Homework 1: Radio Interference In LTE

Amro Lulu
January 31, 2017
Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology has become the technology of choice for keeping up with the
requirement of higher throughput in mobile communication in bands below 6 GHz. Like other communication systems, Interference in its various forms is one of the most common problems in the radio access
network. Different types of interference arise in the LTE system, which to be mitigated to achieve high
reliability of the system. There are several forms of interference to be considered as co-channel interference
(CCI) and inter symbol interference (ISI). In this report we discuss the problems and solutions of co-channel
interference and its impact on the LTE system.

Co-Channel Interference

In cellular mobile communication (GSM & LTE Systems), the frequency resource is partitioned into
non-overlapping spectrum bands and is assigned to different cells. Co-channel interference is the type of
interference that exists between any two cells in LTE cellular networks due to the sharing of same channel.
This type of interference is a serious issue as it degrades the performance of the system in terms of data rate
and spectral efficiency particularly at cell edge. To improve the efficiency of spectrum, the frequency reuse
methods are adopted.

The frequency reuse is the practice of splitting an area into smaller regions that do not overlap so that
each utilizes the full range of frequencies without interference.
On the other hand, this method leads to co-channel interference as the same set of frequency is used by
several cells in the network. The term co-channel interference is also known as inter-cell interference. It is
not possible to mitigate the co-channel interference by increasing the power of the transmitter. however,
this increase in transmitter power might increase the interference among the neighboring co-channel cells.
To mitigate co-channel interference there exist several simple approaches that is by physically separating
the co-channel cells with minimum distance and by using the cell sectorization in the seven-cell system.
The co-channel interference can also be controlled by cell planning, cell selection, modulation schemes,
dynamic channel allocation and power control. By mitigating co-channel interference (CCI) the link quality
and throughput for cell edge users can be improved.
LTE uplink consists of a single-carrier frequency-division multiple access (SC-FDMA) technique
that orthogonalizes different users transmissions in the same cell by explicit assignments of groups of
DFT-precoded orthogonal subcarriers. This type of interference is totally different from 3G, where the
interference occur on the carrier bandwidth. This type of interference in the 3G is known as same-cell

interference and it is suppressed by techniques as successive interference cancelers. The design of LTE
avoids this type of interference, however, introduces other cell interference that needs new managing power
control techniques.
Uplink interference in LTE networks needs to be managed over multiple narrow bands, each corresponding to collection of a few subcarriers over the entire bandwidth, thus giving rise to unique research challenges.
Next figure shows a situation of three adjacent LTE cells, Depending on time-frequency assignment to users
in Cell-2, 3, uplink transmission of User-A in Cell-1 could receive high interference from Cell-2 and low
interference from Cell-3 or vice versa

Solutions for uplink interference include depolying self-organized networking (SON) capabilities to maximize network performances. LTE heterogeneous networks also include high-power macrocells overlaying
low-power small (pico/femto) cells to avoid interference. Cellular access nodes belong to three categories:
macro-cells (< 3 km), micro-cells (< 1 km) and pico-cells (< 100 m). The small cells are deployed in traffic
hotspots or coverage challenged areas, typically in an indoor environment, and thus, typically small cells
outnumber macros by an order of magnitude, however leads to a much larger, and hence more difficult
to tune and manage, cellular network, where centralized SON servers are deployed to continuously optimize the network. Thus, a good solution to uplink interference management should satisfy the following
requirements:
1. It should be adaptive to network traffic, propagation geometry and topology
2. It should scale with the size of the network that could consist of tens of thousands of cells.
3. It should be architecturally compliant in the sense that it is implementable in a SON server and
adherent to standards.
Note that SON implementability dictates that the solution makes use of the large amount of network
measurement data.

Inter-Symbol Interference

In wireless environment, the transmitted signals are affected in different ways, one example is the propagation
environment, which causes multipath effect, as signals arrive to the receiver with different delays, which is
known as delay spread. Due to the signal propagation phenomena, like reflection or diffraction, a receiver
can receive several delayed versions of the same signal. This creates Inter-Symbol Interference (ISI).
Inter-symbol interference (ISI) is a form of distortion of a signal in which one symbol interferes with
subsequent symbols. This is an unwanted phenomenon as the previous symbols have similar effect as noise,
thus making the communication less reliable. Interference in OFDM symbols results in ISI effect on RF
channels. Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) which is an extension of OFDM to
the implementation of a multiuser communication system, is particularly robust against ISI. Furthermore,
OFDMA enables the OFDM transmission to benefit from multi-user diversity, thanks to its structure and
the use of the Cyclic Prefix (CP) which allows the receiver to perform a low-complexity single-tap scalar
equalization in the frequency domain. Based on feedback information about the frequency-selective channel
conditions from each user, adaptive user-to-subcarrier assignment can be performed, enhancing considerably
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the total system spectral efficiency compared to single-user OFDM systems. Optimal reception by coherent
detection therefore typically requires accurate estimation of the propagation channel.

In the downlink, the subcarriers are split into resource blocks. This enables the system to be able to
compartmentalise the data across standard numbers of subcarriers.
Resource blocks comprise 12 subcarriers, regardless of the overall LTE signal bandwidth. They also
cover one slot in the time frame. This means that different LTE signal bandwidths will have different
numbers of resource blocks. For the LTE uplink, a different concept is used for the access technique.
Although still using a form of OFDMA technology, the implementation is called Single Carrier Frequency
Division Multiple Access (SC-FDMA). One of the key parameters that affects all mobiles is that of battery
life. Even though battery performance is improving all the time, it is still necessary to ensure that the mobiles
use as little battery power as possible. With the RF power amplifier that transmits the radio frequency
signal via the antenna to the base station being the highest power item within the mobile, it is necessary
that it operates in as efficient mode as possible. This can be significantly affected by the form of radio
frequency modulation and signal format. Signals that have a high peak to average ratio and require linear
amplification do not lend themselves to the use of efficient RF power amplifiers. As a result it is necessary
to employ a mode of transmission that has as near a constant power level when operating. Unfortunately
OFDM has a high peak to average ratio. While this is not a problem for the base station where power is not
a particular problem, it is unacceptable for the mobile. As a result, LTE uses a modulation scheme known as
SC-FDMA - Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiplex which is a hybrid format. This combines the low
peak to average ratio offered by single-carrier systems with the multipath interference resilience and flexible
subcarrier frequency allocation that OFDM provides.