Simplified sum-product algorithm for decoding LDPC codes with optimal performance

A simple, yet effective decoding algorithm is proposed for low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes, which significantly simplifies the check node update computation of the optimal sum-product algorithm. It achieves essentially optimal performance by applying scaling in the decoder's extrinsic information. If no such scaling is applied, then the proposed algorithm has small performance degradation, e.g. in the order of 0.1 to 0.2 dB, depending on the coded block size.