Sensitivity of RMS Delay Spread Estimation to Power Delay Profile Thresholding in Time-Varying Channels at 33 GHz
Abstract
Root mean square (RMS) delay spread is a key parameter characterizing temporal dispersion in radio propagation channels. Its estimation from measured power delay profiles (PDPs), however, depends strongly on the adopted power threshold. This paper investigates the sensitivity of RMS delay spread estimates to relative PDP thresholding in a time-varying millimeter-wave channel at 33 GHz. The analysis uses wideband channel sounding measurements conducted in a dynamic road environment with moving vehicles. The temporal evolution and empirical cumulative distributions of RMS delay spread are evaluated for thresholds ranging from -20 to -50 dB. Reducing the threshold increases the median RMS delay spread from approximately 140 to 168 ns and the 90th percentile from 200 to 210 ns. Both statistics converge at lower thresholds, with -40 dB providing a practical convergence level. The results emphasize the importance of threshold selection for reliable channel characterization and consistent comparison of measurements.
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BibTeX
@misc{wojtun2026sensitivity,
title = {{Sensitivity of RMS Delay Spread Estimation to Power Delay Profile Thresholding in Time-Varying Channels at 33 GHz}},
author = {Jarosław Wojtuń and Bartosz Czaja and Tomasz Grasza and Jan M. Kelner and Cezary Ziółkowski and Radek Zavorka and Josef Vychodil and Tomas Mikulasek and Jiri Blumenstein and Ales Prokes and Aniruddha Chandra},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2610.36783},
eprint = {2610.36783},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.36783},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Sensitivity of RMS Delay Spread Estimation to Power Delay Profile Thresholding in Time-Varying Channels at 33 GHz
AU - Jarosław Wojtuń
AU - Bartosz Czaja
AU - Tomasz Grasza
AU - Jan M. Kelner
AU - Cezary Ziółkowski
AU - Radek Zavorka
AU - Josef Vychodil
AU - Tomas Mikulasek
AU - Jiri Blumenstein
AU - Ales Prokes
AU - Aniruddha Chandra
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/27
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2610.36783
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.36783
AB - Root mean square (RMS) delay spread is a key parameter characterizing temporal dispersion in radio propagation channels. Its estimation from measured power delay profiles (PDPs), however, depends strongly on the adopted power threshold. This paper investigates the sensitivity of RMS delay spread estimates to relative PDP thresholding in a time-varying millimeter-wave channel at 33 GHz. The analysis uses wideband channel sounding measurements conducted in a dynamic road environment with moving vehicles. The temporal evolution and empirical cumulative distributions of RMS delay spread are evaluated for thresholds ranging from -20 to -50 dB. Reducing the threshold increases the median RMS delay spread from approximately 140 to 168 ns and the 90th percentile from 200 to 210 ns. Both statistics converge at lower thresholds, with -40 dB providing a practical convergence level. The results emphasize the importance of threshold selection for reliable channel characterization and consistent comparison of measurements.
ER -