Performance of Time and Frequency Approaches for Synchronization Tracking in 5G NR Systems

Massive Machine Type Communications (mMTC) is one of the main features supported by the 3GPP New Radio (NR) technology. The new system specifications render multiple challenges for radio designers. Machine terminals are required to setup a call at signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) as low as -10dB in the extended coverage mode. Further, only one receive antenna is to be used with almost no frequency diversity. Maintaining timing and frequency synchronization with such requirements is a challenging task. In this work, we present, and evaluate the potential timing and frequency offset tracking algorithms subject to the new system requirements. The performance of the presented algorithms can be improved at low SNR regimes by employing the time averaging approach on the account of increasing the processing time. A comparison of the performance of different algorithms using system simulations is presented for different channel conditions.