Iterated Convolutions

Any ``reasonable'' probability density function (PDF) (§C.1.3) has a Fourier transform that looks like near its tip. Iterating convolutions then corresponds to , which becomes [2]

for large , by the definition of [248]. This proves that the th power of approaches the Gaussian function defined in §D.1 for large .

Since the inverse Fourier transform of a Gaussian is another Gaussian (§D.8), we can define a time-domain function as being ``sufficiently regular'' when its Fourier transform approaches in a sufficiently small neighborhood of . That is, the Fourier transform simply needs a ``sufficiently smooth peak'' at that can be expanded into a convergent Taylor series. This obviously holds for the DTFT of any discrete-time window function (the subject of Chapter 3), because the window transform is a finite sum of continuous cosines of the form in the zero-phase case, and complex exponentials in the causal case, each of which is differentiable any number of times in .

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About the Author: Julius Orion Smith III
Julius Smith's background is in electrical engineering (BS Rice 1975, PhD Stanford 1983). He is presently Professor of Music and Associate Professor (by courtesy) of Electrical Engineering at Stanford's Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA), teaching courses and pursuing research related to signal processing applied to music and audio systems. See http://ccrma.stanford.edu/~jos/ for details.