reviews the recent progress in theory and applications of wavelet transform
algorithms. The book is intended to cover a wide range of methods (e.g. li ing DWT,
shi
invariance, 2D image enhancement) for constructing DWTs and to illustrate the
utilization of DWTs in several non-stationary problems and in biomedical as well as
industrial applications. It is organized into four major parts. Part I focuses on non-