Collaborative Research: MLWiNS: Physical Layer Communication revisited via Deep Learning

可靠的通信是现代信息时代的主力。通信、编码和信息论的学科通过设计有效的编码来推动创新，这些编码允许传输被可靠地解码。接近最优代码的进步是由个人的聪明才智取得的，而突破是零星的，在几十年里传播开来。深度学习最近在算法选择空间巨大的问题（例如，围棋）中显示出强大的前景。这种情况同样是交际理论的特点。深度学习方法可以在实现上述目标方面发挥至关重要的作用。所有产生的算法将维护在一个在线存储库与完整的源代码和文档。新代码的实际应用将在无线部署的背景下进行探讨。研究成果将用于开发新的本科和研究生课程。该研究的基本性质跨越了两个独立的科学和技术领域：有限块长度信息理论和深度学习数学。该项目旨在利用深度学习工具为规范通信模型设计一系列新的编码和解码方法；这样生成的代码自然是为有限的块长度构建的。同时，神经网络架构作为编码和解码过程的观点为研究其数学性质提供了独特的优势。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Reliable communication is a workhorse of the modern information age. The disciplines of communication, coding, and information theory drive the innovation by designing efficient codes that allow transmissions to be robustly decoded. Progress in near optimal codes is made by individual human ingenuity and breakthroughs have been, befittingly, sporadic, spread over several decades. Deep learning has recently shown strong promise in problems where the space of algorithmic choices is enormous (e.g., Go). This scenario likewise characterizes communication theory. Deep learning methods can play a crucial role in achieving the aforementioned goals. All resulting algorithms will be maintained on an online repository with full source code and documentation. The practical applications of the new codes will be explored in the context of wireless deployments. The research outcomes will be used to develop new undergraduate and graduate curricula. The fundamental nature of the research spans two areas of independent scientific and technical interest: finite block length information theory and the mathematics of deep learning. This project aims to bring the tools of deep learning to design a new family of encoding and decoding methods for canonical communication models; the codes so generated are naturally built for finite block lengths. In parallel, the viewpoint of neural network architectures as encoding and decoding procedures provides a unique vantage point to study their mathematical properties.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.