[Title page]

The following topics are dealt with: spoofing attacks; robust fingerprint verification; large-scale fingerprint database indexing; large-scale fingerprint database retrieval; type-independent pixel-level alignment point detection; adaptive SIFT-based algorithm; keyed scalable minutiae coding; fingerprint image quality; palmprint recognition; PCA-based multispectral band compression; orientation pattern hashing; DCT; Walsh transforms; discrete orthonormal s-transform; Gabor Wigner transform; hand biometrics interoperability; hand-shape feature selection; finger-vein image restoration; finger-vein image enhancement; Riesz transforms based coding scheme; finger-knuckle-print recognition; hand image segmentation algorithm; hand-dorsa vein recognition; multi-modal biometric feature extraction and contactless multimodal biometric system.