JOURNAL OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS, VOLUME 25, ISSUE 2, JUNE 2014

1

Comparison of the Upper Bounds of the Link
Efficiency of Selective-Repeat ARQ in Burst
Error Channels Considering Unreliable
Acknowledgements
K. D. R. Jagath Kumara
AbstractRecent research on high efficiency data links includes a variety of hybrid-ARQ protocols, which almost always rely
on the principles of selective-repeat ARQ (SR-ARQ) protocol. In evaluating the efficiency of such protocols, it is often assumed
that the acknowledgement channel is perfect and therefore the acknowledgements, positive or negative, are not lost. However,
this paper illustrates the inaccuracy caused by making this assumption. It compares the upper bound of the efficiency that would
result if the acknowledgements are reliable to that if the acknowledgements are unreliable considering burst error channels, in
particular. For this purpose, the paper first uses a statistical model of a burst error channel to derive the frame error probability
and the corresponding efficiency theoretically. It also generates such bursty bit sequences, according to the model, in the
computer and estimates the quantities of interest for validation. This paper then simulates a data transmission scheme over a
multipath Rayleigh fading channel and estimates the parameters of the burst model in order to evaluate the same. In most
cases, it makes comparisons to random error channels.
Index TermsARQ, Efficiency, Burst Errors, Unreliable Acknowledgements.

1 INTRODUCTION
n exchanging data between two transceivers, a certain
link protocol is overlaid for error control and flow con-
trol. With some of these protocols known as Automatic
Repeat reQuest (ARQ) [1], [2], [3], a data frame consisting
of a certain number of data bits, is transmitted after ap-
pending error detection parity bits. If errors are detected
in a certain frame at the receiver, the transmitter is in-
structed to retransmit the corresponding frame. There-
fore, with this kind of a procedure, an error-free sequence
of data frames can be exchanged. In addition, because the
two transceivers are connected by bi-directional channels,
issues related to flow control and other transmission
problems can be managed in real time by using certain
control frames. Out of the basic variants, the Selective-
Repeat ARQ (SR-ARQ) [1], [2], [3] is known to support
continuous transmission of data resulting in highest link
efficiency. In order to increase the efficiency further, in
hybrid-ARQ, error correction too is incorporated into the
protocol. The receiver is provided with the error correc-
tion parity bits which are generated using either a block
code or a convolutional code, in different ways [4], [5],
[6], [7], [8], [9], [10], so that the efficiency and the average
time delay experienced by a frame is minimized. More
gains have been obtained by combining the codewords
constructed at the receiver after two or more retransmis-
sions as reported in [11], [12], [13], [14]. However, all of
these more efficient versions of hybrid-ARQ are almost
always based on the principles of SR-ARQ. Therefore, it is
worthwhile to establish the performance bounds of SR-
ARQ clearly through further research.
In SR-ARQ, both transceivers can transmit multiple
data frames in sequence. Each such frame carries a se-
quence number (SeqNr) so that a given receiver can issue
explicit positive acknowledgements (Acks) and negative
acknowledgements (NAcks) to indicate if the correspond-
ing frames are error-free or erroneous respectively. A giv-
en transmitter keeps copies of all the frames sent until the
corresponding Acks arrive, and retransmits all the frames
for which NAcks arrive. Further, if the acknowledgement
is erroneous and unreadable or if the transmitter does not
receive any acknowledgement for a certain frame, it re-
transmits the same after a time-out period. For this pur-
pose, the transmitter starts a timer for each frame it
transmits. The time-out period includes the two way
propagation delay, processing delays at the transceivers
and a safety margin. Ideally, the receiver must acknowl-
edge each frame individually as they arrive by including
Acks or NAcks in the data frames sent back in the other
direction. In addition, the receiver buffers all those frames
that arrive after an error in a certain frame and re-
sequences them once it obtains an error-free copy of the
same.
The main topic of this paper is to quantify the effect of
unreliable acknowledgements in burst error channels. It
allows both the data channel and the acknowledgement
channel to be equally noisy, bursty and busy. Unreliable
acknowledgements include erroneous Ack or NAck
frames, Acks converted to NAcks or vice versa due to an

- K. D. R. Jagath Kumara is with the department of Electrical and Electronic
Engineering, The University of Peradeniya, Peradeniya 20400, Sri Lanka.


