LTE stands for Long Term Evolution and it was started as a project in 2004 by

telecommunication body known as the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). LTE
evolved from an earlier 3GPP system known as the Universal Mobile Telecommunication
System (UMTS), which in turn evolved from the Global System for Mobile
Communications (GSM).

Audience
This tutorial has been designed for audiences with a need to understand the
LTE technology basics in very simple terms. This tutorial will give you enough
understanding on LTE technology from where you can take yourself at higher
level of expertise.

Prerequisites
Though I assumed you have a very little or zero understanding on 2G and 3G
technologies like GSM, GPRS and UMTS but if you have basic understanding
of any of the technologies like GSM, GPRS, Core Network, Radio Interfaces
etc then it will help you a lot in understanding the concepts explained in this
tutorial.

LTE stands for Long Term Evolution and it was started as a project in 2004
by telecommunication body known as the Third Generation Partnership
Project (3GPP). SAE (System Architecture Evolution) is the corresponding
evolution of the GPRS/3G packet core network evolution. The term LTE is
typically used to represent both LTE and SAE.

LTE evolved from an earlier 3GPP system known as the Universal Mobile
Telecommunication System (UMTS), which in turn evolved from the Global
System for Mobile Communications (GSM). Even related specifications were
formally known as the evolved UMTS terrestrial radio access (E-UTRA) and
evolved UMTS terrestrial radio access network (E-UTRAN). First version of
LTE was documented in Release 8 of the 3GPP specifications.

A rapid increase of mobile data usage and emergence of new applications

such as MMOG (Multimedia Online Gaming), mobile TV, Web 2.0, streaming
contents have motivated the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) to
work on the Long-Term Evolution (LTE) on the way towards fourth-generation
mobile.

The main goal of LTE is to provide a high data rate, low latency and packet
optimized radioaccess technology supporting flexible bandwidth
deployments. Same time its network architecture has been designed with the
goal to support packet-switched traffic with seamless mobility and great
quality of service.

LTE Evolution
Year Event

Mar 2000 Release 99 - UMTS/WCDMA

Mar 2002 Rel 5 - HSDPA

Mar 2005 Rel 6 - HSUPA

Year 2007 Rel 7 - DL MIMO, IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem)

November 2004 Work started on LTE specification

January 2008 Spec finalized and approved with Release 8

2010 Targeted first deployment

Facts about LTE

 LTE is the successor technology not only of UMTS but also of CDMA 2000.

 LTE is important because it will bring up to 50 times performance improvement

and much better spectral efficiency to cellular networks.
  LTE introduced to get higher data rates, 300Mbps peak downlink and 75 Mbps
peak uplink. In a 20MHz carrier, data rates beyond 300Mbps can be achieved
under very good signal conditions.

 LTE is an ideal technology to support high date rates for the services such as voice
over IP (VOIP), streaming multimedia, videoconferencing or even a high-speed
cellular modem.

 LTE uses both Time Division Duplex (TDD) and Frequency Division Duplex (FDD)
mode. In FDD uplink and downlink transmission used different frequency, while
in TDD both uplink and downlink use the same carrier and are separated in Time.

 LTE supports flexible carrier bandwidths, from 1.4 MHz up to 20 MHz as well as
both FDD and TDD. LTE designed with a scalable carrier bandwidth from 1.4 MHz
up to 20 MHz which bandwidth is used depends on the frequency band and the
amount of spectrum available with a network operator.

 All LTE devices have to support (MIMO) Multiple Input Multiple Output
transmissions, which allow the base station to transmit several data streams over
the same carrier simultaneously.

 All interfaces between network nodes in LTE are now IP based, including the
backhaul connection to the radio base stations. This is great simplification
compared to earlier technologies that were initially based on E1/T1, ATM and
frame relay links, with most of them being narrowband and expensive.

 Quality of Service (QoS) mechanism have been standardized on all interfaces to

ensure that the requirement of voice calls for a constant delay and bandwidth,
can still be met when capacity limits are reached.

