In this paper, two decoding algorithms based on Successive-Cancellation (SC) are proposed to improve the error-correction performance of cyclic redundancy check (CRC)-aided polar codes while aiming for a low-complexity implementation. Comparisons with Dynamic SC Flip (DSCF) and SC Perturbation (SCP) are carried out since the proposed DSCF and Perturbation (DSCFP) and Perturbed DSCF (PDSCF) algorithms combine both methods. The analysis includes comparisons with several code lengths$N$and various number of decoding attempts$T_{max}$. For$N=1024$and the coding rate$R= 1/2$, the DSCF and the SCP algorithms with$T_{\max}= 17$are bested by approximately 0.1 dB at block-error rate (BLER) of 0.001. At BLER = 10−6and for$T_{max}= 64$, the gain is of 0.375 dB and > 0.5 dB with respect to DSCF and SCP, respectively. At high signal-to-noise ratio, the average computational complexity of the proposed algorithms is virtually equivalent to that of SC.

Automorphism Ensemble (AE) decoding has recently drawn attention as a possible alternative to list decoding of polar codes. In this letter, we investigate the distribution of Partially-Symmetric Reed-Muller (PS-RM) codes, a family of polar codes yielding good performances under AE decoding. We prove the existence of these codes for almost all code dimensions for code lengths N ≤ 256. Moreover, we analyze the absorption group of this family of codes under SC decoding, proving that valuable permutations in AE decoding always exist. Finally, we experimentally show that PS-RM codes can outperform state-of-the-art polar-code-construction algorithms in terms of error-correction performance for short code lengths, while reducing decoding latency.

Polar codes are a class of error-correcting codes that provably achieve the capacity of practical channels. The successive-cancellation flip (SCF) decoder is a low-complexity decoder that was proposed to improve the performance of the successive-cancellation (SC) decoder as an alternative to the high-complexity successive-cancellation list (SCL) decoder. The SCF decoder improves the error-correction performance of the SC decoder, but the variable execution time and the high worst-case execution time pose a challenge for the realization of receivers with fixed-time algorithms. The dynamic SCF (DSCF) variation of the SCF decoder further improves the error-correction performance but the challenge of decoding delay remains. In this work, we propose a simplified restart mechanism (SRM) that reduces the execution time of SCF and DSCF decoders through conditional restart of the additional trials from the second half of the codeword. We show that the proposed mechanism is able to improve the execution time characteristics of SCF and DSCF decoders while providing identical error-correction performance. For a DSCF decoder that can flip up to 3 simultaneous bits per decoding trial, the average execution time, the average additional execution time and the execution-time variance are reduced by approximately 31%, 37% and 57%, respectively. For this setup, the mechanism requires approximately 3.9% additional memory.

In this paper, we propose an analysis of the automorphism group of polar codes, with the aim of designing codes tailored forautomorphism ensemble(AE) decoding. Using a novel description of polar codes as monomial codes through negative monomials, we prove the equivalence between the notion ofdecreasing monomial codesand the universal partial order (UPO) framework for polar codes; this property is widely believed to hold true but a formal proof was missing. We further provide a rigorous mathematical connection between code word permutations and affine transformations, an important link to understand the considered automorphisms. Based on this mathematical formalisms, we analyze the algebraic properties of theaffine automorphisms groupof polar codes, providing a novel description of its structure. We classify automorphisms such that all automorphisms in the same class lead to the same result under permutation decoding, which gives rise to the concept ofredundantautomorphisms. Mathematically this is achieved by introducing equivalence classes of affine automorphisms under AE-based decoding. For practical application, we provide an algorithm to compute representatives for the equivalence classes, such that one automorphism from each equivalence class can be selected for use in AE decoding. A numerical analysis of the error correction performance of AE decoding of polar codes, based on equivalence classes, concludes the paper.

This paper proposes new polar code design principles for the low-latency automorphism ensemble (AE) decoding. Our proposal permits to design a polar code with the desired automorphism group (if possible) while assuring the decreasing monomial property. Moreover, we prove that some automorphisms are redundant under AE decoding, and we propose a new automorphisms classification based on equivalence classes. Finally, we propose an automorphism selection heuristic based on drawing only one element of each class; we show that this method enhances the block error rate (BLER) performance of short polar codes even with a limited number of automorphisms.

In this paper we deal with polar code automorphisms that are beneficial under low-latency automorphism ensemble (AE) decoding, and we propose polar code designs that have such automorphisms. Successive-cancellation (SC) decoding and thus SC-based AE decoding are invariant with respect to the only known polar code automorphisms, namely those of the lower-triangular affine (LTA) group. To overcome this problem, we provide methods to determine whether a given polar code has non-LTA automorphisms and to identify such automorphisms. Building on this, we design specific polar codes that admit automorphisms in the upper-diagonal linear (UTL) group, and thus render SC-based AE decoding effective. Demonstrated by examples, these new polar codes under AE decoding outperform conventional polar codes under SC list decoding in terms of error rate, while keeping the latency comparable to SC decoding. Moreover, state-of-the-art BP-based permutation decoding for polar codes is beaten by BP-based AE thanks to this design.

In this paper we propose an enhanced soft cancellation (SCAN) decoder for polar codes based on decoding stages permutation. The proposed soft cancellation list (SCANL) decoder runs L independent SCAN decoders, each one relying on a different permuted factor graph. The estimated bits are selected among the L candidates through a dedicated metric provided by the decoders. Furthermore, we introduce an early-termination scheme reducing decoding latency without affecting error correction performance. We investigate the error-correction performance of the proposed scheme under various combinations of number of iterations used, permutation set and early-termination condition. Simulation results show that the proposed SCANL provides similar results when compared with belief propagation list, while having a smaller complexity. Moreover, for large list sizes, SCANL outperforms non-CRC aided successive cancellation list decoding.

The 5thgeneration wireless systems (5G) standardization process of the 3rdgeneration partnership project (3GPP) chose polar codes as a channel coding scheme for the control channel. In case of downlink control information, polar codes are concatenated with distributed distributed cyclic redundancy check (CRC). Whereas CRC bits allow to improve the performance of successive cancellation list (SCL) decoders by improving distance properties, distributed CRC bits allow for path pruning and decoding early-termination. In this paper, we show how to take advantage of the distributed CRC to improve SCL decoding, analyzing various schemes having different early-termination and error correction properties. Simulation results compare the proposed decoding schemes, showing different tradeoffs between error-correction performance and early-termination with different decoder parameters.