I
2

error in the AckNr field [15] and lost Acks or NAcks due
to frame synchronization errors. However, the parity
check detects the former two cases with a high degree of
accuracy. In the latter case, the receiver is unable to locate
the frame boundaries clearly and discards the corres-
ponding sequence of bits, together with any acknowled-
gement information they carry. However, in all three cas-
es, the transmitter has to retransmit the corresponding
frame after time-out causing the efficiency to be low.
Therefore, this paper describes the effect of unreliable
acknowledgements on the upper bound of the efficiency
of SR-ARQ, conditioned on the accuracy of detecting bit
errors and synchronization errors.
In order to consider the effect of bursts, this paper re-
fers to a comprehensive statistical model described in [16]
and [17]. This model enables evaluating the probability
that a frame is in error (P
fe
) in a burst channel, on which
the link efficiency mainly depends [1], [2], [3], [4]. The
paper first considers a bursty bit sequence generated ac-
cording to the model using a computer and estimates P
fe

by counting. Then, it considers a simulation of a digital
modulation scheme in a three path Rayleigh fading envi-
ronment and estimates model parameters rigorously to
evaluate P
fe
.
Section 2 states the efficiencies of SR-ARQ if the ac-
knowledgements are reliable or unreliable for random
error channels, as described in [18]. Section 3 describes
the burst model in brief and, the simulation methods of
an arbitrary burst distribution and a digital data channel
in a fading environment. This section also presents simu-
lation data and derives the statistical quantities of interest
for the two examples. Section 4 presents results and com-
parisons. Section 5 concludes the paper.
2 EFFECT OF THE UNRELIABLE
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ON THE LINK EFFICIENCY
If the average number of times a given frame is transmit-
ted, including the original transmission and the retrans-
missions, in the process of transferring an error-free copy
of it to the destination is n , the efficiency of SR-ARQ, q,
is given by
1/ n q = (1)
This efficiency is for a case where the buffer sizes and
the SeqNr space are large enough to keep the transmis-
sion continuous. It considers whole frames including the
corresponding control fields and the flags. However, if
the transmission is not continuous and the frame over-
head is considered, (1) is modified by a factor correspond-
ing to the stoppage time and another corresponding to
the overhead bits in the frame [1], [2].
Therefore, in general, the derivation of n results in q
which serves the purpose of an upper bound. The frame
transmission is considered successful, only when the
transmitter receives an Ack after transmitting a certain
frame. Before that, several rounds of unsuccessful trans-
missions may have taken place due to frame errors caus-
ing NAcks. In addition, the fact that the acknowledge-
ments too, may arrive at the transmitter with errors mak-
ing the given transmission round unsuccessful increases
the number of retransmissions. Note also that there is no
synchronism between the transmitting and receiving
frames. Hence, the occurrence of errors in a given Ack or
a NAck is not correlated to that in the corresponding
frame which is being acknowledged. Therefore, let the
probability of error in a data frame be P
fe
. Then, if the bi-
directional channels are identical with respect to the oc-
currences of bit errors, the probability of error in a frame
carrying an acknowledgement is also P
fe
.

Otherwise, the
following derivation would simply result in a different
efficiency for each pair of frame error probabilities.
Hence, the probability that a frame carrying an acknowl-
edgement is error-free, P
c
, is the same as the probability
that a data frame is error-free and is given by
(1 )
c fe
P P = (2)
If the transmission becomes successful after the first
attempt, both the frame and the corresponding Ack must
be error-free. The probability of this event, P
t
(1), is given
by
2
(1) .
t c c c
P P P P = = (3)
Note that in the case where there is a perfect channel for
acknowledgements, P
t
(1) would be just P
c
, because the
acknowledgements would definitely arrive at the trans-
mitter error-free. If the frame carrying the Ack is found to
be erroneous, the transmitter cannot rely on the AckNr
field and makes a retransmission upon time out with a
probability of P
c
P
fe
. Further, a retransmission also results
if the original frame or both the frame and the corres-
ponding NAck are in error with probabilities of P
fe
P
c
or
P
fe
P
fe
respectively. Hence, the total probability that two
transmissions are required for successful completion,
P
t
(2), is given by
2 2 2
(2)
t c fe c fe c c fe fe c
P PP P P PP P P P = + + (4)
Again, if it has been assumed that the acknowledgements
are not vulnerable to errors, P
t
(2) would have been only
P
fe
P
c
.
In this way, it is possible to construct the discrete
probability distribution, P
t
(n), of the number of transmis-
sion attempts [18], n, required. As shown in [18], by aver-
aging n over P
t
(n),
2
1/
c
n P = (5)
Thus, the efficiency of SR-ARQ, without assuming that
the acknowledgements are reliable is given by
2
U c
P q = (6)
Note that this would be just
R c
P q = (7)
with the assumption mentioned [1], [2].