 Works with GSM/EDGE/UMTS systems utilizing existing 2G and 3G spectrum and

new spectrum. Supports hand-over and roaming to existing mobile networks.

Advantages of LTE
 High throughput: High data rates can be achieved in both downlink as well as
uplink. This causes high throughput.
  Low latency: Time required to connect to the network is in range of a few
hundred milliseconds and power saving states can now be entered and exited
very quickly.

 FDD and TDD in the same platform: Frequency Division Duplex (FDD) and
Time Division Duplex (TDD), both schemes can be used on same platform.

 Superior end-user experience: Optimized signaling for connection

establishment and other air interface and mobility management procedures have
further improved the user experience. Reduced latency (to 10 ms) for better user
experience.

 Seamless Connection: LTE will also support seamless connection to existing

networks such as GSM, CDMA and WCDMA.

 Plug and play: The user does not have to manually install drivers for the device.
Instead system automatically recognizes the device, loads new drivers for the
hardware if needed, and begins to work with the newly connected device.

 Simple architecture: Because of Simple architecture low operating expenditure

(OPEX).

LTE - QoS
LTE architecture supports hard QoS, with end-to-end quality of service and
guaranteed bit rate (GBR) for radio bearers. Just as Ethernet and the internet
have different types of QoS, for example, various levels of QoS can be applied
to LTE traffic for different applications. Because the LTE MAC is fully
scheduled, QoS is a natural fit.

Evolved Packet System (EPS) bearers provide one-to-one correspondence

with RLC radio bearers and provide support for Traffic Flow Templates (TFT).
There are four types of EPS bearers:

 GBR Bearer resources permanently allocated by admission control

 Non-GBR Bearer no admission control

 Dedicated Bearer associated with specific TFT (GBR or non-GBR)

  Default Bearer Non GBR, catch-all for unassigned traffic

This section will summarize the Basic parameters of the LTE:

Parameters Description

Frequency range UMTS FDD bands

and TDD bands
defined in
36.101(v860)
Table 5.5.1,
given below

Duplexing FDD, TDD, half-

duplex FDD

Channel coding Turbo code

Mobility 350 km/h

Channel Bandwidth (MHz)

 1.4

 3

 5

 10

 15

 20

Transmission Bandwidth Configuration NRB : (1 resource block

 6
= 180kHz in 1ms TTI )
 15

 25

 50

 75

 100
Modulation Schemes
UL: QPSK,
16QAM,
64QAM(optional)

DL: QPSK,
16QAM, 64QAM

Multiple Access Schemes UL: SC-FDMA

(Single Carrier
Frequency
Division Multiple
Access) supports
50Mbps+
(20MHz
spectrum)

DL: OFDM
(Orthogonal
Frequency
Division Multiple
Access) supports
100Mbps+
(20MHz
spectrum)

Multi-Antenna Technology UL: Multi-user

collaborative
MIMO

DL: TxAA,
spatial
multiplexing,
 CDD ,max 4x4
array

Peak data rate in LTE UL:

75Mbps(20MHz
bandwidth)

DL: 150Mbps(UE
Category 4, 2x2
MIMO, 20MHz
bandwidth)

DL: 300Mbps(UE
category 5, 4x4
MIMO, 20MHz
bandwidth)

MIMO UL: 1 x 2, 1 x 4

(Multiple Input Multiple Output)

DL: 2 x 2, 4 x 2,
4x4

Coverage 5 - 100km with

slight
degradation after
30km

QoS E2E QOS allowing

prioritization of
different class of
service
Latency End-user latency
< 10mS

E-UTRA Operating Bands

Following is the table for E-UTRA operating bands taken from LTE
Sepecification 36.101(v860) Table 5.5.1:

The high-level network architecture of LTE is comprised of following three

main components:

 The User Equipment (UE).

 The Evolved UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (E-UTRAN).

 The Evolved Packet Core (EPC).

