Multilayer Codes for Broadcasting over Quasi-Static Fading MIMO Networks

A number of recent source coding techniques compress the source signal into multiple layers such that a destination is able to reconstruct the original signal (with some distortion) even if it has not received all the layers. Implementation of such source coding techniques in wireless networks requires the application of coding mechanisms (such as multilayer coding) which allow unequal error protection for different layers of the transmitted data. In this paper, we study the performance of multilayer coding for quasi-static fading channels where the source and the destination are equipped with multiple antennas and the Channel-State-Information (CSI) is only known at the destination. We limit the study to the scenarios where the destination is only able to perform successive-decoding (joint-decoding is not possible) and the objective is to find the design of a multilayer code which maximizes the average data rate received at the destination. To this end, we first propose a design rule for constructing a proper multilayer code for Multiple-Input-Multiple-Output (MIMO) networks. Furthermore, the paper presents a procedure which uses the proposed design rule to determine the parameters of the multilayer code. The performance of the designed multilayer coding scheme is then studied for different network setups.