On weak convergence of probability measures, channel capacity and code error probabilities

Abstract

The relationship between weak convergence of channel probability measures, channel capacity, and error probability of block codes is examined for memoryless channels with general input and output alphabets. It is shown that channel capacity is a lower semi-continuous function and that every block code with maximal probability of error /spl delta/ for a nominal channel for any /spl epsiv/>0 can be modified such that the modification has a probability of error less than /spl delta/+/spl epsiv/ for all channels in a sufficiently small neighborhood of the nominal channel.