The evolved packet core communicates with packet data networks in the
outside world such as the internet, private corporate networks or the IP
multimedia subsystem. The interfaces between the different parts of the
system are denoted Uu, S1 and SGi as shown below:

The User Equipment (UE)

The internal architecture of the user equipment for LTE is identical to the one
used by UMTS and GSM which is actually a Mobile Equipment (ME). The
mobile equipment comprised of the following important modules:

 Mobile Termination (MT) : This handles all the communication functions.

 Terminal Equipment (TE) : This terminates the data streams.

 Universal Integrated Circuit Card (UICC) : This is also known as the SIM card
for LTE equipments. It runs an application known as the Universal Subscriber
Identity Module (USIM).

A USIM stores user-specific data very similar to 3G SIM card. This keeps
information about the user's phone number, home network identity and
security keys etc.

The E-UTRAN (The access network)

The architecture of evolved UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (E-
UTRAN) has been illustrated below.
The E-UTRAN handles the radio communications between the mobile and the
evolved packet core and just has one component, the evolved base stations,
called eNodeB or eNB. Each eNB is a base station that controls the mobiles
in one or more cells. The base station that is communicating with a mobile is
known as its serving eNB.

LTE Mobile communicates with just one base station and one cell at a time
and there are following two main functions supported by eNB:

 The eBN sends and receives radio transmissions to all the mobiles using the
analogue and digital signal processing functions of the LTE air interface.

 The eNB controls the low-level operation of all its mobiles, by sending them
signalling messages such as handover commands.

Each eBN connects with the EPC by means of the S1 interface and it can also
be connected to nearby base stations by the X2 interface, which is mainly
used for signalling and packet forwarding during handover.

A home eNB (HeNB) is a base station that has been purchased by a user to
provide femtocell coverage within the home. A home eNB belongs to a closed
subscriber group (CSG) and can only be accessed by mobiles with a USIM
that also belongs to the closed subscriber group.
The Evolved Packet Core (EPC) (The core
network)
The architecture of Evolved Packet Core (EPC) has been illustrated below.
There are few more components which have not been shown in the diagram
to keep it simple. These components are like the Earthquake and Tsunami
Warning System (ETWS), the Equipment Identity Register (EIR) and Policy
Control and Charging Rules Function (PCRF).

Below is a brief description of each of the components shown in the above

architecture:

 The Home Subscriber Server (HSS) component has been carried forward from
UMTS and GSM and is a central database that contains information about all the
network operator's subscribers.

 The Packet Data Network (PDN) Gateway (P-GW) communicates with the outside
world ie. packet data networks PDN, using SGi interface. Each packet data
network is identified by an access point name (APN). The PDN gateway has the
same role as the GPRS support node (GGSN) and the serving GPRS support node
(SGSN) with UMTS and GSM.
  The serving gateway (S-GW) acts as a router, and forwards data between the
base station and the PDN gateway.

 The mobility management entity (MME) controls the high-level operation of the
mobile by means of signalling messages and Home Subscriber Server (HSS).

 The Policy Control and Charging Rules Function (PCRF) is a component which is
not shown in the above diagram but it is responsible for policy control decision-
making, as well as for controlling the flow-based charging functionalities in the
Policy Control Enforcement Function (PCEF), which resides in the P-GW.

The interface between the serving and PDN gateways is known as S5/S8. This
has two slightly different implementations, namely S5 if the two devices are
in the same network, and S8 if they are in different networks.

Functional split between the E-UTRAN and

the EPC
Following diagram shows the functional split between the E-UTRAN and the
EPC for an LTE network:
2G/3G Versus LTE
Following table compares various important Network Elements & Signaling
protocols used in 2G/3G abd LTE.

2G/3G LTE

GERAN and UTRAN E-UTRAN

SGSN/PDSN-FA S-GW

GGSN/PDSN-HA PDN-GW

HLR/AAA HSS
VLR MME

SS7-MAP/ANSI-41/RADIUS Diameter

DiameterGTPc-v0 and v1 GTPc-v2

MIP PMIP

LTE Roaming Architecture

A network run by one operator in one country is known as a Public Land
Mobile Network (PLMN) and when a subscribed user uses his operator's PLMN
then it is said Home-PLMN but roaming allows users to move outside their
home network and using the resources from other operator's network. This
other network is called Visited-PLMN.