If the bit errors in the channel occur randomly with a
bit-error probability of P
be
, it is possible to evaluate P
c
and
then q easily. In this case, the probability that a given
frame of length L bits is error free, is given by simply

( ) 1
L
c be
P P = (8)
3

However, if the underlying channel is bursty, this expres-
sion is not accurate.
3 FRAME ERRORS IN BURST ERROR CHANNELS
In a burst channel, there are clusters of errors and rela-
tively long periods of error-free bits. For the purpose of
evaluating the frame error probability, it is necessary to
use a model which characterizes a burst channel com-
pletely allowing quantitative analysis. According to [16]
and [17] by the same author, a sequence of b consecutive
bit errors is defined to be a burst of length b where b > 1.
Then, such a burst of length b, where b is also less than a
certain maximum b
max
, is considered to occur randomly
with a certain probability P
b
(b). In this way, burst occur-
rences are characterized through their length, which is a
random variable. Hence, the length of the next error burst
is governed by each occurrence of this random variable, if
b > 1. Not until the end of this b-bit burst will the random
variable for the next burst be drawn. This length (b) may
be zero, in which case the bit is considered to be error-
free.
According to this model, an error burst of length b
1
oc-
curs with the probability P
b
(b
1
) and makes the next b
1
bits
erronous, while the error-free bits always occur singly
with the probability of P
b
(0). Using this model, it is possi-
ble to show that the effective bit error probability [16],
[17],
(0)
eff
b
b
p
P b
=
+
(9)
where the average length of a burst,
max
1
( )
b
b
b
b bP b
=
=

(10)
Further, the frame error probability for a frame of length
L bits,
(0)
1
(0)
L
b
fe
b
P
P
P b
=
+
(11)
Therefore, the probability that a frame is free of errors,
(0)
(0)
L
b
c
b
P
P
P b
=
+
(12)
This formulation allows for arbitrary error lengths, but
it is necessary to either approximate or empirically esti-
mate the distribution P
b
(b). This is because any theoretical
approach which derives P
b
(b) for a given modulation
scheme and a channel type is not available. Hence, this
paper considers two different approaches for quantifying
the frame error probability, one which defines an arbi-
trary burst-length distribution in an attempt to approx-
imate a real burst channel with a high degree of flexibility
and another which estimates the burst-length distribution
by simulating a binary DPSK (differential phase shift key-
ing) modulation over a multipath Rayleigh fading chan-
nel [16], [17].

3.1 An Arbitrary burst-Length Distribution (P
arb
(b))
Noting that according to the burst model, the burst-length
distribution is of the form,
{ }
0 1 2 max max
( ) , , ,.... for 0,1, 2,....
b
P b P P P P b b = = (13)
consider the arbitrary distribution,
( ) [1 ,0.25 ,0.2 ,0.15 ,0.1 ]; 0,1, 2,3, 4
( ) 0.05 ; 5,6,7,8,9,10 ( ) 0; 10
arb
arb arb
P b p p p p p b
P b p b and P b b
= =
= = = >
(14)

defined in terms of the parameter p, where b
max
= 10. The
significance of p is that it provides the flexibility to vary
the probability of no-error (P
arb
(0)) and the total probabili-
ty of error bursts (sum of P
arb
(b) for (b
max
> b > 1)). In this
way, it is possible to obtain several channels with differ-
ent effective bit error probabilities (p
eff
) but still keeping
the shape of the burst-length distribution for b>1, the
same. For example, Fig. 1 illustrates P
arb
(b) in (14) in a bar
chart for p = 10
-3
.















