  This paper presents several new construction techniques for low-density
parity-check (LDPC) and systematic repeat-accumulate (RA) codes. Based on
specific classes of combinatorial designs, the improved code design focuses on
high-rate structured codes with constant column weights 3 and higher. The
proposed codes are efficiently encodable and exhibit good structural
properties. Experimental results on decoding performance with the sum-product
algorithm show that the novel codes offer substantial practical application
potential, for instance, in high-speed applications in magnetic recording and
optical communications channels.
