BER performance of turbo-coded PPM CDMA systems on optical fiber

We obtain upper bounds on the bit error rate (BER) for turbo-coded optical code-division multiple-access (CDMA) systems using pulse position modulation (PPM). We use transfer function bounding techniques to obtain these bounds, so our results correspond to the average bound over all interleavers of a given length. We consider parallel concatenated coding (PCC) schemes that use recursive convolutional codes as constituent codes. We consider systems using an avalanche photodiode (APD), and treat APD noise, thermal noise, and multi-user interference using a Gaussian approximation. We compare the performance of turbo-coded systems with that of BCH-coded systems with soft-decision decoding, and that of concatenated coding systems with outer Reed-Solomon (RS) code and inner convolutional code. We show that turbo-coded systems have better performance than BCH-coded systems. We also show that concatenated systems have better performance than turbo-coded systems when the block length is small and the received laser power is somewhat large     

Stream-oriented turbo codes

This work considers the design and performance of a stream-oriented approach to turbo codes which avoids the need for data framing. The stream paradigm applies to both serial and parallel turbo codes using continuous, free-running constituent encoders along with continuous, periodic interleavers. A stream-oriented turbo code based on parallel concatenated convolutional codes (PCCC) is considered and interleaver design criteria are developed for both block and nonblock periodic interleavers. Specifically, several nonblock interleavers, including convolutional interleavers, are considered. Interleaver design rules are verified using simulations where it is shown that nonblock interleavers with small-to-moderate delay and small synchronization ambiguity can outperform block interleavers of comparable delay. For large-delay designs, nonblock interleavers are found which perform within 0.8 dB of the capacity limit with a synchronization ambiguity of N=11     

On the Design of Bit-Interleaved Turbo-Coded Modulation With Low Error Floors

In this paper, we introduce an algorithm to optimize the performance in the error-floor region of bit-interleaved turbo-coded modulation (BITCM) on the additive white Gaussian noise channel. The key ingredient is an exact turbo code weight distribution algorithm producing a list of all codewords in the underlying turbo code of weight less than a given threshold. In BITCM, the information sequence is turbo-encoded, bit-interleaved, and mapped to signal points in a signal constellation. Using the union-bounding technique, we show that a well-designed bit interleaver is crucial to have a low error floor. Furthermore, the error-rate performance in the waterfall region depends on the bit interleaver, since the level of protection from channel noise on the bit level depends on the bit position and the neighboring bit values within the same symbol in the transmitted sequence. We observe a tradeoff between error-rate performance in the waterfall and error-floor regions, as illustrated by an extensive case study of a high-rate BITCM scheme. This tradeoff is typical in iterative decoding of turbo-like codes. The reported case study shows that it is possible to design bit interleavers with our proposed algorithm with equal or better performance in the waterfall region and superior performance in the error-floor region, compared with randomly generated bit interleavers. In particular, we were able to design BITCM schemes with maximum-likelihood decoding frame-error rates of$10^-12$and$10^-17$at 2.6 and 3.8 dB away from unconstrained channel capacity, at spectral efficiencies of 3.10 and 6.20 b/s/Hz using square 16 and 256-quadrature amplitude modulation signal constellations, respectively.     

Energy-efficient node position identification through payoff matrix and variability analysis

This paper investigates the use of punctured recursive systematic convolutional codes for turbo coding in a 2-user binary adder channel (2-BAC) in the presence of additive white Gaussian noise, aiming to achieve a higher transmission sum rate with reduced decoding complexity. The encoders for the 2-BAC are assumed to be block synchronized and to employ identical puncturing patterns. Iterative decoding combining the Bahl Cocke Jelinek Raviv algorithm and a two-user punctured trellis is employed. For each user and for a fixed puncturing pattern, random interleavers of length 256 bits or 1024 bits, respectively, are simulated and corresponding curves relating bit error rate versus signal to noise ratio are presented for performance comparison purposes. Computer simulation indicates that the loss in performance of a punctured turbo code can be negligible when longer interleavers are used for both users, similarly to the single user case.     

