PDCCH Dimensioning

Hongyan
19 Sep 2011 7:29 PM

3
We have discussed PCFICH resource mapping, PHICH resource mapping, and PDCCH construction. Now we are
ready to look at PDCCH dimensioning. Since the PDCCH is constructed from Control Channel Elements (CCEs) with
an aggregation level of 1, 2, 4, or 8, we'll calculate how many CCEs are available.
Let's use the table "PDCCH Dimensioning (10 MHz)" channel bandwidth as an example. We assume 1 or 2 or 3
OFDM symbols are allocated for PDCCH.

If the Control Format Indicator (CFI) is 1, only the first OFDM symbol in a subframe is used for the PDCCH.

There are a total of 50 PRBs in a 10MHz channel.

Each PRB has 12 subcarriers and has 12 Resource Elements (REs) in the first OFDM symbol. So 50 PRBs
have 50*12=600 REs in the first OFDM symbol.

Each PRB has 4 REs for Reference Signals (RS), so 50 PRBs have 50*4 =200 REs reserved for RS,
assuming 2 transmit antennas at the eNB.

A total of 16 REs is reserved for PCFICH, regardless of system bandwidth.

The PHICH occupies 84 Res, assuming Ng=1.

The number of REs available for the PDCCH = Total REs - RS REs - PCFICH REs - PHICH REs = 600 200 - 16 - 84 = 300 REs

Each CCE consists of 36 REs, so the number of CCEs is floor(300 / 36) = 8 CCEs

An exercise for you: calculate the number of available CCEs if 2 or 3 OFDM symbols are allocated for the PDCCH.

Similarly, we can also calculate PDCCH dimensioning for 5 MHz and 20 MHz channels.

What does the number of available CCEs indicate? It is a good indication of PDCCH capacity, such as how many
UEs can be scheduled per subframe. Note that the PDCCH carries resource allocations for both user traffic and
control signaling messages. The control signaling overhead includes SIBs, paging, PRACH response, and uplink
Transmit Power Control (TPC) commands. The frequency of the control signaling transmission depends on the
system configuration.
Knowing the PDCCH capacity, dynamic PDCCH allocation can be used to improve throughput. If the number of
active users is low, fewer OFDM symbols are used; if there are more active users in the system, more OFDM
symbols will be allocated for the PDCCH.
PDCCH capacity does not generally impact the throughput of data traffic that can tolerate more delay. For delaysensitive traffic such as Voice over IP (VoIP), PDCCH capacity and utilization need to be carefully monitored for any
potential negative impact.

Don't Forget PCFICH While Doing

Physical Cell Identity (PCI)
Planning

Manohara
1 May 2013 4:05 PM

Abstract:
Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) defines Long Term Evolution (LTE)
standards towards fulfilling the objectives of IMT Advanced 4G standards. The primary
goals of LTE is to achieve over 300Mbps and about 75Mbps on the downlink (DL) and
uplink (UL). Also LTE is designed to serve a large number of users in every cell leading
to higher capacity as compared to 3G. Achieving these two objectives along with the
requirement of deploying LTE networks with frequency reuse of 1 (i.e., every cell should
use the same set of frequency resources) will pose many challenges to the RF planning
engineers. One such challenge is the Physical Cell ID (PCI) planning. Traditionally,
while doing PCI planning, Primary Synchronization Signal (PSS) and Secondary
Synchronization Signal (SSS) are considered as input. But one needs to also take into
account the PCFICH location on the first OFDMA (Orthogonal Frequency Division
Multiple Access) symbol as it plays a very crucial role in ensuring a good throughput at
the cell edges. Thus, optimizing the overall throughput is achieved by proper PCFICH
planning.
Introduction:
3GPP LTE technology defines a data shared channel (PDSCH - Physical Downlink
Shared Channel) to carry both users' data traffic and control signaling/messages that
provides life line to User Equipments (UEs) for the day to day operations. The mantra
(or telltale) here is to ensure optimum resource utilization for data traffic to increase cell
throughputs. Better efficiency of scheduling with shared channel and conservation of
vital (UE's) battery power is enabled with the use of PDCCH (Physical Downlink Control
Channel).
In LTE, all UEs that expect any data (system information, random access response,
paging, common control messaging and user specific data or control messages) on the
DL has to monitor the PDCCH first. The PDCCH informs the UEs about the DL resource
allocation information. The allocation information includes the number of Resource
Blocks (RBs), Modulation and Coding Schemes (MCS), Multiple Input Multiple Output
(MIMO) schemes and UL power control command with an indication for Channel Quality
Index (CQI) report.
Since both the PDDCH and PDSCH share the available resources in every subframe
(Transmit Time Interval -TTI of 1ms duration), the number of simultaneous users (a
measure of capacity) who can be served in a cell will be limited by the availability of
PDCCH resources. Looking the other way, PDSCH throughput is inversely proportional

