Enhanced physical downlink control channel monitoring

Abstract

A method for enhanced physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring includes determining a monitoring span for monitoring a PDCCH within a time slot, the monitoring span having a start symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot. Based on the monitoring span, at least one of a maximum number of blind decoding (BD) attempts or a maximum number of control channel elements (CCEs) for channel estimation is determined. The PDCCH is monitored within the monitoring span until at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs is reached.

Description

[0001] CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

[0002] This application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 62 / 843,287, filed on May 3, 2019, the entire contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference herein. Technical Field

[0003] The present disclosure generally relates to physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring in wireless communications. Background Art

[0004] Wireless communications have evolved significantly from early voice systems to today's highly complex integrated communications platforms. The next generation of wireless communications systems, fifth generation new radio (5G NR), will extend wireless communications to operate very different users and sometimes conflicting services and applications. In general, 5G NR will evolve based on the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Long Term Evolution Advanced (LTE-Advanced) standard with the addition of potential new radio access technologies (RATs) to improve wireless connectivity solutions. Summary of the invention

[0005] In general, in one aspect, a method includes determining a monitoring span for monitoring a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) within a time slot, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot, determining at least one of a maximum number of blind decoding (BD) attempts or a maximum number of control channel elements (CCEs) for channel estimation based on the monitoring span, and monitoring the PDCCH within the monitoring span until at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs.

[0006] In general, in one aspect, a user equipment (UE) device includes one or more processors and a memory storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations including determining a monitoring span for monitoring a PDCCH within a time slot, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot, determining at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation based on the monitoring span, and monitoring the PDCCH within the monitoring span until at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs.

[0007] In general, in one aspect, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium stores instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations including determining a monitoring span for monitoring a PDCCH within a time slot, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot, determining at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation based on the monitoring span, and monitoring the PDCCH within the monitoring span until at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs is reached.

[0008] In general, in one aspect, a method includes determining capability information for a UE, the capability information including at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation; determining one or more monitoring spans for monitoring a PDCCH within a time slot based on the capability information, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot, and transmitting at least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span to the UE.

[0009] In general, in one aspect, a base station (BS) includes a transceiver, one or more processors, and a memory storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations including: determining capability information for a UE, the capability information including at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation; determining one or more monitoring spans for monitoring a PDCCH within a time slot based on the capability information, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot, and transmitting, by the transceiver, at least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span to the UE.

[0010] In general, in one aspect, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium stores instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations including: determining capability information for a UE, the capability information including at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation; determining one or more monitoring spans for monitoring a PDCCH within a time slot based on the capability information, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot, and transmitting at least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span to the UE.

[0011] Implementations of any of the above aspects may include one or a combination of two or more of the following features.

[0012] The starting symbol of the monitoring span may be defined relative to the boundary of the time slot or relative to the PDCCH monitoring opportunity or both. The duration of the monitoring span may be greater than three symbols. At least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span may be configured to change across time slots. A signal including an indication of at least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span may be received from a base station. At least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span may be determined based on a configured channel resource set (CORESET) or a search space configuration. The CORESET associated with the PDCCH may be completely contained within the monitoring span. The CORESET associated with the PDCCH may extend beyond the monitoring span, and the first symbol of the CORESET may be located within the monitoring span. In some examples, at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs is determined by X_total_in_slot / maxNumMaxSpans_in_slot, where X_total_in_slot is the maximum number of non-overlapping CCEs or BDs available and maxNumSpans_in_slot is the maximum number of non-overlapping monitoring spans supported within a slot.

[0013] In some examples, a second monitoring span within the time slot may be determined, wherein the second monitoring span does not overlap with the monitoring span. At least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation may be determined for the second monitoring span, the at least one being different from at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation for the monitoring span. A signal indicating one or more PDCCH monitoring capabilities of the UE may be transmitted (e.g., by the UE and to the base station), and another signal indicating one or more parameters of the monitoring span may be received (e.g., at the UE and from the base station), wherein the one or more parameters are determined based at least in part on the PDCCH monitoring capabilities of the user equipment. One or more PDCCH candidates may be discarded based on the monitoring span. When it is determined that the monitoring span extends across a boundary of the time slot, the monitoring span may be truncated. The monitoring span may be adjusted in response to an indication of a change in the number of monitoring opportunities within the time slot. A PDCCH monitoring search space (e.g., a common search space (CSS) or a user equipment-specific search space (UE-SS)) may be constrained based on at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs.

[0014] The details of one or more specific implementations are set forth in the following figures and description. The techniques described herein may be implemented by one or more wireless communication systems, components of wireless communication systems (e.g., user equipment, base stations), or other systems, devices, methods, or non-transitory computer-readable media, etc. Other features and advantages will be apparent in the detailed description and drawings, as well as in the claims. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0015] Figure 1 An example of a wireless communication system is shown.

[0016] Figure 2 An example of infrastructure equipment is shown.

[0017] Figure 3 Examples of platforms or devices are shown.

[0018] Figure 4 Exemplary components of baseband circuitry and radio front-end circuitry are shown.

[0019] Figure 5 Exemplary components of a cellular communications circuit are shown.

[0020] Figure 6 Exemplary protocol functions that may be implemented in a wireless communication system are shown.

[0021] Figure 7 An exemplary computer system is shown.

[0022] Figure 8 An example of a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring duration is shown.

[0023] Fig. 9 An exemplary procedure for enhanced PDCCH monitoring is shown.

[0024] Like reference symbols in the various drawings indicate like elements. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0025] In 5G NR, a new Ultra-Reliable Low Latency Communication (URLLC) category is defined to support emerging services and applications with strict latency (e.g., 1ms) and reliability (e.g., 99.999%) requirements. To support URLLC services, control and shared channels should adopt advanced transmission schemes that maximize diversity and energy in very short transmission intervals. In this sense, the reliability of the Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) is critical to providing both downlink and uplink operations. Recently, it was agreed to support 16 control channel elements (CCEs) per decoding candidate to improve coverage for the considered use cases. However, in order to effectively support URLLC requirements, further enhancements to the 5G NR PDCCH design should be explored.

[0026] The technology described herein provides enhanced PDCCH monitoring adapted within the existing 5G NR framework. Specifically, the present disclosure provides technologies for defining, configuring, indicating and applying the concept of monitoring span, and its meaning in terms of limiting the number of blind decodings for channel estimation and the number of CCEs for channel estimation. In this way, greater flexibility is achieved in terms of monitoring span and scheduling opportunities, and PDCCH monitoring is better adapted to different traffic patterns and requirements, such as those corresponding to URLLC services.

[0027] Figure 1 An exemplary wireless communication system 100 is shown. For convenience and not limitation, the exemplary system 100 is described in the context of LTE and 5G NR communication standards defined by the 3GPP technical specifications. However, the techniques described herein may also be implemented in other communication systems using other communication standards such as other 3GPP standards or IEEE 802.16 protocols (e.g., WMAN or WiMAX).

[0028] System 100 includes UE 101a and UE 101b (collectively referred to as "UE 101"). In this example, UE 101 is shown as a smartphone (eg, a handheld, touch-screen mobile computing device that can connect to one or more cellular networks). In other examples, any of the multiple UEs 101 may include other mobile computing devices or non-mobile computing devices, such as consumer electronic devices, cellular phones, smart phones, feature phones, tablet computers, wearable computer devices, personal digital assistants (PDAs), pagers, wireless handheld devices, desktop computers, laptop computers, in-vehicle infotainment (IVI), in-car entertainment (ICE) devices, instrument clusters (ICs), heads-up display (HUD) devices, on-board diagnostic (OBD) devices, on-board mobile equipment (DME), mobile data terminals (MDTs), electronic engine management systems (EEMS), electronic / engine control units (ECUs), electronic / engine control modules (ECMs), embedded systems, microcontrollers, control modules, engine management systems (EMS), networked or "smart" appliances, machine type communication (MTC) devices, machine-to-machine (M2M) devices, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, or combinations thereof, etc.

[0029] In some examples, any one of the plurality of UEs 101 may be an IoT UE, which may include a network access layer designed for low-power IoT applications utilizing short-term UE connections. The IoT UE may utilize technologies such as M2M or MTC to exchange data with an MTC server or device utilizing, for example, a public land mobile network (PLMN), a proximity service (ProSe), a device-to-device (D2D) communication, a sensor network, an IoT network, or a combination thereof. M2M or MTC data exchange may be a machine-initiated data exchange. The IoT network describes interconnected IoT UEs, which may include uniquely identifiable embedded computing devices (within the Internet infrastructure) with short-lived connections. The IoT UE may execute background applications (e.g., keep-alive messages, status updates, etc.) to facilitate the connection of the IoT network. In some examples, the UE 101 may be a narrowband (NB)-IoT UE 101. NB-IoT uses a physical layer optimized for extremely low power consumption (e.g., a full carrier BW of 180kHz, and a subcarrier spacing of 3.75kHz or 15kHz) to provide access to network services. A number of E-UTRA functions are not used for NB-IoT and do not need to be supported by the RAN node 111 and UE 101 using only NB-IoT. Examples of such E-UTRA functions may include inter-RAT mobility, handover, measurement reporting, common warning function, GBR, CSG, support of HeNB, relay, carrier aggregation, dual connectivity, NAICS, MBMS, real-time services, interference avoidance for in-device coexistence, RAN-assisted WLAN interworking, sidelink communication / discovery, MDT, emergency calls, CS fallback, and self-configuration / self-optimization, etc. In NB-IoT operation, the UE 101 may use 12 subcarriers with a subcarrier BW of 15 kHz in the downlink and a single subcarrier with a subcarrier BW of 3.75 kHz or 15 kHz in the uplink, or alternatively, 3, 6, or 12 subcarriers with a subcarrier BW of 15 kHz.

[0030] In various examples, the UE 101 may be a MulteFire (MF) UE 101. An MF UE 101 is an LTE-based UE 101 that operates (exclusively) in an unlicensed spectrum. The unlicensed spectrum is defined in the MF specifications provided by the MulteFire Forum and may include, for example, 1.9Ghz (Japan), 3.5Ghz, and 5GHz. MulteFire is closely aligned with the 3GPP standards and builds on elements of the 3GPP specifications for LAA / eLAA, thereby enhancing standard LTE to operate in a global unlicensed spectrum. In some examples, LBT may be implemented to coexist with other unlicensed spectrum networks (such as WiFi, other LAA networks, etc.). In various examples, some or all UEs 101 may be NB-IoT UEs 101 operating according to MF. In such examples, these UEs 101 may be referred to as "MF NB-IoT UE 101", however, unless otherwise specified, the term "NB-IoT UE 101" may refer to "MF UE 101" or "MF and NB-IoT UE 101". Therefore, the terms "NB-IoT UE 101", "MF UE 101" and "MF NB-IoT UE 101" may be used interchangeably throughout the present disclosure.

[0031] UE 101 is configured to connect (e.g., be communicatively coupled) to an access network (AN) or radio access network (RAN) 110. In some examples, RAN 110 may be a next generation RAN (NG RAN), an evolved UMTS terrestrial radio access network (E-UTRAN), or a traditional RAN, such as a UMTS terrestrial radio access network (UTRAN) or a GSM EDGE radio access network (GERAN). As used herein, the term "NG RAN" or the like may refer to a RAN 110 operating in a 5G NR system 100, while the term "E-UTRAN" or the like may refer to a RAN 110 operating in an LTE or 4G system 100, and the term "MF RAN" or the like may refer to a RAN 110 operating in an MF system 100. Multiple UEs 101 utilize connections (or channels) 103 and 104, respectively, each connection including a physical communication interface or layer (discussed in further detail below). Connections 103 and 104 may include several different physical DL channels and several different physical UL channels. As an example, the physical DL channel includes PDSCH, PMCH, PDCCH, EPDCCH, MPDCCH, R-PDCCH, SPDCCH, PBCH, PCFICH, PHICH, NPBCH, NPDCCH, NPDSCH and / or any other physical DL channel mentioned herein. For example, the physical UL channel includes PRACH, PUSCH, PUCCH, SPUCCH, NPRACH, NPUSCH and / or any other physical UL channel mentioned herein.

[0032] In order to connect to RAN 110, multiple UEs 101 utilize connections (or channels) 103 and 104, respectively, each of which may include a physical communication interface or layer, as described below. In this example, connections 103 and 104 are shown as air interfaces to achieve communication coupling, and may be consistent with cellular communication protocols, such as global system for mobile communications (GSM) protocols, code division multiple access (CDMA) network protocols, push-to-talk (PTT) protocols, cellular PTT (POC) protocols, universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS) protocols, 3GPP LTE protocols, 5G NR protocols, or combinations thereof, as well as other communication protocols. In some examples, multiple UEs 101 may use interfaces 105 such as ProSe interfaces to directly exchange communication data. Interface 105 may alternatively be referred to as sidelink interface 105 and may include one or more logical channels, such as physical sidelink control channel (PSCCH), physical sidelink shared channel (PSSCH), physical sidelink downlink channel (PSDCH) or physical sidelink broadcast channel (PSBCH) or combinations thereof, etc.

[0033] UE 101b is shown configured to access access point (AP) 106 (also referred to as "WLAN node 106", "WLAN 106", "WLAN termination 106", "WT 106", etc.) using connection 107. Connection 107 may include a local wireless connection, such as a connection consistent with any IEEE 802.11 protocol, wherein AP 106 will include wireless fidelity Router. In this example, AP 106 is shown connected to the Internet without being connected to the core network of the wireless system, as described in further detail below. In various examples, UE 101b, RAN 110 and AP 106 may be configured to use LTE-WLAN aggregation (LWA) operation or LTW / WLAN radio level operation integrated with IPsec tunnel (LWIP). LWA operation may involve UE 101b in RRC_CONNECTED state being configured by RAN nodes 111a, 111b to utilize radio resources of LTE and WLAN. LWIP operation may involve UE 101b using IPsec protocol tunnel to use WLAN radio resources (e.g., connection 107) to authenticate and encrypt packets (e.g., IP packets) sent through connection 107. IPsec tunnel transmission may include encapsulating the entire original IP packet and adding a new packet header, thereby protecting the original header of the IP packet.

[0034] The RAN 110 may include one or more AN nodes or RAN nodes 111a and 111b (collectively referred to as "RAN nodes 111") that enable connections 103 and 104. As used herein, the terms "access node", "access point", etc. may describe equipment that provides radio baseband functions for data or voice connections or both between a network and one or more users. These access nodes may be referred to as base stations (BS), gNodeBs, gNBs, eNodeBs, eNBs, NodeBs, RAN nodes, road side units (RSUs), transmit receive points (TRxPs or TRPs), etc., and may include ground stations (e.g., terrestrial access points) or satellite stations that provide coverage within a geographic area (e.g., a cell), etc. As used herein, the terms "NG RAN nodes" and the like may refer to RAN nodes 111 (e.g., gNBs) operating in a 5G NR system 100, while the term "E-UTRAN node" may refer to RAN nodes 111 (e.g., eNBs) operating in an LTE or 4G system 100. In some examples, multiple RAN nodes 111 may be implemented as one or more of dedicated physical devices such as macrocell base stations or low power (LP) base stations for providing femtocells, picocells, or other similar cells with smaller coverage areas, smaller user capacity, or higher bandwidth than macrocells.

[0035] In some examples, some or all of the multiple RAN nodes 111 may be implemented as one or more software entities running on a server computer as part of a virtual network that may be referred to as a cloud RAN (CRAN) or a virtual baseband unit pool (vBBUP). The CRAN or vBBUP may implement RAN functional partitioning, such as a packet data convergence protocol (PDCP) partitioning, where the radio resource control (RRC) and PDCP layers are operated by the CRAN / vBBUP, and other layer 2 (e.g., data link layer) protocol entities are operated by individual RAN nodes 111; a medium access control (MAC) / physical layer (PHY) partitioning, where the RRC, PDCP, MAC, and radio link control (RLC) layers are operated by the CRAN / vBBUP, and the PHY layer is operated by individual RAN nodes 111; or a "lower PHY" partitioning, where the RRC, PDCP, RLC, and MAC layers and the upper portion of the PHY layer are operated by the CRAN / vBBUP, and the lower portion of the PHY layer is operated by individual RAN nodes 111. This virtualization framework allows idle processor cores of the RAN nodes 111 to execute, for example, other virtualized applications. In some examples, individual RAN nodes 111 may represent nodes using respective F1 interfaces ( Figure 1 In some examples, the gNB-DU may include one or more remote radio heads or RFEMs (see, e.g., Figure 2 ), and the gNB-CU may be operated by a server (not shown) located in the RAN 110 or by a server pool in a manner similar to the CRAN / vBBUP. In addition or alternatively, one or more of the RAN nodes 111 may be a next generation eNB (ng-eNB), including a RAN node that provides E-UTRA user plane and control plane protocol terminals to the UE 101 and is connected to a 5G core network (e.g., the core network 120) using a next generation interface.

