It is shown that
![\\sqrt [8]{2}](/images/tex/6474.gif)
is an element of order

in

, where

is a Fermat prime for

. Hence it can be used to define a fast Fourier transform (FFT) of as many as

symbols in

. Since
![\\sqrt [8]{2}](/images/tex/6474.gif)
is a root of unity of order

in

, this transform requires fewer muitiplications than the conventional FFT algorithm. Moreover, as Justesen points out [1], such an FFT can be used to decode certain Reed-Solomon codes. An example of such a transform decoder for the case

, where

is in

, is given.