Method and system for estimating the speed of a mobile device in a network

1. A method for estimating the speed of a mobile device in a network, comprising:

estimating a first value for a normalized upper corner frequency, f m , of a power spectral density, X(f), for demodulated pilot symbols received at the mobile device based on a first correlation length, S 1 , in a coarse estimation;

selecting a second correlation length, S 2 , based on the first estimated value of f m ; and

estimating the speed of the mobile device based on the selected second correlation length, S 2 , in a fine estimation.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising estimating a second value for f m based on the selected second correlation length, S 2 , in the fine estimation.

3. The method of claim 1 , estimating the first value for the normalized upper corner frequency, f m , of the power spectral density, X(f), for demodulated pilot symbols received at the mobile device comprising:

calculating N values of the power spectral density for the demodulated pilot symbols;

determining a set of values, Z, of the power spectral density for the demodulated pilot symbols whose absolute values are between 0.4 and 0.5;

determining a set of values, R, such that R=½(N−Z);

calculating a statistical mean, I o , of the values in the set Z;

selecting a threshold, T;

locating a maximum frequency element in the set R that satisfies an inequality X(f)>TI o , the maximum frequency element comprising an (a) th element in the set R; and

estimating the first value of f m by determining the value of a/N.

4. The method of claim 3 , selecting the threshold comprising selecting the threshold based on a signal-to-noise ratio.

5. The method of claim 1 , selecting the second correlation length, S 2 , based on the first estimated value of f m comprising selecting a lower S 2 for a higher absolute value of f m and a higher S 2 for a lower absolute value of f m .

6. The method of claim 1 , selecting the second correlation length, S 2 , based on the first estimated value of f m comprising selecting S 2 to be 40960 when an absolute value of f m is between 0 and 0.02, selecting S 2 to be 10240 when the absolute value of f m is between 0.02 and 0.07, selecting S 2 to be 5120 when the absolute value of f m is between 0.07 and 0.15, and selecting S 2 to be 2560 when the absolute value of f m is between 0.15 and 0.4.

7. The method of claim 1 , estimating the speed of the mobile device based on the selected second correlation length, S 2 , comprising estimating the speed, v, of the mobile device using the equation v=f m c/S 2 f C T C , where c is the speed of light, f C is the carrier frequency of signals transmitted by a base station communicating with the mobile device, and T C is a chip period.

8. The mobile device of claim 1 , wherein the speed estimation unit is further configured to:

calculate N values of the power spectral density for the demodulated pilot symbols;

determine a set of values, Z, of the power spectral density for the demodulated pilot symbols whose absolute values are between 0.4 and 0.5;

determine a set of values, R, such that R=½(N−Z);

calculate a statistical mean, I o , of the values in the set Z;

select a threshold, T;

locate a maximum frequency element in the set R that satisfies an inequality X(f)>TI o , the maximum frequency element comprising an (a) th element in the set R; and

estimate the first value of f m by determining the value of a/N.

9. The mobile device of claim 8 , wherein the speed estimation unit is configured to select the threshold based on a signal-to-noise ratio.

10. A mobile device comprising at least one rake receiver, each rake receiver including:

a speed estimation unit configured to estimate a first value for a normalized upper corner frequency, f m , of a power spectral density, X(f), for demodulated pilot symbols received at the mobile device based on a first correlation length, S 1 , in a coarse estimation; and

a pilot correlator configured to select a second correlation length, S 2 , based on the first estimated value of f m ,

wherein the speed estimation unit is further configured to estimate the speed of the mobile device based on the selected second correlation length, S 2 , in a fine estimation.

11. The mobile device of claim 10 , wherein the speed estimation unit is further configured to estimate a second value for f m based on the selected second correlation length, S 2 , in the fine estimation.

12. The mobile device of claim 10 , wherein the speed estimation unit is configured to select a lower S 2 for a higher absolute value of f m and a higher S 2 for a lower absolute value of f m .

13. The mobile device of claim 10 , wherein the speed estimation unit is configured to select S 2 to be 40960 when an absolute value of f m is between 0 and 0.02, to select S 2 to be 10240 when the absolute value of f m is between 0.02 and 0.07, to select S 2 to be 5120 when the absolute value of f m , is between 0.07 and 0.15, and to select S 2 to be 2560 when the absolute value of f m is between 0.15 and 0.4.

14. The mobile device of claim 10 , wherein the speed estimation unit is configured to estimate the speed, v, of the mobile device using the equation v=f m c/S 2 f C T C , where c is the speed of light, f C is the carrier frequency of signals transmitted by a base station communicating with the mobile device, and T C is a chip period.

15. A mobile device comprising a plurality of rake receivers, each rake receiver including:

a pilot correlator configured to generate demodulated pilot symbols based upon a first selected correlation length;

a power spectrum unit configured to receive the demodulated pilot symbols and to compute a number of values of a power spectrum for the demodulated pilot symbols;

a speed estimation unit configured to initiate selection of a second correlation length if a coarse estimation is being performed and configured to estimate speed of the mobile device based on the selected second correlation length if a fine estimation is being performed.

16. The mobile device of claim 15 , wherein the pilot correlator is configured to one of accumulate a specified number of demodulated pilot symbols and correlate a pilot code with an input signal using the first or second correlation length.

17. The mobile device of claim 15 , wherein the specified number of demodulated pilot symbols accumulated by the pilot correlator is based upon the first or second correlation length.

18. The mobile device of claim 15 , wherein the speed estimation unit is configured to select a threshold for values of the power spectrum values based on a signal-to-noise ratio.

19. The mobile device of claim 15 , wherein the speed estimation unit is configured to an averaging length for a channel estimation unit, the channel estimation unit configured to estimate a phase delay of a traffic signal based on the demodulated pilot symbols.

20. The mobile device of claim 15 , wherein the pilot correlator selects a correlation length of 2560 if a coarse estimation is being performed and selects a correlation length based on a result of the coarse estimation if a fine estimation is being performed.