US Patent 8116579 Method and system for data compression

A method and an apparatus for compressing or decompressing two-dimensional electronic data are provided. The method for compressing the two-dimensional electronic data set includes dividing the data set into data arrays, performing a wavelet transformation on each array to provide a plurality of wavelet coefficients, and encoding at least some of the wavelet coefficients using an entropy encoding scheme. Each data array preferably relates to a separate and continuous area of an image.