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A Quick Primer On Sampling Theory: Aliasing

1) Sampling is the process of converting a continuous analog signal into a discrete digital signal by measuring the signal's amplitude at uniform time intervals. 2) For a signal to be exactly reproduced from its samples, the sampling rate must be at least twice the highest frequency contained in the original signal, as stated by the Nyquist-Shannon sampling theorem. 3) If a signal is sampled at a rate lower than the Nyquist rate, aliasing will occur, which is when frequencies higher than the Nyquist rate are incorrectly interpreted as lower frequencies in the reconstructed signal.

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36 views3 pages

A Quick Primer On Sampling Theory: Aliasing

1) Sampling is the process of converting a continuous analog signal into a discrete digital signal by measuring the signal's amplitude at uniform time intervals. 2) For a signal to be exactly reproduced from its samples, the sampling rate must be at least twice the highest frequency contained in the original signal, as stated by the Nyquist-Shannon sampling theorem. 3) If a signal is sampled at a rate lower than the Nyquist rate, aliasing will occur, which is when frequencies higher than the Nyquist rate are incorrectly interpreted as lower frequencies in the reconstructed signal.

Uploaded by

Jasperine James
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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A Quick Primer on Sampling Theory

The signals we use in the real world, such as our voices, are called "analog" signals.  To
process these signals in computers, we need to convert the signals to "digital" form.  While an
analog signal is continuous in both time and amplitude, a digital signal is discrete in both
time and amplitude.  To convert a signal from continuous time to discrete time, a process
called sampling is used.  The value of the signal is measured at certain intervals in time.
When the continuous analog signal is sampled at a frequency F, the resulting discrete signal
has more frequency components than did the analog signal.  To be precise, the frequency
components of the analog signal are repeated at the sample rate.  That is, in the discrete
frequency response they are seen at their original position, and are also seen centered around
+/- F, and around +/- 2F, etc.

How many samples are necessary to ensure we are preserving the information contained in
the signal?  If the signal contains high frequency components, we will need to sample at a
higher rate to avoid losing information that is in the signal.  In general, to preserve the full
information in the signal, it is necessary to sample at twice the maximum frequency of the
signal.  This is known as the Nyquist rate.  The Sampling Theorem states that a signal can be
exactly reproduced if it is sampled at a frequency F, where F is greater than twice the
maximum frequency in the signal.
What happens if we sample the signal at a frequency that is lower that the Nyquist rate? 
When the signal is converted back into a continuous time signal, it will exhibit a phenomenon
called aliasing.  Aliasing is the presence of unwanted components in the reconstructed
signal.  These components were not present when the original signal was sampled.  In
addition, some of the frequencies in the original signal may be lost in the reconstructed
signal.  Aliasing occurs because signal frequencies can overlap if the sampling frequency is
too low.  Frequencies "fold" around half the sampling frequency - which is why this
frequency is often referred to as the folding frequency.
Sampling is defined as, “The process of measuring the instantaneous values of continuous-
time signal in a discrete form.”
Sample is a piece of data taken from the whole data which is continuous in the time domain.
When a source generates an analog signal and if that has to be digitized,
having 1s and 0s i.e., High or Low, the signal has to be discretized in time. This
discretization of analog signal is called as Sampling.
The following figure indicates a continuous-time signal x tt and a sampled signal xs tt.
When x tt is multiplied by a periodic impulse train, the sampled signal xs tt is obtained.
Sampling Rate

To discretize the signals, the gap between the samples should be fixed. That gap can be
termed as a sampling period Ts.
SamplingFrequency=1Ts=fsSamplingFrequency=1Ts=fs
Where,
 TsTs is the sampling time
 fsfs is the sampling frequency or the sampling rate
Sampling frequency is the reciprocal of the sampling period. This sampling frequency, can
be simply called as Sampling rate. The sampling rate denotes the number of samples taken
per second, or for a finite set of values.
For an analog signal to be reconstructed from the digitized signal, the sampling rate should
be highly considered. The rate of sampling should be such that the data in the message
signal should neither be lost nor it should get over-lapped. Hence, a rate was fixed for this,
called as Nyquist rate.

Nyquist Rate

Suppose that a signal is band-limited with no frequency components higher than W Hertz.


That means, W is the highest frequency. For such a signal, for effective reproduction of the
original signal, the sampling rate should be twice the highest frequency.
Which means,
fS=2WfS=2W
Where,
 fSfS is the sampling rate
 W is the highest frequency
This rate of sampling is called as Nyquist rate.
A theorem called, Sampling Theorem, was stated on the theory of this Nyquist rate.

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