[0036] In a vehicle-to-everything (V2X) scenario, one or more of the RAN nodes 111 may be or act as an RSU. The term "roadside unit" or "RSU" refers to any traffic infrastructure entity used for V2X communication. The RSU may be implemented in or by a suitable RAN node or a stationary (or relatively stationary) UE, wherein an RSU implemented in or by a UE may be referred to as a "UE-type RSU", an RSU implemented in or by an eNB may be referred to as an "eNB-type RSU", an RSU implemented in or by a gNB may be referred to as a "gNB-type RSU", and so on. In some examples, the RSU is a computing device coupled to a radio frequency circuit located on the road side that provides connectivity support to a passing vehicle UE 101 (vUE 101). The RSU may also include internal data storage circuitry for storing intersection map geometry, traffic statistics, media, and applications or other software for sensing and controlling ongoing vehicle and pedestrian traffic. The RSU may operate on the 5.9 GHz Direct Short Range Communications (DSRC) band to provide extremely low latency communications required for high-speed events, such as collision avoidance, traffic warnings, and the like. In addition or alternatively, the RSU may operate on the cellular V2X band to provide the aforementioned low latency communications as well as other cellular communications services. In addition or alternatively, the RSU may operate as a Wi-Fi hotspot (2.4 GHz band) or provide connectivity to one or more cellular networks to provide uplink and downlink communications, or both. Some or all of the computing device and the RSU's RF circuitry may be packaged in a weather-resistant enclosure suitable for outdoor installation, and may include a network interface controller to provide a wired connection (e.g., Ethernet) to a traffic signal controller or a backhaul network, or both.

[0037] Any of the RAN nodes 111 may serve as an endpoint for the air interface protocol and may be the first point of contact for the UE 101. In some examples, any of the multiple RAN nodes 111 may perform various logical functions of the RAN 110, including but not limited to functions of a radio network controller (RNC), such as radio bearer management, uplink and downlink dynamic radio resource management and data packet scheduling, and mobility management.

[0038] In some examples, multiple UEs 101 may be configured to communicate with each other or with any of multiple RAN nodes 111 over a multi-carrier communication channel using orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) communication signals according to various communication techniques, such as, but not limited to, OFDMA communication techniques (e.g., for downlink communications) or SC-FDMA communication techniques (e.g., for uplink and ProSe or sidelink communications), although the scope of the techniques described herein is not limited in this respect. The OFDM signal may include multiple orthogonal subcarriers.

[0039] In some examples, the downlink (DL) and uplink (UL) may be organized into frames with a duration of 10 ms, where each frame includes ten 1 ms subframes. The slot duration may be 14 symbols with a normal CP and 12 symbols with an extended CP, and may be time-scaled as a function of the subcarrier spacing used, so that there is always an integer number of slots in a subframe. In some examples, such as in LTE implementations, a DL resource grid may be used for DL ​​transmissions from any RAN node 111 to UE 101, and UL transmissions from UE 101 to RAN node 111 may utilize a suitable UL resource grid in a similar manner. These resource grids may refer to a time-frequency grid and indicate the physical resources in the DL or UL in each slot. Each column and each row of the DL resource grid may correspond to one OFDM symbol and one OFDM subcarrier, respectively, and each column and each row of the UL resource grid may correspond to one SC-FDMA symbol and one SC-FDMA subcarrier, respectively. The duration of the resource grid in the time domain corresponds to one slot in a radio frame. The resource grid includes multiple resource blocks (RBs) that describe the mapping of specific physical channels to resource elements (REs). In the frequency domain, this can represent the minimum amount of resources that can be currently allocated. Each RB includes a set of REs. RE is the smallest time-frequency unit in the resource grid. Each RE is uniquely identified by an index pair (k, l) in a time slot, where k = 0, ..., And l = 0, ..., are indices in the frequency domain and time domain, respectively. RE(k, l) on antenna port p corresponds to the complex value The antenna ports are defined such that the channel on which a symbol on the antenna port is transmitted can be inferred from the channel on which another symbol on the same antenna port is transmitted. There is one resource grid per antenna port. The set of antenna ports supported depends on the reference signal configuration in the cell, and these aspects are discussed in more detail in 3GPP TS 36.211, the entire contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference herein.

[0040] In some examples, such as in 5G NR implementations, DL and UL transmissions are organized into frames with 10 ms duration, each duration consisting of ten 1 ms subframes. The number of consecutive OFDM symbols per subframe is Each frame is divided into two equally sized half-frames of five subframes, each subframe having half-frame 0 including subframes 0-4 and half-frame 1 including subframes 5-9. There is one set of frames in UL and one set of frames in DL on a carrier. The UL frame number i for transmission from a UE shall be given by 3GPP TS 38.213 N TA,offset T starts before the start of the corresponding downlink frame at the UETA =(N TA +N TA,offset )T c For a subcarrier spacing configuration μ, the time slots are numbered in increasing order within a subframe. and are numbered in increasing order within the frame as Existing in the time slot Consecutive OFDM symbols, where Depends on the cyclic prefix given in Tables 4.3.2-1 and 4.3.2-2 of 3GPP TS 38.211. Slots in a subframe The start of the OFDM symbol in the same subframe in time OFDM symbols in a time slot can be classified as "downlink", "flexible", or "uplink", where downlink transmissions only occur in "downlink" or "flexible" symbols and UE101 only transmits in "uplink" or "flexible" symbols.

[0041] For each parameter and carrier, define subcarriers and The resource grid of an OFDM symbol starts at a common There is a set of resource grids per transmission direction (e.g., uplink or downlink), where the subscript x is set to DL for downlink and x is set to UL for uplink. For a given antenna port p, subcarrier spacing configuration μ, and transmission direction (e.g., downlink or uplink), there is one resource grid.

[0042] RB is defined as contiguous subcarriers. In the frequency domain with subcarrier spacing μ, common RBs are numbered from 0 upwards. The center of subcarrier 0 of common resource block 0 with subcarrier spacing μ coincides with "point A". Common resource block numbering in the frequency domain The relationship between the resource element (k, l) and the subcarrier spacing configuration μ is given by is given by, where k is defined relative to point A such that k=0 corresponds to a subcarrier centered at point A. Point A is used as a common reference point for the resource block grid and is obtained from offsetToPointA for the PCell downlink, where offsetToPointA represents the frequency offset between point A and the lowest subcarrier of the lowest resource block with subcarrier spacing provided by the higher layer parameter subCarrierSpacingCommon and overlaps with the SS / PBCH block used by the UE for initial cell selection, expressed in units of resource blocks, assuming a subcarrier spacing of 15 kHz for FR1 and 60 kHz for FR2; and absoluteFrequencyPointA for all other cases, where absoluteFrequencyPointA represents the frequency position of point A as expressed in the ARFCN.

[0043] The PRBs of subcarrier configuration μ are defined within a BWP and are numbered from 0 to Where i is the number of BWPs. The physical resource blocks in BWPi With the public The relationship between Given, where is a common RB, where BWP starts relative to common RB 0. VRBs are defined within BWP and are numbered from 0 to Where i is the number of BWPs.

[0044] Each element in the resource grid for antenna port p and subcarrier spacing configuration μ is called RE and is represented by (k, l) p,μ Uniquely identifies a resource element (k, l), where k is an index in the frequency domain and l refers to the symbol position in the time domain relative to some reference point. p,μ Corresponding to physical resources and complex values The antenna ports are defined such that the channel on which a symbol on the antenna port is transmitted can be inferred from the channel on which another symbol on the same antenna port is transmitted. The two antenna ports are considered to be quasi-co-located if the large-scale properties of the channel on which the symbol on one antenna port is transmitted can be inferred from the channel on which the symbol on the other antenna port is transmitted. The large-scale properties include one or more of delay spread, Doppler spread, Doppler shift, average gain, average delay, and spatial Rx parameters.

[0045] BWP is μ on a given carrier. i BWP i A subset of contiguous common resource blocks as defined in subclause 4.4.4.3 of 3GPP TS 38.211 for a given parameter set in . and resource blocks in BWP The number of and The configuration of the BWP is described in clause 12 of 3GPP TS 38.213. The UE 101 may be configured with up to four BWPs in the DL, with a single DL BWP being active at a given time. The UE 101 is not expected to receive PDSCH, PDCCH, or CSI-RS (except RRM) outside of the active BWP. The UE 101 may be configured with up to four BWPs in the UL, with a single UL BWP being active at a given time. If the UE 101 is configured with a supplementary UL, the UE 101 may be configured with up to four additional BWPs in the supplementary UL, with a single supplementary UL BWP being active at a given time. The UE 101 does not transmit PUSCH or PUCCH outside of the active BWP, and for active cells, the UE does not transmit SRS outside of the active BWP.

[0046] Nb is defined as six non-overlapping consecutive PRBs in the frequency domain. The total number of DL NBs in the configured DL transmission BW in a cell is given by In the narrow band n NB Including PRB index (in ), the NBs are numbered in the order of increasing number of PRBs.

[0047] if The broadband is defined as four non-overlapping narrowbands in the frequency domain. The total number of uplink broadbands in the uplink transmission bandwidth configured in the cell is given by Given, and the broadbands are numbered in the order of increasing narrowband numbers Among them, the bandwidth n WB By narrowband index 4n WB +i, where i=0,1,...,3. If but and a single broadband One or more non-overlapping narrow bands.

[0048] There are several different physical channels and physical signals that are transmitted using RBs or individual REs. A physical channel corresponds to a set of REs that carry information originating from higher layers. Physical UL channels may include PUSCH, PUCCH, PRACH, and / or any other physical UL channels discussed herein, and physical DL channels may include PDSCH, PBCH, PDCCH, and / or any other physical DL channels discussed herein. Physical signals are transmitted by the physical layer (e.g., Figure 8The physical UL signal may include DMRS, PTRS, SRS, and / or any other physical UL signal discussed herein, and the physical DL signal may include DMRS, PTRS, CSI-RS, PSS, SSS, and / or any other physical DL signal discussed herein.

[0049] The PDSCH carries user data and higher layer signaling to multiple UEs 101. Typically, DL scheduling (allocation of control and shared channel resource blocks to UEs 101 within a cell) may be performed on any of the RAN nodes 111 based on channel quality information fed back from any of the multiple UEs 101. Downlink resource allocation information may be sent on a PDCCH for (e.g., allocated to) each of the UEs 101. The PDCCH uses CCEs to transmit control information (e.g., DCI), and a group of CCEs may be referred to as a "control region." A control channel is formed by an aggregation of one or more CCEs, where different coding rates for the control channel are achieved by aggregating different numbers of CCEs. The CCEs are numbered from 0 to N. CCE,k -1, where N CCE,k-1 is the number of CCEs in the control region of subframe k. Before being mapped to REs, the PDCCH complex-valued symbols may first be organized into quadruplets, which may then be arranged using a subblock interleaver for rate matching. Each PDCCH may be transmitted using one or more of these CCEs, where each CCE may correspond to nine sets of four physical REs, referred to as REGs. Four QoS symbols may be mapped to each REG. Depending on the size of the DCI and the channel conditions, one or more CCEs may be used to transmit the PDCCH. There may be four or more different PDCCH formats defined with different numbers of CCEs (e.g., aggregation levels, L=1, 2, 4, or 8 in LTE, and L=1, 2, 4, 8, or 16 in NR). UE 101 monitors a set of PDCCH candidates on one or more activated serving cells as configured by high-layer signaling for control information (e.g., DCI), where monitoring means attempting to decode each of the PDCCHs (or PDCCH candidates) in the set according to all monitored DCI formats (e.g., DCI formats 0 to 6-2, as discussed in Section 5.3.3 of 3GPP TS 38.212, DCI formats 0_0 to 2_3, as discussed in Section 7.3 of 3GPP TS 38.212, etc.). UE 101 monitors (or attempts to decode) the corresponding PDCCH candidate set in one or more configured monitoring occasions according to the corresponding search space configuration. DCI transmits DL, UL or SL scheduling information, requests for aperiodic CQI reports, LAA common information, notification of MCCH changes, UL power control commands for one cell and / or one RNTI, notification of a group of UEs 101 about the timeslot format, notification of a group of UEs about PRBs and OFDM symbols (where the UE can assume that no transmission is intended for the UE), TPC commands for PUCCH and PUSCH, and / or TPC commands for PUCCH and PUSCH. The DCI encoding steps are discussed in 3GPP TS 38.212, the entire contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference herein.

[0050] Some examples may use the concept of resource allocation for control channel information, which is an extension of the above concept. For example, EPDCCH using PDSCH resources can be used for control information transmission. One or more ECCEs can be used to transmit EPDCCH. Similar to the above, each ECCE can correspond to nine sets of four physical resource elements, called EREG. In some cases, ECCE can have other numbers of EREGs.

[0051] As mentioned above, the PDCCH can be used to schedule DL transmissions on the PDSCH and UL transmissions on the PUSCH, wherein the DCI on the PDCCH includes, for example, a downlink assignment, which includes at least a modulation and coding format, resource allocation, and HARQ information related to the DL-SCH; and / or an uplink scheduling grant, which includes at least a modulation and coding format, resource allocation, and HARQ information related to the UL-SCH. In addition to scheduling, the PDCCH can be used to activate and deactivate configured PUSCH transmissions with configured grants; activate and deactivate PDSCH semi-persistent transmissions; notify one or more UEs 101 of the time slot format; notify one or more UEs 101 of PRBs and OFDM symbols, wherein the UE 101 can assume that no transmission is intended for the UE; transmit TPC commands for PUCCH and PUSCH; transmit one or more TPC commands for SRS transmission by one or more UEs 101; switch the active BWP of the UE 101; and initiate a random access procedure, etc.

[0052] In a NR specific implementation, the UE 101 monitors (or attempts to decode) the corresponding PDCCH candidate set in one or more configured control resource sets (CORESETs) in one or more configured monitoring opportunities according to the corresponding search space configuration. A CORESET may include a PRB set with a duration of 1 to 3 OFDM symbols. A CORESET may additionally or alternatively include RB and time domain symbol. A CORESET comprises six REGs numbered in increasing order in a time-first manner, where a REG is equal to one RB during one OFDM symbol. UE 101 may be configured with multiple CORESETs, where each CORESET is associated with only one control channel element (CCE) to resource element group (REG) mapping. Both interleaved and non-interleaved CCE to REG mappings are supported in a CORESET. Each REG that carries a PDCCH carries its own Debit Reference Signal (DMRS).

[0053] In some examples, multiple UEs 101 and multiple RAN nodes 111 communicate (e.g., transmit and receive) data over a licensed medium (also referred to as a "licensed spectrum" or "licensed band") and an unlicensed shared medium (also referred to as an "unlicensed spectrum" and / or "unlicensed band"). The licensed spectrum may include channels operating in a frequency range of approximately 400 MHz to approximately 3.8 GHz, and the unlicensed spectrum may include a 5 GHz band.

[0054] To operate in an unlicensed spectrum, multiple UEs 101 and multiple RAN nodes 111 may operate using licensed assisted access (LAA), enhanced LAA (eLAA), or additional enhanced LAA (feLAA) mechanisms. In these specific implementations, multiple UEs 101 and multiple RAN nodes 111 may perform one or more known medium sensing operations or carrier sensing operations or both to determine whether one or more channels in the unlicensed spectrum are unavailable or otherwise occupied before transmitting in the unlicensed spectrum. The medium / carrier sensing operation may be performed according to a listen-before-talk (LBT) protocol. LBT is a mechanism for equipment (e.g., multiple UEs 101, multiple RAN nodes 111) to sense a medium (e.g., a channel or carrier frequency) and transmit when the medium is sensed to be idle (or when a particular channel in the medium is sensed to be unoccupied). The medium sensing operation may include a clear channel assessment (CCA), which uses energy detection to determine whether there are other signals on the channel in order to determine whether the channel is occupied or clear. The LBT mechanism allows cellular / LAA networks to coexist with existing systems in unlicensed spectrum and with other LAA networks. Energy detection may include sensing RF energy over an intended transmission band over a period of time and comparing the sensed RF energy to a predefined or configured threshold.

[0055] The existing system in the 5 GHz band may be a WLAN based on IEEE 802.11 technology. The WLAN adopts a contention-based channel access mechanism (e.g., CSMA with collision avoidance (CSMA / CA). In some examples, when a WLAN node (e.g., a mobile station (MS) such as UE 101, AP 106, etc.) intends to transmit, the WLAN node may first perform CCA before transmitting. In addition, in the case where more than one WLAN node senses the channel as idle and transmits at the same time, a backoff mechanism is used to avoid conflicts. The backoff mechanism can be a counter randomly drawn within the contention window size (CWS), which increases exponentially when a conflict occurs and is reset to a minimum value when the transmission is successful. In some examples, the LBT mechanism designed for LAA is similar to CSMA / CA for WLAN. In some examples, the LBT process for a DL or UL transmission burst (including PDSCH or PUSCH transmission) may have a LAA contention window of variable length between X and Y extended CAA (ECCA) time slots, where X and Y are the minimum and maximum values ​​of the CWS for LAA. In one example, the minimum CWS for LAA transmission may be 9 microseconds (μs); however, the size of the CWS and the maximum channel occupancy time (e.g., transmission burst) may be based on government regulatory requirements.

[0056] In some examples, the LAA mechanism is built on the carrier aggregation technology of the LTE-Advanced system. In CA, each aggregated carrier is called a component carrier. In some examples, the component carrier may have a bandwidth of 1.4, 3, 5, 10, 15, or 20 MHz, and up to five component carriers may be aggregated to provide a maximum aggregate bandwidth of 100 MHz. In a frequency division duplex (FDD) system, the number of aggregated carriers may be different for DL ​​and UL. For example, the number of UL component carriers may be equal to or less than the number of DL component carriers. In some cases, each component carrier may have a different bandwidth from other component carriers. In a time division duplex (TDD) system, the number of component carriers and the bandwidth of each component carrier are typically the same for DL ​​and UL.

