Deriving Good LDPC Convolutional Codes from LDPC Block Codes

Low-density parity-check (LDPC) convolutional codes are capable of achieving excellent performance with low encoding and decoding complexity. In this paper we discuss several graph-cover-based methods for deriving families of time-invariant and time-varying LDPC convolutional codes from LDPC block codes and show how earlier proposed LDPC convolutional code constructions can be presented within this framework. Some of the constructed convolutional codes significantly outperform the underlying LDPC block codes. We investigate some possible reasons for this "convolutional gain," and we also discuss the --- mostly moderate --- decoder cost increase that is incurred by going from LDPC block to LDPC convolutional codes.Comment: Submitted to IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, April 2010; revised August 2010, revised November 2010 (essentially final version). (Besides many small changes, the first and second revised versions contain corrected entries in Tables I and II.

Low-Density Arrays of Circulant Matrices: Rank and Row-Redundancy Analysis, and Quasi-Cyclic LDPC Codes

This paper is concerned with general analysis on the rank and row-redundancy of an array of circulants whose null space defines a QC-LDPC code. Based on the Fourier transform and the properties of conjugacy classes and Hadamard products of matrices, we derive tight upper bounds on rank and row-redundancy for general array of circulants, which make it possible to consider row-redundancy in constructions of QC-LDPC codes to achieve better performance. We further investigate the rank of two types of construction of QC-LDPC codes: constructions based on Vandermonde Matrices and Latin Squares and give combinatorial expression of the exact rank in some specific cases, which demonstrates the tightness of the bound we derive. Moreover, several types of new construction of QC-LDPC codes with large row-redundancy are presented and analyzed.Comment: arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1004.118

Design of Finite-Length Irregular Protograph Codes with Low Error Floors over the Binary-Input AWGN Channel Using Cyclic Liftings

We propose a technique to design finite-length irregular low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes over the binary-input additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel with good performance in both the waterfall and the error floor region. The design process starts from a protograph which embodies a desirable degree distribution. This protograph is then lifted cyclically to a certain block length of interest. The lift is designed carefully to satisfy a certain approximate cycle extrinsic message degree (ACE) spectrum. The target ACE spectrum is one with extremal properties, implying a good error floor performance for the designed code. The proposed construction results in quasi-cyclic codes which are attractive in practice due to simple encoder and decoder implementation. Simulation results are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed construction in comparison with similar existing constructions.Comment: Submitted to IEEE Trans. Communication

Deterministic Constructions of Binary Measurement Matrices from Finite Geometry

Deterministic constructions of measurement matrices in compressed sensing (CS) are considered in this paper. The constructions are inspired by the recent discovery of Dimakis, Smarandache and Vontobel which says that parity-check matrices of good low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes can be used as {provably} good measurement matrices for compressed sensing under $\ell_1$-minimization. The performance of the proposed binary measurement matrices is mainly theoretically analyzed with the help of the analyzing methods and results from (finite geometry) LDPC codes. Particularly, several lower bounds of the spark (i.e., the smallest number of columns that are linearly dependent, which totally characterizes the recovery performance of $\ell_0$-minimization) of general binary matrices and finite geometry matrices are obtained and they improve the previously known results in most cases. Simulation results show that the proposed matrices perform comparably to, sometimes even better than, the corresponding Gaussian random matrices. Moreover, the proposed matrices are sparse, binary, and most of them have cyclic or quasi-cyclic structure, which will make the hardware realization convenient and easy.Comment: 12 pages, 11 figure

A Class of Quantum LDPC Codes Constructed From Finite Geometries

Low-density parity check (LDPC) codes are a significant class of classical codes with many applications. Several good LDPC codes have been constructed using random, algebraic, and finite geometries approaches, with containing cycles of length at least six in their Tanner graphs. However, it is impossible to design a self-orthogonal parity check matrix of an LDPC code without introducing cycles of length four. In this paper, a new class of quantum LDPC codes based on lines and points of finite geometries is constructed. The parity check matrices of these codes are adapted to be self-orthogonal with containing only one cycle of length four. Also, the column and row weights, and bounds on the minimum distance of these codes are given. As a consequence, the encoding and decoding algorithms of these codes as well as their performance over various quantum depolarizing channels will be investigated.Comment: 5pages, 2 figure

New Combinatorial Construction Techniques for Low-Density Parity-Check Codes and Systematic Repeat-Accumulate Codes

This paper presents several new construction techniques for low-density parity-check (LDPC) and systematic repeat-accumulate (RA) codes. Based on specific classes of combinatorial designs, the improved code design focuses on high-rate structured codes with constant column weights 3 and higher. The proposed codes are efficiently encodable and exhibit good structural properties. Experimental results on decoding performance with the sum-product algorithm show that the novel codes offer substantial practical application potential, for instance, in high-speed applications in magnetic recording and optical communications channels.Comment: 10 pages; to appear in "IEEE Transactions on Communications

The Road From Classical to Quantum Codes: A Hashing Bound Approaching Design Procedure

Powerful Quantum Error Correction Codes (QECCs) are required for stabilizing and protecting fragile qubits against the undesirable effects of quantum decoherence. Similar to classical codes, hashing bound approaching QECCs may be designed by exploiting a concatenated code structure, which invokes iterative decoding. Therefore, in this paper we provide an extensive step-by-step tutorial for designing EXtrinsic Information Transfer (EXIT) chart aided concatenated quantum codes based on the underlying quantum-to-classical isomorphism. These design lessons are then exemplified in the context of our proposed Quantum Irregular Convolutional Code (QIRCC), which constitutes the outer component of a concatenated quantum code. The proposed QIRCC can be dynamically adapted to match any given inner code using EXIT charts, hence achieving a performance close to the hashing bound. It is demonstrated that our QIRCC-based optimized design is capable of operating within 0.4 dB of the noise limit