Fig. 1: The arbitrary burst length distribution (P
arb
(b)) in
(14) at p = 10
-3


It is possible to generate such bit sequences for a range
of p in a computer using MatLab and estimate the frame
error probability by counting the number of erroneous
frames [16, [17] as

fe
fe
tof
N
P
N
= (15)
where N
fe
is the number of frames with any number of
errors and N
tof
is the total number of frames including the
error-free frames. Thus, by comparing

fe
P to the frame
error probability obtained through the model parameters
(P
fe
) using (9) (12) and (14), [16] and [17] validated the
model. To keep the statistical accuracy, N
tof
was more
than 1000 times larger than the reciprocal of the ex-
pected

fe
P . The same references further validated the
model against the probability, P
x, L
, that a frame of length
L contains any number of errors, x, in general. Based on
Parb(0): 0.999 (t heory, (14))
Bit Error Probabilit y: 0.003740 (t heory, (9));
0.003531 (est imat ed, (16));
0
0.0001
0.0002
0.0003
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Burst lengt h, b
P
r
o
b
a
b
i
l
i
t
y

o
f

a

b
u
r
s
t

o
f

l
e
n
g
t
h

b
,

P
a
r
b
(
b
)
4

that, it is possible to approximate a burst-length distribu-
tion and evaluate p
eff
, P
fe
, P
c
and P
x, L
using the model ma-
thematically without generating such a bit sequence, each
time. Note that this paper uses both P
fe
obtained theoreti-
cally for P
arb
(b) given in (14) at each p
eff
, and

fe
P of the cor-
responding computer generated bit sequence with an
estimated bit error probability of
eff
p for evaluating the
efficiencies of SR-ARQ (q
U
and q
R
) where

be
eff
tob
N
p
N
= (16)
In (16), N
be
is the number of erroneous bits and N
tob
is the
total number of bits, in each bit sequence. For a frame
length of L = 473, Table 1 lists P
arb
(0), b , P
fe
and p
eff
calcu-
lated for a range of values of p in (14). For comparison,
Table 2 lists N
tof
, N
fe
,

fe
P and
eff
p obtained by simulating
each of those bit sequences. These tables show that the
differences between the quantities obtained using the
theory (P
fe
and p
eff
) and the simulation (

fe
P and
eff
p ) are
very small, respectively.

TABLE 1
THEORETICAL PARAMETERS
p P
arb
(0)
b
P
fe

from (11)
p
eff

from (9)
10
-2
0.99 0.0375 0.991612 0.036496
10
-2.5
0.9968377 0.0118585 0.778381 0.011756
10
-3
0.999 0.00375 0.378726 0.003740
10
-3.5
0.9996837 0.0011859 0.139725 0.001185
10
-4
0.9999 0.000375 0.046463 0.000375
10
-4.5
0.9999684 0.0001186 0.014922 0.000119
10
-5
0.99999 0.0000375 0.004746 0.000038
10
-5.5
0.9999968 0.0000119 0.001521 0.000012
10
-6
0.999999 0.0000038 0.000476 0.000004

TABLE 2
ESTIMATED PARAMETERS
N
tof
N
fe

fe
P
from (15)

eff
p
from (16)
217 216 0.995392 0.036386
213 158 0.741784 0.011620
211 76 0.360190 0.003531
211 28 0.132701 0.001169
2114 75 0.035478 0.000272
2114 21 0.009934 0.000080
21140 104 0.004920 0.000039
211400 328 0.001552 0.000012
211400 102 0.000483 0.000004

3.2 The Burst Length distribution of a Simulated
Digital Channel (P
sim
(b))
A 500 bps, binary DPSK (differential phase shift keying)
transmission scheme with a carrier frequency of 1 kHz
was simulated over a 3-path Rayleigh fading channel us-
ing the SimuLink of MatLab, [16], [17]. The relative path
delays were set to 0.001 s and 0.0012 s. The additive white
Gaussian noise (AWGN) was added at the receiver end.
The burst error pattern of this transmission scheme was
found by comparing the input bit stream with the re-
ceived bit stream. The burst probability distribu-
tion,

( )
sim
P b , could be approximated by counting the
number of b-bit error bursts, b>0, and no-errors, b=0, and
dividing them by the total number of events, which is the
sum of the number of no-errors and the number of error
bursts. However, according to [17], a more accurate burst
distribution,

( )
sim
P b , could be obtained by making correc-
tions for the bursts that are caused by the combination of
two or more lower order bursts. For example, a certain 2-
bit burst might have been caused by the occurrence of
two 1-bit bursts consecutively. In counting, they were
unknowingly considered as just a single 2-bit burst mak-
ing

