Fast discrete quadratic phase transform for estimating the parameters of chirp signals

This paper is concerned with the problem of estimating the parameters of multicomponent chirp signals from a finite number of noisy discrete time observations. A new transform called quadratic phase transform and its discrete version called discrete quadratic phase transform (DQPT) are introduced which jointly estimate the phase parameters of chirp signals. The DQPT is shown to result in maximum likelihood estimates for a single component chirp signal. A fast implementation of the DQPT is also proposed that results in substantial savings in the computational cost.