Next generation LTE, LTE-Advanced or LTE Rel-10 is the next step in radio access technology

Whatever the name – next generation LTE, LTE-Advanced or LTE Rel-10 – the next step in LTE evolution allows operators to introduce new technologies without putting existing investments at risk.

LTE radio access technology is continuously evolving to meet the requirements of regulators, operators and users. The first fully commercial and operational 4G mobile broadband systems, currently being deployed, are based on the first release of LTE, 3GPP Rel-8, which was finalized in 2008. Rel-9, finalized at the end of 2009, added support for broadcast/multicast services, positioning services, and enhanced emergency call functionality, as well as enhancements for downlink dual-layer beam forming.

Authors : Stefan Parkvall, Anders Furuskär, Erik Dahlman

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Carrier Aggregation for LTE-Advanced

To meet LTE-Advanced requirements, support of wider transmission bandwidths is required than the 20 MHz bandwidth specified in 3GPP Release 8/9. The preferred solution to this is carrier aggregation. It is of the most distinct features of 4G LTE-Advanced. Carrier aggregation allows expansion of effective bandwidth delivered to a user terminal through concurrent utilization of radio resources across multiple carriers. Multiple component carriers are aggregated to form a larger overall transmission bandwidth.

3GPP specifies carrier aggregation in LTE as following

• Rel-8/9 backward compatible carriers are the basic building blocks and to be supported
• Rel-10 signalling to support aggregation of up to 5 DL of component carriers and 5 UL of component carriers, irrespective of intra- or inter-band Carrier Aggregation (CA).
• Rel-10 to support both intra- and inter-band aggregation for both DL & UL in FDD
• Rel-10 to support inter-band aggregation with different signal reception timings across of component carriers of different bands for FDD DL
• UE-specific asymmetric number of component carriers in DL and UL
• Component carriers can have any of the bandwidths supported in Rel-8

Contiguous & non-contiguous carrier aggregation

Two or more component carriers can be aggregated to support wider transmission bandwidths up to 100 MHz. Spectrum deployment can be either contiguous or non-contiguous. Support for carrier aggregation feature requires enhancement to the 3GPP LTE Release 8 & 9 physical, MAC, and RRC protocol layers. To an LTE Release 8 terminal, each component carrier will appear as an LTE carrier, while an LTE-Advanced terminal can use the total aggregated bandwidth.

source: LteWorld

The Path to 4G: LTE and LTE-Advanced

Presented by James Seymour, Senior Director, Alcatel-Lucent.

The Path to 4G: LTE and LTE-Advanced

View more presentations from Zahid Ghadialy.

Further Enhancements for LTE-Advanced

Further Enhancements for LTE-Advanced

View more presentations from Zahid Ghadialy.

Network Deployment for LTE-Advanced

Inter-cell Interference Coordination Schemes via Homo/Hetero-geneous Network Deployment for LTE-Advanced

View more presentations from All About 4G.

Radio Layer 2 And RRC Aspects

Rev 090004 Radio Layer 2 And Rrc Aspects

View more presentations from maddiv.

LTE and LTE Advanced Introduction

LTE and LTE Advanced Introduction

View more presentations from bramnha.

Qualcomm Webinar: LTE Advanced

This Qualcomm webinar was presented last month, it examines LTE Advanced and provides a high-level view into how it helps operators make the next performance leap.

Qualcomm Webinar: LTE Advanced

LTE Release 10 and Beyond (LTE-Advanced)

A very informative 3GPP presentation, Radio Access Networks - LTE progress report, May 24, 2010, Takehiro Nakamura, 3GPP TSG-RAN Chairman

See a snapshot below

From LTE

source: LteWorld

LTE-Advanced Requirements

Below are the requirements for LTE-Advanced which were part of the 3GPP RAN Chairmans’ presentation to the ITU-R WP 5D Third Workshop on IMT-Advanced.

General Requirements

LTE-Advanced is an evolution of LTE
LTE-Advanced shall meet or exceed IMT-Advanced requirements within the ITU-R time plan
Extended LTE-Advanced targets are adoptedSystem

System Performance Requirements

Peak data rate
- 1 Gbpsdata rate will be achieved by 4-by-4 MIMO and transmission bandwidth wider than approximately 70 MHz
Peak spectrum efficiency
- DL: Rel. 8 LTE satisfies IMT-Advanced requirement
- UL: Need to double from Release 8 to satisfy IMT-Advanced requirement
Capacity and cell-edge user throughput
- Target for LTE-Advanced was set considering gain of 1.4 to 1.6 from Release 8 LTE performance

Other Important Requirements

Spectrum flexibility

- Actual available spectra are different according to each region or country

- In 3GPP, various deployment scenarios for spectrum allocation are being taken into consideration in feasibility study

- Support for flexible deployment scenarios including downlink/uplink asymmetric bandwidth allocation for FDD and non‐contiguous spectrum allocationTotal

LTE-Advanced will be deployed as an evolution of LTE Release 8 and on new bands.

LTE-Advanced shall be backwards compatible with LTE Release 8 in the sense that

- a LTE Release 8 terminal can work in an LTE-Advanced NW,
- an LTE-Advanced terminal can work in an LTE Release 8 NW

Increased deployment of indoor eNBand HNB in LTE-Advanced.

What is LTE-Advanced?

The ITU has coined the term IMT Advanced to identify mobile systems whose capabilities go beyond those of IMT 2000. In order to meet this new challenge, 3GPPs Organizational Partners have agreed to widen 3GPP’s scope to include systems beyond 3G.

In 2008 3GPP held two workshops on IMT Advanced, where the “Requirements for Further Advancements for E-UTRA” were gathered. The resulting Technical Report 36.913 is now published (June 08) and a liaison was sent to ITU-R covering the work in 3GPP RAN on LTE-Advanced towards IMT-Advanced.

Why “Advanced”?

The ITU has coined the term IMT Advanced to identify mobile systems whose capabilities go beyond those of IMT 2000. In order to meet this new challenge, 3GPPs Organizational Partners have agreed to widen 3GPP’s scope to include the development of systems beyond 3G.

Some of the key features of IMT-Advanced will be;

• Worldwide functionality & roaming
• Compatibility of services
• Interworking with other radio access systems
• Enhanced peak data rates to support advanced services and applications (100 Mbit/s for high and 1 Gbit/s for low mobility)

LTE-Advanced Requirements

In 2008 3GPP held two workshops on IMT Advanced, where the “Requirements for Further Advancements for E-UTRA” were gathered. The resulting Technical Report 36.913 is now published.

General requirements for Advanced E-UTRA and Advanced E-UTRAN states that Advanced E-UTRA and Advanced E-UTRAN shall be an evolution of Release 8 E-UTRA and E-UTRAN. Further, Advanced E-UTRA and Advanced E-UTRAN shall meet or exceed IMT-Advanced requirements.

As per requirements Advanced E-UTRA should support significantly increased instantaneous peak data rates. At a minimum, Advanced E-UTRA should support the key feature of IMT-Advanced which is stated in the Circular Letter from the ITU-R as "enhanced peak data rates to support advanced services and applications (100 Mbit/s for high and 1 Gbit/s for low mobility were established as targets for research)". The system should target a downlink peak data rate of 1 Gbps and an uplink peak data rate of 500 Mbps.

The overall C-Plane/U-Plane latency shall be significantly decreased compared to EPS Rel-8.

Over all 36.913 specifies a number of more requirments in the areas of System performance, Deployment, E-UTRAN architecture and migration.

See LteWorld link to know more about LTE-Advanced.