Achieving unequal error protection with convolutional codes

This paper examines the unequal error protection capabilities of convolutional codes. Both time-invariant and periodically time-varying convolutional encoders are examined. The effective free distance vector is defined and is shown to be useful in determining the unequal error protection (UEP) capabilities of convolutional codes. A modified transfer function is used to determine an upper bound on the bit error probabilities for individual input bit positions in a convolutional encoder. The bound is heavily dependent on the individual effective free distance of the input bit position. A bound relating two individual effective free distances is presented. The bound is a useful tool in determining the maximum possible disparity in individual effective free distances of encoders of specified rate and memory distribution. The unequal error protection capabilities of convolutional encoders of several rates and memory distributions are determined and discussed

Turbo-Detected Unequal Protection MPEG-4 Wireless Video Telephony using Multi-Level Coding, Trellis Coded Modulation and Space-Time Trellis Coding

Most multimedia source signals are capable of tolerating lossy, rather than lossless delivery to the human eye, ear and other human sensors. The corresponding lossy and preferably low-delay multimedia source codecs however exhibit unequal error sensitivity, which is not the case for Shannon’s ideal entropy codec. This paper proposes a jointly optimised turbo transceiver design capable of providing unequal error protection for MPEG-4 coding aided wireless video telephony. The transceiver investigated consists of space-time trellis coding (STTC) invoked for the sake of mitigating the effects of fading, in addition to bandwidth efficient trellis coded modulation or bit-interleaved coded modulation, combined with a multi-level coding scheme employing either two different-rate non-systematic convolutional codes (NSCs) or two recursive systematic convolutional codes for yielding a twin-class unequal-protection. A single-class protection based benchmark scheme combining STTC and NSC is used for comparison with the unequal-protection scheme advocated. The video performance of the various schemes is evaluated when communicating over uncorrelated Rayleigh fading channels. It was found that the proposed scheme requires about 2.8 dBs lower transmit power than the benchmark scheme in the context of the MPEG-4 videophone transceiver at a similar decoding complexity

Turbo-Detected Unequal Protection MPEG-4 Audio Transceiver Using Convolutional Codes, Trellis Coded Modulation and Space-Time Trellis Coding

A jointly optimised turbo transceiver capable of providing unequal error protection is proposed for employment in an MPEG-4 aided audio transceiver. The transceiver advocated consists of Space-Time Trellis Coding (STTC), Trellis Coded Modulation (TCM) and two different-rate Non-Systematic Convolutional codes (NSCs) used for unequal error protection. A benchmarker scheme combining STTC and a single-class protection NSC is used for comparison with the proposed scheme. The audio performance of the both schemes is evaluated when communicating over uncorrelated Rayleigh fading channels. It was found that the proposed unequal protection turbo-transceiver scheme requires about two dBs lower transmit power than the single-class turbo benchmarker scheme in the context of the MPEG-4 audio transceiver, when aiming for an effective throughput of 2 bits/symbol, while exhibiting a similar decoding complexity

Turbo-detected unequal protection audio and speech transceivers using serially concatenated convolutional codes, trellis coded modulation and space-time trellis coding

The MPEG-4 TwinVQ audio codec and the AMR-WB speech codec are investigated in the context of a jointly optimised turbo transceiver capable of providing unequal error protection. The transceiver advocated consists of serially concatenated Space-Time Trellis Coding (STTC), Trellis Coded Modulation (TCM) and two different-rate Non-Systematic Convolutional codes (NSCs) used for unequal error protection. A benchmarker scheme combining STTC and a single-class protection NSC is used for comparison with the proposed scheme. The audio and speech performance of both schemes is evaluated, when communicating over uncorrelated Rayleigh fading channels. An $E_b/N_0$ value of about 2.5 (3.5)~dB is required for near-unimpaired audio (speech) transmission, which is about 3.07 (4.2)~dB from the capacity of the system

Turbo-Detected Unequal Error Protection Irregular Convolutional Codes Designed for the Wideband Advanced Multirate Speech Codec

Abstract—since the different bits of multimedia information, such as speech and video, have different error sensitivity, efficient unequalprotection channel coding schemes have to be used to ensure that the perceptually more important bits benefit from more powerful protection. Furthermore, in the context of turbo detection the channel codes should also match the characteristics of the channel for the sake of attaining a good convergence performance. In this paper, we address this design dilemma by using irregular convolutional codes (IRCCs) which constitute a family of different-rate subcodes. we benefit from the high design flexibility of IRCCs and hence excellent convergence properties are maintained while having unequal error protection capabilities matched to the requirements of the source. An EXIT chart based design procedure is proposed and used in the context of protecting the different-sensitivity speech bits of the wideband AMR speech codec. As a benefit, the unequalprotection system using IRCCs exhibits an SNR advantage of about 0.4dB over the equal-protection system employing regular convolutional codes, when communicating over a Gaussian channel

