LTE Advanced Pro

3MBB Service – Carrier Aggregation

3.1. Functional architecture

The aggregation of the carriers results in sharing of the IP (Internet Protocol) packets between the different accesses. For the downstream direction (respectively the upstream direction), the sharing is performed by the evolved node base station (eNB) (respectively the mobile) and the reassembly is provided by the mobile (respectively the entity eNB). This operation is performed exclusively in the evolved universal terrestrial radio access network (E-UTRAN).

LTE (Long-Term Evolution) aggregation operates in licensed frequency bands (Figure 3.1).

LAA (Licensed Assisted Access) aggregation is an extension of LTE aggregation. The LTE transmission, defined by the data link layer and the physical layer, takes place on LTE and Wi-Fi (Wireless Fidelity) frequency bands, between the mobile and the eNB entity, without an intermediate access point, in accordance with the 3GPP standards (Figure 3.1).

The LTE Advanced and LTE Advanced Pro evolutions respectively defined an aggregation of five channels in a licensed band and extend up to 32 channels in a non-licensed band (Figure 3.1).

LWA (LTE–Wi-Fi Aggregation) and LWIP (LTE/WLAN radio level integration with IPsec tunnel) aggregations use both LTE and Wi-Fi technologies in their respective bands. The transmission on the Wi-Fi radio channel occurs between the mobile and the access point (AP) in accordance with 802.11 standard (Figure 3.1).

LTE and Wi-Fi carrier aggregation ...