Impact of Propagation Delay on the Performance of Satellite LTE Networks

This paper investigates the impact of the Round Trip Propagation Delay (RTPD) in the satellite LTE air interface with the adoption of MIMO technology. The Satellite LTE air interface will provide global coverage and hence complement its terrestrial counterpart in the provision of LTE services to mobile users. A land mobile dual-polarized GEO satellite system has been considered for this work. The link adaption is an important module for the scheduling scheme and the satellite LTE network as a whole in order to make optimal scheduling decisions and effectively utilize the network resources respectively. However, the long RTPD experienced when Channel Quality Indicator (CQI) is reported from the User Equipment (UE) to the eNodeB via GEO satellite causes misalignment between the reported CQI at the eNodeB and the present CQI of the mobile user. The aim of this paper is to investigate the effect of the misalignment as a result of long RTPD on the system performance of Satellite LTE network.