EEE436

DIGITAL COMMUNICATION
Coding

En. Mohd Nazri Mahmud

MPhil (Cambridge, UK)
BEng (Essex, UK)
nazriee@eng.usm.my
Room 2.14

EE436 Lecture Notes 1

 Turbo Codes
A relatively new class of convolutional codes first introduced in 1993
A basic turbo encoder is a recursive systematic encoder that employs two
convolutional encoders (recursive systematic convolutional or RSC in parallel, where
the second encoder is preceded by a pseudorandom interleaver to permute the
symbol sequence
Turbo code is also known as Parallel Concatenated Codes (PCC)

Systematic
bits, xk

Message
bits Parity
bits, y1k
RSC Puncture
encoder 1 & To
MUX transmitter
RSC
Interleaver
encoder 2
Parity
bits, y2k

EE436 Lecture Notes 2

 Turbo Codes
The input data stream is applied directly to encoder 1 and the pseudorandomly
reordered version of the same data stream is applied to encoder 2
Both encoders produce the parity bits.
The parity bits and the original bit stream are multiplexed and then transmitted
The block size is determined by the size of the interleaver for example 65, 536 is
common)
Puncture is applied to remove some parity bits to maintain the data rate. For
example, by eliminating odd parity bits from the first RSC and the even parity bits
from the second RSC
Systematic
Message bits, xk
bits
Parity
bits, y1k
RSC Puncture
encoder 1 & To
MUX transmitter
RSC
Interleaver
encoder 2
Parity
bits, y2k

EE436 Lecture Notes 3

RSC encoder for Turbo encoding

EE436 Lecture Notes 4

 RSC encoder for Turbo encoding

0011
0001
0001

0001

0001 1111
Recursive
Non-recursive

More 1’s for recursive gives better error performance

EE436 Lecture Notes 5

 Turbo decoding

Turbo decoder consists of two maximum a posterior (MAP) decoders and a feedback
path
Decoding operates on the noisy version of the systematic bits and the two sets of
parity bits in two decoding stages to produce estimate of the original message bits
The first decoder takes the information from the received signal and calculates the
A posterior probability (APP) value
This value is then used as the a priori probability value for the second decoder
The output is then fedback to the first decoder where the process repeats in an iterative
fashion with each iteration producing more refined estimates.
EE436 Lecture Notes 6
Turbo decoding uses BCJR algorithm

BCJR ( Bahl, Cocke, Jelinek and Raviv, 1972) algorithm is a

maximum a posteriori probability (MAP) decoder which minimizes
the bit errors by estimating the a posteriori probabilitities of the
individual bits in a code word.
It takes into account the recursive character of the RSC codes and
computes a log-likelihood ratio to estimate the APP for each bit.

EE436 Lecture Notes 7

Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) codes

An LDPC code is specified in terms of its parity-check matrix, H that

has the following structural properties

i) Each row consists of ρ 1’s

ii) Each column consists of γ 1’s
iii) The number of 1’s in common between any two columns is no
greater than 1; ie λ= 0 or 1
iv) Both ρ and γ are small compared with the length of the code

LDPC codes are recognised in the form of (n, γ, ρ)

H is said to be a low density parity check matrix

H has constant row and column weights (ρ and γ )

Density of H = total number of 1’s divided by total number of entries in H

EE436 Lecture Notes 8

Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) codes
Example (15, 4, 4) LDPC code
Each row consists of ρ=4 1’s
Each column consists of γ=4 1’s
The number of 1’s in common
between any two columns is no
greater than 1; ie λ= 0 or 1
Both ρ and γ are small compared
with the length of the code
Density = 4/15 = 0.267

EE436 Lecture Notes 9

Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) codes – Constructing H

For a given choice of ρ and γ, form a kγ by kρ matrix H (where k = a positive

integer > 1) that consists of γ k-by-kρ submatrix, H1, H2,….Hγ

Each row of a submatrix has ρ 1’s and each column of a submatrix contains a
single 1

Therefore each submatrix has a total of kρ 1’s.

Based on this, construct H1 by appropriately placing the 1’s.

1 i  k
For ,the ith row of H1 contains all its ρ 1’s in columns (i-1) ρ+1 to iρ

The other submatrices are merely column permutations of H1

EE436 Lecture Notes 10

Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) codes – Example Constructing H

Choice of ρ=4 and γ=3 and k=5

Form a kγ by kρ (15-by-20) matrix H that consists of γ=3 k-by-kρ (5-by-20)

submatrix, H1, H2,Hγ=3

Each row of a submatix has ρ=4 1’s and each column of a submatrix contains a
single 1

Therefore each submatrix has a total of kρ=20 1’s.

Based on this, construct H1 by appropriately placing the 1’s.

1 i  5
For ,the ith row of H1 contains all its ρ=4 1’s in columns (i-1) ρ+1 to iρ

The other submatrices are merely column permutations of H1

EE436 Lecture Notes 11

Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) codes –
Example Constructing H for (20, 3, 4) LDPC code

EE436 Lecture Notes 12

Construction of Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) codes

There are many techniques of constructing the LDPC codes

Constructing LDPC codes with shorter block is easier than the
longer ones
For large block sizes, LDPC codes are commonly constructed by first
studying the behaviour of decoders.
Among the techniques are Pseudo-random techniques, Combinatorial
approaches and finite geometry. These are beyond the scope of this
lecture.
For this lecture, we see how short LDPC codes are constructed from a
given parity check matrix.

For example a (6,3) linear LDPC code given by the following H

EE436 Lecture Notes 13

Construction of Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) codes

For example a (6,3) linear LDPC code given by the following H

0

The 8 codewords can be obtained by putting the parity-check matrix H into

this form H=[PT I In-k ]; where P=coefficient matrix and In-k = identity matrix

The generator matrix is, G = [In-k I P]

At the receiver, H=[PT I In-k ] is used to check the error syndrome.

Exercise:
Generate the codeword for m=001 and show how the receiver performs
the error checking

EE436 Lecture Notes 14