Multisynchrosqueezing short-time fractional Fourier transform and its application in rolling bearing instantaneous frequency estimation

Multisynchrosqueezing transform (MSST) enhances the time-frequency energy concentration by using iterative reassignment operations in time-frequency analysis (TFA). However, its effectiveness is limited for signals with rapidly changing instantaneous frequency. To address this issue, this paper presents a novel time-frequency representation (TFR) method called multisynchrosqueezing short-time fractional Fourier transform, which offers improved TF concentration for strongly frequency-modulated signals. Firstly, a high-resolution TFR of the signal is obtained by locally optimized short-time fractional Fourier transform (STFrFT). Secondly, iterative synchrosqueezing operations are introduced to further enhance the STFrFT energy concentration, with a termination strategy relying on Rényi entropy proposed to ascertain the optimal number of iterations. Finally, the ideal TFA with high energy concentration is achieved. The proposed method was validated using multi-scene simulated signals and variable-speed bearing signals. The results show that the proposed method exhibits superior time-frequency energy concentration and instantaneous frequency estimation accuracy. The estimation error of the method is consistently at least 40% lower than that of the compared short-time Fourier transform-based methods, as assessed through the evaluation criteria of maximum relative error, mean square error and symmetric mean absolute percentage error.