A roaming user is connected to the E-UTRAN, MME and S-GW of the visited
LTE network. However, LTE/SAE allows the P-GW of either the visited or the
home network to be used, as shown in below:
The home network's P-GW allows the user to access the home operator's
services even while in a visited network. A P-GW in the visited network allows
a "local breakout" to the Internet in the visited network.

The interface between the serving and PDN gateways is known as S5/S8. This
has two slightly different implementations, namely S5 if the two devices are
in the same network, and S8 if they are in different networks. For mobiles
that are not roaming, the serving and PDN gateways can be integrated into
a single device, so that the S5/S8 interface vanishes altogether.

LTE Roaming Charging

The complexities of the new charging mechanisms required to support 4G
roaming are much more abundant than in a 3G environment. Few words
about both pre-paid and post-paid charging for LTE roaming is given below:

 Prepaid Charging - The CAMEL standard, which enables prepaid services in 3G,
is not supported in LTE; therefore, prepaid customer information must be routed
back to the home network as opposed to being handled by the local visited
network. As a result, operators must rely on new accounting flows to access
prepaid customer data, such as through their P-Gateways in both IMS and non-
IMS environments or via their CSCF in an IMS environment.

 Postpaid Charging - Postpaid data-usage charging works the same in LTE as it

does in 3G, using versions TAP 3.11 or 3.12. With local breakout of IMS services,
TAP 3.12 is required.

Operators do not have the same amount of visibility into subscriber activities
as they do in home-routing scenarios in case of local breakout scenarios
because subscriber-data sessions are kept within the visited network;
therefore, in order for the home operator to capture real-time information on
both pre- and postpaid customers, it must establish a Diameter interface
between charging systems and the visited network's P-Gateway.

In case of local breakout of ims services scenario, the visited network creates
call detail records (CDRs) from the S-Gateway(s), however, these CDRs do
not contain all of the information required to create a TAP 3.12 mobile session
or messaging event record for the service usage. As a result, operators must
correlate the core data network CDRs with the IMS CDRs to create TAP record

LTE Numbering & Addressing

An LTE network area is divided into three different types of geographical
areas explained below:

S.N. Area and Description

1
The MME pool areas

This is an area through which the mobile can move without a change of
serving MME. Every MME pool area is controlled by one or more MMEs on
the network.

2
The S-GW service areas

This is an area served by one or more serving gateways S-GW, through

which the mobile can move without a change of serving gateway.

3
The Tracking areas

The MME pool areas and the S-GW service areas are both made from
smaller, non-overlapping units known as tracking areas (TAs). They are
similar to the location and routing areas from UMTS and GSM and will be
used to track the locations of mobiles that are on standby mode.

Thus an LTE network will comprise of many MME pool areas, many S-GW
service areas and lots of tracking areas.

The Network IDs

The network itself will be identified using Public Land Mobile Network Identity
(PLMN-ID) which will have a three digit mobile country code (MCC) and a two
or three digit mobile network code (MNC). For example, the Mobile Country
Code for the UK is 234, while Vodafone's UK network uses a Mobile Network
Code of 15.

The MME IDs

Each MME has three main identities. An MME code (MMEC) uniquely identifies
the MME within all the pool areas. A group of MMEs is assigned an MME Group
Identity (MMEGI) which works along with MMEC to make MME identifier
(MMEI). A MMEI uniquely identifies the MME within a particular network.

If we combile PLMN-ID with the MMEI then we arrive at a Globally Unique

MME Identifier (GUMMEI), which identifies an MME anywhere in the world:

The Tracking Area IDs

Each tracking area has two main identities. The tracking area code (TAC)
identifies a tracking area within a particular network and if we combining this
with the PLMN-ID then we arrive at a Globally Unique Tracking Area Identity
(TAI).
The Cell IDs
Each cell in the network has three types of identity. The E-UTRAN cell identity
(ECI) identifies a cell within a particular network, while the E-UTRAN cell
global identifier (ECGI) identifies a cell anywhere in the world.

