Abstract:
Claude Shannon created information theory in 1948, with his paper "A Mathematical Theory of Communication". Subsequently, mathematicians and engineers attacked the challenge of designing practical error-correcting codes that would offer the performance that Shannon proved possible for point to point communication links. In this talk, we will follow the historical development of the design of such codes, and show how mathematical disciplines such as combinatorics, linear algebra, finite fields theory, algebraic geometry, symbolic dynamics, and graph theory have been applied towards meeting the challenge.