Image Compression Using Cascaded Neural Networks

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The completion of this thesis has involved an enormous amount of help from a number of people. First and foremost of these is Dr. Dimitrios Charalampidis, my thesis advisor, for providing the original ideas, suggestions, and motivation for the work. He freely bestowed his time, guidance, brilliance, and wisdom considerably beyond the call of duty; and was a model of professorial responsibility, professionalism, and commitment. What I have learned from him cannot be quantified. Special thanks to other members of my thesis committee, Dr. Juliette Ioup and Dr. Terry Riemer for enriching my experience in academia by sharing with me their intellectual curiosity, professional insight and integrity, and personal warmth and understanding through their courses. I would especially like to thank Dr. Juliette Ioup for carefully reading through the entire draft of my thesis and offering several helpful editorial comments. If anyone has had to be patient with me in the course of writing this thesis, it is my special friend, Melissa Bias. Her companionship has helped me to put forth my full effort, and to maintain my sanity. Sincere appreciation goes to Vijay Kura, a fellow graduate student and a good friend, for lending some of his exquisite programming skills at the beginning stages. And last, but most of all, to my parents, James and Mmachukwu Obiegbu, I owe everything; they sustain me in all that I do and it is to them that this work is dedicated with love; and in loving memory of my dearest cousin, Uchenna Ebeledike.