Parameter estimation for exponential sums by approximate Prony method

The recovery of signal parameters from noisy sampled data is a fundamental problem in digital signal processing. In this paper, we consider the following spectral analysis problem: Let f be a real–valued sum of complex exponentials. Determine all parameters of f , i.e., all different frequencies, all coefficients, and the number of exponentials from finitely many equispaced sampled data of f . This is a nonlinear inverse problem. In this paper, we present new results on an approximate Prony method (APM) which is based on [1]. In contrast to [1], we apply matrix perturbation theory such that we can describe the properties and the numerical behavior of the APM in detail. The first part of APM estimates the frequencies and the second part solves an overdetermined linear Vandermonde–type system in a stable way. We compare the first part of APM also with the known ESPRIT method. The second part is related to the nonequispaced fast Fourier transform (NFFT). Numerical experiments show the performance of our method.