[0057] Carrier aggregation may also include separate serving cells to provide separate component carriers. The coverage of the serving cells may be different, for example, because component carriers on different frequency bands may experience different path losses. The primary serving cell (PCell) may provide a primary component carrier for both UL and DL, and may handle RRC and non-access stratum (NAS) related activities. Other serving cells are referred to as secondary component carriers (SCells), and each SCell may provide a separate secondary component carrier for both UL and DL. Secondary component carriers may be added and removed as needed, and changing the primary component carrier may require UE 101 to undergo switching. In LAA, eLAA, and feLAA, some or all of the SCells may operate in an unlicensed spectrum (referred to as "LAA SCells"), and the LAA SCells are assisted by the PCells operating in a licensed spectrum. When a UE is configured with more than one LAA SCell, the UE may receive UL authorizations on the configured LAA SCells, indicating different PUSCH start positions within the same subframe.

[0058] The RAN nodes 111 are configured to communicate with each other using an interface 112. In an example, such as when the system 100 is an LTE system (e.g., when the core network 120 is an evolved packet core (EPC) network), the interface 112 may be an X2 interface 112. The X2 interface may be defined between two or more RAN nodes 111 (e.g., two or more eNBs, etc.) connected to the EPC 120, or between two eNBs connected to the EPC 120, or both. In some examples, the X2 interface may include an X2 user plane interface (X2-U) and an X2 control plane interface (X2-C). The X2-U may provide a flow control mechanism for user packets transmitted over the X2 interface, and may be used to transmit information about the delivery of user data between eNBs. For example, X2-U may provide specific sequence number information about user data transmitted from the primary eNB to the secondary eNB; information about successful in-sequence delivery of PDCP protocol data units (PDUs) from the secondary eNB to the UE 101 for user data; information about PDCP PDUs that were not delivered to the UE 101; information about the current minimum expected buffer size at the secondary eNB for transmitting user data to the UE; and the like. X2-C may provide intra-LTE access mobility functions, including context transfer from a source eNB to a target eNB, or user plane transmission control; load management functions; inter-cell interference coordination functions; and the like. In an example where the system 100 is a MF system (e.g., when the CN 120 is a NHCN 120), the interface 112 may be an X2 interface 112. The X2 interface may be defined between two or more RAN nodes 111 (e.g., two or more MF-APs, etc.) connected to the NHCN 120, and / or between two MF-APs connected to the NHCN 120. In these examples, the X2 interface may operate in the same or similar manner as previously discussed.

[0059] In some examples, such as when the system 100 is a 5G NR system (e.g., when the core network 120 is a 5G core network), the interface 112 may be an Xn interface 112. The Xn interface may be defined between two or more RAN nodes 111 (e.g., two or more gNBs, etc.) connected to the 5G core network 120, between a RAN node 111 (e.g., a gNB) and an eNB connected to the 5G core network 120, or between two eNBs connected to the 5G core network 120, or a combination of the above. In some examples, the Xn interface may include an Xn user plane (Xn-U) interface and an Xn control plane (Xn-C) interface. The Xn-U may provide non-guaranteed delivery of user plane PDUs and support / provide data forwarding and flow control functions. The Xn-C may provide management and error handling functions for managing functions of the Xn-C interface; mobility support for UE 101 in a connected mode (e.g., CM-CONNECTED), including functions for managing UE mobility in a connected mode between one or more RAN nodes 111; and the like. Mobility support may include context transfer from the old (source) serving RAN node 111 to the new (target) serving RAN node 111, and control of the user plane tunnel between the old (source) serving RAN node 111 and the new (target) serving RAN node 111. The protocol stack of Xn-U may include a transport network layer built on an Internet Protocol (IP) transport layer, and a GPRS Tunneling Protocol (GTP-U) layer for carrying user plane PDUs on top of a user datagram protocol (UDP) or IP layer or both. The Xn-C protocol stack may include an application layer signaling protocol (referred to as the Xn Application Protocol (Xn-AP)) and a transport network layer built on a stream control transmission protocol (SCTP). SCTP may be on top of the IP layer and may provide guaranteed delivery of application layer messages. In the transport IP layer, point-to-point transport is used to deliver signaling PDUs. In other specific implementations, the Xn-U protocol stack or the Xn-C protocol stack or both may be the same or similar to the user plane and / or control plane protocol stacks shown and described herein.

[0060] RAN 110 is shown as being communicatively coupled to a core network 120 (referred to as "CN 120"). CN 120 includes one or more network elements 122 configured to provide various data and telecommunication services to customers / subscribers (e.g., users of UE 101) connected to CN 120 using RAN 110. Components of CN 120 may be implemented in one physical node or separate physical nodes and may include components for reading and executing instructions from a machine-readable or computer-readable medium (e.g., a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium). In some examples, network function virtualization (NFV) may be used to virtualize some or all of the network node functions described herein using executable instructions stored in one or more computer-readable storage media, as will be described in further detail below. A logical instance of CN 120 may be referred to as a network slice, and a logical instance of a portion of CN 120 may be referred to as a network sub-slice. NFV architecture and infrastructure may be used to virtualize one or more network functions onto physical resources comprising a combination of industry-standard server hardware, storage hardware, or switches (alternatively performed by proprietary hardware). In other words, a NFV system may be used to perform virtual or reconfigurable implementations, or both, of one or more network components or functions.

[0061] In general, the application server 130 may be an element that provides applications that use IP bearer resources with the core network (e.g., UMTS packet service (PS) domain, LTE PS data service, etc.). The application server 130 may also be configured to utilize the CN 120 to support one or more communication services for the UE 101 (e.g., VoIP sessions, PTT sessions, group communication sessions, social network services, etc.).

[0062] In some examples, CN 120 may be a 5G core network (referred to as "5GC 120"), and RAN 110 may be connected to CN 120 using a next generation interface 113. In some examples, next generation interface 113 may be divided into two parts: a next generation user plane (NG-U) interface 114, which carries traffic data between multiple RAN nodes 111 and a user plane function (UPF); and an S1 control plane (NG-C) interface 115, which is a signaling interface between the RAN node 111 and an access and mobility management function (AMF).

[0063] In some examples, CN 120 may be an EPC (referred to as “EPC 120” or the like), and RAN 110 may be connected to CN 120 using an S1 interface 113. In some examples, S1 interface 113 may be divided into two parts: an S1 user plane (S1-U) interface 114, which carries traffic data between RAN node 111 and a serving gateway (S-GW); and an S1-MME interface 115, which is a signaling interface between RAN node 111 and a mobility management entity (MME).

[0064] In the example where CN 120 is an MF NHCN 120, one or more network elements 122 may include or operate one or more NH-MMEs, local AAA agents, NH-GWs, and / or other similar MF NHCN elements. The NH-MME provides functions similar to the MME in the EPC 120. The local AAA agent is an AAA agent that is part of the NHN, which provides the AAA functions required for interworking with the PSP AAA and 3GPP AAA. The PSP AAA is an AAA server (or server pool) that uses non-USIM credentials associated with the PSP, and may be inside or outside the NHN, and the 3GPP AAA is discussed in more detail in 3GPP TS 23.402. The NH-GW provides functions similar to the combined S-GW / P-GW connected to the non-EPC routed PDN. For the EPC routed PDN connection, the NHN-GW provides functions similar to the S-GW previously discussed in the interaction with the MF-AP through the S1 interface 113, and is similar to the TWAG in the interaction with the PLMN PDN-GW through the S2a interface. In some examples, MF AP 111 may be connected to EPC 120 discussed previously. In addition, RAN 110 (sometimes referred to as "MF RAN 110") may be connected to NHCN 120 via S1 interface 113. In these embodiments, S1 interface 113 may be divided into two parts: S1-U interface 114 that carries traffic data between RAN node 111 (e.g., "MF-AP 111") and NH-GW, and S1-MME-N interface 115 that is a signaling interface between RAN node 111 and NH-MME. S1-U interface 114 and S1-MME-N interface 115 have the same or similar functions as S1-U interface 114 and S1-MME interface 115 of EPC 120 discussed herein.

[0065] Figure 2An example of infrastructure equipment 200 is shown. Infrastructure equipment 200 (or "system 200") can be implemented as a base station, a radio head, a RAN node (such as the RAN node 111 or AP 106 shown and described previously), an application server 130, or any other component or device described herein. In other examples, system 200 can be implemented in or by a UE.

[0066] System 200 includes: application circuit 205, baseband circuit 210, one or more radio front end modules (RFEM) 215, memory circuit 220, power management integrated circuit (PMIC) 225, power tee circuit 230, network controller circuit 235, network interface connector 240, satellite positioning circuit 245 and user interface circuit 250. In some examples, system 200 may include additional elements such as memory, storage, display, camera, one or more sensors or input / output (I / O) interfaces or combinations thereof. In other examples, the components described with reference to system 200 may be included in more than one device. For example, various circuits may be separately included in more than one device for CRAN, vBBU or other specific implementations.

[0067] The application circuit 205 may include circuits such as, but not limited to, one or more processors (or processor cores), cache memory, one or more of the following: a low dropout regulator (LDO), an interrupt controller, a serial interface such as SPI, I2C or a general programmable serial interface module, a real-time clock (RTC), a timer-counter including an interval timer and a watchdog timer, a general input / output (I / O or IO), a memory card controller such as a secure digital (SD) multimedia card (MMC) or similar products, a universal serial bus (USB) interface, a mobile industry processor interface (MIPI) interface, and a joint test access group (JTAG) test access port. The processor (or core) of the application circuit 205 may be coupled to or may include a memory or storage element, and may be configured to execute instructions stored in the memory or storage element to enable various applications or operating systems to run on the system 200. In some examples, the memory or storage element may include an on-chip memory circuit, which may include any suitable volatile or non-volatile memory, such as DRAM, SRAM, EPROM, EEPROM, flash memory, solid-state memory, or a combination thereof, etc.

[0068] The processor of the application circuit 205 may include, for example, one or more processor cores (CPUs), one or more application processors, one or more graphics processing units (GPUs), one or more reduced instruction set computing (RISC) processors, one or more Acorn RISC Machine (ARM) processors, one or more complex instruction set computing (CISC) processors, one or more digital signal processors (DSPs), one or more FPGAs, one or more PLDs, one or more ASICs, one or more microprocessors or controllers, or combinations thereof. In some examples, the application circuit 205 may include or may be a dedicated processor or controller configured to perform various techniques described herein. As an example, the processor of the application circuit 205 may include one or more Apple A series processors, Intel ARM processors, or a combination thereof. or Processor: Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) Processor, Accelerated Processing Unit (APU) or Processor; ARM-based processors licensed by ARM Holdings, Ltd., such as the ARM Cortex-A series processors provided by Cavium (TM), Inc. and MIPS-based designs from MIPS Technologies, Inc., such as the MIPSWarrior P-class processor; etc. In some examples, system 200 may not utilize application circuit 205, and instead may include a dedicated processor or controller to process IP data received, for example, from an EPC or 5GC.

[0069] In some examples, the application circuit 205 may include one or more hardware accelerators, which may be microprocessors, programmable processing devices, etc. The one or more hardware accelerators may include, for example, computer vision (CV) or deep learning (DL) accelerators or both. In some examples, the programmable processing device may be one or more field programmable devices (FPDs), such as field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), etc.; programmable logic devices (PLDs), such as complex PLDs (CPLDs) or high-capacity PLDs (HCPLDs); ASICs, such as structured ASICs; programmable SoCs (PSoCs), or combinations thereof, etc. In such specific implementations, the circuits of the application circuit 205 may include logic blocks or logic architectures, as well as other interconnected resources that can be programmed to perform various functions such as the processes, methods, functions described herein. In some examples, the circuitry of application circuit 205 may include memory cells (e.g., erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), flash memory, static memory (e.g., static random access memory (SRAM), or anti-fuse)) for storing logic blocks, logic architectures, data, or other data in a look-up table (LUT), etc.

[0070] The baseband circuit 210 may be implemented, for example, as a solder-in substrate including one or more integrated circuits, a single packaged integrated circuit soldered to a main circuit board, or a multi-chip module containing two or more integrated circuits. Figure 4 Various hardware electronic components of baseband circuit 210 are discussed.

[0071] The user interface circuit 250 may include one or more user interfaces designed to enable a user to interact with the system 200 or a peripheral component interface designed to enable a peripheral component to interact with the system 200. The user interface may include, but is not limited to, one or more physical or virtual buttons (e.g., a reset button), one or more indicators (e.g., light emitting diodes (LEDs)), a physical keyboard or keypad, a mouse, a touch pad, a touch screen, a speaker or other audio transmitting device, a microphone, a printer, a scanner, a headset, a display screen or display device, or a combination thereof, etc. The peripheral component interface may include, but is not limited to, a non-volatile memory port, a universal serial bus (USB) port, an audio jack, a power interface, etc.

[0072] The radio front end module (RFEM) 215 may include a millimeter wave (mm-wave) RFEM and one or more sub-millimeter wave radio frequency integrated circuits (RFICs). In some examples, the one or more sub-millimeter wave RFICs may be physically separated from the mm-wave RFEM. The RFIC may include connections to one or more antennas or antenna arrays (see, e.g., Figure 4Antenna array 411), and the RFEM can be connected to multiple antennas. In some examples, both millimeter wave and sub-millimeter wave radio functions can be implemented in the same physical RFEM 215 that combines both millimeter wave antennas and sub-millimeter waves.

[0073] Memory circuit 220 may include one or more of the following: volatile memory, such as dynamic random access memory (DRAM) or synchronous dynamic random access memory (SDRAM); and non-volatile memory (NVM), such as high-speed electrically erasable memory (commonly referred to as flash memory), phase change random access memory (PRAM), or magnetoresistive random access memory (MRAM), or a combination thereof. In some examples, memory circuit 220 may include a memory device obtained from and The memory circuit 220 may be implemented as one or more of the following, for example: a solder-in package integrated circuit, a socket memory module, and a plug-in memory card.

[0074] PMIC 225 may include a voltage regulator, a surge protector, a power alarm detection circuit, and one or more backup power sources, such as a battery or capacitor. The power alarm detection circuit may detect one or more of a brownout (undervoltage) and a surge (overvoltage) condition. Power tee circuit 230 may provide power extracted from a network cable to provide both power and data connections for infrastructure equipment 200 using a single cable.

[0075] The network controller circuit 235 may provide connectivity to the network using a standard network interface protocol such as Ethernet, Ethernet based on a GRE tunnel, Ethernet based on a multi-protocol label switching (MPLS), or some other suitable protocol. A network connection may be provided to and from the infrastructure equipment 200 using a network interface connector 240 using a physical connection, which may be an electrical connection (commonly referred to as a "copper interconnect"), an optical connection, or a wireless connection. The network controller circuit 235 may include one or more dedicated processors or FPGAs or both for communicating using one or more of the aforementioned protocols. In some examples, the network controller circuit 235 may include multiple controllers for providing connectivity to other networks using the same or different protocols.

[0076] The positioning circuit 245 includes a circuit for receiving and decoding signals transmitted or broadcast by a positioning network of a global navigation satellite system (GNSS). Examples of GNSS include the United States' Global Positioning System (GPS), Russia's Global Navigation System (GLONASS), the European Union's Galileo system, China's Beidou Navigation Satellite System, regional navigation systems or GNSS augmentation systems (e.g., using the Indian constellation (NAVIC), Japan's Quasi-Zenith Satellite System (QZSS), France's Doppler Orbit Chart and Satellite Integrated Radio Positioning (DORIS) for navigation), etc. The positioning circuit 245 may include various hardware elements (e.g., including hardware devices such as switches, filters, amplifiers, antenna elements, etc. for facilitating OTA communication) to communicate with components of the positioning network such as navigation satellite constellation nodes. In some examples, the positioning circuit 245 may include a micro technology (micro PNT) IC for positioning, navigation, and timing, which uses a master timing clock to perform position tracking and estimation without GNSS assistance. The positioning circuit 245 may also be part of or interact with the baseband circuit 210 or RFEM 215 or both to communicate with nodes and components of the positioning network. The positioning circuitry 245 may also provide data (eg, location data, time data) to the application circuitry 205 , which may use the data to synchronize operations with various infrastructure (eg, the RAN node 111 ).

[0077] Figure 2 The components shown can communicate with each other using interface circuits that can include any number of bus or interconnect (IX) technologies, such as industry standard architecture (ISA), extended ISA (EISA), peripheral component interconnect (PCI), peripheral component interconnect extended (PCIx), PCI express (PCIe), or any number of other technologies. The bus or IX can be a proprietary bus, for example, used in a SoC-based system. Other bus or IX systems can be included, such as an I2C interface, an SPI interface, a point-to-point interface, and a power bus, etc.

[0078] Figure 3 An example of a platform 300 (or "device 300") is shown. In some examples, computer platform 300 may be suitable for use as UE 101, application server 130, or any other component or device discussed herein. Platform 300 may include any combination of the components shown in the examples. The components (or portions thereof) of platform 300 may be implemented as integrated circuits (ICs), discrete electronic devices, or other modules, logic, hardware, software, firmware, or combinations thereof adapted in computer platform 300, or as components otherwise incorporated within a chassis of a larger system. Figure 3The block diagram is intended to show a high-level view of the components of platform 300. However, in some examples, platform 300 may include fewer, additional, or alternative components, or include Figure 3 Different arrangements of components are shown.

