Low-density parity-check codes for noncoherent UWB communication systems

Abstract

In order to guarantee reliable data transmission, powerful channel coding techniques are usually required in noncoherent ultra- wideband (UWB) communication systems. Accordingly, several forward error correction (FEC) codes, such as Reed-Solomon and convolutional codes have been used in noncoherent UWB systems to improve the bit error rate (BER) performance. In this paper, low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes are further studied as more powerful FEC candidates for noncoherent UWB systems. Two LDPC codes and the corresponding decoding procedures are presented for noncoherent UWB systems. Moreover, performance comparison between the LDPC codes and other FEC codes are provided for three major noncoherent UWB communication systems, namely, noncoherent pulse position modulation (NC-PPM), transmitted reference (TR) and transmitted reference pulse cluster (TRPC). Both theoretical analysis and simulation results show that the two investigated LDPC codes outperform other existing FEC codes with limited penalty in terms of complexity and therefore they are promising FEC candidates for noncoherent UWB systems with low- cost and low-power consumption.