Coexistence Between DVB-T/T2 and LTE Standards in Common Frequency Bands

Abstract

In the last decade, fulfilling the growing users' expectations on the quality of provided multimedia services is one of the biggest challenges for different wireless communication systems. However, many times, different kinds of wireless systems can operate in the same (shared) frequency band. Such coexistence generally negatively affects the performance of the systems colliding. This is especially true for the widely used Digital Video Broadcasting-Terrestrial (DVB-T) or upcoming DVB-2nd Generation Terrestrial (DVB-T2) and Long-Term Evolution (LTE) standards, operating in Europe. Hence, the aim of this paper is to explore the impact of interfering mobile telecommunication services on the mobile TV services provided by LTE and DVB-T/T2 systems in the same frequency band. For the simulation of the coexistence between the LTE and DVB-T/T2 services on the physical layer level, an appropriate method is proposed and complex simulation tools are coupled. The results, presented as a dependence of modulation error ratio at the receiver input and bit error ratio at the channel decoder input on the spectral level ratio, show comparable performances for DVB-T and DVB-T2 systems. Results from simulations are verified by laboratory measurements and should help to better understand the influence of co-channel interferences from LTE mobile networks on DVB-T/T2 networks for mobile transmission scenarios.