To the Graduate Council: I am submitting herewith a thesis written by ...

Vita 100VITASreenivas Rangan Sukumar was born in Chennai, India on the 16 th of May, 1981. Hegraduated as the department topper of his college with a Bachelors Degree inElectronics and Communication Engineering from the University of Madras, India in2002. Programming experience at the National Institute of Information Technology,India paved his way into Pentamedia Graphics Limited, India, where he was part ofthe research team that implemented a data compression framework for archivingmultimedia on the web. It infused his interest in image processing and informationtheory to pursue his Masters Degree at the Imaging, Robotics and Intelligent SystemsLab at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, U.S.A. He wishes to pursue hisacademic career with a PhD degree before he can be ready to contribute to the society.He spends his leisure time listening to Carnatic music and wishes for more time withthe “veena” (a south Indian musical instrument).