Concatenated Reed-Solomon/convolutional coding scheme for data transmission in CDMA cellular systems

An error control scheme for data transmission in Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) cellular systems is proposed. The forward error correction scheme employs Reed-Solomon (RS) outer codes concatenated with convolutional inner codes. New tight upper bounds on the convolutional code performance in independent Rayleigh fading multipath channels are derived. Using these bounds and invoking the Gaussian assumption for the multiple access interference, the performance of the concatenated coding scheme is evaluated. Furthermore, design examples of RS outer codes and convolutional inner codes for data transmission at 9.6 and 128 kbit/s in CDMA cellular systems are presented. Finally, the capacity of a CDMA cellular system employing the proposed concatenated coding scheme is computed.