PDCCH Aggregation Level:

There are 4 different aggregation levels defined in LTE and they are 1, 2, 4 and 8 using which each DCI format is
mapped on to the DL control symbols,
Basically all downlink control channels are defined in terms of following terms,

▪ REG – Resource element group, which is smallest defined unit and includes 4 subcarriers/resource elements
▪ CCE – Control channel element, which is nothing but group of 9 REGs, that means there are a total of
9×4=36 subcarriers and since all the control channels are mapped using QPSK/BPSK which basically can
map 2 bits per subcarrier, we can accommodate 72 control channel bits per CCE

PDCCH is made up of CCEs (Control Channel Elements) and each CCE is made up of 36 REs (Resource
Elements). PDCCH further uses a concept of aggregation layers which is a group of CCEs. There are 4
aggregation layers in the normal PDCCH

– Aggregation layer 1 : This uses 1 CCE and it is the smallest block so it is only used in very good radio
conditions.

– Aggregation layer 2 : This uses 2 CCEs and it is usually the most common aggregation layer in normal radio
conditions.

– Aggregation layer 4 : This uses 4 CCEs and it is a robust allocation. It can be used for signalling and control
information allocations.

– Aggregation layer 8 : This uses 8 CCEs and it is the most robust allocation. Users in very bad radio conditions
are allocated with this layer or it can be used for control information.

PDCCH Resource Allocation

One PDCCH is carried by multiple number of consecutive CCEs. How many CCEs are necessary to carry
one PDCCH ? It depends on the format of the PDCCH. The relationship between PDCCH format and the
number CCE required to carry the PDCCH is as follows :

• PDCCH Format 0 : Requires 1 CCE = Aggregation Level 1 (2^PDCCH Format = 2^0 = 1)

• PDCCH Format 1 : Requires 2 CCE = Aggregation Level 2 (2^PDCCH Format = 2^1 = 2)
• PDCCH Format 2 : Requires 4 CCE = Aggregation Level 4 (2^PDCCH Format = 2^2 = 4)
• PDCCH Format 3 : Requires 8 CCE = Aggregation Level 8 (2^PDCCH Format = 2^3 = 8)

Aggregation Levels
So now directly jumping to aggregation levels, as I told earlier there are 4 different aggregation levels supported in LTE downlink,
they are 1, 2, 4 and 8. Each of these numbers basically specify the number of CCE they require to map a PDCCH DCI, as shown
below

▪ Aggregation level = 1
▪ Number of CCE = 1
▪ Number of subcarriers available to map = 36
▪ Number of bits possible to map = 72
▪ Aggregation level = 2
▪ Number of CCE = 2
▪ Number of subcarriers available to map = 72
▪ Number of bits possible to map = 144
▪ Aggregation level = 4
▪ Number of CCE = 4
▪ Number of subcarriers available to map = 144
▪ Number of bits possible to map = 288
▪ Aggregation level = 8
▪ Number of CCE = 8
▪ Number of subcarriers available to map = 288
▪ Number of bits possible to map = 576
How 'Number of PDCCH bits' is derived for each PDCCH

Number of PDCCH bits for PDCCH Format 0 = 1 (CCE) x 9 (REG/CCE) x 4 (RE/REG) x 2 (bits/RE, QPSK) = 72
Number of PDCCH bits for PDCCH Format 1 = 2 (CCE) x 9 (REG/CCE) x 4 (RE/REG) x 2 (bits/RE, QPSK) = 144
Number of PDCCH bits for PDCCH Format 2 = 4 (CCE) x 9 (REG/CCE) x 4 (RE/REG) x 2 (bits/RE, QPSK) = 288
Number of PDCCH bits for PDCCH Format 3 = 8 (CCE) x 9 (REG/CCE) x 4 (RE/REG) x 2 (bits/RE, QPSK) = 576

It means that even the same DCI with exactly same bit length, the number of physical channel bits gets different
depending on which PDCCH format it is carried by. It means the Code Rate of PDCCH varies depending on
which PDCCH format is used.
For example, if we use DCI Format 2A (bit length of DCI Format2A is 40 bits)
Case 1 : If we use Aggregation Level = 1
i) After Channel Coding, the bit length would be about 120
ii) After Rate Matching, it should be 72 (1 CCE)
Case 2 : If we use Aggregation Level = 2
i) After Channel Coding, the bit length would be about 120
ii) After Rate Matching, it should be 144 (2 CCE)
Case 3 : If we use Aggregation Level = 4
i) After Channel Coding, the bit length would be about 120
ii) After Rate Matching, it should be 288 (4 CCE)
Case 4 : If we use Aggregation Level = 8
i) After Channel Coding, the bit length would be about 120
ii) After Rate Matching, it should be 576 (8 CCE)

A PDCCH is used to give scheduling allocations to the UE on the PDSCH or PUSCH. For example, if the UE
has data in the PDSCH, it needs to know where the data is located. The PDCCH will tell the UE that the data it is
looking for is located at this location on PDSCH. This means that if the UE is unable to decode PDCCH then the
UE cannot read the PDSCH in that subframe and consistent decoding failures of PDCCH lead to RLF (Radio
Link Failure) due to N310. Hence, the decoding of PDCCH is extremely important and that is why it uses a
special structure which is different than other channels.

