Design of globally optimal multiple description scalar quantizers

Abstract

Due to the character of the original source materials and the nature of batch digitization, quality control issues may be present in this document. Please report any quality issues you encounter to [email protected], referencing the URI of the item.Includes bibliographical references.This thesis investigates the design of globally optimal multiple description scalar quantizers. The design of multiple description scalar quantizers is formulated as a combinatorial optimization problem due to the index assignment issue. The first approach uses the simulated annealing technique coupled with the generalized Lloyd algorithm developed for multiple description scalar quantizers. The second approach utilizes deterministic annealing, where a sequence of smooth energy functions, parameterized by a temperature coefficient is generated. The design of the multiple description scalar quantizer with the simulated annealing algorithm resulted in good index assignments. For Gaussian and Laplacian sources, a significant improvement in the overall distortion of the quantizer was achieved. For the Uniform source, no improvement was observed. The deterministic annealing algorithm used for the design of the multiple description scalar quantizer, performed poorly and was worse than the conventional design method at high rates