( )
sim
P b less accurate. Shown in Table 3, are the number
of correct bits, N
0
, burst counts, N
b
for 1 s bs 5, the total
number of bit errors, N
be
, and
eff
p in a sample of N
tob
=
999984 bits. In this case, different sets of readings were
obtained by varying the power spectral density of
AWGN. Illustrated in Fig. 2, is the empirical burst-length
distribution,

( )
sim
P b , obtained with corrections, when
eff
p =
0.003760. Note that by using these burst statistics col-
lected from the simulated digital channel, the accuracy of
the burst model has been again verified in [17]. Therefore,
the efficiencies of SR-ARQ (q
U
and q
R
) can be evaluated
by finding P
fe
and P
c
theoretically for each

( )
sim
P b . Note that
q
U
and q
R
obtained in this way may be considered as
semi-theoretical because they are based on both the simu-
lation data and the theory.

TABLE 3
BURST COUNTS OF THE SIMULATED CHANNEL
N
0
N
1
N
2
N
3
N
4
N
5
N
be

eff
p
990134 4920 2410 30 5 0 9850 0.009850
996224 2032 856 4 1 0 3760 0.003760
999268 374 171 0 0 0 716 0.000716
999543 219 111 0 0 0 441 0.000441
999857 79 24 0 0 0 127 0.000127
999964 14 3 0 0 0 20 0.000020

















Fig. 2: The empirical burst distribution (

( )
sim
P b ) of the
simulated digital channel (in Log scale) at 0.00376
eff
p =
Psim(0): 0.997104 (est imat ed)
Bit Error Probabilit y: 0.00376 (est imat ed (16))
Channel: Binary DPSK on 3-Pat h Rayleigh Fading
wit h AWGN
0.0000001
0.00001
0.001
0.1
0 1 2 3 4
Burst length, b
P
r
o
b
a
b
i
l
i
t
y

o
f

a

b
u
r
s
t

o
f

l
e
n
g
t
h

b
,

P
s
i
m
(
b
)
^


^

<

<

5

4 RESULTS
In [18], the efficiency of SR-ARQ if the acknowledgements
are unreliable (q
U
) in random error channels is illustrated
for 1000-bit frames. It is compared to the ideal case where
the acknowledgements are reliable (q
R
). According to this
work, if the acknowledgements are not reliable, the link
efficiency of SR-ARQ is considerably inferior, for exam-
ple, by about 60% at a bit error probability of 10
-3
.
This paper illustrates the same for burst error chan-
nels by allowing both the data channel and the acknowl-
edgement channel to be equally bursty. Fig. 3 illustrates
q
U
and q
R
obtained using (11), (2), (6) and (7) for the burst
channels (P
arb
(b)) defined in (14) at different bit error
probabilities (p
eff
) found from (9). It also illustrates q
U
and
q
R
estimated by simulating the same burst channels as
described in Section 3.1 and by using (15), (2), (6) and (7)
for the corresponding bit error probabilities (
eff
p ) given
by (16). Fig. 4 compares q
U
and q
R
obtained through si-
mulations for the same burst channels to those for ran-
dom error channels. In this case, Fig. 4 includes the effi-
ciencies of SR-ARQ calculated using (8), (6) and (7) sup-
posing that the bit errors are random at each of those val-
ues of
eff
p . The frame size (L) for theses cases is 473 bits.
Fig. 5 illustrates q
U
and q
R
obtained semi-theoretically
using (10), (12), (6) and (7) for the empirical burst distri-
butions (

( )
sim
P b ) as described in Section 3.2 for the frame
size of L= 473 bits. It too contains comparisons to random
error channels. Fig. 6 illustrates the same in Fig. 5 for a
frame length of L=1000 bits.
















Fig. 3: q
U
and q
R
for the arbitrary burst channels (P
arb
(b))
obtained using theory (Th.) and simulations (Sim.)

According to Figs. 3, 4 and 5, q
U
is always inferior to
q
R
in any channel, either random or bursty. In the arbi-
trary burst channel, the percentage degradation can
amount to 40 at a bit error probability of about 10
-3
. How-
ever, in the simulated transmission scheme, this percen-
tage is about 25 considering the same frame size of 473
bits. When the frame size increases to 1000 bits, q
U
deteri-
orates further, by about 30%. As Figs. 4, 5 and 6 shows,
the corresponding efficiencies, q
U
or q
R
, are considerably
higher if the errors are bursty rather than random at a
given bit error probability.
















