Title: Timely Updates over an Erasure Channel,
Abstract: Using an age of information (AoI) metric, we examine the transmission of
coded updates through a binary erasure channel to a monitor/receiver. We start
by deriving the average status update age of an infinite incremental redundancy
(IIR) system in which the transmission of a k-symbol update continuesuntil k
symbols are received. This system is then compared to a fixed redundancy (FR)
system in which each update is transmitted as an n symbol packet and the packet
is successfully received if and only if at least k symbols are received. If
fewer than k symbols are received, the update is discarded. Unlike the IIR
system, the FR system requires no feedback from the receiver. For a single
monitor system, we show that tuning the redundancy to the symbol erasure rate
enables the FR system to perform as well as the IIR system. As the number of
monitors is increased, the FR system outperforms the IIR system that guarantees
delivery of all updates to all monitors.