The physical cell identity, which is a number from 0 to 503 and it distinguishes
a cell from its immediate neighbours.

The Mobile Equipment ID

The international mobile equipment identity (IMEI) is a unique identity for
the mobile equipment and the International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI)
is a unique identity for the UICC and the USIM.

The M temporary mobile subscriber identity (M-TMSI) identifies a mobile to

its serving MME. Adding the MME code in M-TMSI results in a S temporary
mobile subscriber identity (S-TMSI), which identifies the mobile within an
MME pool area.

Finally adding the MME group identity and the PLMN identity with S-TMSI
results in the Globally Unique Temporary Identity (GUTI).

LTE Radio Protocol Architecture

The radio protocol architecture for LTE can be separated into control
planearchitecture and user plane architecture as shown below:
At user plane side, the application creates data packets that are processed
by protocols such as TCP, UDP and IP, while in the control plane, the radio
resource control (RRC) protocol writes the signalling messages that are
exchanged between the base station and the mobile. In both cases, the
information is processed by the packet data convergence protocol (PDCP),
the radio link control (RLC) protocol and the medium access control (MAC)
protocol, before being passed to the physical layer for transmission.

User Plane
The user plane protocol stack between the e-Node B and UE consists of the
following sub-layers:

 PDCP (Packet Data Convergence Protocol)

 RLC (radio Link Control)

 Medium Access Control (MAC)

On the user plane, packets in the core network (EPC) are encapsulated in a
specific EPC protocol and tunneled between the P-GW and the eNodeB.
Different tunneling protocols are used depending on the interface. GPRS
Tunneling Protocol (GTP) is used on the S1 interface between the eNodeB
and S-GW and on the S5/S8 interface between the S-GW and P-GW.

Packets received by a layer are called Service Data Unit (SDU) while the
packet output of a layer is referred to by Protocol Data Unit (PDU) and IP
packets at user plane flow from top to bottom layers.

Control Plane
The control plane includes additionally the Radio Resource Control layer
(RRC) which is responsible for configuring the lower layers.

The Control Plane handles radio-specific functionality which depends on the

state of the user equipment which includes two states: idle or connected.

Mode Description

Idle The user equipment camps on a cell after a cell selection or

reselection process where factors like radio link quality, cell status
and radio access technology are considered. The UE also monitors a
paging channel to detect incoming calls and acquire system
information. In this mode, control plane protocols include cell
selection and reselection procedures.

Connected The UE supplies the E-UTRAN with downlink channel quality and
neighbour cell information to enable the E-UTRAN to select the most
suitable cell for the UE. In this case, control plane protocol includes
the Radio Link Control (RRC) protocol.
The protocol stack for the control plane between the UE and MME is shown
below. The grey region of the stack indicates the access stratum (AS)
protocols. The lower layers perform the same functions as for the user plane
with the exception that there is no header compression function for the
control plane.

LTE Protocol Stack Layers

et's have a close look at all the layers available in E-UTRAN Protocol Stack
which we have seen in previous chapter. Below is a more ellaborated diagram
of E-UTRAN Protocol Stack:
Physical Layer (Layer 1)
Physical Layer carries all information from the MAC transport channels over
the air interface. Takes care of the link adaptation (AMC), power control, cell
search (for initial synchronization and handover purposes) and other
measurements (inside the LTE system and between systems) for the RRC
layer.

Medium Access Layer (MAC)

MAC layer is responsible for Mapping between logical channels and transport
channels, Multiplexing of MAC SDUs from one or different logical channels
onto transport blocks (TB) to be delivered to the physical layer on transport
channels, de multiplexing of MAC SDUs from one or different logical channels
from transport blocks (TB) delivered from the physical layer on transport
channels, Scheduling information reporting, Error correction through HARQ,
Priority handling between UEs by means of dynamic scheduling, Priority
handling between logical channels of one UE, Logical Channel prioritization.

