Key challenges and potential applications of LTE-Advanced

Mobile technologies have been experiencing an extremely rapid evolution in the past decade. Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) initiated the Long Term Evolution (LTE) for the high complexity and limited capacity of the third generation (3G) cellular system. LTE is now established in most part of the world for its higher data rate and lower latency. However, it is necessary to upgrade the LTE system to cope up with the enormous current and future demands of mobile data traffic, new services, and applications. Researchers and standardizing bodies are putting a significant effort on LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) to meet that demands. This paper provides extensive views on the key challenges of LTE-A system. These challenges are considered as the major barrier to implement the LTE-A. Based on the user behavior and estimation of future demand, some potential future applications are also described.