An Iterative Detection Aided Unequal Error Protection Wavelet Video Scheme Using Irregular Convolutional Codes

A wavelet-based videophone scheme proposed, where the video bits are Unequal Error Protection (UEP) using Irregular Convolutional Codes (IRCCs). The proposed system uses Adaptive Arithmetic Coding (AAC) for encoding the motion vectors and individual wavelet subband coefficients. The turbo equalized IRCC-aided videophone scheme is capable of attaining a near unimpaired video quality for channel Signal-to-Noise Ratios (SNRs) in excess of about 4.5dB over a five-path dispersive AWGN channel

Integrated Wireless Multimedia Turbo-Transceiver Design Approaching the Rayleigh Channel's Capacity: Interpreting Shannon's Lessons in the Turbo-Era

Claude Shannon's pioneering work quantified the performance limits of communications systems operating over classic wireline Gaussian channels. However, his source and channel coding theorems were derived for a range of idealistic conditions, which may not hold in low-delay, interactive wireless multimedia communications. Firstly, Shannon's ideal lossless source encoder, namely the entropy encoder may have an excessive codeword length, hence exhibiting a high delay and a high error sensitivity. However, in practice most multimedia source signals are capable of tolerating lossy, rather than lossless delivery to the human eye, ear and other human sensors. The corresponding lossy and preferably low-delay multimedia source codecs however exhibit unequal error sensitivity, which is not the case for Shannon's ideal entropy codec. There are further numerous differences between the Shannonian lessons originally outlined for Gaussian channels and their ramifications for routinely encountered dispersive wireless channels, where typically bursty, rather than random errors are encountered. This paper elaborates on these intriguiging lessons in the context of a few turbo-transceiver design examples, using a jointly optimised turbo transceiver capable of providing unequal error protection in the context of MPEG-4 aided wireless video telephony. The transceiver investigated consists of Space-Time Trellis Coding (STTC) invoked for the sake of mitigating the effects of fading, Trellis Coded Modulation (TCM) or Bit-Interleaved Coded Modulation (BICM) as well as two different-rate Non-Systematic Convolutional codes (NSCs) or Recursive Systematic Convolutional codes (RSCs). A single-class protection based benchmarker scheme combining STTC and NSC is used for comparison with the unequal-protection scheme advocated. The video performance of the various schemes is evaluated when communicating over uncorrelated Rayleigh fading channels. It was found that the achievable performance of the proposed scheme is within 0.99~dB of the corresponding capacity of the Rayleigh fading channel

Error control techniques for satellite and space communications

The unequal error protection capabilities of convolutional and trellis codes are studied. In certain environments, a discrepancy in the amount of error protection placed on different information bits is desirable. Examples of environments which have data of varying importance are a number of speech coding algorithms, packet switched networks, multi-user systems, embedded coding systems, and high definition television. Encoders which provide more than one level of error protection to information bits are called unequal error protection (UEP) codes. In this work, the effective free distance vector, d, is defined as an alternative to the free distance as a primary performance parameter for UEP convolutional and trellis encoders. For a given (n, k), convolutional encoder, G, the effective free distance vector is defined as the k-dimensional vector d = (d(sub 0), d(sub 1), ..., d(sub k-1)), where d(sub j), the j(exp th) effective free distance, is the lowest Hamming weight among all code sequences that are generated by input sequences with at least one '1' in the j(exp th) position. It is shown that, although the free distance for a code is unique to the code and independent of the encoder realization, the effective distance vector is dependent on the encoder realization

Error control techniques for satellite and space communications

Worked performed during the reporting period is summarized. Construction of robustly good trellis codes for use with sequential decoding was developed. The robustly good trellis codes provide a much better trade off between free distance and distance profile. The unequal error protection capabilities of convolutional codes was studied. The problem of finding good large constraint length, low rate convolutional codes for deep space applications is investigated. A formula for computing the free distance of 1/n convolutional codes was discovered. Double memory (DM) codes, codes with two memory units per unit bit position, were studied; a search for optimal DM codes is being conducted. An algorithm for constructing convolutional codes from a given quasi-cyclic code was developed. Papers based on the above work are included in the appendix

Perceptual video quality optimization in AWGN channel using low complexity channel code rate allocation

ABSTRACT In error-prone channels, forward error correction is necessary for protecting important data. In this paper, we use a packet loss visibility model to evaluate the visual importance of video packets to be transmitted. With the loss visibility of each packet, we use the Branch and Bound method to optimally allocate rates of Rate-Compatible Punctured Convolutional codes. The complexity of our prior algorithm can be reduced by k-means clustering before using the Branch and Bound method. Experimental results show that the proposed unequal error protection algorithm can improve upon the received video quality compared to our prior work with much lower complexity. Index Terms-Unequal error protection, packet loss visibility model, perceptual quality