Soft-decoding vector quantizer using reliability information from turbo-codes

The optimum soft-decoding vector quantizer using the reliability information from turbo-codes is derived for combined source-channel coding. The encoder and decoder of the quantizer are optimized iteratively. For a four-dimensional vector quantizer having a rate of 1 bit/sample transmitted through a noisy channel, the soft-decoding channel-optimized quantizer can achieve about 3-3.7 dB performance improvement over conventional source-optimized quantizer.