Radio Link Control (RLC)

RLC operates in 3 modes of operation: Transparent Mode (TM),
Unacknowledged Mode (UM), and Acknowledged Mode (AM).

RLC Layer is responsible for transfer of upper layer PDUs, error correction
through ARQ (Only for AM data transfer), Concatenation, segmentation and
reassembly of RLC SDUs (Only for UM and AM data transfer).

RLC is also responsible for re-segmentation of RLC data PDUs (Only for AM
data transfer), reordering of RLC data PDUs (Only for UM and AM data
transfer), duplicate detection (Only for UM and AM data transfer), RLC SDU
discard (Only for UM and AM data transfer), RLC re-establishment, and
protocol error detection (Only for AM data transfer).

Radio Resource Control (RRC)

The main services and functions of the RRC sublayer include broadcast of
System Information related to the non-access stratum (NAS), broadcast of
System Information related to the access stratum (AS), Paging,
establishment, maintenance and release of an RRC connection between the
UE and E-UTRAN, Security functions including key management,
establishment, configuration, maintenance and release of point to point Radio
Bearers.

Packet Data Convergence Control (PDCP)

PDCP Layer is responsible for Header compression and decompression of IP
data, Transfer of data (user plane or control plane), Maintenance of PDCP
Sequence Numbers (SNs), In-sequence delivery of upper layer PDUs at re-
establishment of lower layers, Duplicate elimination of lower layer SDUs at
re-establishment of lower layers for radio bearers mapped on RLC AM,
Ciphering and deciphering of user plane data and control plane data, Integrity
protection and integrity verification of control plane data, Timer based
discard, duplicate discarding, PDCP is used for SRBs and DRBs mapped on
DCCH and DTCH type of logical channels.
Non Access Stratum (NAS) Protocols
The non-access stratum (NAS) protocols form the highest stratum of the
control plane between the user equipment (UE) and MME.

NAS protocols support the mobility of the UE and the session management
procedures to establish and maintain IP connectivity between the UE and a
PDN GW.

LTE Layers Data Flow

Below is a logical digram of E-UTRAN Protocol layers with a depiction of data
flow through various layers:

Packets received by a layer are called Service Data Unit (SDU) while the
packet output of a layer is referred to by Protocol Data Unit (PDU). Let's see
the flow of data from top to bottom:
  IP Layer submits PDCP SDUs (IP Packets) to the PDCP layer. PDCP layer does
header compression and adds PDCP header to these PDCP SDUs. PDCP Layer
submits PDCP PDUs (RLC SDUs) to RLC layer.

PDCP Header Compression : PDCP removes IP header (Minimum 20 bytes)

from PDU, and adds Token of 1-4 bytes. Which provides a tremendous savings in
the amount of header that would otherwise have to go over the air.

 RLC layer does segmentation of these SDUS to make the RLC PDUs. RLC adds
header based on RLC mode of operation. RLC submits these RLC PDUs (MAC
SDUs) to the MAC layer.

RLC Segmentation : If an RLC SDU is large, or the available radio data rate is
low (resulting in small transport blocks), the RLC SDU may be split among several
RLC PDUs. If the RLC SDU is small, or the available radio data rate is high, several
RLC SDUs may be packed into a single PDU.

 MAC layer adds header and does padding to fit this MAC SDU in TTI. MAC layer
submits MAC PDU to physical layer for transmitting it onto physical channels.

 Physical channel transmits this data into slots of sub frame.

LTE Communication Channels

The information flows between the different protocols are known as channels
and signals. LTE uses several different types of logical, transport and physical
channel, which are distinguished by the kind of information they carry and by
the way in which the information is processed.
  Logical Channels : Define whattype of information is transmitted over the air,
e.g. traffic channels, control channels, system broadcast, etc. Data and signalling
messages are carried on logical channels between the RLC and MAC protocols.

 Transport Channels : Define howis something transmitted over the air, e.g.
what are encoding, interleaving options used to transmit data. Data and signalling
messages are carried on transport channels between the MAC and the physical
layer.