Multistage recursive interleaver for turbo codes in DS-CDMA mobileradio

A multistage recursive block interleaver (MIL) is proposed for the turbo code internal interleaver. Unlike conventional block interleavers, the MIL repeats permutations of rows and columns in a recursive manner until reaching the final interleaving length. The bit error rate (BER) and frame error rate (FER) performance with turbo coding and MIL under frequency-selective Rayleigh fading are evaluated by computer simulation for direct-sequence code-division multiple-access mobile radio. The performance of rate-1/3 turbo codes with MIL is compared with pseudorandom and S-random interleavers assuming a spreading chip rate of 4.096 Mcps and an information bit rate of 32 kbps. When the interleaving length is 3068 bits, turbo coding with MIL outperforms the pseudorandom interleaver by 0.4 dB at an average BER of 10^-6 on a fading channel using the ITU-R defined Vehicular-B power-delay profile with the maximum Doppler frequency of f_D = 80 Hz. The results also show that turbo coding with MIL provides superior performance to convolutional and Reed-Solomon concatenated coding; the gain over concatenated coding is as much as 0.6 dB     

On turbo encodedBicm

The superior performance of the binary turbo codes has stimulated vigorous efforts in generating bandwidth efficient modulation schemes adhering to these codes. Several approaches for the integration of turbo-coding and modulation have emerged in recent years but none seem to dominate. In the bit interleaved coded modulation (Bicm) scheme is used to achieve high bandwidth and power efficiency, while separating coding and modulation. As is now well known, theBicm scheme achieves capacity remarkably close to the constellation channel capacity. The turbo-Bicm scheme enjoys high coding diversity (well suited for fading channels), high flexibility as well as design and implementation simplicity, while maintaining good power efficiency. The system comprises one standard turbo code, an interleaver, a mapper and a modulator at the transmitter, corresponding to a demodulator, a de-interleaver and a turbo decoder at the receiver. A modified system, which improves on performance by incorporating the demodulation in the iterative decoding procedure, is investigated, and some performance gain is demonstrated, especially for low rate codes. Information theoretic arguments for the somewhat minor potential improvement in performance are detailed. The preferred mapper and interleaver for this system are considered. Extending previous works, for higher level modulations, we analyze a system including a convolutional code, an interleaver, a differential encoder (De), a mapper and a modulator at the transmitter. As for theBpsk modulation, the serial concatenation of a convolutional code withDe outperforms the single convolutional code. The serial concatenation withDe approach is analyzed also for a turbo code, where it is found to fail in achieving performance improvement. Several structures for the serial concatenation withDe are examined. These results are substantiated through the ‘spectral thinning’ phenomena of the weight distribution of the convolutional and turbocodes.     

Design of turbo-coded modulation for the AWGN channel with Tikhonov phase error

We design 1-b/symbol/Hz parallel concatenated turbo-coded modulation (PCTCM) for the additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel with Tikhonov phase error. Constituent recursive convolutional codes are optimized so that the turbo codes have low error floors and low convergence thresholds. The pairwise error probability based on the maximum-likelihood decoding metric is used to select codes with low error floors. We also present a Gaussian approximation method that accurately predicts convergence thresholds for PCTCM codes on the AWGN/Tikhonov channel. Simulation results show that the selected codes perform within 0.6 dB of constellation constrained capacity, and have no detectable error floor down to bit-error rates of 10/sup -6/.     

Comparative study of turbo equalization schemes usingconvolutional, convolutional turbo, and block-turbo codes

Turbo equalizers have been shown to be successful in mitigating the effects of inter-symbol interference introduced by partial response modems and by dispersive channels for code rates of R⩽ 1/2. We comparatively studied the performance of a range of binary phase-shift keying turbo equalizers employing block-turbo codes, namely Bose-Chaudhuri-Hocquenghen (1960, 1959) turbo codes, convolutional codes, and convolutional turbo codes having high code rates, such as R=3/4 and R=5/6, over a dispersive five-path Gaussian channel and an equally weighted symbol-spaced five-path Rayleigh fading channel. These turbo equalization schemes were combined with an iterative channel estimation scheme in order to characterize a realistic scenario. The simulation results demonstrated that the turbo-equalized system using convolutional turbo codes was the most robust system for all code rates investigated     

Space-time codes and concatenated channel codes for wirelesscommunications

Following a brief historical perspective on channel coding, an introduction to space-time block codes is given. The various space-time codes considered are then concatenated with a range of channel codecs, such as convolutional and block-based turbo codes as well as conventional and turbo trellis codes. The associated estimated complexity issues and memory requirements are also considered. These discussions are followed by a performance study of various space-time and channel-coded transceivers. Our aim is first to identify a space-time code/channel code combination constituting a good engineering tradeoff in terms of its effective throughput, bit-error-rate performance, and estimated complexity. Specifically, the issue of bit-to-symbol mapping is addressed in the context of convolutional codes (CCs) and convolutional coding as well as Bose-Chaudhuri-Hocquenghem coding-based turbo codes in conjunction with an attractive unity-rate space-time code and multilevel modulation is detailed. It is concluded that over the nondispersive or narrow-band fading channels, the best performance versus complexity tradeoff is constituted by Alamouti's twin-antenna block space-time code concatenated with turbo convolutional codes. Further comparisons with space-time trellis codes result in similar conclusions     

