Fourth Reader

First, I would like to express my profound gratitude to my advisor Professor Clem Karl, whose expertise, encouragement, patience, and help in organizing and directing my own ideas had an unmeasurable importance at all stages of my work. I am particularly thankful for my advisor’s support in publishing our results, presenting them at conferences, and writing reports. His mentoring helped me focus my work, develop key ideas and ultimately made this dissertation possible. I am thankful to other committee members who provided valuable advice at different stages of my PhD work. I would like to thank Professor Stan Sclaroff for important suggestions in my prospectus preparation as well as for valuable discussions. I also would like to thank Professor Janusz Konrad for support throughout my PhD study. Professor Konrad’s advice regarding my research was very helpful at uncountable occasions. I am particularly thankful to Professor Konrad for advising me in a separate research project that did not become a part of this dissertation. I would like to express particular gratitude to professor Jayant Shah for many discussion we had at early stages of my PhD study. His expertise motivated me in several directions that I have taken, especially in shape classification focus area of this thesis. I am also thankfu