to the PDDCH size (or resources). That is, the smaller the resources reserved for
PDCCH the larger the resources available for PDSCH which means higher throughput
is achieved in the TTI. Another scenario is the case where PDCCH occupies larger
resources due to the requirement of higher number of users to be served which means
large capacity. Now, PDSCH is left with lesser resources to carry data leading to lower
throughput. From the above discussion we see that LTE provides us with a handle to
leverage either capacity or throughput every TTI as the scenario may warrant. The key
to this kind of leverage is through the use of the PCFICH (Physical Control Format
Indicator Channel). The PCFICH provides the information about the PDCCH resources
(number of OFDMA - Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access symbols) in the
present TTI or subframe. Figure 1 provides a pictorial representation of the resource
utilization in a generic subframe by PDSCH, PDCCH and PCFICH in LTE.

Figure 1: A generic subframe in LTE

Till now our discussions were limited to only time domain. When we shift our focus to
frequency domain (i.e., subcarriers) yet another PDCCH constraint will be seen. That is
the PDCCH resources are made up of OFDM symbols on the time domain and
subcarriers in the frequency domain. The number of subcarriers available for
communication is dependent on the available (deployed) bandwidth. LTE supports
scalable bandwidth deployments of 1.4MHz, 3MHz, 5MHz, 10MHz, 15MHz and 20MHz
with 6, 15, 25, 50, 75 and 100 RBs, respectively. To achieve the same capacity in two
(2) different deployment bandwidths (say 5MHz and 10MHz), the PDCCH may have to
span further OFDM symbols in lower bandwidth leading to more degradation in cell

throughput. This leads to yet another dimension to the design of a radio network. LTE
supports a variable number of OFDMA symbols (maximum 3 in case of higher
bandwidth and 4 OFDMA symbols in case of less bandwidths like 1.4MHz deployment)
to take care of all the scenarios discussed so far. Physically, PCFICH carries this
information (number of OFDMA symbols that constitutes the PDCCH channel for the
present subframe) to all users monitoring the DL. In summary, LTE UE needs to first
decode the PCFICH to decode PDCCH and then listen to PDCCH for PDSCH
resources and then decode the data on PDSCH.
PCFICH Details - What, where and how
PCFICH carries CFI (Control Format Indicator) that informs 4 values 1, 2, 3, or 4
suggesting that PDCCH occupies 1, 2, 3 or 4 OFDM symbols in the present subframe.
Figure 2.below provides more information about PCFICH and what CFI carries.
PCFICH is mapped to 4 REGs (labeled p, q, r and s in Figure 2) which are equidistant
and spread across the bandwidth in frequency domain. These four REG locations are a
function of PCI and the deployed bandwidth. In time domain, it is mapped to the first
OFDMA symbol of the subframe (see Figure 1). LTE defines a REG (Resource Element
Group) as 4 useful REs (Resource elements) or modulation symbols grouped together.
But with 2 MIMO Reference signals associated, 6 REs are grouped into a REG in the
first OFDMA symbol of the subframe (Figure 2 shows sample position of Reference
signals marked as x).