Asymptotic analysis of superorthogonal turbo codes

We examine a low-rate turbo coding scheme based on superorthogonal convolutional encoders (SOCEs). The low-rate coding is suitable for code-division multiple-access (CDMA) applications. We use the property that the component encoders are equivalent to conventional convolutional encoders to analyze the asymptotic performance. We analyze the iterative decoding performance that can be achieved when both the code length and the number of iterations tend to infinity and present a bound on the iterative limit of the code construction. It is shown by asymptotic analysis, that the rate 1/7,1/15, and 1/31 codes with component encoders of memory 3,4, and 5 have iterative limits below -0.65, -0.88, and -0.95 dB, respectively. Simulations for codes with large permutors (interleavers) confirm these asymptotic results. The construction is general and can be done for codes of lower rates as well.     

Computing the free distance of turbo codes and seriallyconcatenated codes with interleavers: algorithms and applications

We present a new algorithm for computing the free distance d_free of parallel and serially concatenated codes with interleavers, the parameter that dominates the code performance at very high signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs). The knowledge of d_free allows one to analytically estimate the error floor, which may prevent the use of concatenated codes in applications requiring very low error rates. The algorithm is based on the new notion of constrained subcodes, and permits the computation of large distances for large interleavers without a constraint on the input sequence weight (e.g., up to d_free=40 for a rate-1/3 turbo code with interleaver length N=3568). Applications to practical cases of relevant interest, i.e., (1) the new Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems (CCSDS) standard for deep-space telemetry and (2) the new UMTS/3GPP standard for third-generation personal communications, are presented for the first time. Other related aspects, like a study on the free distance distribution of turbo codes with small/medium interleaver length, and a comparison between parallel and serial concatenation behavior, are also discussed     

Design of cyclic shift interleavers for Turbo Codes

In this paper we consider cyclic shift interleavers for turbo coding. The properties of cyclic shift interleavers are discussed and compared with S-random interleavers. It is shown that the cyclic shift interleavers are equivalent or better than the S-random interleavers in the ability to break low weight input patterns. We estimated the performance of turbo codes with cyclic shift interleavers and compared it with the performance of S-random interleavers for varions interleaver sizes. The simulation results show that a turbo code with a cyclic shift interleaver can achieve a better performance than an S-random interleaver if the parameters of the cyclic shift interleaver are chosen properly. In addition, the cyclic interleavers have the advantages of lower design complexity and memory requirements.     

Satellite based turbo-coded, blind-equalized 4-QAM and 16-QAMdigital video broadcasting

The pan-European digital satellite video broadcasting (DVB-S) system's performance is characterized and improved with the aid of turbo coding and multi-level modulation. Specifically, various configurations of blind equalizers and convolutional as well as turbo codecs operating at different code rates were investigated. The standard system's performance was improved upon replacing the conventional convolutional codec by a turbo codec. Lastly, the feasibility of employing blind equalized 16-level modulation within the DVB-S system is demonstrated, potentially doubling the available bit rate and hence improving the associated video quality at the cost of a higher signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) requirement. This extra transmitted power requirement can be eliminated upon invoking the more complex turbo codec, which requires lower transmitted power for attaining the same performance as the standard convolutional codes     

Combined MMSE interference suppression and turbo coding for acoherent DS-CDMA system

The performance of a turbo-coded code division multiaccess system with a minimum mean-square error (MMSE) receiver for interference suppression is analyzed on a Rayleigh fading channel. In order to accurately estimate the performance of the turbo coding, two improvements are proposed on the conventional union bounds: the information of the minimum distance of a particular turbo interleaver is used to modify the average weight spectra, and the tangential bound is extended to the Rayleigh fading channel. Theoretical results are derived based on the optimum tap weights of the MMSE receiver and maximum-likelihood decoding. Simulation results incorporating iterative decoding, RLS adaptation, and the effects of finite interleaving are also presented. The results show that in the majority of the scenarios that we are concerned with, the MMSE receiver with a rate-1/2 turbo code will outperform a rate-1/4 turbo code. They also show that, for a bit error rate lower than 10^-3, the capacity of the system is increased by using turbo codes over convolutional codes, even with small block sizes     

