On unequal error protection LDPC codes based on Plotkin-type constructions

A family of unequal error-protection (UEP) low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes, based on Plotkin-type constructions, is introduced. The codes are decoded in multiple stages in such a manner that the order of decoding determines the level of error protection. The level of UEP among the code bits can be further increased by properly combining structured and random-like LDPC component codes with carefully chosen properties, and by using some new reliability features. The proposed scheme also offers a good trade-off between code performance on the one hand and encoding/decoding and storage complexity on the other. To the best of our knowledge, the proposed approach represents the first iterative UEP method with analytically provable properties.