Source and Channel Coding for Quasi-Static Fading Channels

Abstract

We consider transmission of a continuous amplitude source over a quasi-static Rayleigh fading channel. We analyze three different source and channel coding strategies in terms of overall expected distortion (ED). Our goal is to maximize the distortion exponent (Delta), which is the exponential decay rate of ED with increasing SNR. In each case, by adjusting the system parameters we find the best Delta as a function of the bandwidth expansion. We also find an upper bound for Delta and illustrate how this upper bound can be achieved for all bandwidth expansions even with reasonably simple strategies. Although we focus on a Gaussian source for brevity, we demonstrate that our results can be extended to more general source distributions