A Study on the Impact of Antenna Downtilt on theOutdoor Users in an Urban Environment

• Main Author: Ramachandra, Pradeepa
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Linköpings universitet, Kommunikationssystem 2012
• Subjects: Antenna Parameters; Antenna Downtilt; Urban Network Scenario
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-80414

Inter-site interference distribution acts as a basic limitation on how much performance a network service provider can achieve in an urban network scenario. There are many different ways of controlling this interference levels. One such method is tuning the antenna downtilt depending on the network situation. Antenna downtilt can also be seen as a powerful tool for load balancing in the network. This thesis work involves a study of the impact of the antenna downtilt in an urban environment, involving non-uniform user distribution. A realistic dual ray propagation model is used to model the path gain from the base station to a UE. Such a propagation model is used along with a directional antenna radiation pattern model to calculate the overall path gain from the base station to a UE. Under such modeling, the results of the simulations show that the antenna downtilt plays a crucial role in optimizing the network performance. The results show that the optimal antenna downtilt angle is not very sensitive to the location of the hotspot in the network. The results also show that the antenna downtilt sensitivity is very much dependent on the network scenario. The coupling between the antenna downtilt and the elevation half power beamwidth is also evaluated.