Information Theoretic Criterion for Stopping Turbo Iteration

Abstract—Most existing stopping criteria for turbo decoding have their root in hypothesis test, requiring a subjective threshold for decision making. A consequence is that the turbo decoding receiver so-constructed can con-verge at high signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) but fails at low SNRs, thereby calling for a new design philosophy for stopping criteria. In this correspon-dence, the problem is tackled in the framework of information theoretic criterion, which enables the turbo decoding to properly work in a changing SNR environment. Numerical results are presented for illustrating the good performance of the proposed method. Index Terms—MDL, stopping criterion, turbo decoding. I