5G-NR

Author: Badal Mishra

Major Changes in 5G as per 3GPP
Frame Structure Agreement - 3GPP RP 38.802, 38.804
• Maximum channel bandwidth per NR carrier is 400 z in Rel 15.
• One Numerology corresponds to one subcarrier spacing in frequency domain
• Subframe Duration is fixed to be 1 ms . It is likely that one TTI(Transmission Time Interval) length is much
shorter than this to meet the latency requirement.
• One TTI duration corresponds to a number of consecutive symbols for one transmission in time domain
• The combination of one numerology and one TTI duration determines how transmission is made on physical
layer.
• Frame Length is fixed to be 10 ms & Number of subcarrier per PRB is 12
• Scalable numerology should allow the subcarrier spacing from 15 KHz to 480 KHz.
• Number of OFDM symbols per slot may vary depending on subcarrier spacing
• For subcarrier spacing <= 60, the number of OFDM symbols / slot = 7 or 14
• For subcarrier spacing > 60, the number of OFDM symbols / slot = 14
• Slot Aggregation (data transmission scheduling to span one or multiple slots
• No explicit DC subcarrier is reserved for both Downlink and Uplink
• All numerologies align on symbol boundaries every 1 ms in NR carrier (regardless of subcarrier spacing and CP-
overhead)
5G 3GPP NR Frame Structure

• The 3GPP technical provide the specifications for the PHY layer. Both Frequency Division Duplexing (FDD) and
Time Division Duplexing (TDD) will be supported.
The waveform is Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) with a cyclic prefix.
Different numerologies will be used in order to address the different use cases of 5G.
The frame structure follows a time and frequency grid similar to that of LTE, with a higher number of configurable
parameters. The subcarrier spacing is 15 × 2 n kHz, n ∈ Z, n ≤ 4 .
• In Release 15, at most, there will be 3300 sub-carriers, for a maximum bandwidth of 400 MHz. A frame lasts 10
ms, with 10 subframes of 1 ms.
It will be possible to multiplex different numerologies for a given carrier frequency and the whole communication
must be aligned on a subframe basis. A slot is composed of 14 OFDM symbols.
There are multiple slots in a subframe, and their number is given by the numerology used since the symbol
duration is inversely proportional to the subcarrier spacing.
• Mini-slots are also supported: they can be as small as 2 OFDM symbol and have variable length, and can be
positioned asynchronously with respect to the beginning of the slot (so low-latency data can be sent without any
waiting for all slot duration).
5G NR Frame Structure:
Why Short Subframes in 5G?

• It is to meet such a short latency requirement in 5G.

• OFDM operates in very high frequency like mmWave, it is very difficult to make it work in such
a short subcarrier spacing like 15 Khz as we do in current LTE.  Usually frequency drift (like
doppler shift or drift due to poor local oscillator) happens in proportion to operating frequency.
If we use the frequency like 26 Ghz, even a small fraction of frequency drift happens, it would
get easily over several tens of Khz. Therefore, it is highly likely that 5G will use OFDM with
much wider sub carrier spacing (meaning Wide Subcarrier) comparing to current LTE. If the
subcarrier width gets wider, the symbol length gets shorter (this is based on inverse
relationship between frequency domain and time domain). If we assume that we will pack the
same number of symbols within a subframe, the shorter symbol length would create shorter
subframe.
5G 3GPP NR Frequency Ranges

• In Release 15 NR, the operating bands are divided into two frequency ranges; Frequency Range 1 (FR1)
and Frequency Range 2 (FR2).
The definition of the frequency ranges is shown below:

• The physical layer and higher layers designs are frequency agnostic, but separate radio performance
requirements are specified for each frequency range. Furthermore, different testing methodologies are used in
FR1 and FR2.
FR1 SCS:
• In FR1, the supported subcarrier spacings are {15, 30, 60} kHz. The supported and maximum transmission
bandwidth configuration NRB for each bandwidth and subcarrier spacing are following:
FR2 SCS:
• In FR2, the supported subcarrier spacings are {60, 120} kHz. The supported and maximum transmission
bandwidth configuration NRB for each bandwidth and subcarrier spacing are as following: 
5G NR Time Frame Structure

• In the time domain, the physical layer transmissions are organized in radio frames. The radio frame’s duration is
10 ms. Each radio frame is divided into 10 subframes, each with a duration of 1 ms. Each subframe is further
divided into slots.
• The number of slots in a subframe depends on the subcarrier spacing as shown below:
For example: Frame structure in for Subcarrier Spacing of 120
kHz with normal CP;
5G NR Frequency Frame Structure

