Lossless Source Coding in the Point-to-Point, Multiple Access, and Random Access Scenarios

This work studies point-to-point, multiple access, and random access lossless source coding in the finite-blocklength regime. In each scenario, a random coding technique is developed and used to analyze third-order coding performance. Asymptotic results include a third-order characterization of the Slepian-Wolf rate region with an improved converse that relies on a connection to composite hypothesis testing. For dependent sources, the result implies that the independent encoders used by Slepian-Wolf codes can achieve the same third-order-optimal performance as a single joint encoder. The concept of random access source coding is introduced to generalize multiple access (Slepian-Wolf) source coding to the case where encoders decide independently whether or not to participate and the set of participating encoders is unknown a priori to both the encoders and the decoder. The proposed random access source coding strategy employs rateless coding with scheduled feedback. A random coding argument proves the existence of a single deterministic code of this structure that simultaneously achieves the third-order-optimal Slepian-Wolf performance for each possible active encoder set.