Achievable rates for additive isotropic α-stable noise channels

Abstract

Impulsive noise arises in many communication systems - ranging from wireless to molecular - and is often modeled via the α-stable distribution. In this paper, we investigate properties of the capacity of complex isotropic α-stable noise channels, which can arise in the context of wireless cellular communications and are not well understood at present. In particular, we derive a tractable lower bound, as well as prove existence and uniqueness of the optimal input distribution. We then apply our lower bound to study the case of parallel α-stable noise channels and derive a bound that provides insight into the effect of the tail index α on the achievable rate.