Fig. 4: q
U
and q
R
for the arbitrary burst channels (P
arb
(b))
and random error channels (L=473 bits)
















Fig. 5: q
U
and q
R
for the simulated digital channels
(

( )
sim
P b ) and random error channels (L=473 bits)

















Fig. 6: q
U
and q
R
for the simulated digital channels
(

( )
sim
P b ) and random error channels (L=1000 bits)
5 CONCLUSIONS
It has been shown that if the acknowledgements are not
reliable, the link efficiency of SR-ARQ reduces to
2
c
P , in-
stead of P
c
in an ideal case with fully reliable acknowled-
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1 2 3 4 5 6
- Log(bit error probability)
E
f
f
i
c
i
e
n
c
y
(Th.) (Th.)
(Sim.) (Sim.)
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1 2 3 4 5
- Log(bit error probability)
E
f
f
i
c
i
e
n
c
y
(Th.)-Random Errors (Th.)-Random Errors
(Sim.,Th.)-Burst Errors (Sim.,Th.)-Burst Errors
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1 2 3 4 5 6
- Log(bit error prbability)
E
f
f
i
c
i
e
n
c
y
(Th.)- Random Errors (Th.)- Random Errors
(Sim.)- Burst Errors (Sim.)- Burst Errors
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1 2 3 4 5
- Log(bit error probability)
E
f
f
i
c
i
e
n
c
y
(Th.)-Random Errors (Th.)-Random Errors
(Sim.,Th.)-Burst Errors (Sim.,Th.)-Burst Errors
6

gements. This reduction amounts to 60% when P
be
=10
-3
in
bi-directional channels with random bit errors. Note
that
2
c
P is an upper bound for the efficiency of SR-ARQ
overlaid on a full duplex channel, both of which are
prone to errors. This efficiency is only to reduce due to
the frame overhead, discontinuous transmission and the
undetectable error probability.
It is interesting to quantify the same for burst-error
channels, which has been pursued in this paper. The
burst model used in here can describe occurrences of er-
ror bursts with a good accuracy and can aid in the theo-
retical evaluation or the estimation of the protocol effi-
ciency. The burst channels contain clusters of errors and
long sequences of error free bits. For this reason, relative-
ly more frames are likely to be error-free causing lower
P
fe
. This is in contrast to random channels in which errors
occur rather regularly and long error free sequences are
unlikely causing higher P
fe
. As a result, the efficiency of
SR-ARQ is higher for burst channels when compared to
random channels. However, in burst channels, imperfect
acknowledgements can degrade the efficiency (q
U
) up to
40%, particularly at moderate bit error probabilities
around 10
-3
. An increase in the frame size results in de-
creasing both efficiencies, q
U
and q
R
, and in increasing the
relative degradation of q
U
with respect to q
R
.
In order to make acknowledgements more reliable, the
receiver can include several copies of them in different
frames so that at least one of them reaches the transmitter
error-free [14]. Further, header error correction and head-
er repetition increases the reliability of acknowledge-
ments.

