LTE-A

Technologies
 Table of contents

● Heterogeneous Networks
● Carrier Aggregation
● Enhanced Inter-Cell Interference Coordination
● Relay
● Coordinated Multipoint
 Release schedule & RAN features
1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011 2013 2015

3GPP work is structured in releases (REL) of 1-3 years

ITU-R M.1457
Release 99 W-CDMA
duration
IMT-2000 Recommendation
Release 4 LCR TDD each release consists of several work items (WI) and
study items (SI)
Release 5 HSDPA
even if a REL is completed corrections are possible
Release 6
later
HSUPA, MBMS
existing features of one REL can be enhanced in a
Release 7 HSPA+ (MIMO, etc.) future REL

Release 8 LTE

3GPP aligned to ITU-R IMT process

LTE enhancements
Release 9
3GPP Releases evolve to meet:
• Future Requirements for IMT
LTE-Advanced
• Future operator and end-user requirements Release 10

Further LTE
Release 11 enhancements

IMT= International Mobile ITU-R M.2012 [IMT.RSPEC]

Telecommunications- IMT-Advanced Recommendation
Release 12 LTE / CR

3
 LTE Release 8 Key Features
 The LTE PHY is designed to meet the following goals:
1. Support scalable bandwidths of 1.4, 3, 5.0, 10.0 and 20.0 MHz
2. Peak data rate that scales with system bandwidth
a. Downlink (2 Ch MIMO) peak rate of 100 Mbps in 20 MHz
channel
b. Uplink (single Ch Tx) peak rate of 50 Mbps in 20 MHz
channel

3. Supported antenna configurations

a. Downlink: 4x2, 2x2, 1x2, 1x1
b. Uplink: 1x2, 1x1
 LTE Release 8 Key Features
4. Spectrum efficiency
a. Downlink: 3 to 4 x HSDPA Rel. 6
b. Uplink: 2 to 3 x HSUPA Rel. 6
5. Latency
a. C-plane: <50 – 100 msec to establish U-plane
b. U-plane: <30 msec from UE to server
6. Mobility
A. Optimized for low speeds (<15 km/hr)
B. High performance at speeds up to 120 km/hr
C. Maintain link at speeds up to 350 km/hr
7. Coverage
a. Full performance up to 5 km
b. Slight degradation 5 km – 30 km
c. Operation up to 100 km
 LTE Release 8 Key Features
1. Adaptive modulation and coding

2. – DL modulations: QPSK, 16QAM, and 64QAM

3. – UL modulations: QPSK and 16QAM

4. Multiple access scheme

5. – DL: OFDMA with CP.

6. – UL: Single Carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA) with CP.

7. Advanced MIMO spatial multiplexing techniques

8. – (2 or 4)x(2 or 4) downlink and uplink supported.

 LTE Release 9 Key Features
• Femto Cell
• MIMO Beam forming
• Self Organizing Networks (SON)
• eMBMS
 LTE Release 9 Key Features
1. Femto Cell: Femto cell is basically a small cell used in offices or homes and
connected to providers’ networks through landline broadband connection.
3G Femto cells are deployed around world and in order for LTE users to take
advantage of femto cell, new requirements were added to release 9

2. MIMO Beam forming: Beamforming is used to increase cell edge

throughput by directing beam towards specific UE by position estimation at
eNB. In release 8, LTE supported single layer beam forming based on user-
specific Reference Symbols. In release 9, single layer beam forming has been
extended to multilayer beam forming
 LTE Release 9 Key Features
• Self Organizing Networks (SON): SON means self installation, optimization
and healing of networks in order to reduce manual work and cost associated
with technical support. The idea of SON was introduced in release 8 though
the focus was more towards eNBs self configuration where as in release 9,
requirements for self optimization were also added

• eMBMS: With Multimedia broadcast Multicast Services (MBMS), operators

have capability to broadcast services over LTE network. The idea is not novel
to the LTE and has been used in legacy networks as well but for LTE, the
MBMS channel has evolved from data rate and capacity perspective. The
MBMS was already defined at physical layer in release8 but with release 9,
higher layer and network layer aspects were completed
 Release 10 – LTE Advanced
• Some key requirements

• – 1 Gbps DL / 500 Mbps UL throughput

• – High spectral efficiency
• – Worldwide roaming

• Following are some significant improvements in release 10

• Enhanced Uplink multiple access: Release 10 introduces
clustered SC-FDMA in uplink. Release 8 SC-FDMA only
allowed carriers along contiguous block of spectrum but
LTE-Advanced in release 10 allows frequency-selective
scheduling in uplink
 Release 10 – LTE Advanced
• MIMO enhancements: LTE-Advanced allows upto 8×8 MIMO in downlink and
on the UE side it allows 4X4 in uplink direction

