As mentioned above, it is desirable to pre-compute and store image features for the entire image of a biological specimen in order to reduce redundant computations and enable a real-time experience for the user. In some applications, however, the amount of image features to be stored is so vast that to store them all may require large amounts of memory, and the storage and retrieval operations themselves may require significant amounts of time (e.g., several seconds or more). This is especially true for web-based applications and other applications where the features are stored on a remote server accessible by the client application through a local area network or a wide area network such as the Internet. In such applications, retrieving all the precomputed image features in real time may take too long and may not enable an interactive real-time user experience.

Systems and methods described below provide a technical solution to the above described problem of real-time retrieval of precomputed image features of high-density and high-resolution digital images of biological specimen. It is appreciated by a person skilled in the art that the problem arises specifically in the realm of computers, computer networks, and real-time image processing of high-resolution digital images. It is further appreciated that the systems and methods described herein are not limited to solving the particular problem stated above, and can also be utilized in other types of applications facing other types of issues that may or may not be related to performance or storage optimization.