09/10/2015

peakdet:PeakdetectionusingMATLAB(nonderivativelocalextremum,maximum,minimum)

Home
CV
CV
(hebrew)

peakdet:PeakdetectionusingMATLAB
Here'saproblemIencounterinseveralfields:Findthelocalmaximaand
minimainsomenoisysignal,whichtypicallylookslikethefollowinggraph:

FPGA
Editor
Free
software
Lectures
Perlilog
Eobj
frandom
cdepend
hitec
(LaTeX)
easyspec
peakdet
FIFOtricks
CDCE906
Optical
simulator
HTML
highlighting
Hobbies
Techblog

Thelocalmaximaandminimaareplottedasredandgreenstarsonthe
graph.Totheeyeit'ssoobviouswheretheyare,butmakingacomputer
findthemcanturnouttricky.
Let'sstartwithwhatnottodo:Usingthewellknownzeroderivate
method.Duetothenoise,whichisalwaysthereinreallifesignals,
accidentalzerocrossingsofthefirstderivateoccur,yieldingfalse
detections.Thetypicalsolutionistosmooththecurvewithsomelowpass
filter,usuallykillingtheoriginalsignalatthesametime.Theresultis
usuallythatthealgorithmgoeshorriblywrongwhereit'ssoobvioustothe
eye.
Inmanycases,wedon'treallycareaboutmaximaandminimainthe
mathematicalsense.Wecanseethepeaksandvalleys,andwewantthe
computertofindthem.Thisiswhat"peakdet"does.
Thetrickhereistorealize,thatapeakisthehighestpointbetweem

http://www.billauer.co.il/peakdet.html

1/3

09/10/2015

peakdet:PeakdetectionusingMATLAB(nonderivativelocalextremum,maximum,minimum)

"valleys".Whatmakesapeakisthefactthattherearelowerpointsaround
it.Thisstrategyisadoptedby"peakdet":Lookforthehighestpoint,
aroundwhichtherearepointslowerbyXonbothsides.
Let'sseeanexample:First,let'screatethegraphshowninthefigure
above:
>>t=0:0.001:10;
>>x=0.3*sin(t)+sin(1.3*t)+0.9*sin(4.2*t)+0.02*randn(1,10001);
>>figure;plot(x);
Nowwe'llfindthepeaksandvalleys:(you'llneedtocopythe"peakdet"
functionfromthebottomofthispageandputitinyourworkingdirectory
oradirectoryintheMATLABsearchpath):
>>[maxtab,mintab]=peakdet(x,0.5);
>>holdon;plot(mintab(:,1),mintab(:,2),'g*');
>>plot(maxtab(:,1),maxtab(:,2),'r*');
Notethecalltopeakdet():Thefirstargumentisthevectortoexamine,
andthesecondisthepeakthreshold:Werequireadifferenceofatleast
0.5betweenapeakanditssurroundinginordertodeclareitasapeak.
Samegoeswithvalleys.
Thereturnedvectors"maxtab"and"mintab"containthepeakandvalley
points,asevidentbytheirplots(notethecolors).
Thevector'sXaxisvaluescanbepassedasathirdargument(thanksto
SvenBillietforhiscontributiononthis),inwhichcasepeakdet()returns
thesevaluesinsteadofindices,asshowninthefollowingexample:
>>figure;plot(t,x);
>>[maxtab,mintab]=peakdet(x,0.5,t);
Andfromherewecontinuelikebefore,butnotethattheXaxisrepresents
"t"andnotindices.
>>holdon;plot(mintab(:,1),mintab(:,2),'g*');
>>plot(maxtab(:,1),maxtab(:,2),'r*');
Asfortheimplementationofthisfunction:Theworkisdonewithafor
loop,whichisconsideredlousypracticeinMATLAB.SinceI'venever
neededthisfunctionforanythingelsethanprettyshortvectors(<100000
points),Ialsoneverbotheredtotryspeedingitup.CompilingtoMEXisa
directsolution.I'mnotsureifit'spossibletovectorizethisalgorithmin
MATLAB.I'llbegladtohearsuggestions.
Afinalnote:IfyouhappentopreferPython,youcouldtrythis(someone
hasbeenkindenoughtoconvertthisfunction).Therearealsoaversionin
CbyHongXuandaversioninFORTRAN90byBrianMcNoldy.Ihaven't
verifiedanyofthese.
Andhereisthefunction.Copyandsaveitas'peakdet.m'.It'sreleasedto
thepublicdomain:
function[maxtab,mintab]=peakdet(v,delta,x)
%PEAKDETDetectpeaksinavector
%[MAXTAB,MINTAB]=PEAKDET(V,DELTA)findsthelocal
%maximaandminima("peaks")inthevectorV.
%MAXTABandMINTABconsistsoftwocolumns.Column1
%containsindicesinV,andcolumn2thefoundvalues.
%
%With[MAXTAB,MINTAB]=PEAKDET(V,DELTA,X)theindices
%inMAXTABandMINTABarereplacedwiththecorresponding
http://www.billauer.co.il/peakdet.html

2/3

09/10/2015

peakdet:PeakdetectionusingMATLAB(nonderivativelocalextremum,maximum,minimum)

%Xvalues.
%
%Apointisconsideredamaximumpeakifithasthemaximal
%value,andwaspreceded(totheleft)byavaluelowerby
%DELTA.
%EliBillauer,3.4.05(Explicitlynotcopyrighted).
%Thisfunctionisreleasedtothepublicdomain;Anyuseisallowed.
maxtab=[];
mintab=[];
v=v(:);%Justincasethiswasn'tapropervector
ifnargin<3
x=(1:length(v))';
else
x=x(:);
iflength(v)~=length(x)
error('Inputvectorsvandxmusthavesamelength');
end
end

if(length(delta(:)))>1
error('InputargumentDELTAmustbeascalar');
end
ifdelta<=0
error('InputargumentDELTAmustbepositive');
end
mn=Inf;mx=Inf;
mnpos=NaN;mxpos=NaN;
lookformax=1;
fori=1:length(v)
this=v(i);
ifthis>mx,mx=this;mxpos=x(i);end
ifthis<mn,mn=this;mnpos=x(i);end

iflookformax
ifthis<mxdelta
maxtab=[maxtab;mxposmx];
mn=this;mnpos=x(i);
lookformax=0;
end
else
ifthis>mn+delta
mintab=[mintab;mnposmn];
mx=this;mxpos=x(i);
lookformax=1;
end
end
end
LastmodifiedonFriJul2021:16:582012.Email:
sendtome@billauer.co.il

http://www.billauer.co.il/peakdet.html

3/3