 Physical Channels : Define whereis something transmitted over the air, e.g.
first N symbols in the DL frame. Data and signalling messages are carried on
physical channels between the different levels of the physical layer.

Logical Channels
Logical channels define what type of data is transferred. These channels
define the data-transfer services offered by the MAC layer. Data and
signalling messages are carried on logical channels between the RLC and MAC
protocols.

Logical channels can be divided into control channels and traffic channels.
Control Channel can be either common channel or dedicated channel. A
common channel means common to all users in a cell (Point to multipoint)
while dedicated channels means channels can be used only by one user (Point
to Point).

Logical channels are distinguished by the information they carry and can be
classified in two ways. Firstly, logical traffic channels carry data in the user
plane, while logical control channels carry signalling messages in the control
plane. Following table lists the logical channels that are used by LTE:

Channel Name Acronym Control Traffic

channel channel

Broadcast Control Channel BCCH X

Paging Control Channel PCCH X

Common Control Channel CCCH X

Dedicated Control Channel DCCH X

Multicast Control Channel MCCH X

Dedicated Traffic Channel DTCH X

Multicast Traffic Channel MTCH X

Transport Channels
Transport channels define how and with what type of characteristics the data
is transferred by the physical layer. Data and signalling messages are carried
on transport channels between the MAC and the physical layer.

Transport Channels are distinguished by the ways in which the transport

channel processor manipulates them. Following table lists the transport
channels that are used by LTE:

Channel Name Acronym Downlink Uplink

Broadcast Channel BCH X

Downlink Shared Channel DL-SCH X

Paging Channel PCH X

Multicast Channel MCH X

Uplink Shared Channel UL-SCH X

Random Access Channel RACH X

Physical Channels
Data and signalling messages are carried on physical channels between the
different levels of the physical layer and accordingly they are divided into two
parts:

 Physical Data Channels

 Physical Control Channels

Physical data channels

Physical data channels are distinguished by the ways in which the physical
channel processor manipulates them, and by the ways in which they are
mapped onto the symbols and sub-carriers used by Orthogonal frequency-
division multiplexing (OFDMA). Following table lists the physical data
channels that are used by LTE:

Channel Name Acronym Downlink Uplink

Physical downlink shared PDSCH X

channel

Physical broadcast channel PBCH X

Physical multicast channel PMCH X

Physical uplink shared channel PUSCH X

Physical random access channel PRACH X

The transport channel processor composes several types of control
information, to support the low-level operation of the physical layer. These
are listed in the below table:

Field Name Acronym Downlink Uplink

Downlink control information DCI X

Control format indicator CFI X

Hybrid ARQ indicator HI X

Uplink control information UCI X

Physical Control Channels

The transport channel processor also creates control information that
supports the low-level operation of the physical layer and sends this
information to the physical channel processor in the form of physical control
channels.

The information travels as far as the transport channel processor in the

receiver, but is completely invisible to higher layers. Similarly, the physical
channel processor creates physical signals, which support the lowest-level
aspects of the system.

Physical Control Channels are listed in the below table:

Channel Name Acronym Downlink Uplink

Physical control format indicator PCFICH X

channel
Physical hybrid ARQ indicator PHICH X
channel

Physical downlink control channel PDCCH X

Relay physical downlink control R-PDCCH X

channel

Physical uplink control channel PUCCH X

The base station also transmits two other physical signals, which help the
mobile acquire the base station after it first switches on. These are known as
the primary synchronization signal (PSS) and the secondary synchronization
signal (SSS).

LTE OFDM Technology

To overcome the effect of multi path fading problem available in UMTS, LTE
uses Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) for the downlink -
that is, from the base station to the terminal to transmit the data over many
narrow band careers of 180 KHz each instead of spreading one signal over
the complete 5MHz career bandwidth ie. OFDM uses a large number of narrow
sub-carriers for multi-carrier transmission to carry data.

Orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM), is a frequency-division

multiplexing (FDM) scheme used as a digital multi-carrier modulation
method.