• Relay Nodes: In order to decrease coverage loop holes, Relay nodes are one
of the features proposed in release 10. The relay nodes or low power enbs
extending the coverage of main eNB in low coverage environment. The relay
nodes are connected to Donor eNB (DeNB) through Un interface.
•
enhanced inter-cell interference coordination (eICIC): eICIC introduced in
3GPP release 10 to deal with interference issues in Heterogeneous Networks
(HetNet). eICIC mitigates interference on traffic and control channels. eICIC
uses power, frequency and also time domain to mitigate intra-frequency
interference in heterogeneous networks
 Release 10 – LTE Advanced
• Carrier Aggregation (CA):
• CA introduced in release 10 is a cost effective way
for operators to utilize their fragmented spectrum
spread across different or same bands in order to
improve end user throughput as required by IMT-
Advanced.
• User throughput is increased by sending data
simultaneously over two or more carriers.
• LTE-Advanced supports bandwidths up to 100 MHz
formed by combining up to five 20MHz component
carriers. Contiguous and non-contiguous carriers
may be aggregated
 Release 10 – LTE Advanced
• Support for Heterogeneous Networks: The combination of large macro cells
with small cells results in heterogeneous networks. Release 10 intended to
layout the detail specification for heterogeneous networks

• SON Improvements: Release 10 provides enhancements to SON features

introduced in release 10 which also considers self healing procedures
Architecture prior to lte
 LTE Network Architecture
• The User Equipment (UE).
• Evolved Node B (eNB)
• The Evolved Packet Core (EPC).
• Mobility Management Entity (MME)
• Serving gateway(S-GW)
• PDN gateway(PDN-GW)

interface from To

Uu UE eNB

X2 eNB eNB

S1 eNB MME/S-GW
LTE-A
 Coordination across the Cell

● Imply avoiding transmission, or transmitting with

lower power or in a different direction (beam-
forming), on a certain resource in order to reduce
the interference to devices served by other,
neighboring transmission points if such a device
would otherwise experience severe interference.
● In certain cases one could even consider using
both transmission points for transmission to the
same device.
 Main deployment scenarios

● Coordination within a homogeneous

deployment, for example between nodes in
a macro deployment.
● Coordination within a heterogeneous
deployment, such as between a macro
node and under-laid lower-power nodes.
Fractional Frequency Reuse
Soft Frequency Reuse
Coordination examples
Coordination examples
Downlink & Uplink
 Coordination between network points
phases

● The 3GPP activities related to coordination

between network points for LTE can be
divided into two phases:
○ Release 8 activities on inter-cell interference
coordination (ICIC), primarily focusing on inter-
eNB (X2) signaling to assist such coordination
○ Release 10-13 activities on multi-point
coordination/transmission targeting more
dynamic coordination and focusing on new
radio-interface features and device capabilities
Inter-Cell Interference Coordination (ICIC)

● ICIC is introduced in 3GPP release 8

● ICIC mitigates interference on traffic
channels only
● ICIC uses power and frequency domain to
mitigate cell-edge interference from
neighbor cells.
● X2 interface is used to share the
information between the eNodeB’s.
 X2 uplink messages

● The HII provides information about the set

of resource blocks within which an eNodeB
has high sensitivity to interference.
(proactive ICIC tool)
● The OI essentially indicates, at three levels
(low/medium/high), the uplink interference
experienced by a cell on its different
resource blocks.(reactive ICIC tool)
X2 uplink messages
 Relative Narrowband Transmit Power

● For the downlink, the relative narrowband

transmit power (RNTP) was defined to support
ICIC operation.
● The RNTP is similar to the HII in the sense that it
provides information, for each resource block,
whether or not the relative transmit power of that
resource block is to exceed a certain level.
X2 downlink messages
MULTI-POINT
COORDINATION/TRANSMISSION

● Part of release 10/11 CoMP activities

● Focused on radio-interface features and device
functionality to assist different coordination
means
● There were no discussions on specific inter-
eNodeB signaling to support CoMP
● New enhancements are introduced in release
12 which consist of defining new X2 messages
for exchanging information about so-called
CoMP hypothesis
(Uplink) multi-point coordination/
reception
● A similar distinction can be made for the uplink
transmission direction
○ (uplink) multi-point coordination, where the uplink scheduling is
coordinated between different reception points
○ multi-point reception where reception may be carried out at multiple
points.
● It should be noted that, at least from a radio-interface point
of view, uplink multi-point coordination/reception is very
much a network implementation issue with very little
impact on the device and very little visibility in the radio
interface specifications.
 MULTI-POINT COORDINATION