[0079] The application circuit 305 includes circuits such as, but not limited to, one or more processors (or processor cores), cache memory, and one or more of an LDO, an interrupt controller, a serial interface (such as SPI), I2C or a general programmable serial interface module, an RTC, a timer (including an interval timer and a watchdog timer), a general I / O, a memory card controller (such as an SD MMC or similar controller), a USB interface, a MIPI interface, and a JTAG test access port. The processor (or core) of the application circuit 305 may be coupled to or may include a memory / storage element, and may be configured to execute instructions stored in the memory or storage device to enable various applications or operating systems to run on the system 300. In some examples, the memory or storage element may be an on-chip memory circuit, which may include any suitable volatile or non-volatile memory, such as DRAM, SRAM, EPROM, EEPROM, flash memory, solid-state memory, or a combination thereof, etc.

[0080] The processor of application circuit 205 may include, for example, one or more processor cores, one or more application processors, one or more GPUs, one or more RISC processors, one or more ARM processors, one or more CISC processors, one or more DSPs, one or more FPGAs, one or more PLDs, one or more ASICs, one or more microprocessors or controllers, multi-threaded processors, ultra-low voltage processors, embedded processors, some other known processing elements, or any suitable combination thereof. In some examples, application circuit 205 may include or may be a dedicated processor / controller for performing techniques described herein.

[0081] As an example, the processor of the application circuit 305 may include an Apple A series processor. The processor of the application circuit 1105 may also be one or more of the following: based on Architecture Core TM Processors such as Quark TM 、Atom TM , i3, i5, i7 or MCU class processors, or available from Santa Clara, CA company( Another such processor is Intel Corporation, Santa Clara, CA); Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) Processor or Accelerated Processing Unit (APU); from Snapdragon by Technologies, Inc. TM Processor, Texas Instruments, Open Multimedia ApplicationsPlatform(OMAP) TM processors; MIPS-based designs from MIPS Technologies, Inc., such as the MIPS Warrior M-class, Warrior I-class, and Warrior P-class processors; ARM-based designs licensed from ARM Holdings, Ltd., such as the ARM Cortex-A, Cortex-R, and Cortex-M series processors; etc. In some examples, application circuit 305 can be part of a system on a chip (SoC), in which application circuit 305 and other components are formed as a single integrated circuit or a single package.

[0082] Additionally or alternatively, the application circuit 305 may include circuits such as, but not limited to, one or more field programmable devices (FPDs) such as FPGAs; programmable logic devices (PLDs), such as complex PLDs (CPLDs), high capacity PLDs (HCPLDs); ASICs, such as structured ASICs; programmable SoCs (PSoCs), or combinations thereof, etc. In some examples, the application circuit 305 may include logic blocks or logic structures, and other interconnected resources that may be programmed to perform various functions such as the processes, methods, functions described herein. In some examples, the application circuit 305 may include memory cells (e.g., erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), flash memory, static memory (e.g., static random access memory (SRAM) or antifuse)) for storing logic blocks, logic structures, data or other data in a lookup table (LUT), etc.

[0083] The baseband circuit 310 may be implemented, for example, as a solder-in substrate including one or more integrated circuits, a single packaged integrated circuit soldered to a main circuit board, or a multi-chip module containing two or more integrated circuits. Figure 4 Various hardware electronic components of baseband circuit 310 are discussed.

[0084] The RFEM 315 may include a millimeter wave (mm Wave) RFEM and one or more sub-millimeter wave radio frequency integrated circuits (RFICs). In some examples, the one or more sub-millimeter wave RFICs may be physically separated from the mm Wave RFEM. The RFIC may include connections to one or more antennas or antenna arrays (see, e.g., Figure 4 The antenna array 411 of the embodiment of the present invention can be connected to multiple antennas, and the RFEM can be connected to multiple antennas. In some examples, both the millimeter wave and sub-millimeter wave radio functions can be implemented in the same physical RFEM 315 that combines both millimeter wave antennas and sub-millimeter waves.

[0085] The memory circuit 320 may include any number and type of memory devices for providing a fixed amount of system memory. As an example, the memory circuit 320 may include one or more of the following: volatile memory, such as random access memory (RAM), dynamic RAM (DRAM) or synchronous dynamic RAM (SDRAM); and non-volatile memory (NVM), such as high-speed electrically erasable memory (commonly referred to as flash memory), phase change random access memory (PRAM), or magnetoresistive random access memory (MRAM) or a combination thereof. The memory circuit 320 may be developed according to the Joint Electron Device Engineering Council (JEDEC) based low power double data rate (LPDDR) design such as LPDDR2, LPDDR3, LPDDR4, etc. The memory circuit 320 may be implemented as one or more of the following: a solder-in package integrated circuit, a single die package (SDP), a dual die package (DDP) or a quad die package (Q17P), a socketed memory module, a dual in-line memory module (DIMM) including a micro DIMM or a mini DIMM, or soldered to a motherboard using a ball grid array (BGA). In a low-power implementation, memory circuit 320 may be an on-chip memory or register associated with application circuit 305. To provide persistent storage of information such as data, applications, operating systems, etc., memory circuit 320 may include one or more mass storage devices, which may include, for example, a solid-state disk drive (SSDD), a hard disk drive (HDD), a micro HDD, a resistive change memory, a phase change memory, a holographic memory, or a chemical memory. In some examples, computer platform 300 may be combined with a memory device obtained from and Three-dimensional (3D) cross-point (XPOINT) memory.

[0086] The removable memory circuit 323 may include devices, circuits, housings, casings, ports or sockets, etc., for coupling portable data storage devices to the platform 300. These portable data storage devices may be used for mass storage and may include, for example, flash memory cards (e.g., secure digital (SD) cards, micro SD cards, xD picture cards), as well as USB flash drives, optical disks, or external HDDs, or combinations thereof, etc.

[0087] The platform 300 may further include an interface circuit (not shown) for connecting external devices to the platform 300. External devices connected to the platform 300 using the interface circuit include a sensor circuit 321 and an electromechanical component (EMC) 322, and a removable memory device coupled to a removable memory circuit 323.

[0088] Sensor circuit 321 includes a device, module, or subsystem whose purpose is to detect events or changes in its environment and send information about the detected events (e.g., sensor data) to one or more other devices, modules, or subsystems. Examples of such sensors include: an inertial measurement unit (IMU), such as an accelerometer, gyroscope, or magnetometer; a microelectromechanical system (MEMS) or nanoelectromechanical system (NEMS) including a three-axis accelerometer, a three-axis gyroscope, or a magnetometer; a liquid level sensor; a flow sensor; a temperature sensor (e.g., a thermistor); a pressure sensor; a barometric pressure sensor; a gravity meter; an altimeter; an image capture device (e.g., a camera or a lensless aperture); a light detection and ranging (LiDAR) sensor; a proximity sensor (e.g., an infrared radiation detector, etc.), a depth sensor, an ambient light sensor, an ultrasonic transceiver; a microphone or other audio capture device, or a combination thereof, etc.

[0089] The EMC 322 includes devices, modules, or subsystems whose purpose is to enable the platform 300 to change its state, position, or orientation or to move or control a mechanism, system, or subsystem. In addition, the EMC 322 can be configured to generate messages or signaling and send the messages or signaling to other components of the platform 300 to indicate the current state of the EMC 322. Examples of the EMC 322 include one or more power switches, relays (such as electromechanical relays (EMRs) and / or solid-state relays (SSRs)), actuators (e.g., valve actuators), audible sound generators, visual warning devices, motors (e.g., DC motors or stepper motors), wheels, thrusters, propellers, claws, clamps, hooks, or combinations thereof. In some examples, the platform 300 is configured to operate one or more EMCs 322 based on one or more capture events, instructions, or control signals received from a service provider or client, or both.

[0090] In some examples, the interface circuit may connect the platform 300 to the positioning circuit 345. The positioning circuit 345 includes a circuit for receiving and decoding signals transmitted or broadcast by a positioning network of a GNSS. Examples of GNSS may include the United States' GPS, Russia's GLONASS, the European Union's Galileo system, China's Beidou navigation satellite system, a regional navigation system or a GNSS augmentation system (e.g., NAVIC), Japan's QZSS, France's DORIS, etc. The positioning circuit 345 includes various hardware elements (e.g., including hardware devices such as switches, filters, amplifiers, antenna elements, etc. for facilitating OTA communications) to communicate with components of the positioning network such as navigation satellite constellation nodes. In some examples, the positioning circuit 345 may include a micro PNT IC that uses a master timing clock to perform position tracking or estimation without GNSS assistance. The positioning circuit 345 may also be part of or interact with the baseband circuit 210 or the RFEM 315 or both to communicate with nodes and components of the positioning network. Positioning circuitry 345 may also provide data (eg, position data, time data) to application circuitry 305, which may use the data to synchronize operations with various infrastructures (eg, radio base stations) for use in turn-by-turn navigation applications, and the like.

[0091] In some examples, the interface circuit may connect the platform 300 with a near field communication (NFC) circuit 340. The NFC circuit 340 is configured to provide contactless short-range communication based on the radio frequency identification (RFID) standard, wherein a magnetic field is sensed to enable communication between the NFC circuit 340 and an NFC-enabled device (e.g., an "NFC touch point") external to the platform 300. The NFC circuit 340 includes an NFC controller coupled to an antenna element and a processor coupled to the NFC controller. The NFC controller may be a chip or IC that provides NFC functionality to the NFC circuit 340 by executing an NFC controller firmware and an NFC stack. The NFC stack may be executed by the processor to control the NFC controller, and the NFC controller firmware may be executed by the NFC controller to control the antenna element to transmit a short-range RF signal. The RF signal may power a passive NFC tag (e.g., a microchip embedded in a sticker or wristband) to transfer stored data to the NFC circuit 340, or initiate data transfer between the NFC circuit 340 and another active NFC device (e.g., a smart phone or an NFC-enabled POS terminal) close to the platform 300.

[0092] The driver circuit 346 may include software and hardware elements for controlling specific devices embedded in, attached to, or otherwise communicatively coupled to the platform 300. The driver circuit 346 may include various drivers to allow other components of the platform 300 to interact with or control various input / output (I / O) devices that may be present in or connected to the platform 300. For example, the driver circuit 346 may include: a display driver for controlling and allowing access to a display device, a touch screen driver for controlling and allowing access to a touch screen interface of the platform 300, a sensor driver for obtaining sensor readings of the sensor circuit 321 and controlling and allowing access to the sensor circuit 321, an EMC driver for obtaining an actuator position of the EMC 322 or controlling and allowing access to the EMC 322, a camera driver for controlling and allowing access to an embedded image capture device, and an audio driver for controlling and allowing access to one or more audio devices.

[0093] A power management integrated circuit (PMIC) 325 (also referred to as “power management circuit 325”) may manage power provided to various components of platform 300. Specifically, PMIC 325 may control power source selection, voltage scaling, battery charging, or DC-DC conversion with respect to baseband circuit 310. PMIC 325 may be included when platform 300 is capable of being powered by battery 330, for example, when the device is included in UE 101.

[0094] In some examples, the PMIC 325 may control or otherwise be part of various power saving mechanisms of the platform 300. For example, if the platform 300 is in the RRC_Connected state, in which the platform is still connected to the RAN node because it expects to receive traffic soon, then after a period of inactivity, the platform may enter a state known as discontinuous reception mode (DRX). During this state, the platform 300 may be powered off for short time intervals, thereby saving power. If there is no data traffic activity for a longer period of time, the platform 300 may transition to the RRC_Idle state, in which the device is disconnected from the network and no operations such as channel quality feedback or switching are performed. This may allow the platform 300 to enter a very low power state, in which the platform periodically wakes up to listen to the network and then powers off again. In some examples, the platform 300 may not receive data in the RRC_Idle state, but must transition back to the RRC_Connected state to receive data. Additional power saving modes may prevent the device from using the network for longer than the paging interval (ranging from a few seconds to a few hours). During this time, the device may not be able to connect to the network and may lose power completely. Any data sent during this time may be significantly delayed, and it is assumed that the delay is acceptable.

[0095] Battery 330 may power platform 300, but in some examples, platform 300 may be deployed in a fixed location and may have a power source coupled to a power grid. Battery 330 may be a lithium-ion battery, a metal-air battery such as a zinc-air battery, an aluminum-air battery, or a lithium-air battery, etc. In some examples, such as in V2X applications, battery 330 may be a typical lead-acid car battery.

[0096] In some examples, the battery 330 may be a "smart battery" that includes or is coupled to a battery management system (BMS) or a battery monitoring integrated circuit. The BMS may be included in the platform 300 to track the state of charge (SoCh) of the battery 330. The BMS may be used to monitor other parameters of the battery 330, such as the state of health (SoH) and state of function (SoF) of the battery 330 to provide fault prediction. The BMS may transmit information of the battery 330 to the application circuit 305 or other components of the platform 300. The BMS may also include an analog-to-digital (ADC) converter that allows the application circuit 305 to directly monitor the voltage of the battery 330 or the current from the battery 330. The battery parameters may be used to determine actions that the platform 300 may perform, such as transmission frequency, network operation, sensing frequency, etc.

[0097] A power block or other power source coupled to the grid can be coupled to the BMS to charge the battery 330. In some examples, the power block 330 can be replaced with a wireless power receiver to obtain power wirelessly, for example, through a loop antenna in the computer platform 300. In these examples, a wireless battery charging circuit can be included in the BMS. The specific charging circuit selected can depend on the size of the battery 330 and therefore the current required. Charging can be performed using the aviation fuel standard published by the Aviation Fuel Alliance, the Qi wireless charging standard published by the Wireless Power Alliance, or the Rezence charging standard published by the Wireless Power Alliance.

[0098] The user interface circuit 350 includes various input / output (I / O) devices present in or connected to the platform 300, and includes one or more user interfaces designed to implement user interaction with the platform 300 or peripheral component interfaces designed to implement interaction with peripheral components of the platform 300. The user interface circuit 350 includes input device circuits and output device circuits. The input device circuit includes any physical or virtual means for accepting input, including one or more physical or virtual buttons (e.g., a reset button), a physical keyboard, a keypad, a mouse, a touchpad, a touch screen, a microphone, a scanner, or a headset, or a combination thereof, etc. The output device circuit includes any physical or virtual means for displaying information or otherwise conveying information (such as sensor readings, actuator positions, or other information). The output device circuitry may include any number or combination of audio or visual displays, including one or more simple visual outputs or indicators (e.g., binary state indicators (e.g., light emitting diodes (LEDs)), multi-character visual outputs, or more complex outputs, such as a display device or touch screen (e.g., a liquid crystal display (LCD), an LED display, a quantum dot display, or a projector), where the output of characters, graphics, or multimedia objects is generated or produced by the operation of the platform 300. The output device circuitry may also include a speaker or other audio emitting device, or a printer. In some examples, the sensor circuitry 321 may be used as an input device circuit (e.g., an image capture device or a motion capture device) and one or more EMCs may be used as an output device circuit (e.g., an actuator for providing tactile feedback). In another example, an NFC circuit may be included to read an electronic tag or connect to another NFC-enabled device, the NFC circuitry including an NFC controller and a processing device coupled to an antenna element. The peripheral component interface may include, but is not limited to, a non-volatile memory port, a USB port, an audio jack, or a power interface.

[0099] Although not shown, the components of platform 300 can communicate with each other using a suitable bus or interconnect (IX) technology, which can include any number of technologies, including ISA, EISA, PCI, PCIx, PCIe, time-triggered protocol (TTP) systems, FlexRay systems, or any number of other technologies. The bus or IX can be a proprietary bus or IX, for example, used in a SoC-based system. Other bus or IX systems can be included, such as an I2C interface, an SPI interface, a point-to-point interface, and a power bus, etc.

[0100] Figure 4 4 and 415. The baseband circuit 410 may correspond to the exemplary components of the radio front end module (RFEM) 415. Figure 2 The baseband circuit 210 and Figure 3 The baseband circuit 310. RFEM 415 may correspond to Figure 2 RFEM215 and Figure 3 RFEM 315. As shown, RFEM 415 may include a radio frequency (RF) circuit 406, a front end module (FEM) circuit 408, and an antenna array 411 coupled together.

[0101] The baseband circuit 410 includes circuits or control logic components or both, which are configured to perform various radio or network protocols and control functions for implementing communications with one or more radio networks using the RF circuit 406. The radio control functions may include, but are not limited to, signal modulation and demodulation, encoding and decoding, and radio frequency shifting. In some examples, the modulation and demodulation circuits of the baseband circuit 410 may include fast Fourier transform (FFT), precoding or constellation mapping and demapping functions. In some examples, the encoding and decoding circuits of the baseband circuit 410 may include convolution, tail-biting convolution, turbo, Viterbi, or low-density parity check (LDPC) encoder and decoder functions. The modulation and demodulation and encoder and decoder functions are not limited to these examples and may include other suitable functions in other examples. The baseband circuit 410 is configured to process baseband signals received from the receive signal path of the RF circuit 406 and generate baseband signals for the transmit signal path of the RF circuit 406. The baseband circuit 410 is configured to communicate with application circuits (e.g., Figure 2 and Figure 3 The application circuits 205 and 305 are shown to interact to generate and process baseband signals and control the operation of the RF circuit 406. The baseband circuit 410 may handle various radio control functions.