On the theory and performance of trellis termination methods forturbo codes

The performance of a turbo code can be severely degraded if no trellis termination is employed. This paper investigates the implications of the choice of trellis termination method for turbo codes, and explains the origin of the performance degradation often experienced without trellis termination. An efficient method to derive the distance spectrum of turbo codes for different trellis termination methods is presented. Further, we present interleaver design rules that are tailored to each termination method. Using interleavers designed with these restrictions, we demonstrate that the performance difference between various termination methods is very small, including no trellis termination at all. For example, we demonstrate a turbo code with a 500-bit interleaver that exhibits no sign of an error floor for frame error rates as low as 10^-8, even though no trellis termination is employed     

On the performance of hybrid FEC/ARQ systems using rate compatiblepunctured turbo (RCPT) codes

This paper introduces a hybrid forward-error correction/automatic repeat-request (ARQ) system that employs rate compatible punctured turbo (RCPT) codes to achieve enhanced throughput performance over a nonstationary Gaussian channel. The proposed RCPT-ARQ system combines the performance of turbo codes with the frugal use of incremental redundancy inherent in the rate compatible punctured convolutional codes of Hagenauer (1988). Moreover, this paper introduces the notion of puncturing the systematic code symbols of a turbo code to maximize throughput at signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) of interest. The resulting system provides both an efficient family of achievable code rates at middle to high SNR and powerful low-rate error correction capability at low SNR     

Turbo-coded modulation for systems with transmit and receiveantenna diversity over block fading channels: system model, decodingapproaches, and practical considerations

We study the use of turbo-coded modulation for wireless communication systems with multiple transmit and receive antennas over block Rayleigh fading channels. We describe an effective way of applying turbo-coded modulation as an alternative to the current space-time codes with appropriate interleaving. We study the performance with the standard iterative turbo decoding algorithm, as well as the iterative demodulation-decoding algorithm. In addition to the introduction of the turbo-coded modulation scheme, we consider a variety of practical issues including the case of large number of antennas, the effects of estimated channel state information, and correlation among subchannels between different transmit-receive antenna pairs. We present examples to illustrate the performance of the turbo-coded modulation scheme and observe significant performance gains over the appropriately interleaved space-time trellis codes     

Analysis, design, and iterative decoding of double seriallyconcatenated codes with interleavers

A double serially concatenated code with two interleavers consists of the cascade of an outer encoder, an interleaver permuting the outer codeword bits, a middle encoder, another interleaver permuting the middle codeword bits, and an inner encoder whose input words are the permuted middle codewords. The construction can be generalized to h cascaded encoders separated by h-1 interleavers, where h>3. We obtain upper bounds to the average maximum likelihood bit-error probability of double serially concatenated block and convolutional coding schemes. Then, we derive design guidelines for the outer, middle, and inner codes that maximize the interleaver gain and the asymptotic slope of the error probability curves. Finally, we propose a low-complexity iterative decoding algorithm. Comparisons with parallel concatenated convolutional codes, known as “turbo codes”, and with the proposed serially concatenated convolutional codes are also presented, showing that in some cases, the new schemes offer better performance     

Optimized prunable single-cycle interleavers for turbo codes

This paper is aimed at the problem of designing optimized interleavers for parallel concatenated convolutional codes (PCCC) that satisfy several requirements simultaneously: 1) designing interleavers tailored to the constituent codes of the PCCC; 2) improving the distance spectra of the resulting turbo codes which dominate their asymptotic performance; 3) constructing optimized interleavers recursively so that they are implicitly prunable; and 4) completely avoiding short permutation cycles in order to reduce the risk of having strong correlations between the extrinsic information during iterative decoding. To this end, we present two theorems that lead to a modification of a previously developed iterative interleaver growth algorithm (IGA) that can be used to design optimized variable-length interleavers, whereby at every length the optimized permutation implemented by the interleaver is a single-cycle permutation. Two more modifications of the IGA are presented to improve the performance of the optimized interleavers at a reduced complexity. The optimization is achieved via constrained minimization of a cost function closely related to the asymptotic bit-error rate or frame-error rate of the code.     

Multilevel turbo coding with short interleavers

The impact of the interleaver, embedded in the encoder for a parallel concatenated code, called the turbo code, is studied. The known turbo codes consist of long random interleavers, whose purpose is to reduce the value of the error coefficients. It is shown that an increased minimum Hamming distance can be obtained by using a structured interleaver. For low bit-error rates (BERs), we show that the performance of turbo codes with a structured interleaver is better than that obtained with a random interleaver. Another important advantage of the structured interleaver is the short length required, which yields a short decoding delay and reduced decoding complexity (in terms of memory). We also consider the use of turbo codes as component codes in multilevel codes. Powerful coding structures that consist of two component codes are suggested. Computer simulations are performed in order to evaluate the reduction in coding gain due to suboptimal iterative decoding. From the results of these simulations we deduce that the degradation in the performance (due to suboptimal decoding) is very small