Performance of NR Downlink Initial Access Using Synchronization Signal Block for Mm-Wave Bands

This paper presents the performance for New Radio (NR) downlink initial access including physical-layer cell ID (PCID) detection, and demodulation and decoding of the physical broadcast channel (PBCH) payload using the synchronization signal block (SSB) in the millimeter (mm)-wave bands. In this paper, we take into account carrier frequency offset (CFO) and time-varying phase noise that are major impairments in the mm-wave bands. Link-level simulation results show that the detection error of the primary synchronization signal (PSS) has a large impact on the detection probability of the PCID, that of the PBCH demodulation reference signal sequence (DMRS), and on the resultant detection error of the PBCH payload. We also show that the residual CFO after CFO compensation affects the detection probability of the PBCH payload using Polar coding. We show, however, that the high detection probability of 90% for the correct radio frame timing based on the PBCH payload information is achieved at the average received signal-to-noise ratios of approximately -3 dB and -5 dB for the Tapped Delay Line (TDL)-C and E channel models, respectively, which indicates an effective SSB configuration for the NR radio interface.