{"ID":2877510,"CreatedAt":"2026-06-01T04:54:23.091178241Z","UpdatedAt":"2026-06-01T04:54:23.091178241Z","DeletedAt":null,"paper_url":"https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.19631","arxiv_id":"2508.19631","title":"Code-Weight Sphere Decoding","abstract":"Ultra-reliable low-latency communications (URLLC) demand high-performance error-correcting codes and decoders in the finite blocklength regime. This letter introduces a novel two-stage near-maximum likelihood (near-ML) decoding framework applicable to any linear block code. Our approach first employs a low-complexity initial decoder. If this initial stage fails a cyclic redundancy check, it triggers a second stage: the proposed code-weight sphere decoding (WSD). WSD iteratively refines the codeword estimate by exploring a localized sphere of candidates constructed from pre-computed low-weight codewords. This strategy adaptively minimizes computational overhead at high signal-to-noise ratios while achieving near-ML performance, especially for low-rate codes. Extensive simulations demonstrate that our two-stage decoder provides an excellent trade-off between decoding reliability and complexity, establishing it as a promising solution for next-generation URLLC systems.","short_abstract":"Ultra-reliable low-latency communications (URLLC) demand high-performance error-correcting codes and decoders in the finite blocklength regime. This letter introduces a novel two-stage near-maximum likelihood (near-ML) decoding framework applicable to any linear block code. Our approach first employs a low-complexity i...","url_abs":"https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.19631","url_pdf":"https://arxiv.org/pdf/2508.19631v3","authors":"[\"Yubeen Jo\",\"Geon Choi\",\"Yongjune Kim\",\"Namyoon Lee\"]","published":"2025-08-27T07:11:40Z","proceeding":"eess.SP","tasks":"[\"eess.SP\",\"cs.IT\"]","methods":"[]","has_code":false}