Coordinated Link Adaptation

Coordinated Link Adaptation
Steps
● For a given subframe, transmission points carry out
transmission decisions.
○ In the simplest case this may be decisions on whether or
not to transmit data on a certain set of time/frequency
resources.
○ In a more general case it may also include, for example,
decisions on transmission power and/or beam-forming
decisions for the given set of resources.
● Information about the transmission decisions is shared
between neighboring transmission points.
● Transmission points use the information about
transmission decisions of neighboring transmission
points as input to the link-adaption decision for the
transmission(s).
Coordinated Link Adaptation
MULTI-POINT COORDINATION
Scheduling

○ Coordinated scheduling is about coordinating

the actual transmission decision(s) between
transmission points.
○ Not only sharing of information (like link
adaptation) but also coordination between
transmission points to reduce and control the
actual interference levels.
■ Dynamic point blanking
■ Coordinated beam-forming
MULTI-POINT TRANSMISSION

● The transmission to a given device can be carried

out from different transmission points, either so that
○ the point of transmission can change dynamically, referred
to as dynamic point selection,
○ or so that the transmission can be carried out jointly from
multiple transmission points, referred to as joint
transmission
Dynamic Point Selection
Joint Transmission
Inter-Cell Interference Coordination cases
Technology is designed to reduce the interference created by two or more cells.

Case 1: UE is in cell boundary of a cell. Case 2: UE is under coverage of a femto or pico cell.
HetNet
Stands for Heterogeneous Network, meaning
'collection of all different networks'. Imagine
you are making a list of all the network
around you, starting from your home with
WiFi. As you get out of the house, you will
have one or more LTE cell and 2G/3G Cells
while you are driving to your office building. If
your office building is very large, it is likely
that their will be DAS (distributed antenna
system), some pico/femto cell and WiFi APs
in the building. The collection of all of these
networks can be called HetNet.
Enhanced Inter-Cell Interference Coordination
(eICIC)
● eICIC introduced in 3GPP release 10
● eICIC introduced to deal interference
issues in Heterogeneous Networks
● eICIC mitigates interference on traffic
and control channels
● eICIC uses power, frequency and also
time domain to mitigate intra-
frequency interference in
heterogeneous networks
● eICIC introduces concept of "Almost
blank subframe" (ABS).
● ABS configuration is shared via OAM or
x2 interface
Solutions
1- Time Domain 2- Frequency Domain

Almost Blank Subframe (ABS) RB allocation

 CoMP Schemes

● The different approaches to CoMP considered for

the LTE downlink can be divided into two main
groups:
○ Multi-point coordination: Schemes where transmission is
carried out from a specific transmission point but where
the scheduling and link adaptation may be coordinated
between transmission points.
○ Multi-point transmission: Schemes where transmission to
a device may be carried out from different transmission
points. The transmission can then either
■ switch dynamically between the different transmission
points
■ or be carried out jointly from multiple points.
HETEROGENEOUS DEPLOYMENTS
USING REL-8 FUNCTIONALITY

● Heterogeneous deployments are already possible

from the first release of LTE using release 8
functionality.
● In this case, the transmission points define unique
cells typically based on the downlink received power
as in the homogeneous case.
● a fair amount of range expansion, up to several dBs,
is easily achieved in this scheme by adjusting the
cell selection offset.
FREQUENCY-DOMAIN PARTITIONING

● Frequency-domain partitioning attempts to reduce

interference by using different parts of the frequency
spectrum for different layers.
● The transmission points define unique cells
● Measurements of the received downlink power are
used as the basis of cell selection.
 FREQUENCY-DOMAIN
PARTITIONING SCHEMES

