Published on: August 22, 2025 01:16 pm IST
Developed six decades ago, Fast Furrier converted signal processing and still reduces innovations from 5G to AI.
This often does not shape the entire arch of an algorithm modern technology, but the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) has done the same. Made by Researchers at Princeton University and IBM in the early 1960s, FFT streaming videos and from audio to medical scanning and AI and 5G networks backbones outline everything. Even after six decades, this piece of genius is as important for today’s digital age as when John Tuki and James Koli first unveiled it.
Digital processing heartbeat
Before FFT arrives, signal analysis was slow with pain. Engineers fought with the Assat Fourier Transform (DFT), which was both slow and memory-flesh. When a Princeton Mathematician, and an IBM researcher James Koili John Tuki performed FFT in 1964. And this was a revelation: this mathematical technique broke the signs in a hundred times faster than before.
Why was it so important? The world was looking for ways to create an understanding of the data hidden in timely signals – think of sound or seismic waves. Initially, the work was about detecting underground nuclear tests, a project for John F. Kennedy’s Science Advisory Committee. In IBM, Richard Garvin witnessed capacity and encouraged cooperation which became a Koli-Tuki FFT. With FFT, the sesmometer could detect atomic activity in continents, and groundwork for digital sensing, imaging and more.
The fundamental move of FFT is to convert time-based signals into frequency domains and convert complex data into managed block. This efficiency saves processing time, reduces the use of memory and allows modern equipment to do things that we are now provided: clean the noise audio, compress video, beam high-speed wireless signals and even allow the body to cut the medical image through the body with accurate CT scans.
Today, FFT is cooked in AI framework, quantum computing experiments, autonomous vehicles and 5G and beyond internal functioning. Major techniques such as real-time data streaming or digital broadcasting will not be present without it.
The story of FFT is a lesson in teamwork between academics and industry. The original codes came out of joint efforts in Princeton and IBM, and the work was quickly recognized with major awards for both Tuki and Kole. On its 60th anniversary, IEEE celebrated FFT as a milestone, now with planets in both institutions. It is a reminder that the great ideas created with clarity and cooperation leave a legacy that can also carry forward the fastest growing technology revolutions.
