James L. Massey, ETH Zurich

Location :

salle du conseil du L2S (B4.40)
Laboratoire des signaux et systèmes
CNRS-SUPELEC-UPS
3, rue Joliot-Curie
91190 Gif-sur-Yvette 

Abstract :

This talk will deal with three "little" coding problems that the speaker has found to be conceptually 
interesting.  Here are the problems:
1)      Linear Source Coding -- What is the rate-distortion tradeoff when a binary memoryless 
source is encoded with a linear sequential machine (such as a convolutional encoder)?  A simple proof 
will be given of Ancheta's theorem for the binary symmetric source.  The generalization and relation 
to channel coding above capacity will be discussed together with open problems.

2)      Ambiguous Decoding and Erroneous Decoding -- Simple upper bounds on the probability 
of ambiguous decoding in terms of the error probability for maximum-likelihood decoding will be 
given for the Binary Symmetric Channel and the Z-channel.  Applications to coding with feedback will 
be given and open problems stated..

3)      Access Structures for Secret Sharing -- It will be shown that, when a linear code is used in a 
secret sharing scheme, the minimal codewords in the dual code completely determine the access 
structure.  Open problems will be described.

Biography :
*James L. Massey* served on the faculties of the University of Notre Dame, Indiana  (1962-1977), 
the University of California, Los Angeles (1977-1980), and the Swiss Federal Institute of 
Technology (ETH), Zürich (1980-1998), where he now hold emeritus status.   He is currently an 
Adjunct Professor at the University of Lund, Sweden, and at the Technical University of 
Denmark. Massey has served the /IEEE Transactions on Information Theory/ as Editor and 
as Associate Editor for Algebraic Coding and the /Journal of Cryptology/ as an Associate Editor.  He 
is a past President of the IEEE Information Theory Society and of the International Association for 
Cryptologic Research.  He was a founder of Codex Corporation (later a division of Motorola) and of 
Cylink Corporation (later a subsidiary of SafeNet).  His awards include the 1988 Shannon Award of the 
IEEE Information Theory Society, the 1992 IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal "for contributions to 
the theory and practical implementation of forward-error-correcting codes, multi-user communications, 
and cryptographic systems; and for excellence in engineering education", the l987 IEEE W.R.G. 
Baker Award (joint with P. Mathys) for the "most outstanding paper reporting original work in the 
Transactions, Journals, and Magazines of IEEE Societies or in the Proceedings of the IEEE", the 
1999 Marconi Prize, and the 2004 IEEE Information Theory Society Distinguished Service 
Award.   He is a Fellow of the IEEE, a member of the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences, a 
member of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts, a member /emeritus/ of the U. S. 
National Academy of Engineering, an honorary member of the Hungarian Academy of Science, a 
foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and a Fellow of the American Academy 
of Arts and Sciences.

Host :

Merouane Debbah