Detection of Variable Length PLH Codes for the DVB-S2X System

In this paper, we address the problem of the detection of variable length Physical Layer Header (PLH) codes. We take as a case study the DVB-S2X standard, and, after selecting a suitable PLH code with variable codeword length, we propose two alternative noncoherent detection strategies. The proposed detection strategies allow to jointly estimate the length of the transmitted PLH field, which is unknown at the receiver, and decoding the PLH code. We demonstrate that it is possible to achieve an excellent detection performance while significantly reducing the overhead due to the transmission of the PLH field with respect to a standard fixed-length PLH.