Let’s have a look at how many users can be scheduled by PDCCH in a subframe. This depends on the number of
CCEs that the subframe can handle which in turn depends on many factors. Let’s have a look at a couple of
examples

– Consider a 10 MHz channel using 2×2 MIMO (2 CRS ports). The PDCCH can span over 3 symbols at
maximum and may use 1 symbol at minimum. The number of RBs in a 10 MHz channel is 50 and this means
that a symbol can hold a maximum of (12x50) 600 REs. However, in the first symbol, we have 2 RS per RB for
each antenna port. This means that there will be a total of 4 RS per RB in the first symbol and since there are 50
RBs so total RS count will be 4*50 =200 REs. Moreover, there is a PCFICH control channel that spans over 4
REGs or 16 REs. Then there are PHICH groups and each PHICH group occupies 3 REGs or 12 REs. If the Ng
parameter is 1 then there will be 7 PHICH groups in 10 MHz channel so the total PHICH overhead will be
12*7=84.
Number of REs in one symbol : 50*12 = 600

Overhead in Symbol 1 = 200 RS + 16 REs of PCFICH + 84 REs of PHICH = 300 REs

Overhead in symbol 2 = 0 REs

Overhead in symbol 3 = 0 REs

Total REs available for PDCCH (REs available in 3 symbols) = 1800 – 300 = 1500 REs

Total CCEs available for PDCCH = 1500 REs / 36 = 41 CCEs

This means that if all the users are in very good radio conditions, then there can be 41 users scheduled in 1 TTI (1
ms) with 3 PDCCH symbols. However, this does not happen because the radio conditions of the users are usually
distributed and there are common allocations like TPC (transmit power control) commands which are usually at a
bigger aggregation layer since it carries allocations for multiple users. So, if there is one TPC command which
takes 8 CCEs then around 33 CCEs are remaining. These CCEs will be divided between downlink and uplink
data allocations. Usually, downlink data is more so most of the allocations are taken by downlink. Consider that
the users are in good conditions and require 2 CCEs each then there can be 16 users in each TTI (16*2 =32
CCEs) with 3 PDCCH symbols.

Now that the PDCCH structure is out of the way, let’s have a look at the optimization procedures for PDCCH.
As described above, the PDCCH symbol usage can go upto 3. Each subframe has 14 symbols so if PDCCH uses
3 symbols, then the PDSCH will only be able to use 11 symbols. If the PDCCH symbol number is reduced to 1,
then the PDSCH symbol count can increase to 13 which is around 15% improvement in throughput or capacity.
However, if we change the PDCCH symbol count to 1 then that means that the available PDCCH CCEs will
reduce to 8 (300/36=8) since the first symbol has 300 REs available and other 300 REs are used by RS, PCFICH
and PHICH. And if we need to transmit a TPC command then it will utilize all the CCEs and we cannot transmit
any data allocations.

In order to tackle this, most of the vendors have introduced a dynamic algorithm that changes the PDCCH
symbol count with respect to the requirement of the users. If there is data for 6 users and a TPC command, it will
use 2 symbols for PDCCH and if there is only 1 user that needs to be scheduled, it will reduce the PDCCH
symbol count to 1. Activating this algorithm is the first step to ensure optimum balance between PDCCH and
PDSCH.

The PDCCH allocation is mostly based on a BLER target accompanied by a CQI input. If the UE is showing a
good CQI, the eNB will allocate a good aggregation layer. For example, the UE reported CQI index 12 which
shows that it is in good radio conditions then the eNB will allocate it aggregation layer 2 which uses 2 CCEs.
Now, consider that the UE moves away and eNB experiences BLER so the eNB will increase the aggregation
layer to 4 to provide more robustness to the PDCCH. However, there is another way to increase the robustness
and that is to increase the PDCCH power. Vendors have dynamic power features for PDCCH and if such a
feature is used, it will increase the PDCCH power with the same aggregation layer to increase the robustness.
This means that the UE will stay with the same aggregation layer using 2 CCEs and since it did not expand to 4
CCEs so there was a gain of 2CCEs or 72 REs which might prevent the eNB to increase the PDCCH symbol
from 1 to 2 resulting in an extra symbol for PDSCH
.

Another approach is to tune the PDCCH BLER target. If the BLER target is slightly increased, then the eNB will
use the same PDCCH aggregation layer for longer and this will reduce expansion of PDCCH resulting in a lower
CCE utilization and reduced overhead. However, if the BLER target is increased excessively, the UEs might fail
to decode the PDCCH resulting in retransmissions.

Another dimension is the coding rate for the PDCCH aggregation layers. If there is more number of bits in a
particular PDCCH allocation, then it might exceed the upper limit of the Aggregation Layer 1. So, the eNB will
have to expand to the bigger aggregation layer. This happens because the eNB has a threshold for maximum
coding rate per aggregation layer. However, if the maximum coding rate threshold is increased, the eNB will be
able to send more bits within the same aggregation layer. This would reduce the transitions to higher aggregation
layers and might reduce the overhead. As an example, a transmit diversity allocation uses lesser number of
PDCCH bits compared to a Open Loop Spatial Multiplexing (TM3) allocation. So, if a network has Transmit
Diversity and it moves to Open Loop Spatial Multiplexing, an increase in aggregation layer will be observed.
Similarly, if the network shifts from Open Loop to Closed Loop, another increase in aggregation layer will be
observed as Closed Loop MIMO allocations take more number of bits on PDCCH compared to Open Loop
MIMO allocations. This can be mitigated by increasing the maximum coding rate threshold for the PDCCH. But
increasing it reduces the robustness of the PDCCH and therefore, a balance must be maintained.

The gain of the PDCCH optimization is directly proportional to the utilization and load on the PDCCH. If the
network is lightly loaded then most of the time PDCCH will only be using 1 symbol and since that is the
minimum number of symbols allocated to PDCCH so there will be no gain with any of the above mentioned
changes. If the network is congested and PDCCH is consistently using 3 symbols then such measures can help in
reducing the symbols to 2 which can expand the PDSCH or data capacity. However, in all the cases, special care
must be taken that this does not increase decoding failures excessively.

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