The LTE radio interface - key characteristics and performance

Mobile broadband usage is taking off, demanding improved services and increased capacity of mobile networks. To meet these requirements, 3GPP has defined LTE (the 3GPP Long Term Evolution). This paper presents some key characteristics of the LTE radio interface, including physical layer and radio resource management functions, and evaluates their impact on system performance. As compared to a reference system with more basic characteristics, represented by mobile WiMax, results point to a combined gain in spectrum efficiency of 60% in downlink and 100% in uplink. Cell-edge bitrate gains are about 100% in both downlink and uplink. A closer analysis of the individual system characteristics indicates that these performance differences are due to rather uniform contributions from a set of distinctive features.