A comprehensive study on the synchronization procedure in 5G NR with 3GPP-compliant link-level simulator

Abstract The 5G New Radio synchronization procedure is the first step that the user must complete to access the mobile network. It mainly consists of the detection of the primary and secondary synchronization signals (PSS and SSS, respectively) and the decoding of the physical broadcast channel (PBCH). Our goal is to provide a comprehensive study of the synchronization procedure and investigate different techniques and approaches, through the implementation of a 5G New Radio-compliant simulator. Of significant interest is the investigation of impairments such as the fading channel, the frequency offset, and the delay spread. The results are provided in terms of detection probability for the PSS and SSS detection, and in terms of block error rate for the PBCH. From the data collected, there is evidence that choosing M-sequences for the PSS leads to an appreciably robust solution against frequency offset. The structure of the Gold sequences for SSS generation can be exploited to reduce the detection complexity, and different approaches can be chosen to improve reliability against delay spread. Moreover, the polar coding for 5G PBCH outperforms the former 4G coding technique, but they are still sensible to frequency offset. Finally, the simulator functionalities are validated through real captures of 5G signals.