OFDM meets the LTE requirement for spectrum flexibility and enables cost-
efficient solutions for very wide carriers with high peak rates. The basic LTE
downlink physical resource can be seen as a time-frequency grid, as
illustrated in Figure below:

The OFDM symbols are grouped into resource blocks. The resource blocks
have a total size of 180kHz in the frequency domain and 0.5ms in the time
domain. Each 1ms Transmission Time Interval (TTI) consists of two slots
(Tslot).

Each user is allocated a number of so-called resource blocks in the

time.frequency grid. The more resource blocks a user gets, and the higher
the modulation used in the resource elements, the higher the bit-rate. Which
resource blocks and how many the user gets at a given point in time depend
on advanced scheduling mechanisms in the frequency and time dimensions.

The scheduling mechanisms in LTE are similar to those used in HSPA, and
enable optimal performance for different services in different radio
environments.

Advantages of OFDM
 The primary advantage of OFDM over single-carrier schemes is its ability to cope
with severe channel conditions (for example, attenuation of high frequencies in a
long copper wire, narrowband interference and frequency-selective fading due to
multipath) without complex equalization filters.

 Channel equalization is simplified because OFDM may be viewed as using many

slowly-modulated narrowband signals rather than one rapidly-modulated
wideband signal.

 The low symbol rate makes the use of a guard interval between symbols
affordable, making it possible to eliminate inter symbol interference (ISI).
  This mechanism also facilitates the design of single frequency networks (SFNs),
where several adjacent transmitters send the same signal simultaneously at the
same frequency, as the signals from multiple distant transmitters may be
combined constructively, rather than interfering as would typically occur in a
traditional single-carrier system.

Drawbacks of OFDM
 High peak-to-average ratio

 Sensitive to frequency offset, hence to Doppler-shift as well

SC-FDMA Technology
LTE uses a pre-coded version of OFDM called Single Carrier Frequency
Division Multiple Access (SC-FDMA) in the uplink. This is to compensate for a
drawback with normal OFDM, which has a very high Peak to Average Power
Ratio (PAPR).

High PAPR requires expensive and inefficient power amplifiers with high
requirements on linearity, which increases the cost of the terminal and drains
the battery faster.

SC-FDMA solves this problem by grouping together the resource blocks in

such a way that reduces the need for linearity, and so power consumption,
in the power amplifier. A low PAPR also improves coverage and the cell-edge
performance.

LTE Glossary
Term Description

3GPP 3rd Generation Partnership Project

3GPP2 3rd Generation Partnership Project 2

ARIB Association of Radio Industries and Businesses

ATIS Alliance for Telecommunication Industry Solutions

AWS Advanced Wireless Services

CAPEX Capital Expenditure

CCSA China Communications Standards Association

CDMA Code Division Multiple Access

CDMA2000 Code Division Multiple Access 2000

DAB Digital Audio Broadcast

DSL Digital Subscriber Line

DVB Digital Video Broadcast

eHSPA evolved High Speed Packet Access

ETSI European Telecommunications Standards Institute

FDD Frequency Division Duplex

FWT Fixed Wireless Terminal

GSM Global System for Mobile communication

HSPA High Speed Packet Access

HSS Home Subscriber Server

IEEE Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers

IPTV Internet Protocol Television

LTE Long Term Evolution

MBMS Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Service

MIMO Multiple Input Multiple Output

MME Mobility Management Entity

NGMN Next Generation Mobile Networks

OFDM Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing

OPEX Operational Expenditure

PAPR Peak to Average Power Ratio

PCI Peripheral Component Interconnect

PCRF Policing and Charging Rules Function

PDSN Packet Data Serving Node

PS Packet Switched
QoS Quality of Service

RAN Radio Access Network

SAE System Architecture Evolution

SC-FDMA Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access

SGSN Serving GPRS Support Node

TDD Time Division Duplex

TTA Telecommunications Technology Association

TTC Telecommunication Technology Committee

TTI Transmission Time Interval

UTRA Universal Terrestrial Radio Access

UTRAN Universal Terrestrial Radio Access Network

WCDMA Wideband Code Division Multiple Access

WLAN Wireless Local Area Network