Young-Jo Ko

Error-correcting codes on scale-free networks.

We investigate the potential of scale-free networks as error-correcting codes. We find that irregular low-density parity-check codes with the highest performance known to date have degree distributions well fitted by a power-law function p (k) approximately k(-gamma) with gamma close to 2, which suggests that codes built on scale-free networks with appropriate power exponents can be good error-correcting codes, with a performance possibly approaching the Shannon limit. We demonstrate for an erasure channel that codes with a power-law degree distribution of the form p (k) = C (k+alpha)(-gamma), with k> or =2 and suitable selection of the parameters alpha and gamma, indeed have very good error-correction capabilities.