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I was once asked what signal processing is. The questioner thought it had something
to do with traffi c lights. It became clear to me at that moment that although the
theory and practice of signal processing in an engineering context has made possible
the massive advances of recent times in everything from consumer electronics to
healthcare, the area is poorly understood by those not familiar with digital signal
processing (DSP). Unfortunately, such lack of understanding sometimes extends to
those embarking on higher education courses in engineering, computer science, and
allied fi elds, and I believe it is our responsibility not simply to try to cover every
possible theoretical aspect, but to endeavor to open the student ’ s eyes to the possible
applications of signal processing, particularly in a multidisciplinary context.
With that in mind, this book sets out to provide the necessary theoretical and
practical underpinnings of signal processing, but in a way that can be readily understood
by the newcomer to the fi eld. The assumed audience is the practicing engineer,
the engineering undergraduate or graduate student, or the researcher in an allied fi eld
who can make use of signal processing in a research context. The examples given
to introduce the topics have been chosen to clearly introduce the motivation behind
the topic and where it might be applied. Necessarily, a great deal of detail has to be
sacrifi ced in order to meet the expectations of the audience. This is not to say that
the theory or implementation has been trivialized. Far from it; the treatment given
extends from the theoretical underpinnings of key algorithms and techniques to
computational and numerical aspects.
The text may be used in a one - term or longer course in signal processing, and
the assumptions regarding background knowledge have been kept to a minimum.
Shorter courses may not be able to cover all that is presented, and an instructor may
have to sacrifi ce some breadth in order to ensure adequate depth of coverage of
important topics. The sections on fast convolution and fi ltering, and medical image
processing, may be omitted in that case. Likewise, recursive fi lter design via analog
prototyping may be omitted or left to a second course if time does not permit
coverage. |