[0102] The aforementioned circuits and control logic of the baseband circuit 410 may include one or more single-core or multi-core processors. For example, the one or more processors may include a 3G baseband processor 404A, a 4G or LTE baseband processor 404B, a 5G or NR baseband processor 404C, or some other baseband processor 404D for other existing generations, generations under development, or generations to be developed in the future (e.g., the sixth generation (6G)). In some examples, some or all of the functions of the baseband processors 404A-D may be included in a module stored in the memory 404G and executed using a central processing unit (CPU) 404E. In some examples, some or all of the functions of the baseband processors 404A-D may be provided as a hardware accelerator (e.g., FPGA or ASIC) loaded with an appropriate bitstream or logic block stored in a corresponding memory unit. In some examples, the memory 404G may store program code of a real-time OS (RTOS), which, when executed by the CPU 404E (or other baseband processor), is used to enable the CPU 404E (or other baseband processor) to manage resources of the baseband circuit 410, schedule tasks, or perform other operations. Examples of RTOS may include a Operating System Embedded (OSE) provided TM , by Mentor NucleusRTOS provided TM , by Mentor Versatile Real-Time Executive (VRTX) provided by Express Provided by ThreadX TM ,Depend on FreeRTOS and REX OS provided by Open Kernel (OK) OKL4 is provided, or any other suitable RTOS, such as those discussed herein. In addition, the baseband circuit 410 includes one or more audio digital signal processors (DSPs) 404F. The audio DSP 404F includes elements for compression and decompression and echo cancellation, and may include other suitable processing elements in some examples.

[0103] In some examples, each of processors 404A-404E includes a corresponding memory interface to send data to and receive data from memory 404G. Baseband circuit 410 may also include one or more interfaces for communicatively coupling to other circuits or devices, such as an interface for sending data to and receiving data from a memory external to baseband circuit 410; an interface for sending data to and receiving data from a memory external to the baseband circuit; Figure 2 and Figure 3 The application circuit interface for sending data to and receiving data from the application circuit 205, 305; Figure 4 RF circuit interface for sending data to and receiving data from the RF circuit 406 of the RF circuit; for receiving data from one or more wireless hardware elements (e.g., near field communication (NFC) components, Low power consumption components, components, etc.) to send data and receive data from these wireless hardware elements; and a power management interface for sending power or control signals to the PMIC 325 and receiving power or control signals from the PMIC.

[0104] In some examples (which may be combined with the above examples), the baseband circuit 410 includes one or more digital baseband systems, which are coupled to each other and to the CPU subsystem, the audio subsystem, and the interface subsystem using an interconnection subsystem. The digital baseband subsystem may also be coupled to the digital baseband interface and the mixed signal baseband subsystem using another interconnection subsystem. Each of the interconnection subsystems may include a bus system, a point-to-point connector, a network on chip (NOC) structure, or some other suitable bus or interconnection technology, such as those discussed herein. The audio subsystem may include a DSP circuit, a buffer memory, a program memory, a voice processing accelerator circuit, a data converter circuit such as an analog-to-digital converter circuit and a digital-to-analog converter circuit, an analog circuit including one or more of an amplifier and a filter, etc. In some examples, the baseband circuit 410 may include a protocol processing circuit having one or more control circuit instances (not shown) to provide control functions for a digital baseband circuit or a radio frequency circuit (e.g., a radio front end module 415).

[0105] although Figure 4 Not shown, but in some examples, the baseband circuit 410 includes various processing devices (e.g., a "multi-protocol baseband processor" or "protocol processing circuit") to operate one or more wireless communication protocols and various processing devices to implement PHY layer functions. In some examples, the PHY layer functions include the aforementioned radio control functions. In some examples, the protocol processing circuit operates or implements various protocol layers or entities of one or more wireless communication protocols. For example, when the baseband circuit 410 or the RF circuit 406 or both are part of a millimeter wave communication circuit or some other suitable cellular communication circuit, the protocol processing circuit may operate an LTE protocol entity or a 5G NR protocol entity or both. In this example, the protocol processing circuit may operate MAC, RLC, PDCP, SDAP, RRC, and NAS functions. In some examples, when the baseband circuit 410 or the RF circuit 406 or both are part of a Wi-Fi communication system, the protocol processing circuit may operate one or more IEEE-based protocols. In this example, the protocol processing circuit may operate Wi-Fi MAC and logical link control (LLC) functions. The protocol processing circuitry may include one or more memory structures (e.g., 404G) for storing program code and data for operating protocol functions, and one or more processing cores for executing program code and performing various operations using data. The baseband circuitry 410 may also support radio communications for more than one wireless protocol.

[0106] The various hardware elements of the baseband circuit 410 discussed herein may be implemented as, for example, a solder-in substrate including one or more integrated circuits (ICs), a single packaged integrated circuit soldered to a main circuit board, or a multi-chip module containing two or more ICs. In some examples, the components of the baseband circuit 410 may be appropriately combined in a single chip or a single chipset, or disposed on the same circuit board. In some examples, some or all of the components of the baseband circuit 410 and the RF circuit 406 may be implemented together, such as a system on a chip (SoC) or a system-level package (SiP). In some examples, some or all of the components of the baseband circuit 410 may be implemented as a separate SoC communicatively coupled to the RF circuit 406 (or multiple instances of the RF circuit 406). In some examples, some or all of the components of the baseband circuit 410 and the application circuits 205, 305 may be implemented together as a separate SoC mounted to the same circuit board (e.g., a "multi-chip package").

[0107] In some examples, baseband circuitry 410 may provide communications compatible with one or more radio technologies. For example, baseband circuitry 410 may support communications with E-UTRAN or other WMANs, WLANs, or WPANs. Examples in which baseband circuitry 410 is configured to support radio communications for more than one wireless protocol may be referred to as multi-mode baseband circuitry.

[0108] RF circuit 406 can communicate with a wireless network through a non-solid medium using modulated electromagnetic radiation. In some examples, RF circuit 406 may include components such as switches, filters, or amplifiers to facilitate communication with a wireless network. RF circuit 406 may include a receive signal path, which may include circuitry for down-converting an RF signal received from FEM circuit 408 and providing a baseband signal to baseband circuit 410. RF circuit 406 may also include a transmit signal path, which may include circuitry for up-converting a baseband signal provided by baseband circuit 410 and providing an RF output signal for transmission to FEM circuit 408.

[0109] The receive signal path of the RF circuit 406 includes a mixer circuit 406a, an amplifier circuit 406b, and a filter circuit 406c. In some examples, the transmit signal path of the RF circuit 406 may include a filter circuit 406c and a mixer circuit 406a. The RF circuit 406 also includes a synthesizer circuit 406d for synthesizing frequencies used by the mixer circuit 406a of the receive signal path and the transmit signal path. In some examples, the mixer circuit 406a of the receive signal path may be configured to down-convert the RF signal received from the FEM circuit 408 based on the synthesized frequency provided by the synthesizer circuit 406d. The amplifier circuit 406b may be configured to amplify the down-converted signal, and the filter circuit 406c may be a low pass filter (LPF) or a band pass filter (BPF) configured to remove unwanted signals from the down-converted signal to generate an output baseband signal. The output baseband signal may be provided to the baseband circuit 410 for further processing. In some examples, the output baseband signal can be a zero frequency baseband signal, although this is not required.In some examples, the mixer circuit 406a of the receive signal path can include a passive mixer.

[0110] In some examples, mixer circuit 406a of the transmit signal path can be configured to up-convert an input baseband signal based on a synthesized frequency provided by synthesizer circuit 406d to generate an RF output signal for FEM circuit 408. The baseband signal can be provided by baseband circuit 410 and can be filtered by filter circuit 406c.

[0111] In some examples, the mixer circuit 406a of the receive signal path and the mixer circuit 406a of the transmit signal path may include two or more mixers and may be arranged for orthogonal down-conversion and up-conversion, respectively. In some examples, the mixer circuit 406a of the receive signal path and the mixer circuit 406a of the transmit signal path may include two or more mixers and may be arranged for image suppression (e.g., Hartley image suppression). In some examples, the mixer circuit 406a of the receive signal path and the mixer circuit 406a of the transmit signal path may be arranged for direct down-conversion and direct up-conversion, respectively. In some examples, the mixer circuit 406a of the receive signal path and the mixer circuit 406a of the transmit signal path may be configured for superheterodyne operation.

[0112] In some examples, the output baseband signal and the input baseband signal may be analog baseband signals. In some examples, the output baseband signal and the input baseband signal may be electronic baseband signals, and the RF circuit 406 may include an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) and a digital-to-analog converter (DAC) circuit, and the baseband circuit 410 may include a digital baseband interface to communicate with the RF circuit 406.

[0113] In some dual-mode examples, separate radio IC circuits may be provided to process signals for each spectrum, but the techniques described herein are not limited in this respect.

[0114] In some examples, synthesizer circuit 406d may be a fractional-N synthesizer or a fractional N / N+1 synthesizer, although other types of frequency synthesizers may also be used. For example, synthesizer circuit 406d may be a delta-sigma synthesizer, a frequency multiplier, or a synthesizer including a phase-locked loop with a frequency divider.

[0115] Synthesizer circuit 406d may be configured to synthesize an output frequency based on the frequency input and the divider control input for use by mixer circuit 406a of RF circuit 406. In some examples, synthesizer circuit 406d may be a fractional-N / N+1 synthesizer.

[0116] In some examples, the frequency input may be provided by a voltage controlled oscillator (VCO), although this is not required. The divider control input may be provided by the baseband circuit 410 or the application circuit 205 / 305 according to the desired output frequency. In some examples, the divider control input (e.g., N) may be determined from a lookup table based on the channel indicated by the application circuit 205, 305.

[0117] The synthesizer circuit 406d of the RF circuit 406 may include a frequency divider, a delay locked loop (DLL), a multiplexer, and a phase accumulator. In some examples, the frequency divider may be a dual-mode frequency divider (DMD), and the phase accumulator may be a digital phase accumulator (DPA). In some examples, the DMD may be configured to divide the input signal by N or N+1 (e.g., based on a carry) to provide a fractional division ratio. In some examples, the DLL may include a cascaded, tunable, delay element, a phase detector, a charge pump, and a set of D-type flip-flops. The delay element may be configured to divide the VCO cycle into Nd equal phase groups, where Nd is the number of delay elements in the delay line. In this way, the DLL provides negative feedback to help ensure that the total delay through the delay line is one VCO cycle.

[0118] In some examples, the synthesizer circuit 406d can be configured to generate a carrier frequency as an output frequency, while in other examples, the output frequency can be a multiple of the carrier frequency (e.g., twice the carrier frequency, four times the carrier frequency) and can be used with a quadrature generator and divider circuit to generate multiple signals with multiple different phases relative to each other at the carrier frequency. In some examples, the output frequency can be an LO frequency (fLO). In some examples, the RF circuit 406 can include an IQ or polarity converter.

[0119] FEM circuitry 408 may include a receive signal path that may include circuitry configured to operate on RF signals received from antenna array 411, amplify the received signals, and provide an amplified version of the received signals to RF circuitry 406 for further processing. FEM circuitry 408 may also include a transmit signal path that may include circuitry configured to amplify transmit signals provided by RF circuitry 406 for transmission by one or more antenna elements in antenna array 411. Amplification by either the transmit signal path or the receive signal path may be accomplished only in RF circuitry 406, only in FEM circuitry 408, or in both RF circuitry 406 and FEM circuitry 408.

[0120] In some examples, FEM circuit 408 may include a TX / RX switch to switch between transmit mode and receive mode operation. FEM circuit 408 may include a receive signal path and a transmit signal path. The receive signal path of FEM circuit 408 may include an LNA to amplify a received RF signal and provide the amplified received RF signal as an output (e.g., to RF circuit 406). The transmit signal path of FEM circuit 408 may include a power amplifier (PA) for amplifying an input RF signal (e.g., provided by RF circuit 406), and one or more filters for generating an RF signal for subsequent transmission by one or more antenna elements of antenna array 411.

[0121] The antenna array 411 includes one or more antenna elements, each of which is configured to convert an electrical signal into a radio wave to travel through the air and convert the received radio wave into an electrical signal. For example, a digital baseband signal provided by the baseband circuit 410 is converted into an analog RF signal (e.g., a modulated waveform), which is amplified and transmitted using the antenna elements of the antenna array 411 including one or more antenna elements (not shown). The antenna elements may be omnidirectional, directional, or a combination thereof. The antenna elements may be formed into a variety of arrangements as known and / or discussed herein. The antenna array 411 may include a microstrip antenna or a printed antenna fabricated on the surface of one or more printed circuit boards. The antenna array 411 may be formed as a patch of metal foil of various shapes (e.g., a patch antenna) and may be coupled to the RF circuit 406 and / or the FEM circuit 408 using a metal transmission line or the like.

[0122] The processor of the application circuit 205 / 305 and the processor of the baseband circuit 410 can be used to execute elements of one or more instances of the protocol stack. For example, the processor of the baseband circuit 410 can be used alone or in combination to perform layer 3, layer 2, or layer 1 functions, while the processor of the application circuit 205, 305 can utilize data received from these layers (e.g., packet data) and further perform layer 4 functions (e.g., TCP and UDP layers). As mentioned herein, layer 3 may include an RRC layer, which will be described in further detail below. As mentioned herein, layer 2 may include a MAC layer, an RLC layer, and a PDCP layer, which will be described in further detail below. As mentioned herein, layer 1 may include a PHY layer of a UE / RAN node, which will be described in further detail below.

[0123] Figure 5 2 shows exemplary components of communication circuit 500. In some examples, communication circuit 500 may be implemented as Figure 2 and Figure 3 The communication circuit 500 may be communicatively coupled (e.g., directly or indirectly) to one or more antennas, such as antennas 502a-c. In some examples, the communication circuit 500 includes or is communicatively coupled to dedicated receive chains for multiple RATs (e.g., a first receive chain for LTE and a second receive chain for 5G Nr), a processor, or a radio component, or a combination thereof. For example, as Figure 5 As shown, the communication circuit 500 includes a modem 510 and a modem 520, which may correspond to or may be Figure 2 and Figure 3 Modem 510 may be configured to communicate in accordance with a first RAT (such as LTE or LTE-A), and modem 520 may be configured to communicate in accordance with a second RAT (such as 5G NR).

[0124] The modem 510 includes one or more processors 512 and a memory 516 in communication with the processor 512. The modem 510 is in communication with a radio frequency (RF) front end 530, which may correspond to or may be a Figure 2 and Figure 3The RF front end 530 may include circuits for transmitting and receiving radio signals. For example, the RF front end 530 includes a receiving circuit (RX) 532 and a transmitting circuit (TX) 534. In some examples, the receiving circuit 532 communicates with the DL front end 550, which may include circuits for receiving radio signals from the antenna 502a. The switch 570 may selectively couple the modem 510 to the UL front end 572, which may include circuits for transmitting radio signals using the antenna 502c.

[0125] Similarly, the modem 520 includes one or more processors 522 and a memory 526 in communication with the processor 522. The modem 520 is in communication with an RF front end 540, which may correspond to or may be Figure 2 and Figure 3 502c. The RF front end 540 may include circuits for transmitting and receiving radio signals. For example, the RF front end 540 includes a receiving circuit 542 and a transmitting circuit 544. In some examples, the receiving circuit 542 communicates with the DL front end 560, which may include circuits for receiving radio signals from the antenna 502b. The switch 570 may selectively couple the modem 520 to the UL front end 572 for transmitting radio signals using the antenna 502c.

[0126] Modem 510 may include hardware and software components for time division multiplexing UL data (e.g., for NSA NR operation) and various other techniques described herein. Processor 512 may include one or more processing elements configured to implement various features described herein, such as by executing program instructions stored on memory 516 (e.g., a non-transitory computer-readable memory medium). In some examples, processor 512 may be configured as a programmable hardware element, such as an FPGA or ASIC. In some examples, processor 512 may include one or more ICs configured to perform the functions of processor 512. For example, each IC may include a circuit configured to perform the functions of processor 512.

[0127] Modem 520 may include hardware and software components for time division multiplexing UL data (e.g., for NSA NR operation) and various other techniques described herein. Processor 522 may include one or more processing elements configured to implement various features described herein, such as by executing instructions stored on memory 526 (e.g., a non-transitory computer-readable memory medium). In some examples, processor 522 may be configured as a programmable hardware element, such as an FPGA or ASIC. In some examples, processor 522 may include one or more ICs configured to perform the functions of processor 522. For example, each IC may include a circuit configured to perform the functions of processor 522.

[0128] Figure 6 Various protocol functions that can be implemented in a wireless communication device are shown. Specifically, Figure 6 An arrangement 600 is included to show the interconnection between various protocol layers / entities. Various protocol layers and entities operating in conjunction with the 5G NR system standard and the LTE system standard are provided. Figure 6 The following description, but Figure 6 Some or all aspects of the invention may also be applicable to other wireless communication network systems.

[0129] In addition to other higher layer functions not shown, the protocol layers of arrangement 600 may also include one or more of PHY 610, MAC 620, RLC 630, PDCP 640, SDAP 647, RRC 655, and NAS layer 657. These protocol layers may include one or more service access points (e.g., Figure 6 Items 659, 656, 650, 649, 645, 635, 625 and 615).

