Method and apparatus for compressing data

A non-transitory computer-readable medium which is loadable directly into internal memory of a digital signal processing unit and which comprises software code sections which, when executed on the digital signal processing unit causes compression of data representing a time-dependent signal comprising a multiplicity of time-dependent signal elements, the software code sections comprising:

• program code for receiving a multiplicity of spectra, each spectrum of the multiplicity of spectra corresponding to one time-dependent signal element of the time-dependent signal elements, each spectrum comprising a multiplicity of frequencies and a multiplicity of amplitudes of the multiplicity of frequencies;
• program code for generating a compressed data record;
• program code for ascertaining a respective number of coefficients of an autoregressive model for a multiplicity of amplitudes of each of the multiplicity of frequencies;
• and
• program code for generating the compressed data record, said compressed data record comprising at least a number of coefficients and the frequencies associated with the coefficients.

A signal processing unit for compressing data comprising:

• a reception unit for receiving a multiplicity of spectra;
• an autoregressive coefficient determination unit for determining a respective number of coefficients of an autoregressive model for a multiplicity of amplitudes of each frequency of the multiplicity of spectra;
• and
• a memory unit for storing a compressed data record;
• wherein the signal processor is configured to:
• receive the multiplicity of spectra, each spectrum of the multiplicity of spectra corresponding to one time-dependent signal element of the time-dependent signal elements, and each spectrum comprising a multiplicity of frequencies and a multiplicity of amplitudes of the multiplicity of frequencies;
• generate a compressed data record;
• ascertain a respective number of coefficients of an autoregressive model for a multiplicity of amplitudes of each of the multiplicity of frequencies;
• and
• generate the compressed data record, said compressed data record comprising at least a number of coefficients and the frequencies associated with the coefficients.