Error Rate Performance Analysis of the 5G NR Physical Uplink Shared Channels for Cell-Free Systems

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Abstract

This paper investigates the physical layer performance of 5G New Radio (NR) in a cell-free (CF) massive MIMO
system, focusing on the transmission of the Physical Uplink
Shared Channel (PUSCH) over frequency-selective Rayleigh
fading channels. A comprehensive link-level simulator, compliant
with 3GPP standards, is developed to evaluate the system’s
performance across various scenarios. Key parameters such as
subcarrier spacing (SCS), modulation and coding schemes (MCS)
(QPSK, 16-QAM, 64-QAM, 256-QAM), and varying numbers of
distributed radio units (RUs) are systematically analyzed. The
results demonstrate the dual benefits of increasing the number of
RUs: enhanced spatial diversity and improved proximity between
user equipment (UE) and RUs, leading to significant improvements in reliability and error rate performance. The study also
highlights the impact of higher SCS values in leveraging frequency diversity, particularly when signal bandwidth exceeds the
channel’s coherence bandwidth. Practical channel estimation is
incorporated to validate performance under realistic conditions.
Block Error Ratio (BLER) is used as the primary performance
metric, providing valuable insights into the interplay of spatial
and frequency diversity in CF 5G NR systems, thereby confirming
their potential to achieve robust and efficient communication in
challenging wireless environments
Original languageEnglish
JournalIEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications
Early online date11 Dec 2024
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 11 Dec 2024

Bibliographical note

This is an author-produced version of the published paper. Uploaded in accordance with the University’s Research Publications and Open Access policy.

Keywords

  • Cell-free system
  • Block error rate
  • Physical uplink shared channel
  • 5G New Radio

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