Rate-compatible punctured space-time codes for unequal error protection

In this paper, space-time codes are combined with puncturing for the application of unequal error protection (UEP). We propose a new class of the rate-compatible punctured space- time codes with flexible code rates and powerful UEP capabilities. All punctured codes in the same family can be decoded via a single decoder for the parent code. Performance analysis is provided together with a design criterion for optimizing the punctured codes. Based on the criterion, families of good rate- compatible punctured space-time codes with various rates and memories are given by a computer search. the dynamic puncturing may result in the unpredictable per- formance loss. A new class of the rate-compatible punctured space-time codes is devised under the rate-compatible criterion (2) for UEP. By maximizing the minimum effective distance, families of good rate-compatible punctured space-time codes with various rates and memories are given by a computer search. The rest of this paper is organized as follows. In Section II, we describe how to puncture space-time code, including the maximum likelihood (ML) decoding. The performance analysis of the punctured space-time codes is presented in Section III, where an effective parameter for performance evaluation is provided. In Section IV, we study the application of the punctured space-time codes to UEP. Simulation results are given in Section V. Finally, Section VI concludes this work.