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1. On the Duality Between the BSC and Quantum PSC

   https://doi.org/10.1109/ISIT45174.2021.9518034  

   Rengaswamy, Narayanan ; Pfister, Henry D. ( July 2021 , 2021 IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory (ISIT))

   null (Ed.)

   In 2018, Renes [IEEE Trans. Inf. Theory, vol. 64, no. 1, pp. 577-592 (2018)] developed a general theory of channel duality for classical-input quantum-output channels. His result shows that a number of well-known duality results for linear codes on the binary erasure channel can be extended to general classical channels at the expense of using dual problems which are intrinsically quantum mechanical. One special case of this duality is a connection between coding for error correction on the quantum pure-state channel (PSC) and coding for wiretap secrecy on the classical binary symmetric channel (BSC). Similarly, coding for error correction on the BSC is related to wire-tap secrecy on the PSC. While this result has important implications for classical coding, the machinery behind the general duality result is rather challenging for researchers without a strong background in quantum information theory. In this work, we leverage prior results for linear codes on PSCs to give an alternate derivation of the aforementioned special case by computing closed-form expressions for the performance metrics. The noted prior results include the optimality of square-root measurement for linear codes on the PSC and the Fourier duality of linear codes. 

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2. New Dual Relationships for Error-Correcting Wiretap Codes

   https://doi.org/10.1109/ITW48936.2021.9611443  

   Shoushtari, Morteza ; Harrison, Willie K. ( October 2021 , 2021 Information Theory Workshop (ITW))

   In this paper, we consider the equivocation of finite blocklength coset codes when used over binary erasure wiretap channels. We make use of the equivocation matrix in comparing codes that are suitable for scenarios with noisy channels for both the intended receiver and an eavesdropper. Equivocation matrices have been studied in the past only for the binary erasure wiretap channel model with a noiseless channel for the intended recipient. In that case, an exact relationship between the elements of equivocation matrices for a code and its dual code was identified. The majority of work on coset codes for wiretap channels only addresses the noise-free main channel case, and extensions to noisy main channels require multi-edge type codes. In this paper, we supply a more insightful proof for the noiseless main channel case, and identify a new dual relationship that applies when two-edge type coset codes are used for the noisy main channel case. The end result is that the elements of the equivocation matrix for a dual code are known precisely from the equivocation matrix of the original code according to fixed reordering patterns. Such relationships allow one to study the equivocation of codes and their duals in tandem, which simplifies the search for best and/or good finite blocklength codes. This paper is the first work that succinctly links the equivocation/error correction capabilities of dual codes for two-edge type coset coding over erasure-prone main channels. 

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3. Channel coding at low capacity

   Fereydounian, Mohammad ; Hassani, Hamed ; Jamal, Vahid ; Mahdavifar, Hessam ( August 2023 , IEEE journal on selected areas in information theory)

   Low-capacity scenarios have become increasingly important in the technology of the In- ternet of Things (IoT) and the next generation of wireless networks. Such scenarios require efficient and reliable transmission over channels with an extremely small capacity. Within these constraints, the state-of-the-art coding techniques may not be directly applicable. More- over, the prior work on the finite-length analysis of optimal channel coding provides inaccurate predictions of the limits in the low-capacity regime. In this paper, we study channel coding at low capacity from two perspectives: fundamental limits at finite length and code construc- tions. We first specify what a low-capacity regime means. We then characterize finite-length fundamental limits of channel coding in the low-capacity regime for various types of channels, including binary erasure channels (BECs), binary symmetric channels (BSCs), and additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channels. From the code construction perspective, we charac- terize the optimal number of repetitions for transmission over binary memoryless symmetric (BMS) channels, in terms of the code blocklength and the underlying channel capacity, such that the capacity loss due to the repetition is negligible. Furthermore, it is shown that capacity- achieving polar codes naturally adopt the aforementioned optimal number of repetitions. 

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4. Coded Distributed Computing: Performance Limits and Code Designs

   https://doi.org/10.1109/ITW44776.2019.8989097  

   Jamali, Mohammad Vahid ; Soleymani, Mahdi ; Mahdavifar, Hessam ( August 2019 , 2019 IEEE Information Theory Workshop (ITW))

   We consider the problem of coded distributed computing where a large linear computational job, such as a matrix multiplication, is divided into $k$ smaller tasks, encoded using an $(n,k)$ linear code, and performed over $n$ distributed nodes. The goal is to reduce the average execution time of the computational job. We provide a connection between the problem of characterizing the average execution time of a coded distributed computing system and the problem of analyzing the error probability of codes of length $n$ used over erasure channels. Accordingly, we present closed-form expressions for the execution time using binary random linear codes and the best execution time any linear-coded distributed computing system can achieve. It is also shown that there exist good binary linear codes that attain, asymptotically, the best performance any linear code, not necessarily binary, can achieve. We also investigate the performance of coded distributed computing systems using polar and Reed-Muller (RM) codes that can benefit from low-complexity decoding, and superior performance, respectively, as well as explicit constructions. The proposed framework in this paper can enable efficient designs of distributed computing systems given the rich literature in the channel coding theory. 

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5. Accelerating Polarization via Alphabet Extension

   Duursma, Iwan ; Gabrys, Ryan ; Guruswami, Venkatesan ; Lin, Ting-Chun ; Wang, Hsin-Po ( September 2022 , Leibniz international proceedings in informatics)

   Polarization is an unprecedented coding technique in that it not only achieves channel capacity, but also does so at a faster speed of convergence than any other technique. This speed is measured by the "scaling exponent" and its importance is three-fold. Firstly, estimating the scaling exponent is challenging and demands a deeper understanding of the dynamics of communication channels. Secondly, scaling exponents serve as a benchmark for different variants of polar codes that helps us select the proper variant for real-life applications. Thirdly, the need to optimize for the scaling exponent sheds light on how to reinforce the design of polar code. In this paper, we generalize the binary erasure channel (BEC), the simplest communication channel and the protagonist of many polar code studies, to the "tetrahedral erasure channel" (TEC). We then invoke Mori-Tanaka’s 2 × 2 matrix over 𝔽_4 to construct polar codes over TEC. Our main contribution is showing that the dynamic of TECs converges to an almost-one-parameter family of channels, which then leads to an upper bound of 3.328 on the scaling exponent. This is the first non-binary matrix whose scaling exponent is upper-bounded. It also polarizes BEC faster than all known binary matrices up to 23 × 23 in size. Our result indicates that expanding the alphabet is a more effective and practical alternative to enlarging the matrix in order to achieve faster polarization. 

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