Graduated with an M.Sc. degree from University of Calgary 🎓

The goal of my M.Sc. research was to perform error correction in QKD using polar codes. This project involved the development of required mathematics such as calculating Bhattacharyya parameters (BP) for binary symmetric channels. Calculations of such parameters are necessary for the realization of a reliability sequence. Using BP we developed the algorithm for the reliability sequence which is necessary for doing the encoding in polar codes. We later used this algorithm for polar encoding and an already available polar decoder to perform some experiments to determine the performance of our encoder design.

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My M.Sc. thesis can be found here:

Title: Polar codes for information reconciliation in QKD Quantum security for polarized channels

Abstract:

This thesis considers the problem of information reconciliation in the context of secret key distribution between two parties. We recognize polar codes as a “good” solution to this problem that can be efficiently implemented for binary symmetric channels. In this thesis, we explore the applicability of designing a polar code encoder based on a channel reliability sequence. In particular, we show that the reliability sequence can be derived and used to design an encoder independent of the choice of decoder. We implement our design and evaluate its performance against previous implementations of polar code encoders for QKD as well as other typical error-correcting codes. The advantage of our approach is the modular design, which decouples the encoder and decoder design and allows independent optimization of each.