Combined Analog and Digital Error-Correcting Codes for Analog Information Sources

This paper focuses on error-correcting codes for analog signals. Generally, error-correcting codes exhibit a threshold effect, which degrades performance at the low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) range. We propose two error-correction alternatives based on chaotic dynamical systems, which improve threshold performance relative to previously proposed methods. The first one, which is based on principles of diversity, exhibits a very simple decoder. The second alternative, which is based on a low-density parity-check (LDPC) code, attains a significantly lower threshold. Theoretical analysis and simulations are provided.