● A static split and non overlapping pieces of

spectrum in the macro and pico layers
● Carrier aggregation in combination with
cross-carrier scheduling
TIME-DOMAIN PARTITIONING
Protected Subframes
Carrier Aggregation Types

a) Intra-site CA b) Inter-site CA
 CARRIER AGGREGATION

● Carrier aggregation (CA) was introduced in LTE

release 10
● Maximum bandwidth of each carrier dose not
exceed 20 MHz
● Each carrier is referred to as a component carrier
● CA allows for an overall wider bandwidth and
correspondingly higher per-link data rates
 CARRIER AGGREGATION Features
● Initially, up to five component carriers could be aggregated allowing
for overall transmission bandwidths up to 100 MHz.
● In release 13 this was extended to 32 carriers allowing for an
overall transmission bandwidth of 640 MHz.
● Primarily motivated by the possibility for large bandwidths in
unlicensed spectrum.
● Each component carrier can also be accessed by an LTE device
from earlier releases, that is, component carriers are backward
compatible.
Carrier Aggregation (CA)
Carrier Aggregation Types
CARRIER AGGREGATION
EVOLUTIONS

● The main usage of carrier aggregation, at least initially,

was to handle fragmented spectrum allocations in which
an operator may have 5 or 10 MHz of spectrum allocation
in several bands
● In releases 10 and 11, only downlink-heavy asymmetries
are supported from an RF perspective;
● Uplink heavy asymmetries are less likely to be of practical
interest and would also complicate the overall control
signaling structure
PRIMARY AND SECONDARY COMPONENT CARRIERS
CARRIER AGGREGATION
EVOLUTIONS

● In release 10, all aggregated component carriers

need to have the same duplex scheme,
● In case of TDD, the same uplink/ downlink
configuration across the component carriers.
● For carrier aggregation capable TDD devices in
release 11, different uplink/downlink configurations
can be used for component carrier in different
frequency band.
CARRIER AGGREGATION
EVOLUTIONS
● In release 12, carrier aggregation was further enhanced by
allowing aggregation between FDD and TDD to enable
efficient utilization of an operator’s overall spectrum assets.
● Release 13 increased the number of carriers possible to
aggregate from 5 to 32, resulting in a maximum bandwidth of
640 MHz and a corresponding theoretical peak data rate of
approximately 25 Gbit/s in the downlink.
● CA provides the basic framework for Licensed Assisted
Access (LAA) where LTE is deployed in unlicensed band as a
secondary cell
OVERALL PROTOCOL STRUCTURE
SELF-SCHEDULING AND CROSS-
CARRIER SCHEDULING
 Carrier Aggregation and Dual
Connectivity
● Carrier Aggregation (CA) was introduced in 3GPP to allow a UE to
simultaneous transmit and receive data on multiple component
carriers from a single eNB
● Dual Connectivity (DC) was introduced in 3GPP to allow a UE to
simultaneously transmit and receive data on multiple component
carriers from two cell groups via master eNB (MeNB) and
secondary eNB (SeNB)
DUAL CONNECTIVITY
Dual connectivity
● Dual connectivity implies a device is simultaneously
connected to two eNodeBs:
○ the master eNodeB and
○ the secondary eNodeB
● Each master and secondary has its own scheduler and
interconnected using the X2 interface.
● The master & secondary are a device perspective
● The normal X2 interface is used to connect the two
sites with relaxed latency requirements.
● Dual connectivity is supported only when the device is
active that is, in the RRC_CONNECTED state, and not
in idle mode.
 Dual Connectivity Architecture
● Only one C-plane S1-MME connection per UE - RRC
connection via MeNB only, SeNB connection is controlled
through MeNB
● Two DC user-plane architecture options are supported –
○ - 1A – S1-U termination at MeNB and SeNB (analogous to carrier
aggregation)
○ - 3C – S1-U termination at MeNB, bearer split in RAN (analogous to off-
loading)
 Multi-RAT Dual Connectivity
● Multi-RAT Dual Connectivity (MR-DC) is a generalization of
the Intra-E-UTRA Dual Connectivity (DC).
● A multiple Rx/Tx UE may be configured to utilise resources
provided by two different nodes connected via non-ideal
backhaul, one providing E-UTRA access and the other one
providing NR access.
● One node acts as the MN and the other as the SN. The MN
and SN are connected via a network interface and at least
the MN is connected to the core network.
 MR-DC with the EPC
● E-UTRAN supports MR-DC via E-UTRA-NR Dual Connectivity (EN-
DC), in which a UE is connected to one eNB that acts as a MN and
one en-gNB that acts as a SN.
● The eNB is connected to the EPC via the S1 interface and to the
en-gNB via the X2 interface.
● The en-gNB might also be connected to the EPC via the S1-U
interface and other en-gNBs via the X2-U interface.
MME/S-GW MME/S-GW

EPC

S1- U
U S1-
S1-U

S1-U
S1
S1
S1

S1
X2-U E-UTRAN
en-gNB en-gNB
X2

X2
X2
eNB eNB
Thank You