Burst Erasure Correction Capabilities of (n,n-1) Convolutional Codes

For (n, k, m) systematic polynomial convolutional encoders, there exists an upperbound on the length of a correctable burst of erasures in terms of code parameters. In this paper, we restrict ourselves to the case k = n - 1 and provide a necessary and sufficient condition to achieve the upperbound in terms of the encoder coefficients. In addition, for selected values of m, we present explicit (n, n - 1, m) systematic polynomial convolutional encoders that achieve the upperbound.