Source descriptor selection schemes for multiple description coded services in 4G wireless communication systems

4G wireless communication networks are characterized by the need to support heterogenous terminals differing in size, display, battery, computational power, etc. For efficient usage of the wireless spectrum all devices should be served by the same spectrum instead of allocating spectra dedicated to the different terminal classes. This feature is naturally supported when the source coding of the traffic is done as a multiple description coding. The restoration quality of the information source is proportional to the quantity of the descriptors used in the restoration process. Hence, terminals with less capabilities may simply discard or not receive some of the descriptors, while high class terminals try to receive all information. In the case of partial reception of descriptors the performance can be improved by selection strategies for the descriptors. We advocate the usage of new descriptor selection schemes for multiple description coded services. The proposed schemes differ with respect to the availability of a feedback channel. All solutions are terminal oriented and are beneficial in the design of terminals that have robust and high quality services. Furthermore, our approaches inherently achieve fairness among different terminals. As an example of our results for video communication, we can show gains of 4 dB when the proposed approach is utilized in the system.