UL Link adaptation: based on SINR

DL link adaptation: based on CQI

• Outer loop quality control: CQI adaptation

• DL adaptive modulation and coding (AMC)_LTE31 Link adaptation by AMC (UL/DL) – in RL10_For
PDSCH only(OLLA)

• UL adaptive modulation and coding (AMC) ( 2 component ILLA and OLLA)

• Inner loop link adaptation (ILLA) for UL only

• Outer loop link adaptation (OLLA) for UL only

• For DL Outer loop link adaptation on PDCCH comes in later version (LTE1035 Outer Loop Link
Adaptation for PDCCH in RL30)

• Adaptive Transmission bandwidth (ATB)

• Extended UL link adaptation (E-ULA)

• Fast Link adaptation (F-ULA)

CQI adaptation is closely related to the feature LTE31 “Link adaptation by AMC (UL/DL)”: The selection
of the appropriate modulation and coding scheme for DL transmission by the AMC (adaptive modulation
and coding) algorithm is based on the adjusted CQI value

If DL AMC not activated (dlamcEnable) then there will be fixed MCS applied according to parameter “
iniMCsDL” and applied MCS will never change over the time.

ILLA and OLLA work together. ILLA worked on after period “ulamcSwitchPer” and OLLA works on EDG
(Emergency upgrade) and FUG (Fast upgrade) events.

Radio link quality control

Radio link control comprises the mechanisms and procedures to establish and manage a radio
connection between the user equipment (UE) and the evolved NodeB (eNB). For such a radio
connection, the transmission conditions vary in time due to movements of the UE, variations of the
physical conditions, and interference from other participants in the radio network. The aim of radio link
control is to maintain a radio link in terms of quality of service (QoS) and data rates under varying radio
conditions. Hence, radio link control monitors the link's quality and adjusts radio link parameters
according to the changes of radio conditions.
The main adjustment facilities of radio link control are:

• Link adaptation by adaptive modulation and coding (AMC)

AMC dynamically adjusts the modulation scheme and channel coding scheme to match the prevailing
radio conditions for each user, taking into account the QoS demands on the connections and the
available radio channel capacity. For good radio conditions, a high modulation scheme (16QAM, 64QAM,
256QAM) for the transmission of several bits per symbol, and a coding scheme with a high data rate but
reduced overheads for forward error correction may be selected. For weaker radio conditions, a lower
modulation scheme (for example, quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK)) may be applied, which leads to
fewer bits per transmitted symbol but is more tolerant to phase and amplitude errors. The low
modulation scheme may be complemented by a coding scheme with a low bit rate but a high error-
correction potential. The 3GPP TS36.213 shows that there are precisely 32 modulation and coding
scheme (MCS) values (of which three are reserved for other purposes).

Link adaptation by AMC is applied to the physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) and physical uplink
shared channel (PUSCH). AMC is accompanied by the adaptive transmission bandwidth (ATB)
functionality, which limits the UL transmission bandwidth due to power constraints.

• Power control

Power control dynamically adjusts the UE’s transmit power in dependency to the level and quality of
UE’s signals received by the eNB. Two components of uplink power control are distinguished.

In open-loop uplink power control, which is the basic power control mechanism, the UE autonomously
adjusts its transmit power based on path loss estimations. In closed-loop power control, measurements
of the eNB are taken into account for power changes.

PDSCH, downlink reference symbols, system information broadcast (SIB), and sync signals do not have
dynamic power control. Instead, the eNB transmits all physical resource blocks (PRBs) with the same
transmission power (flat power spectrum density, that is, constant transmission power per unit
bandwidth).

Additionally, a link adaptation mechanism for the physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) is
provided.

The eNB’s sources for monitoring the link level and quality are its own measurements regarding the
uplink direction and reports of the UE regarding the downlink direction. The link quality information sent
from the UE to the eNB includes the channel quality indicator (CQI) reports. The CQI reports can be
transmitted periodically and aperiodically.

Link adaptation

For LTE, the 3GPP standard has defined numerous Modulation and Coding Schemes (MCS) that provide,
besides differences in the modulation patterns (QPSK, 16QAM, 64QAM) additional differences in the
coding rate (that is ratio of coding portion to the total radio packet length). The more complex symbols
are supported (4 for QPSK, 64 for 64 QAM etc.) and the smaller the ratio of the coding portion, the
higher the throughput per symbol but the lower the robustness of the MCS against bad SINR conditions.
Several Link Adaptation methods are performed according to the channel conditions in order to provide
the guaranteed transmission performance such as data rate, packet error rate or latency. One of these
methods is called Adaptive Modulation and Coding (AMC) that allows the application of various
modulation schemes and channel coding rates based on the channel conditions. Figure: Link Adaptation
presents the general idea of a basic Link Adaptation (LA) mechanism. Generally speaking, the closer to
the serving base station, the higher MCS may be used. Conversely, when the UE moves further away
from the base station, the SINR decreases due to increased signal attenuation and increased
interference coming from neighboring cells.

Figure: Link Adaptation

As a general rule, the 3GPP standard has specified that the same MCS has to be applied to all groups of
resource blocks belonging to the same Layer 2 (L2) Protocol Data Unit (PDU) scheduled to one user
within one TTI by a single antenna stream. The same rule applies to multiple streams transmission. The
MCS index is stated in the Transport Format together with information about the Transport Block Size,
resource allocation and transmission rank (that is one or two code-words). The Transport Format is
provided by the Medium Access Control (MAC) layer.

For each E-UTRAN physical channel there is a defined list of modulation schemes which are available /
allowed for use (see Table: Available modulation schemes for various physical channels).

Table: Available modulation schemes for various physical channels

Physical channel Modulation

PDSCH QPSK, 16QAM, 64QAM

PBCH QPSK

PDCCH (and PCFICH) QPSK

PHICH BPSK

PUSCH QPSK, 16QAM

PUCCH BPSK and QPSK (for ACK/NACK and CQI messages) On/off keying (for scheduling request)

The highest modulation (64QAM) ,which offers 6 data bits carried by a modulated symbol can be applied
only for downlink or uplink shared data channels. The most robust schemes are chosen for signaling
channels that are vital for the basic system operation (for example paging, synchronization, controlling,
etc.).