[0130] PHY 610 may transmit and receive physical layer signals 605, which may be received from or sent to one or more other communication devices. Physical layer signals 605 may include one or more physical channels, such as those discussed herein. PHY 610 may also perform link adaptation or adaptive modulation and coding (AMC), power control, cell search (e.g., for initial synchronization and switching purposes), and other measurements used by higher layers (such as RRC 655). PHY 610 may also further perform error detection on transport channels, forward error correction (FEC) encoding and decoding of transport channels, modulation and demodulation of physical channels, interleaving, rate matching, mapping to physical channels, and MIMO antenna processing. In some examples, an instance of PHY 610 may use one or more PHY-SAP 615 to process requests from an instance of MAC 620 and provide instructions thereto. In some examples, requests and instructions transmitted using PHY-SAP 615 may include one or more transport channels.

[0131] An instance of MAC 620 may utilize one or more MAC-SAPs 625 to process requests from and provide indications to instances of RLC 630. These requests and indications transmitted using MAC-SAPs 625 may include one or more logical channels. MAC 620 may perform mapping between logical channels and transport channels, multiplexing MAC SDUs from one or more logical channels onto transport blocks (TBs) to be delivered to PHY 610 using transport channels, demultiplexing MAC SDUs from TBs delivered from PHY 610 using transport channels to one or more logical channels, multiplexing MAC SDUs onto TBs, scheduling information reporting, error correction via HARQ, and logical channel prioritization.

[0132] An instance of RLC 630 may process requests from and provide indications to an instance of PDCP 640 using one or more radio link control service access points (RLC-SAPs) 635. These requests and indications transmitted using RLC-SAPs 635 may include one or more logical channels. RLC 630 may operate in a variety of operating modes, including: transparent mode (TM), unacknowledged mode (UM), and acknowledged mode (AM). RLC 630 may perform transmission of upper layer protocol data units (PDUs), error correction through automatic repeat request (ARQ) for AM data transmission, and concatenation, segmentation, and reassembly of RLC SDUs for UM and AM data transmission. RLC 630 may also perform re-segmentation of RLC data PDUs for AM data transmission, reorder RLC data PDUs for UM and AM data transmission, detect duplicate data for UM and AM data transmission, discard RLC SDUs for UM and AM data transmission, detect protocol errors for AM data transmission, and perform RLC re-establishment.

[0133] An instance of PDCP 640 may process requests from an instance of RRC 655 or an instance of SDAP 647, or both, and provide indications thereto using one or more Packet Data Convergence Protocol Service Points (PDCP-SAPs) 645. These requests and indications transmitted using PDCP-SAP 645 may include one or more radio bearers. PDCP 640 may perform header compression and decompression of IP data, maintain PDCP sequence numbers (SNs), perform in-order delivery of upper layer PDUs when lower layers are reestablished, eliminate duplication of lower layers when reestablishing lower layer SDUs for radio bearers mapped on RLC AM, encrypt and decrypt control plane data, perform integrity protection and integrity verification on control plane data, control timer-based data discard, and perform security operations (e.g., encryption, decryption, integrity protection, or integrity verification).

[0134] An instance of SDAP 647 may utilize one or more SDAP-SAP 649 to process requests from one or more higher layer protocol entities and provide instructions thereto. These requests and instructions transmitted using SDAP-SAP 649 may include one or more QoS flows. SDAP 647 may map QoS flows to data radio bearers (DRBs) and vice versa, and may also mark QoS flow identifiers (QFIs) in DL and UL packets. A single SDAP entity 647 may be configured for a separate PDU session. In the UL direction, NG-RAN 110 may control the mapping of QoS flows to DRBs in two different ways (reflective mapping or explicit mapping). For reflective mapping, SDAP 647 of UE 101 may monitor the QFI of the DL packets of each DRB, and may apply the same mapping to packets flowing in the UL direction. For DRBs, SDAP 647 of UE 101 may map UL packets belonging to a QoS flow corresponding to the QoS flow ID and PDU session observed in the DL packets of the DRB. To implement reflective mapping, the NG-RAN may mark the DL packets with a QoS flow ID over the Uu interface. The explicit mapping may involve the RRC 655 configuring the SDAP 647 with explicit mapping rules of QoS flows to DRBs, which may be stored and followed by the SDAP 647. In some examples, the SDAP 647 may be used only in NR implementations and may not be used in LTE implementations.

[0135] The RRC 655 may configure aspects of one or more protocol layers using one or more management service access points (M-SAPs), which may include one or more instances of PHY 610, MAC 620, RLC 630, PDCP 640, and SDAP 647. In some examples, instances of the RRC 655 may process requests from one or more NAS entities 657 using one or more RRC-SAPs 656 and provide indications thereto. The main services and functions of the RRC 655 may include broadcasting of system information (e.g., included in a master information block (MIB) or system information block (SIB) related to NAS), broadcasting of system information related to the access stratum (AS), paging, establishment, maintenance, and release of an RRC connection between the UE 101 and the RAN 110 (e.g., RRC connection paging, RRC connection establishment, RRC connection modification, and RRC connection release), establishment, configuration, maintenance, and release of point-to-point radio bearers, security functions including key management, inter-RAT mobility, and measurement configuration for UE measurement reporting. The MIB and SIB may include one or more information elements, each of which may include separate data fields or data structures.

[0136] NAS 657 may form the highest layer of the control plane between UE 101 and AMF. NAS 657 may support the mobility and session management procedures of UE 101 to establish and maintain an IP connection between UE 101 and P-GW in the LTE system.

[0137] In some examples, one or more protocol entities of arrangement 600 may be implemented in UE 101, RAN node 111, AMF in NR implementation or MME in LTE implementation, UPF in NR implementation or S-GW and P-GW in LTE implementation, etc., for control plane or user plane communication protocol stacks between the aforementioned devices. In some examples, one or more protocol entities that may be implemented in one or more of UE 101, gNB 111, AMF, etc. may communicate with corresponding peer protocol entities that may be implemented in or on another device (using the services of corresponding lower layer protocol entities to perform such communication). In some examples, the gNB-CU of gNB 111 may host the RRC 655, SDAP 647, and PDCP 640 of the gNB that control the operation of one or more gNB-DUs, and the gNB-DUs of gNB 111 may each host the RLC 630, MAC 620, and PHY 810 of gNB 111.

[0138] In some examples, the control plane protocol stack may include, in order from the highest layer to the lowest layer, NAS 857, RRC 855, PDCP 640, RLC 630, MAC 820, and PHY 810. In this example, the upper layer 660 may be built on top of NAS 857, which includes an IP layer 661, SCTP 662, and an application layer signaling protocol (AP) 663.

[0139] In some examples, such as in NR implementations, AP 663 may be an NG application protocol layer (NGAP or NG-AP) 663 for an NG interface 113 defined between an NG-RAN node 111 and an AMF, or AP 663 may be an Xn application protocol layer (XnAP or Xn-AP) 663 for an Xn interface 112 defined between two or more RAN nodes 111.

[0140] The NG-AP 663 may support the functionality of the NG interface 113 and may include an elementary procedure (EP). The NG-AP EP may be an interaction unit between the NG-RAN point 111 and the AMF. The NG-AP 663 services may include two groups: UE-associated services (e.g., services related to the UE 101) and non-UE-associated services (e.g., services related to the entire NG interface instance between the NG-RAN node 111 and the AMF). These services may include functions such as, but not limited to: a paging function for sending a paging request to the NG-RAN node 111 involved in a specific paging area; a UE context management function for allowing the AMF to establish, modify or release the UE context in the AMF and the NG-RAN node 111; a mobility function for the UE 101 in ECM-CONNECTED mode, for intra-system HO to support mobility within the NG-RAN, and for inter-system HO to support mobility from / to the EPS system; a NAS signaling transmission function for transmitting or rerouting NAS messages between the UE 101 and the AMF; a NAS node selection function for determining the association between the AMF and the UE 101; an NG interface management function for setting up the NG interface and monitoring errors through the NG interface; a warning message transmission function for providing a means for transmitting a warning message using the NG interface or cancelling an ongoing warning message broadcast; a configuration transmission function for requesting and transmitting RAN configuration information (e.g., SON information, or performance measurement (PM) data) between two RAN nodes 111 using the CN 120; or a combination thereof, etc.

[0141] The XnAP 663 may support the functions of the Xn interface 112 and may include XnAP basic mobility procedures and XnAP global procedures. The XnAP basic mobility procedures may include procedures for handling UE mobility within the NG RAN 111 (or E-UTRAN), such as handover preparation and cancellation procedures, SN state transfer procedures, UE context retrieval and UE context release procedures, RAN paging procedures, or procedures related to dual connectivity, etc. The XnAP global procedures may include procedures not related to a specific UE 101, such as Xn interface setup and reset procedures, NG-RAN update procedures, or cell activation procedures, etc.

[0142] In an LTE specific implementation, the AP 663 may be an S1 application protocol layer (S1-AP) 663 for the S1 interface 113 defined between the E-UTRAN node 111 and the MME, or the AP 663 may be an X2 application protocol layer (X2AP or X2-AP) 663 for the X2 interface 112 defined between two or more E-UTRAN nodes 111.

[0143] The S1 application protocol layer (S1-AP) 663 may support the functionality of the S1 interface, and similar to the NG-AP discussed previously, the S1-AP may include an S1-AP EP. The S1-AP EP may be an interaction unit between the E-UTRAN node 111 and the MME within the LTE CN 120. The S1-AP 663 services may include two groups: UE-associated services and non-UE-associated services. The functions performed by these services include, but are not limited to: E-UTRAN Radio Access Bearer (E-RAB) management, UE capability indication, mobility, NAS signaling transmission, RAN Information Management (RIM), and configuration transmission.

[0144] The X2AP 663 may support the functions of the X2 interface 112 and may include an X2AP basic mobility procedure and an X2AP global procedure. The X2AP basic mobility procedure may include a procedure for handling UE mobility within the E-UTRAN 120, such as a handover preparation and cancellation procedure, an SN state transfer procedure, a UE context retrieval and a UE context release procedure, a RAN paging procedure, or a procedure related to dual connectivity, etc. The X2AP global procedure may include a procedure not related to a specific UE 101, such as an X2 interface setup and reset procedure, a load indication procedure, an error indication procedure, or a cell activation procedure, etc.

[0145] The SCTP layer (alternatively referred to as the SCTP / IP layer) 662 may provide guaranteed delivery of application layer messages (e.g., NGAP or XnAP messages in NR implementations, or S1-AP or X2AP messages in LTE implementations). The SCTP 662 may ensure reliable delivery of signaling messages between the RAN node 111 and the AMF / MME based in part on the IP protocol supported by the IP 661. The Internet Protocol layer (IP) 661 may be used to perform packet addressing and routing functions. In some implementations, the IP layer 661 may deliver and transmit the PDUs using point-to-point transport. In this regard, the RAN node 111 may include L2 and L1 layer communication links (e.g., wired or wireless) with the MME / AMF to exchange information.

[0146] In some examples, the user plane protocol stack may include SDAP 647, PDCP 640, RLC 630, MAC 820, and PHY 810 in order from the highest layer to the lowest layer. The user plane protocol stack may be used for communication between UE 101, RAN node 111, and UPF 302 in NR implementation, or communication between S-GW and P-GW in LTE implementation. In this example, the upper layer 651 may be built on top of SDAP 647 and may include a user datagram protocol (UDP) and IP security layer (UDP / IP) 652, a general packet radio service (GPRS) tunneling protocol for a user plane layer (GTP-U) 653, and a user plane PDU layer (UP PDU) 663.

[0147] The transport network layer 654 (also referred to as the "transport layer") may be built on an IP transport, and the GTP-U 653 may be used on top of the UDP / IP layer 652 (including the UDP layer and the IP layer) to carry the user plane PDU (UP-PDU). The IP layer (also referred to as the "Internet layer") may be used to perform packet addressing and routing functions. The IP layer may assign IP addresses to user data packets, for example, in any of the IPv4, IPv6, or PPP formats.

[0148] GTP-U 653 may be used to carry user data within the GPRS core network and between the radio access network and the core network. For example, the transmitted user data may be packets in any of the IPv4, IPv6 or PPP formats. UDP / IP 652 may provide checksums for data integrity, port numbers for addressing different functions at the source and destination, and encryption and authentication of selected data flows. The RAN node 111 and the S-GW may exchange user plane data using a protocol stack including an L1 layer (e.g., PHY 610), an L2 layer (e.g., MAC 620, RLC 630, PDCP 640 and / or SDAP 647), a UDP / IP layer 652, and a GTP-U 653 using an S1-U interface. The S-GW and the P-GW may exchange user plane data using a protocol stack including an L1 layer, an L2 layer, a UDP / IP layer 652, and a GTP-U 653 using an S5 / S8a interface. As previously discussed, the NAS protocol may support the mobility of UE 101 and session management procedures to establish and maintain an IP connection between UE 101 and the P-GW.

[0149] In addition, despite Figure 6Not shown, but an application layer may exist above the AP 663 and / or transport network layer 654. The application layer may be a layer where a user of the UE 101, RAN node 111, or other network element interacts with a software application executed, for example, by the application circuitry 205 or the application circuitry 305, respectively. The application layer may also provide one or more interfaces for the software application to interact with the communication system of the UE 101 or RAN node 111, such as the baseband circuitry 410. In some examples, the IP layer or the application layer, or both, may provide functionality the same or similar to layers 5 to 7 of the open systems interconnection (OSI) model, or portions thereof (e.g., OSI layer 7—application layer, OSI layer 6—presentation layer, and OSI layer 5—session layer).

[0150] Figure 7 is a block diagram illustrating components for reading instructions from a machine-readable or computer-readable medium (e.g., a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium) and performing any one or more of the techniques described herein. Specifically, Figure 7 A schematic diagram of hardware resources 700 is shown, including one or more processors (or processor cores) 710, one or more memories or storage devices 720, and one or more communication resources 730, each of which may be communicatively coupled using a bus 740. For specific implementations in which node virtualization (e.g., NFV) is utilized, a hypervisor 702 may be executed to provide an execution environment for one or more network slices or sub-slices to utilize the hardware resources 700.

[0151] Processor 710 may include processor 712 and processor 714. Processor 710 may be, for example, a central processing unit (CPU), a reduced instruction set computing (RISC) processor, a complex instruction set computing (CISC) processor, a graphics processing unit (GPU), a DSP such as a baseband processor, an ASIC, an FPGA, a radio frequency integrated circuit (RFIC), another processor (including those discussed herein), or any suitable combination thereof.

[0152] The memory / storage device 720 may include main memory, disk storage, or any suitable combination thereof. The memory / storage device 720 may include, but is not limited to, any type of volatile or non-volatile memory, such as dynamic random access memory (DRAM), static random access memory (SRAM), erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), flash memory, or solid-state storage, or a combination thereof.

[0153] The communication resources 730 may include an interconnect or network interface component or other suitable device to communicate with one or more peripheral devices 704 or one or more databases 706 using the network 708. For example, the communication resources 730 may include a wired communication component (e.g., for coupling using USB), a cellular communication component, an NFC component, (or Low power consumption) components, components and other communication components.

[0154] The instructions 750 may include software, programs, applications, applet, applications, or other executable code for causing at least any one of the processors 710 to perform any one or more of the methodologies discussed herein. The instructions 750 may reside in whole or in part in at least one of the processors 710 (e.g., in a cache memory of the processor), the memory / storage device 720, or any suitable combination thereof. In addition, any portion of the instructions 750 may be transmitted to the hardware resources 700 from any combination of the peripheral device 704 or the database 706. Thus, the memory of the processor 710, the memory / storage device 720, the peripheral device 704, and the database 706 are examples of computer-readable and machine-readable media.

[0155] In 5G NR, the PDCCH monitoring period is defined by two configuration levels, the search space monitoring period defined by the number of time slots, and the monitoring timing defined by the symbol within the time slot. Specifically, the parameter "monitoringSlotPeriodicityAndOffset" is defined within the PDCCH search space set configuration to configure the PDCCH monitoring period and offset at the time slot level. In addition, the parameter "monitoredSymbolsWithinSlot" is defined to configure the PDCCH monitoring mode within the time slot, indicating the first symbol of the CORESET. Each configured search space with a specific monitoring period is associated with the CORESET in terms of the starting symbol within the time slot and the monitoring time slot. Therefore, the concept of PDCCH monitoring period is defined based on the search space set and is not configured at the CORESET level.

[0156] The concept of monitoring duration has also been introduced into the search space. Figure 8As shown, the monitoring duration 800 indicates the number of consecutive time slots 802 in which one or more monitoring opportunities for the corresponding PDCCH common search space (CSS) occur. The length of the monitoring duration is configured by RRC and can be in the range of one time slot up to (ks-1) time slots, where ks is the search space monitoring periodicity 804. In other words, the monitoring duration 800 defines the number of time slots that the search space lasts during each time period (e.g., the time period defined in monitoringSlotPeriodicityAndOffset). When the monitoring duration 800 has expired for a specific time period 804, the UE does not monitor the PDCCH for the corresponding search space set for the next (ks-monitoring duration) consecutive time slots. In terms of the number of subsequent time slots, the configuration allows monitoring bursts and gaps until the search space monitoring period 804. In this way, the monitoring duration forms a configurable window that can be widened to increase the duration of the PDCCH monitoring time in non-continuous bursts to cater to the burst traffic profile, while being able to trade off UE power consumption by using a larger monitoring period value.

