ABSTRACT
In a Long Term Evolution Advanced (LTE-A) system, wider bandwidths (up to 100 MHz) are needed to support high peak data rates (1 Gbps in the downlink and 500 Mbps in the uplink) and average throughout per cell. In order to support bandwidths larger than 20 MHz, carrier aggregation (CA) with two or more component carriers (CCs) is considered in LTE-A. An LTE-A terminal with transmission and/ or reception capability beyond 20 MHz can simultaneously transmit and receive data on multiple component carriers. e number of component carriers transmitted and/or received to/from a mobile terminal can vary over time depending on the instantaneous data rate. Up to five component carriers can be aggregated, allowing for transmission bandwidths up to 100 MHz. Backward compatibility to an LTE Rel-8 system is required in the carrier aggregation design to allow LTE Rel-8 terminals to operate in an LTE-A network. However, not all component carriers are necessarily Rel-8 compatible.
