Group testing for image compression

This paper presents the group testing for wavelets algorithm (GTM), which is a novel embedded wavelet-based image compression technique based on the concept of group testing. We explain how group testing is a generalization of the zerotree coding technique for wavelet-transformed images. We also show that Golomb coding is equivalent to Hwang´s (Du and Hwang, 1993) group testing algorithm. GTW is similar to SPIHT (Said and Pearlman, 1996) but replaces SPIHT´s sorting pass with a new group testing based method. Although no arithmetic coding is implemented, GTW performs competitively with SPIHT´s arithmetic coding variant in terms of rate-distortion performance