[0157] Multiple PDCCH monitoring opportunities within a time slot (in addition to the PDCCH monitoring opportunities defined in the first three symbols of the time slot) may be supported as an optional UE capability, as defined by feature group 3-5b in 3GPP TS 38.306 and 38.822. A minimum time interval of X OFDM symbols may be included between the start of two spans, each of which is up to Y consecutive OFDM symbols, during which the PDCCH is configured to be monitored. In addition, certain DCIs may be processed for the group of monitoring opportunities within the same span, where the number of different starting symbol indices for the span of all PDCCH monitoring opportunities, as well as the number of PDCCH monitoring opportunities per time slot, are limited. Therefore, the UE may also be configured to have multiple monitoring opportunities beyond the first 3 symbols. In addition, the first layer of control information to be processed may include parallel triggering for unicast data transmission (e.g., PDSCH or PUSCH), as well as common control and broadcasting with the group of PDCCHs.

[0158] By limiting the number of PDCCHs a UE can expect within a slot duration, the UE processing load for PDCCH monitoring over a slot can be controlled. Therefore, the concept of monitoring span and span gap has been developed, which means that the UE is configured to monitor PDCCH at certain monitoring occasions.

[0159] In this regard, a UE may indicate its ability to monitor the PDCCH multiple times within a timeslot, but in some examples, it may be required to monitor at least a certain number of symbols between the times. This capability imposes certain scheduling constraints and is primarily based on how the UE's firmware can handle control flows (e.g., in terms of receiving grants and being able to perform subsequent processing). As described above, such capability limits place an upper limit on the UE processing load, because otherwise the UE may need to process control information flows that arrive at any time within a timeslot.

[0160] Ultra-Reliable Low-Delay Communication (URLLC) services introduce new requirements, traffic distributions, and scheduling characteristics to PDCCH monitoring. Therefore, it may be useful to enhance PDCCH monitoring (e.g., to achieve greater flexibility in scheduling opportunities, as well as other enhancements) to accommodate such requirements, profiles, and characteristics, because the use cases supported in 3GPP Release 16 may not be sufficient to meet the requirements of 3GPP Release 15. Of course, increasing the number of blind decodings (BDs) or the number of CCEs used for channel estimation can improve scheduling flexibility. However, these enhancements also increase UE complexity and power consumption. The UE needs to delimit control processing in terms of potential PDCCH monitoring enhancements (such as in terms of the maximum number of BDs / CCEs used for channel estimation). Therefore, the optimal balance between improved scheduling flexibility and block performance and increased UE complexity and power consumption should be determined.

[0161] Note that for convenience and compact presentation, the term “BD / CCE” is used herein to refer to “the number of BDs and / or the number of non-overlapping CCEs.” However, the term does not necessarily imply that the requirements for the number of BDs and the number of non-overlapping CCEs can be enforced simultaneously or using the same technique.

[0162] Requirements for the maximum number of BDs / non-overlapping CCEs:

[0163] In future releases of the 5G NR specification, a limit on the maximum number of BD / CCEs over a PDCCH monitoring duration shorter than a slot may be explicitly defined. For example, the duration of a monitoring opportunity or the monitoring span or both may be considered as a reference scale. As described above, in 3GPP Release 15, UE capability development (e.g., as defined in Feature Group 3-5b in 3GPP TS 38.306 and 38.822) does not consider aspects related to the maximum number of BD / CCEs used for channel estimation, and such characterization is defined on a per-slot basis (e.g., with respect to shorter durations such as monitoring spans having no relation).

[0164] The present disclosure provides techniques for defining, configuring, indicating and applying the concept of monitoring span and its implications in terms of defining constraints on the number of blind decodings used for channel estimation and the number of CCEs used for channel estimation. As used herein, "monitoring span" does not necessarily reuse what is defined in 3GPP Release 15, because the BD / CCE characterization imposes different issues compared to the PDCCH monitoring characterization of each feature group 3-5b in 3GPP TS 38.306 and 38.822.

[0165] Unless otherwise noted, the PDCCH monitoring enhancements described herein are applicable to different duplex systems such as FDD, TDD, bandwidth portions with different numerologies (e.g., 15kHz, 30kHz, 60kHz, 120kHz, etc.), licensed and unlicensed spectrum access, etc.

[0166] Used to define the monitoring span required by BD / CCE: definition, duration, configuration and indication:

[0167] Each monitoring span may be considered to have a length of up to Y consecutive OFDM symbols, where PDCCHs may be configured to be monitored. In one example, all PDCCHs associated with a span are fully contained within the span, and each PDCCH monitored is also part of the span.

[0168] There are different options to implement the starting symbol and duration of a span, as well as the starting and duration of a PDCCH associated with a span. In some examples, the starting and duration of the PDCCH associated with a span is determined according to the applicable CORESET and search space configuration. In addition, to avoid ambiguity when a PDCCH may belong to more than one span (such as if the PDCCH is completely contained in more than one span), the PDCCH is considered to be part of the span with the smallest starting symbol index among the spans that completely contain the PDCCH.

[0169] In some examples, the monitoring span is defined relative to a slot boundary, such as every m symbols to and from a slot boundary, where m can be any value less than the number of symbols in a slot (e.g., 14). The parameter m can be defined with or without a specific gap between the start of two consecutive spans. In one example, m is equal to 2 or 3. However, such a definition may impose unnecessary restrictions on the potential starting symbols of the PDCCH monitoring occasions, the possible combinations of CORESET durations, and their starting points. There may also be problems with isolated symbols that do not conform to a span of a specific duration or the case where a CORESET crosses a span boundary.

[0170] In some examples, every m symbols may be marked as a potential span start position. In some examples, the first potential start position without any PDCCH monitoring may trigger an overwrite of such rules. Upon such a trigger, M may be reduced by a specific value and a new potential start position may be marked.

[0171] In some examples, the span may be defined relative to a PDCCH monitoring opportunity (e.g., the start of a PDCCH monitoring opportunity). Thus, the first symbol of the span may correspond to a symbol for which the UE is configured to monitor the PDCCH. In one example, the start symbol of the span is defined to be aligned with the start symbol of the PDCCH monitoring opportunity for which the UE is configured. Such a configuration allows the span to include symbols in which the PDCCH is not monitored. For example, for a span with a duration of 3 symbols, a configuration like 'M0M' may be provided, where 'M' indicates monitoring of one symbol CORESET, and '0' indicates that there is no PDCCH monitoring in the symbol. In addition, in some examples, the maximum number of spans within a time slot duration may be specified on a per SCS basis, either configured to the UE via a higher layer, or reported by the UE as UE capability information. In some examples, the UE may indicate (e.g., based on its capabilities) the maximum span duration and the corresponding minimum gap (as a number of OFDM symbols) between the start symbols of two consecutive spans.

[0172] Note that spans should not overlap when used to characterize BD / CCE requirements, but can be used as an intermediate step to determine the final allocation of spans based on the actual configuration of PDCCH monitoring (e.g., the configured PDCCH search space sets and their monitoring opportunities (MO)). "Candidate spans" can overlap. However, if the allocated spans are constrained to be non-overlapping, and if all PDCCHs associated with the span are completely contained within the span, the resulting set of constraints can be overly restrictive with respect to the candidate PDCCH locations within the slot (and can approach the case where the span is defined based on slot boundaries and symbol indices). Therefore, to alleviate such restrictions, in some examples, as long as the first symbol of the CORESET (corresponding to the MO configured for the search space set mapped to the CORESET) is contained within the span of Y symbols, the PDCCH CORESET can be mapped over the span as long as the PDCCH does not cross the slot boundary. Then, the number of BD / CCEs corresponding to such PDCCH MO is counted as part of the span containing the first symbol of the CORESET (such as the symbol corresponding to the MO).

[0173] In some examples, the UE is configured with a span duration via higher layer signaling. In some examples, such configuration is based on the SCS of the DL BWP. Other alternatives include having the gNB (or another base station) configure some candidate set of span start positions and span duration values ​​to be selected down by the UE. In some examples, a default value may be set (e.g., including back-to-back spans that divide the entire timeslot).

[0174] As described above, there is a tradeoff between overall UE sizing (if these requirements are converted back to slot-level scaling) and effectiveness in typical URLLC-type scheduling, where only a few monitoring candidates may be needed that can be allocated within the slot duration. Therefore, the new capability characterization can effectively accommodate use cases with uneven and "triggered" monitoring opportunities, which can be achieved using the flexible span configuration described herein. In some examples, gNB configuration of span parameters or higher layer signaling to the UE, or both, can enable processing of dynamically triggered DCI monitoring.

[0175] In some examples, the maximum duration of a span may be fixed at a specific number of OFDM symbols (e.g., in the 3GPP specification). In one example, the maximum span length may be specified as 3 OFDM symbols because all 5G NR compliant UEs are able to receive PDCCH through the first three symbols of a slot.

[0176] New definitions of BD / CCE requirements and constraints:

[0177] The requirement for the number of BDs / CCEs may be defined in terms of the monitoring span. Although such an approach may increase the total number of non-overlapping CCEs (and / or BDs) per slot, an upper limit on what the UE may expect in terms of a certain number of symbols may then be defined by defining the requirement for the number of CCEs (and / or BDs) within a certain duration. This approach limits the total amount of layer-1 control information that the UE needs to process at one time or within a certain period of time in terms of the number of CCEs / BDs.

[0178] In one example, the above span for defining the BD / CCE requirement may follow the definition described herein. In another example, the span definition may follow the definition of 3GPP Release 15.

[0179] In some examples, the requirement may be defined based on 3GPP Release 15 onwards PDCCH monitoring span and span gap, where the span and span gap definitions may be enhanced. Some potential enhancements to Release 15 definitions (e.g., adaptation / update of the definition of span / span interval in the context of PDCCH monitoring enhancements for URLLC) include the following:

[0180] In one example, the restriction in version 15 that the spanning pattern be the same in each time slot can be relaxed to allow for more scheduling flexibility, such that the spanning pattern can be different across time slots. However, in some examples, spanning across time slot boundaries may still not be allowed.

[0181] In some examples, the maximum possible duration of the PDCCH monitoring span can be extended to a value greater than 2 or 3 symbols. Specifically, the new span duration values can include one or more of 1, 4, 6, or 7 symbols. The minimum number of BD / CCEs can be different for different span durations, or can be different for each choice of maximum duration, but for a given maximum span duration, the same value can be applied to the UE.

[0182] In another example, there can be more flexibility in defining the span and the span gap, such that PDCCH is allowed to cross the span boundary. In this case, if a span of duration N symbols crosses a time slot boundary, where n < N symbols are in time slot i, then the span is effectively truncated to n symbols, and any PDCCH to be monitored within such a span should also be mapped to a CORESET with a duration not exceeding n symbols.

[0183] In some examples, the span definition can be updated via higher layer, MAC CE signaling, DCI signaling, etc., to better adapt to changes in the monitoring opportunity across time slots. Such semi-static or dynamic updates can depend on the frequency of any monitoring opportunities included in the span and / or the number of monitoring opportunities in the span. In some examples, the coverage rules can be defined based on the span limits. For example, if in two or more consecutive time slots, some of the spans do not include any monitoring opportunities, then a less restricted span determination is considered.

[0184] In another example, the PDCCH monitoring enhancement is defined according to a specific number of symbols. This can also be considered a special case of span definition. Generally speaking, the overall characterization can include a combination of one or both or more of the time slot level, half time slot level, span level, and symbol level monitoring requirements. Thus, the PDCCH monitoring requirements for the number of BDS / CCEs can be defined simultaneously within more than one duration among multiple OFDM symbols. For example, the UE can be required to have at least the minimum required number of BD / CCEs for the corresponding span duration and the minimum required number of BD / CCEs within one or more of the following: 1-symbol duration, time slot duration.

[0185] Coexisting with current requirements:

[0186] When defining BD / CCE requirements within a shorter duration than a slot (eg, within a monitoring span, monitoring opportunity, etc.), it is important to consider how the new constraints coexist with pre-existing slot-level constraints.

[0187] In some examples, once newer constraints (as described herein) are configured, the slot-level constraints are overwritten. In another example, the UE can indicate its capabilities, and a predefined mapping between the capabilities and requirements can be used to determine the appropriate constraints. For example, since the UE is able to indicate its capabilities as well as the span duration and span gap under Release 15, such indications from the UE can also be used to indicate an overall characterization of the number of BD / CCEs. This capability signaling can be extended so that the UE can also report its ability to handle the maximum number of BD / CCEs per span or over the entire slot duration or both. For the latter option, in some examples, the capability can be indicated in a manner similar to the BD / CCE scaling for carrier aggregation (CA) scenarios, where the UE indicates one or more multiplication factors (e.g., one multiplication factor for each of the BD and CCE) based on the slot-level nominal value of the BD / CCE from Release 15 defined per parameter. Then, the per-span BD / CCE limit may be determined as X_total_in_slot / maxNumMaxSpans_in_slot, where X_total_in_slot is the maximum number of non-overlapping CCEs (or BDs, respectively), and maxNumSpans_in_slot is the maximum number of non-overlapping spans that may be supported within a slot duration. Here, X_total_in_slot = f*X_R15, where 'f' is a multiplication factor, and X_R15 is the number of non-overlapping CCEs (or BDs) per slot according to the Release 15 specification for the corresponding parameter set.

[0188] In some examples, the multiplication factor reported by the UE as part of the UE capability report may be weighed against the reported PDCCH monitoring capability reported for CA configuration. In some examples, when enhanced PDCCH monitoring is configured, the multiplication factor for the required total number of BD / CCEs per timeslot may be a non-integer.

[0189] In some examples, the above characterization of BD / CCE requirements for enhanced PDCCH monitoring is used to specify the requirements for each digital scheme, rather than being reported by the UE via a capability signaling framework. Under this approach, the UE may only indicate its capability for enhanced PDCCH monitoring (and possibly its capability with respect to spanning durations and spanning gaps), as described above.

[0190] In some examples, it may be defined whether and how the new requirements and new constraints are applied to the PDCCH in the UE-SS and / or CSS. For example, a predefined mapping is defined between the span position within the timeslot and the search space to be monitored. In some examples, the new constraint may be applied only to the PDCCH monitored in the UE-SS. Alternatively, the new constraint may be applied only to all PDCCHs monitored in both the UE-SS and the CSS. In another example, the new constraint may be applied to both the UE-SS and a subset of CSS types (e.g., type 3 CSS; type 1 CSS with a dedicated RRC configuration and type 3 CSS; or types 0, 0A, and 2 CSS, or a combination thereof, etc.).

[0191] In order to maintain the scheduling flexibility of Release 15 (e.g., scheduling of common control messages), in some examples, the minimum number of BD / CCEs that a UE is expected to support in a span or subslot corresponding to the first two or three symbols of a slot may be different from the number of BD / CCEs in subsequent spans / subslots within the slot. In addition, in the example, the minimum number of BD / CCEs within the span corresponding to the first two or three symbols of the slot is the same as the slot-level requirement in Release 15, but in addition to the per-span requirement (for other spans in the slot), additional per-slot requirements are defined. Such additional per-slot requirements can be defined using the mechanism described herein with respect to the indication of a multiplication factor to determine the new slot-level requirement. In such an example, the number of BD / CCEs in the first span in the slot (within the first two or three symbols in the slot) is subtracted from the total slot-level limit, and the result is divided into subsequent spans within the slot.

[0192] In some examples, such as where special treatment is assigned to a span corresponding to the first two to three symbols of a slot, the example described above of counting PDCCH candidates corresponding to an MO of a search space having a PDCCH that starts within the span but ends outside the first two or three symbols of the slot does not apply. Instead, such BD / CCEs may be counted as part of the next span. Alternatively, the above-described counting method of illustrating BD / CCEs of an MO based on the span to which the starting symbol of the MO belongs may be applied to the first span in a slot.

[0193] In some examples, the PDCCH monitoring requirement may be defined such that the number of BD / CCEs for CSS candidates may use the entire slot-level BD / CCE budget on a single span (which may be shorter than the slot duration). Specifically, the number of BD / CCEs in the span may be equal to the slot-level limit only when all PDCCH candidates in the span correspond to a PDCCH CSS set including type 0, 0A, 1, 2, and 3 PDCCH CCS sets (without RRC configuration). In this example, there may be a single PDCCH span in the slot. If the span includes PDCCH candidates from UE-SS or type 3 CSS that are specially configured for the UE, a span-level limit (which is not greater than the slot-level limit) may be applied. Alternatively, the constraint may be relaxed such that as long as there is a single span within the slot duration, the span-level limit may be exceeded to the point where the slot-level limit is reached within a single PDCCH span with both CSS and UE-SS candidates within the span. In yet another example, the span level limit may be exceeded to the point where the slot level limit is reached within a single PDCCH span with both CSS and UE-SS candidates within the span, as long as there are no more than two non-overlapping spans within the slot duration, one of which contains only PDCCH candidates from PDCCH CSS types 0, 0A, 1, 2, and 3 (without RRC configuration).

[0194] Optimization or discard rules to maintain UE BD and CCE requirements:

[0195] In some examples, mapping and discarding rules have been defined such that if the number of PDCCH BD candidates or the number of CCEs used for channel estimation in a time slot exceeds the corresponding minimum requirement, the UE discards the current search space set and all subsequent search space sets configured to be monitored in the time slot, where the mapping of the search space sets follows the ascending order of the search space set ID (SS_ID). This may result in the entire search space set being deleted even if a single candidate in the search space set causes the total number of BDs or CCEs used for channel estimation to exceed the corresponding specified minimum requirement. This may result in excessive discarding of search space sets, especially for cases where the search space set is configured with a relatively large number of BD candidates or BD candidates with a large aggregation level (AL). At least the latter case is common in URLCC use cases that schedule traffic with low latency and / or high reliability requirements.

