Detecting a periodic timing reference in a received signal

1. An apparatus for detecting a timing reference that occurs periodically in a received signal every P seconds, the apparatus comprising:

a correlator configured to correlate the received signal with a template to produce a correlated signal indicating the presence of the timing reference in the received signal;

an integrator configured to produce an accumulated signal by overlaying one or more delayed versions of the accumulated signal onto the correlated signal, wherein the integrator is configured to delay the accumulated signals by integer multiples L of P, the integer multiples L being at least two; and

a timing detector configured to receive the accumulated signal from the integrator and to indicate timing acquisition or no timing acquisition based on determining a corroboration between:

a first plurality of peak values of the accumulated signal that are separated in time by L times P, and

a second plurality of peak values of the accumulated signals that are separated in time by integer multiples K of P, where K is an integer different than L, and K is not an integer multiple of L.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the integrator comprises a delay line having a single tap which delays the accumulated signal by the integer multiple of P.

3. The apparatus of claim 2 , wherein the integer multiple is two.

4. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the timing detector is configured to combine a plurality of peaks in the accumulated signal to produce a joint-decision metric.

5. The apparatus of claim 4 , wherein the timing detector is configured to indicate timing acquisition in response to the magnitude of each peak in the joint-decision metric exceeding a dynamic threshold.

6. The apparatus of claim 4 , wherein the timing detector is configured to indicate timing acquisition in response to a non-linear combination of the magnitudes of the peaks in the joint-decision metric exceeding a dynamic threshold.

7. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the integrator comprises an IIR filter.

8. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the integrator is configured to scale at least one of the delayed versions of the accumulated signal before overlaying onto the correlated signal, and to produce the accumulated signal for a predetermined initial period of time without decay before introducing a scaling operation.

9. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the integrator comprises programmable coefficients.

10. A system comprising:

the apparatus of claim 1 ; and

a cell-search classification engine configured to respond to an indication of timing acquisition.

11. An apparatus for detecting a periodic timing reference in a received signal, the apparatus comprising:

a correlator configured to correlate the received signal with a template to produce a correlated signal indicating the presence of the periodic timing reference in the received signal;

an integrator configured to produce an accumulated signal by overlaying one or more delayed versions of the accumulated signal onto the correlated signal, wherein the integrator is configured to delay the accumulated signals by integer multiples L of a period of the periodic timing reference, the integer multiples L being at least two; and

a timing detector configured to receive the accumulated signal from the integrator and to indicate timing acquisition or no timing acquisition on the basis of a peak profile of the accumulated signal, wherein the timing detector is configured to separate peaks in the accumulated signal into a plurality of subsets S numbered 0 . . . L−1, wherein the peaks which form part of the S′th subset are at offsets (n*L+S)*P+K, where n and S are integers, P is the period of the periodic timing reference, and K is an unknown in the range [0 . . . P], to maintain a count of the number of peaks in each subset whose magnitude exceeds a magnitude threshold, and to indicate timing acquisition only in response to each of the counts exceeding a count threshold.

12. The apparatus of claim 11 , wherein the integrator comprises a delay line having a single tap which delays the accumulated signal by the integer multiple of the period of the periodic timing reference.

13. The apparatus of claim 12 , wherein the integer multiple is two.

14. The apparatus of claim 13 , wherein the timing detector is configured to allocate to a first subset those peaks which occur at offsets corresponding to S=0, and to allocate to a second subset those peaks which occur at offsets corresponding to S=1.

15. A method of detecting a timing reference that occurs periodically in a received signal every P seconds, the method comprising:

correlating the received signal with a template to produce a correlated signal indicating the presence of the timing reference in the received signal;

producing an accumulated signal by overlaying one or more delayed versions of the accumulated signal onto the correlated signal, wherein the accumulated signals are delayed by integer multiples L of P, the integer multiples L being at least two; and

indicating timing acquisition or no timing acquisition based on determining a corroboration within the accumulated signal between:

a first plurality of peak values of the accumulated signal that are separated in time by L times P, and

a second plurality of peak values of the accumulated signals that are separated in time by integer multiples K of P, where K is an integer different than L, and K is not an integer multiple of L.

16. A non-transitory computer program product storing computer-executable instructions which, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to detect a timing reference that occurs periodically in a received signal every P seconds by:

correlating the received signal with a template to produce a correlated signal indicating the presence of the timing reference in the received signal;

producing an accumulated signal by overlaying one or more delayed versions of the accumulated signal onto the correlated signal, wherein the accumulated signals are delayed by integer multiples L of P, the integer multiples L being at least two; and

indicating timing acquisition or no timing acquisition based on determining a corroboration within the accumulated signal between:

a first plurality of peak values of the accumulated signal that are separated in time by L times P, and

a second plurality of peak values of the accumulated signals that are separated in time by integer multiples K of P, where K is an integer different than L, and K is not an integer multiple of L.

17. The non-transitory computer program product of claim 16 wherein the computer-executable instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to receive the accumulated signal and to indicate timing acquisition or no timing acquisition on the basis of a peak profile of the accumulated signal by separating peaks in the accumulated signal into a plurality of subsets S numbered 0 . . . L−1, wherein the peaks which form part of the S′th subset are at offsets (n*L+S)*P+K, where n and S are integers, and K is an unknown in the range [0 . . . P], to maintain a count of the number of peaks in each subset whose magnitude exceeds a magnitude threshold, and to indicate timing acquisition only in response to each of the counts exceeding a count threshold.

18. The non-transitory computer program product of claim 17 wherein the computer-executable instructions, when executed by the processor, further cause the processor to produce the accumulated signal, at least in part, by using a delay line having a single tap which delays the accumulated signal by the integer multiple of P.

19. The non-transitory computer program product of claim 18 wherein the integer multiple is two.