A Digital Instantaneous Frequency Measurement Technique using High-Speed Analogue-to-Digital Converters and Field Programmable Gate Arrays

In modern information and sensor systems the timely estimation of the carrier frequency of received signals is of critical importance. This paper presents the Digital Instantaneous Frequency Measurement (DIFM) technique, which can measure the carrier frequency of a received waveform within a fraction of a microsecond. The resulting frequency range, resolution and accuracy of the system are scalable. The theoretical background and derivation of the technique, followed by the practical implementation of the technique on modern digital signal processing hardware will be presented. The paper concludes with functional hardware simulations as well as quantitative measurements on a prototype system.