• In the frequency domain, transmissions are organized in resource blocks, a resource block occupies 12
subcarriers.
Factors determining Subframe
Structure
• Subcarrier Spacing : It is proposed to be scaled as Delta_f * 2^K. This is to achieve high multiplexing
efficiency between different numerologies ([7]). The subcarrier spacing varies with the frequency of the spectrum
and/or maximum UE speed to minimize the impact of the Doppler shift and phase noise ([8])
• Number of Symbols per TTI : It is proposed to be scaled as 2^M symbols per TTI. This is to ensure
flexibile TTI downscaling for URLLC (Ultra Reliable Low Latency Communication) from 2^M symbols to 1
symbol([7]).
• CP Length : CP length woud be determined by deployment types (e.g, outdoor or indoor) that has different
delay spread requirements, and/or determined by frequency bands, service type (e.g, unicase or broadcast) or
determined by whether beam forming technology is used or not ([8]).
• TTI Length : TTI length would be determined by service types that has different latency requirement, or
determined by downlink vs uplink vs sidelink.
Numerology - Subcarrier Spacing
• Comparing to LTE numberology (subcarrier spacing and symbol length), the most outstanding diffrence you can
notice is that NR support multiple different types of subcarrier spacing (in LTE there is only one type of
subcarrier spacing, 15 Khz). The types NR numerology is summarized in 38.211
• Each numerology is labled as a parameter(u, mu in Greek). The numerology (u = 0) represents 15 kHz which is
same as LTE. And as you see in the second column the subcarrier spacing of other u is derived from (u=0) by
scaling up in the power of 2.
Numerology and Slot Length
• Slot length gets different depending on numerology. The general tendency is that slot length gets shorter as
subcarrier spacing gets wider. Actually this tendency comes from the nature of OFDM.
Numerology and Supported Channels
• Not every numerology can be used for every physical channel and signals. That is, there is a specific
numerologies that are used only for a certain type of physical channels even though majority of the
numerologies can be used any type of physical channels. Following table shows which numerologies can be
used for which physical channels.
• < 38.300-Table 5.1-1: Supported transmission numerologies and additional info.>
OFDM Symbol Duration
Numerology - Sampling Time

• Sampling time can be defined differently depending on Numerology (i.e, Subcarrier Spacing) and in most case
two types of Timing Unit Tc and Ts are used.

Tc = 0.509 ns
Ts = 32.552 ns
Radio Frame Structure
• In 5G/NR multiple numerologies(waveform configuration like subframe spacing) are supported
and the radio frame structure gets a little bit different depending on the type of the numerology.
• However, regardless of numerology the length of one radio frame and the length of one
subframe is same.  
• The length of a Radio Frame is always 10 ms and the length of a subframe is always 1 ms. 
• The difference is to put different number of slots within one subframe.
• There is another varying parameter with numerology. It is the number of symbols within a slot.
• The number of symbols within a slot does not change with the numerology, it only changes
with slot configuration type. For slot configuration 0, the number of symbols for a slot is always
14 and for slot configuration 1, the number of symbols for a slot is always 7.
Radio frame structure for each
numerology and slot configuration.
• Normal CP, Numerology = 0
• In this configuration, a subframe has only one slot in it, it means a radio frame contains 10 slots in it. The
number of OFDM symbols within a slot is 14.
• Normal CP, Numerology = 1  
• In this configuration, a subframe has 2 slots in it, it means a radio frame contains 20 slots in it. The number of
OFDM symbols within a slot is 14.
• Normal CP, Numerology = 2 
• In this configuration, a subframe has 4 slots in it, it means a radio frame contains 40 slots in it. The number of
OFDM symbols within a slot is 14.
• Normal CP, Numerology = 3
• In this configuration, a subframe has 8 slots in it, it means a radio frame contains 80 slots in it. The number of
OFDM symbols within a slot is 14.
• Normal CP, Numerology = 4 
• In this configuration, a subframe has 16 slots in it, it means a radio frame contains 160 slots in it. The number of
OFDM symbols within a slot is 14.
• Extended CP, Numerology = 2 
• In this configuration, a subframe has 8 slots in it, it means a radio frame contains 80 slots in it. The number of
OFDM symbols within a slot is 12.
Slot Format:
• Slot Format indicates how each of symbols within a single slot is used.

• It defines which symbols are used for uplink and which symbols are used for downlink within a specific
slot.

• In LTE TDD, if a subframe (equivalent to a Slot in NR) is configured for DL or UL, all of the symbols within
the subframe should be used as DL or UL. But in NR, the symbols within a slot can be configured in
various ways as follows.
- We don't need to use every symbols within a slot (this can be a similar concept in LAA subframe
where only a part of subframes can be used for data transmission).
- Single slot can be divided into multiple segments of consecutive symbols that can be used for DL ,
UL or Flexible.
• 3GPP allows only 61 predefined symbol combination within a slot as in following table. These predefined symbol
allocation of a slot called Slot Format.
• Why we need so many different types of slot formats ?
It is to make NR scheduling flexible especially for TDD operation. By applying a slot format or combining different
slot formats in sequence, we can implement various different types of scheduling as in the following example;
TDD DL/UL Common Configuration
• Resource Grid
• The resource grid for NR is defined as follows. If you just take a look at the picture, you would think it is almost
identical to LTE resource grid. But the physical dimension (i.e, subcarrier spacing, number of OFDM symbols
within a radio frame) varies in NR depending on numerology.
• The maximum and minimum number of Resource blocks for downlink and uplink is defined as below (this is
different from LTE)

• Following is the table that converted the downlink portions of above table into frequency Bandwidth just to give
an idea on what is the maximum RF bandwidth that a UE / gNB need to support for single carrier.