Fig 2: PCFICH - Where and What

The Math of PCFICH has

4REGs = 4 time 4 useful REs or 16 modulation symbols
With QPSK modulation PCFICH always carry 32 bit of information which are mapped to
CFI values 1 to 4 as shown in Figure 2.
PCI Planning
In PCI planning we usually consider the Primary Sync Signal (PSS) and Secondary
Sync Signal (SSS) where every cell has a unique PCI. A PCI is a combination of one of
the three unique (orthogonal) PSS sequences and one of 168 cell group identity (or
SSS) sequences that make a range of 0 to 503 unique identities. To minimize
interference, the thumb rule is to ensure that neighboring cells shall not transmit the
same PSS. This ensures that sync signal and reference signals do not interfere with
each other.
PCFICH issues with PCI planning
Now let's focus on PCFICH issues while planning the PCIs. A careful observation of LTE
standards shows that PCFICH location is a function of two variables the PCI and the
bandwidth deployed. In popular deployments of 10Mz, we see that first OFDM symbol
of every subframe has 100 REGs (@ of 2REGs per RB). Likewise we can have 12, 30,
50, 150 and 200 REGs for bandwidths 1.4MHz, 3MHz, 5MHz, 15MHz and 20MHz
respectively. Also PCFICH spans four (4) locations across the bandwidth and are
equidistant. But PCIs are 504 (five hundred and four), so cells with different PCI are
bound to have overlapping PCFICH locations. Hence we see two scenarios arising, first
a set of PCIs for a given bandwidth will have exactly same PCFICH positions and
secondly a group of cells that have one or more overlapping PCFICH locations. If the
PCIs within a set happens to be assigned for neighbor cells, the UEs at cell edges will
experience interference while decoding PCFICH. Any problems in reading PCFICH
leads to a situation where UE is not reading either or both PDCCH and PDSCH thereby
reducing the cell edge throughputs.
First let us see the scenario of neighboring cells with PCIs from a set that has the same
PCFICH positions are very same. Figure 3 shows one such case where three 10MHz
neighbor cells with PCIs 0, 25 and 50 (from the same set) deployed. PCI planning with
synchronization and reference signals point of view looks perfect. i.e., PCIs 0, 25 and
50 have Primary Synchronization signals 0, 1 and 2 respectively. Also the DL cell
specific reference signal positions do not overlap, minimizing the interference. Hence
we see that interference is better managed. But there's an element of surprise when you
analyze interference due to PCFICH.

With 100 REGs in a 10MHz deployment, only 25 (=100/4) unique PCFICH locations
(with four equidistant REGs) are possible. Here we see cells with PCIs separated by a
distance of 25 has the same PCFICH positions (REGs 0, 25, 50 and 75). This will
drastically reduce the cell edge throughputs.

Figure 3: Scenario showing neighbor cells have same PCFICH location.

Now let us look the other scenario where neighbor cell have one or more PCFICH
location in common as seen in figure 4. Here we consider three 5MHz cells having few
PCFICH positions overlapping being deployed. Like in the previous case with 5MHz
deployed, a total of 25 * 2 = 50 REG location are possible within the bandwidth. With 4
equidistant locations we can have only 12 unique PCFICH positions. Figure 4 shows
three neighbor cells having PCIs 0, 12 and 25. When we consider the cell with PCI 0
and 12 or 12 and 25, we see that two REG positions 72 and 222 are overlapping that
decreases the probability of decoding PCFICH, while PCIs 0 and 25 have all the four
positions in common making it even worse to decode PCFICH. When the PCIs have a
difference of 13, we see other two REG positions 0 and 150 overlapping. Hence it is not
advisable to have PCIs with multiples of 12/13 or 25 in neighborhood.
A summary of above discussion can be seen in Table 1 below. Extra care must be taken
while deploying neighbor cells with PCI distances such that those mentioned in the table

are not used leading to better cell edge throughputs. Figure 5 below shows an example
scenario that abides by PCFICH plan to ensure a better cell throughput.

Figure 4: Scenario showing neighbor cells with few (1 or more) overlapping PCFICH
locations

Table 1: PCFICH Separation distance for various LTE deployments

Figure 5: Scenario of PCI plan with PCFICH check

Conclusion
Maximum throughputs can be achieved by careful cell planning considering the PCFICH
locations additionally. The cell planning should see that neighboring cells in the cluster
or across clusters do not have a distances mentioned in Table 1. PCFICH positions
have a randomized interference due to individual REGs of cells overlapping with other
cell individual REGs.
Reference
[1]
36.300 Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (E-UTRA) and Evolved
Universal
Terrestrial Radio Access Network (E-UTRAN); Overall
description; Stage 2
[2]
36.211 - Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (E-UTRA); Physical
channels and
modulation
[3]
36.212 -Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (E-UTRA); Multiplexing
and channel coding