An Online Fountain Code with Dynamic Unequal Error Protection for Underwater Acoustic Networks
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Given the characteristics of underwater acoustic networks, such as limited bandwidth, significant latency, strong dynamics, and energy constraints, traditional online fountain codes with unequal error protection were observed to suffer from high overhead, statically fixed parameters, and frequent feedback, making them difficult to adapt to complex and dynamic underwater environments. To address these issues, a dynamic adaptive adjustment mechanism and a low-overhead dynamic feedback mechanism were designed to optimize encoding parameters and data priorities in real time based on channel and node conditions, thereby accommodating the characteristics of underwater acoustic channels. During the buildup phase, a traversal expansion window strategy for important data was introduced to increase the probability of key data participating in encoding. During the completion phase, a sequential window strategy was adopted to ensure the prioritized recovery of relatively important data. Theoretical analysis and simulation results demonstrate that the proposed scheme reduces the coding overhead for recovering important data by up to 41.13% (minimum 13%), reduces the total overhead by up to 17.44% (minimum 4.36%), and reduces the feedback overhead by more than 50%. Thus, it significantly improves the efficiency and reliability of data transmission with different importance levels in dynamic underwater acoustic networks.
Authors: Zhao Lei, Du Xiujuan, Liu Xiuxiu, Tian Xiaojing
Language: Chinese
Subfield: Ocean Engineering
Field: Engineering
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7163962812