REFERENCES
[1] A. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks, 2
nd
Edition, Prentice-Hall
International Inc., pp. 225-245, 1989.
[2] W. Stallings, Data and Computer Communications, 3
rd
Edition,
Maxwell Macmillan International Editions, pp. 163-170, 1991.
[3] S. Lin, D. Costello, M. Miller, Automatic Repeat-Request Er-
ror-Control Schemes, IEEE Communications Magazine, vol. 22,
no. 12, pp. 5-17, 1984.
[4] E.Y. Rocher, R.L. Pickholtz, An Analysis of the Effectiveness
of Hybrid Transmission Schemes, IBM Journal of Research and
Development, vol. 14, no. 4, pp. 426-433, 1970.
[5] S. Lin, P.S. Yu, A Hybrid ARQ Scheme with Parity Retrans-
mission for Error Control in Satellite Channels, IEEE Transac-
tions on Communications, vol. COM-30, no. 7, pp. 1701-1719,
1982.
[6] P.Z. Fan, M. Darnell, Z. Chen, F. Jin, Adaptive Hybrid-ARQ
Scheme Using Multidimensional Parity-Check Codes, Electron-
ic Letters, vol. 29-2, pp. 196-198, 1993.
[7] L.J. Zhang, V.O.K. Li, Z.G. Cao, Non-Binary Type-II HARQ
and its Application to an Adaptive System, International Jour-
nal of Communication Systems, vol. 18, no. 2, pp. 97-117, 2005.
[8] Q. Huang, S. Chan, L. Ping, K.T. Ko, M. Zukerman, A Hybrid
ARQ Scheme Based on CT-TCM Codes, IEEE Communication
Letters, vol. 9, no. 7, pp. 664-666, 2005.
[9] L. Rasmussen, M.J. Bartz, S.B. Wicker, A Comparison of Trellis
Coded and Reed-Solomon Coded Hybrid-ARQ Protocols over
Slowly Fading Rayleigh Channels, Wireless Personnel Commu-
nications, vol. 2, no. 4, pp. 393-413, 1995.
[10] J.F.T. Cheng, Coding Performance of Hybrid ARQ Schemes,
IEEE Transactions on Communications, vol. 54-6, pp. 1017-1029,
2006.
[11] D. Chase, Code Combining - A Maximum-Likelihood Decod-
ing Approach for Combining an Arbitrary Number of Noisy
Packets, IEEE Transactions on Communications, vol. 33, no. 5,
pp. 385-393, 1985.
[12] F. Chiti, R. Fantacci, A Soft Combining Hybrid-ARQ Tech-
nique Applied to Throughput Maximization within 3G Satellite
IP Networks, IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology, vol.
56-2, pp. 594-604, 2007.
[13] H. Boujemaa, El Bahri, M. Siala, Throughput Performance of
Hybrid ARQ Schemes with Packet and Code Combining for
DS-CDMA Downlink Systems Using Orthogonal Spreading Se-
quences, European Transactions on Telecommunications, vol. 19-2,
pp. 173-179, 2008.
[14] K.D.R. Jagath-Kumara, M. Bebbington, Performance Optimi-
zation of Hybrid-ARQ Schemes with Codeword Combining Us-
ing Physical Layer Modelling, Australian Journal of Electrical
and Electronics Engineering, vol. 5, no. 2, pp. 185-200, 2009.
[15] P. Wu, N. Jindal, Coding versus ARQ in Fading Channels:
How Reliable Should the PHY Be? , Proc. IEEE GLOBECOM
Conference, Honolulu, USA, 2009.
[16] K.D.R. Jagath-Kumara, Testing of a Burst-Error Model Using
Computer Simulations, Proc. Twelfth Electronics New Zealand
Conference (ENZCon 05), Manukau Institute of Technology,
Auckland, New Zealand, pp. 141-145, Nov. 2005.
[17] K.D.R. Jagath-Kumara, M. Bebbington, Error Content in
Frames Transmitted over Burst-Error Channels, IEEE Transac-
tions on Wireless Communications, vol. 4, no. 5, pp. 2533-2539,
2005.
[18] Jagath-Kumara, An Upper Bound for the Link Efficiency of
Selective-Repeat ARQ Considering Unreliable Acknowledge-
ments, Journal of Telecommunications, vol. 21, issue 2, 2013.


K.D.R. Jagath Kumara received the BSc (Honours) degree specializing in
electrical and electronic engineering from the
University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka in 1985 and
the MEngSc degree from the University of New
South Wales, Sydney, Australia in 1992. He
received the PhD degree from the University of
South Australia in 1997. Jagath-Kumara was
employed as an engineer from 1986-87 in the
Ceylon Electricity Board and from 1987-89 in
the Airports and Aviation Services (Sri Lanka)
Ltd. He held research fellow positions at the
University of South Australia from 1996-97 and at the University of Tech-
nology, Sydney, Australia in 1998. He was a lecturer in the Massey univer-
sity, New Zealand from 2000-06. From 2006, he has been a senior lecturer
in the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. He was either, a member, co-
chair or the chair of the TPC for many national and international confe-
rences and has reviewed close to 100 conference and journal papers. Jagath
Kumara has obtained 4 research grants and 6 conference travel grants and,
won a PhD scholarship based on the outstanding academic qualifications
offered by the University of South Australia in 1992. In 2007, he received
the 140
th
anniversary medal and honours from the St Annes College, Sri
Lanka for the contributions made to his academic discipline since 1980.He
has published 26 conference and journal articles since 1994 and given 7
seminars at international venues. His research interests are on the statistical
signal processing, hybrid-ARQ and energy systems. He is currently a cor-
porate member of the Institution of Engineers, Sri Lanka.