Automatic microscopy for screening of sputum smears for tuberculosis would reduce the reliance on technicians in heavily burdened laboratories in poorly-resourced countries. Autofocusing is a key component of automated microscopy. We investigate the use of wavelet-based image fusion for automatic focusing of sputum smear slides as a component of automated fluorescence microscopy to identify Mycobacterium tuberculosis. We use manual focusing as ground truth for assessing the performance of the algorithm. Image fusion produces images with a degree of focus comparable to that of a human operator.
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