A study on the SPIHT image coding technique for underwater acoustic communications

In this paper, we consider the transmission of progressively encoded images over underwater acoustic links, where transmitted symbols are protected by Forward Error Correction (FEC). The allocation of redundancy is performed according to both a Basic and a Multiple Description (MD)-like technique. The performance of this system is analyzed in terms of the resulting Peak Signal-to-Noise Ratio (PSNR) as image packets are transmitted over the measured realizations of acoustic channel impulse responses. These measurements were taken near the coast of Martha's Vineyard during October 2008, in different environmental conditions. In the results, we quantify the performance improvement of the multiple description (MD) technique compared to the Basic allocation, thus suggesting its suitability for the transmission of images in the underwater acoustic scenario.