[0196] If constraints are defined on the sub-slot duration, the excess and drop rules may be affected and should therefore be reconsidered.

[0197] Taking into account the potential overlap between monitoring opportunities, if the characterization of the maximum number of BD / CCEs used for channel estimation is defined based on the monitoring opportunity, appropriate UE behavior as well as discarding and prioritization rules should be specified in the event of overlap. Techniques for reducing the impact of discarding PDCCH candidates when the BD or channel estimation minimum requirements are exceeded are described above, including identification and prioritization based on the location of the monitoring opportunity within the time slot used for the search space set. In some examples, if the characterization of the maximum number of BD / CCEs used for channel estimation is defined based on the monitoring opportunity, in the event of overlap between monitoring opportunities, the UE may prioritize monitoring opportunities within certain symbols (e.g., within the first three symbols).

[0198] Similarly, techniques for prioritizing and discarding based on the monitoring span within the timeslot may be defined. Here, consider the case where some candidates within a subslot (or monitoring span) may be discarded. In one example, the discarded candidates may be defined as those candidates within the search space or at the search space set level, which may be discarded at the subslot / span level rather than the timeslot level. In another example, the discard may be defined based on the type of DCI transmitted in the SS within the monitoring span or subslot duration. In yet another example, the discard rule may be based on the position of the monitoring span within the timeslot of the search space set. For example, the mapping to PDCCH candidates may follow the order of a specific span sequence within the timeslot of the search space set, such as spans occurring within the first three symbols of the timeslot, or for a given search space set, those spans within every N symbols (N={2,3,7,…}, N<14) are prioritized.

[0199] In yet another case, the discard rule may be defined based on the search space (SS) type (e.g., CSS or UE-SS) in which the UE monitors PDCCH candidates, and may depend on how the new constraints are applied to the PDCCH in the UE-SS and / or CSS, and / or based on the DCI format as described above. Therefore, the corresponding SS may take precedence over other SSs. In one example, the discard rule may be exempted for the corresponding SS unless all candidates from other SSs have been discarded and the number of PDCCH BD candidates or CCEs used for channel estimation still exceeds the corresponding minimum requirement. In addition, if a predefined mapping is defined between the span position within the time slot and the specific search space to be monitored, the discard rule defined based on the span position within the time slot may also mean that the discard rule is associated with the monitored SS.

[0200] DC size budget processing:

[0201] In order to better adapt to URLLC traffic characteristics and scheduling requirements, in addition to the existing Release 15 fallback / non-fallback DCI formats, new DCI formats can also be defined. Therefore, format size and budget processing need to be considered for the new DCI format.

[0202] In some examples, dynamic processing options (e.g., by configuration) are defined to maintain an existing (e.g., “3+1”) budget for scheduling DCI format sizes. In this example, zero padding bits may be used to size match non-fallback UL and DL. In Release 15, the UL and DL non-fallback DCI formats are not size matched because zero padding bits are not considered in the design. In some examples, if the configuration using a new DCI format exceeds the DCI size budget (e.g., one with a new URLLC-optimized size for both DL and UL scheduling), the network may configure one DCI format size from the fallback UL / DL, one DCI format size from the non-fallback UL / DL (e.g., by applying configurable size matching), and one DCI format size from the URLLC DCI format UL / DL.

[0203] In summary, under the new DCI formats proposed here, the network may choose to apply zero padding to size matching UL / DL non-fallback DCI formats to meet the DCI format size budget based on higher layer configuration, rather than allowing non-fallback UL and DL DCI to have two different sizes (which would result in two sizes in the DCI budget). Utilizing the identifier field in the non-fallback DCI, the UL / DL DCI can be identified, and this approach allows the number of different DCI sizes to be limited without introducing any ambiguity. Therefore, if configured by higher layers, the UE may assume that if the total number of DCI format sizes for data scheduling DCI formats that can be scrambled with C-RNTI is greater than three (e.g., across DCI formats 0_0, 0_1, 1_0, 1_1, and new DL and UL DCI formats, if introduced) at the end of the DCI format size alignment process step, the sizes of DCI formats 0_1 and 1_1 match the zero padding bits added to the smaller format in the DCI format, as specified in section 7.3.1.0 of 3GPP TS 38.212.

[0204] The new definition of the monitoring span has implications for the dynamic signaling of the monitoring window:

[0205] There are different options for extending the techniques for configuring the monitoring duration, such as dynamic signaling to adapt the monitoring window or period or both, a flexible bitmap for configuring each timeslot within a monitoring period as enabled or disabled, timeslots identified as a set of opportunities for reduced monitoring, or combinations thereof.

[0206] In some examples, a set of monitoring opportunities adjusted within a time slot is characterized in terms of monitoring span within the time slot and spanning gaps. In doing so, the indication of monitoring parameters is simplified and signaling overhead is reduced. In some examples, the UE indicates its ability to support such characterization.

[0207] In some examples, rather than turning monitoring "on" or "off" for an entire timeslot using a monitoring duration parameter or a bitmap whose length is equal to the monitoring period, some timeslots may be identified as monitoring a set of opportunities over a specific subset of all monitoring spans in that timeslot. In one example, such timeslots may be identified by the position of the 0s within the bitmap (which may be carried by the search space set configuration via dedicated RRC signaling).

[0208] In some examples, there may be no restriction on the timeslot duration, which is the minimum granularity of the monitoring configuration indicated via the monitoring duration or bitmap option, so the (UE-specific) configuration may be applicable and extend the duration for the monitoring span.

[0209] Fig. 9 A flow chart of an exemplary process 900 for enhanced PDCCH monitoring is shown. In some examples, Figures 1 to 8 An electronic device, network, system, chip, or component, or a portion or specific implementation thereof, may be configured to perform process 900.

[0210] The operation of process 900 includes determining a monitoring span (902) for monitoring a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) within a time slot. The monitoring span may be determined, for example, by a UE (e.g., UE 101) or a base station (e.g., RAN node 111, such as gNb or eNb). The monitoring span includes a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot. The starting symbol may be defined relative to a boundary of the time slot or relative to a PDCCH monitoring opportunity, etc. The duration of the monitoring span may be one, two, or three symbols (e.g., OFDM symbols), or greater than three symbols (e.g., 4, 6, or 7 symbols). In some examples, at least one of the starting symbol or duration of the monitoring span is configured to change across time slots.

[0211] At least one of a starting symbol or a duration of the monitoring span may be determined based on a configured channel resource set (CORESET) or a search space configuration. In some examples, a signal received from a base station (e.g., via high-layer signaling, MAC CE signaling, DCI signaling, etc.) may include an indication of at least one of a starting symbol or a duration of the monitoring span. In some examples, a signal indicating one or more PDCCH monitoring capabilities of the UE is transmitted (e.g., by the UE and to the base station), and another signal indicating one or more parameters of the monitoring span is received (e.g., at the UE and from the base station), wherein the one or more parameters are determined based at least in part on the PDCCH monitoring capabilities of the user equipment.

[0212] Based on the monitoring span, at least one of a maximum number of blind decoding (BD) attempts or a maximum number of control channel elements (CCEs) for channel estimation for the monitoring span may be determined 904. In some examples, at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs is determined by X_total_in_slot / maxNumMaxSpans_in_slot, where X_total_in_slot is the maximum number of non-overlapping CCEs or BDs available, and maxNumSpans_in_slot is the maximum number of non-overlapping monitoring spans supported within a slot.

[0213] The PDCCH is monitored within the monitoring span until at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs. (906). In some examples, a CORESET associated with the PDCCH is completely contained within the monitoring span. Alternatively, the CORESET associated with the PDCCH may extend beyond the monitoring span, and the first symbol of the CORESET is located within the monitoring span. In some examples, a second monitoring span within the time slot is determined, wherein the second monitoring span does not overlap with the monitoring span. At least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation for the second monitoring span may be determined, which is different from at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation for the monitoring span. One or more PDCCH candidates may be discarded based on the monitoring span. In some examples, when it is determined that the monitoring span extends across a boundary of the time slot, the monitoring span may be truncated. In some examples, the monitoring span may be adjusted in response to an indication of a change (e.g., an increase or decrease) in the number of monitoring opportunities within the time slot. The PDCCH monitoring search space (eg, CSS or UE-SS) may be constrained based on at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs.

[0214] It is understood that the use of personally identifiable information should be subject to privacy policies and practices that are generally recognized to meet or exceed industry or government requirements for maintaining user privacy. Specifically, personally identifiable information data should be managed and processed to minimize the risk of unintentional or unauthorized access or use, and the nature of the authorized use should be clearly stated to users.

[0215] In different specific implementations, the methods described herein can be implemented in software, hardware, or a combination thereof. In addition, the order of the blocks of the method can be changed, and various elements can be added, reordered, combined, omitted, modified, etc. Various modifications and changes can be made, which will be apparent to those skilled in the art who benefit from this disclosure. The various specific implementations described herein are intended to be illustrative and not restrictive. Many variations, modifications, additions, and improvements are possible. Therefore, multiple examples can be provided for the components described herein as a single example. The boundaries between various components, operations, and data repositories are arbitrary to a certain extent, and specific operations are shown in the context of a specific exemplary configuration. Other allocations of functions are contemplated, and they may fall within the scope of the appended claims. Finally, the structure and function presented as discrete components in the exemplary configuration may be implemented as a combined structure or component.

[0216] In various examples, one or more of the techniques described herein may be implemented by: a system; an apparatus; one or more non-transitory computer-readable media comprising instructions for causing an electronic device to perform one or more of the techniques described herein when the instructions are executed by one or more processors of an electronic device; a method, technique or process, a datagram, a packet, a frame, a segment, a protocol data unit (PDU) or a message; a signal encoded with data; an electromagnetic signal carrying computer-readable instructions, wherein execution of the computer-readable instructions by one or more processors causes the one or more processors to perform one or more of the techniques described herein; a computer program comprising instructions, wherein execution of the program by a processing element causes the processing element to perform one or more of the techniques described herein; or a chip, a microchip, a system on a chip, an integrated circuit; or a combination thereof, and the like.

[0217] The following terms and definitions may apply to the examples described herein.

[0218] The term "circuit" as used herein refers to a circuit or a system of multiple circuits configured to perform a specific function in an electronic device. A circuit or circuit system may be part of or include a hardware component such as an electronic circuit, a logic circuit, a processor (shared, dedicated or group) and / or a memory (shared, dedicated or group) configured to provide the function, an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC), a field programmable device (FPD) (e.g., a field programmable gate array (FPGA), a programmable logic device (PLD), a complex PLD (CPLD), a high capacity PLD (HCPLD), a structured ASIC or a programmable SoC), a digital signal processor (DSP), etc. In some examples, a circuit may execute one or more software or firmware programs to provide at least some of the functions. The term "circuit" may also refer to a combination of one or more hardware elements and a program code for performing the function of the program code (or a combination of circuits used in an electrical or electronic system). In these examples, the combination of hardware elements and program codes may be referred to as a circuit of a specific type.

[0219] As used herein, the term "processor circuit" refers to, is part of, or includes a circuit capable of sequentially and automatically performing a series of arithmetic or logical operations or recording, storing, and / or transmitting digital data. The term "processor circuit" may refer to one or more application processors, one or more baseband processors, a physical central processing unit (CPU), a single-core processor, a dual-core processor, a triple-core processor, a quad-core processor, and / or any other device capable of executing or otherwise operating computer-executable instructions (such as program code, software modules, and / or functional processes). The terms "application circuit" and / or "baseband circuit" may be considered synonymous with "processor circuit" and may be referred to as "processor circuit".

[0220] As used herein, the term "memory" and / or "memory circuit" refers to one or more hardware devices for storing data, including random access memory (RAM), magnetoresistive RAM (MRAM), phase change random access memory (PRAM), dynamic random access memory (DRAM) and / or synchronous dynamic random access memory (SDRAM), core memory, read-only memory (ROM), magnetic disk storage media, optical storage media, flash memory devices, or other machine-readable media for storing data. The term "computer-readable medium" may include, but is not limited to, memory, portable or fixed storage devices, optical storage devices, and various other media capable of storing, containing or carrying instructions or data.

[0221] As used herein, the term "interface circuit" refers to a circuit that enables, is a part of, or includes information exchange between two or more components or devices. The term "interface circuit" may refer to one or more hardware interfaces, such as a bus, an I / O interface, a peripheral component interface, a network interface card, etc.

[0222] As used herein, the term "user equipment" or "UE" refers to a device that has radio communication capabilities and can describe a remote user of network resources in a communication network. In addition, the terms "user equipment" or "UE" may be considered synonymous and may be referred to as a client, mobile phone, mobile device, mobile terminal, user terminal, mobile unit, mobile station, mobile user, subscriber, user, remote station, access agent, user agent, receiver, radio equipment, reconfigurable radio equipment, reconfigurable mobile device, etc. In addition, the term "user equipment" or "UE" may include any type of wireless / wired device or any computing device that includes a wireless communication interface.

[0223] As used herein, the term "network element" refers to physical or virtualized equipment and / or infrastructure for providing wired or wireless communication network services. The term "network element" may be considered synonymous with and / or referred to as a networked computer, networking hardware, network equipment, network node, router, switch, hub, bridge, radio network controller, RAN equipment, RAN node, gateway, server, virtualized VNF, NFVI, etc.

[0224] As used herein, the term "computer system" refers to any type of interconnected electronic devices, computer devices, or components thereof. Additionally, the terms "computer system" and / or "system" may refer to various components of a computer that are communicatively coupled to one another. Furthermore, the terms "computer system" and / or "system" may refer to multiple computer devices and / or multiple computing systems that are communicatively coupled to one another and configured to share computing and / or networking resources.

[0225] As used herein, the terms "appliance", "computer appliance", etc. refer to a computer device or computer system with program code (e.g., software or firmware) that is specifically designed to provide specific computing resources. A "virtual appliance" is a virtual machine image to be implemented by a device equipped with a hypervisor that virtualizes or emulates a computer appliance or is otherwise dedicated to providing specific computing resources.

[0226] The term "element" refers to an indivisible unit with well-defined boundaries at a given level of abstraction, where an element may be any type of entity including, for example, one or more devices, systems, controllers, network elements, modules, etc., or a combination thereof.

[0227] The term "device" refers to a physical entity that is embedded within or attached to another physical entity in its vicinity that has the capability to transfer digital information to or from that physical entity.

[0228] The term "entity" refers to the different components of an architecture or device, or the information passed as a payload.

[0229] The term "controller" refers to an element or entity that has the ability to affect a physical entity, such as by changing its state or causing the physical entity to move.

[0230] As used herein, the term "resource" refers to a physical or virtual device, a physical or virtual component within a computing environment, and / or a physical or virtual component within a specific device, such as a computer device, a mechanical device, a memory space, a processor / CPU time and / or a processor / CPU usage rate, a processor and accelerator load, a hardware time or usage rate, a power supply, an input / output operation, a port or a network socket, a channel / link allocation, throughput, memory usage rate, storage, a network, a database and an application, a unit of work, etc. "Hardware resources" may refer to computing, storage and / or network resources provided by physical hardware elements. "Virtualized resources" may refer to computing, storage and / or network resources provided by a virtualized infrastructure to an application, a device, a system, etc. The term "network resources" or "communication resources" may refer to resources that a computer device / system can access via a communication network. The term "system resources" may refer to any kind of shared entity that provides a service, and may include computing resources and / or network resources. System resources may be considered as a set of coherent functions, network data objects or services that can be accessed through a server, wherein such system resources reside on a single host or multiple hosts and can be clearly identified.

[0231] As used herein, the term "channel" refers to any tangible or intangible transmission medium for transmitting data or data streams. The term "channel" may be synonymous and / or equivalent to "communication channel", "data communication channel", "transmission channel", "data transmission channel", "access channel", "data access channel", "link", "data link", "carrier", "radio frequency carrier" and / or any other similar terms representing a path or medium through which data is transmitted. In addition, the term "link" as used herein refers to a connection between two devices for transmitting and receiving information over a RAT.

[0232] As used herein, the term "communication protocol" (wired or wireless) refers to a set of standardized rules or instructions implemented by communication devices and / or systems to communicate with other devices and / or systems, including instructions for packetizing / unpacking data, modulating / demodulating signals, implementing protocol stacks, etc.

[0233] As used herein, the terms "instantiate," "instantiate," and the like refer to the creation of an instance. "Instance" also refers to a specific occurrence of an object, which may occur, for example, during the execution of program code.

[0234] The terms "coupled," "communicatively coupled," and their derivatives are used herein. The term "coupled" may mean that two or more elements are in direct physical or electrical contact with each other, may mean that two or more elements are in indirect contact with each other but still cooperate or interact with each other, and / or may mean that one or more other elements are coupled or connected between the elements said to be coupled to each other. The term "directly coupled" may mean that two or more elements are in direct contact with each other. The term "communicatively coupled" may mean that two or more elements may be in contact with each other by means of communication, including through a wire or other interconnect connection, through a wireless communication channel or link, etc.

[0235] The term "information element" refers to a structural element that contains one or more fields. The term "field" refers to the individual contents of an information element, or a data element that contains the contents.

[0236] The term "admission control" refers to a verification process in a communication system where a check is performed before a connection is established to see if current resources are sufficient for the proposed connection.

[0237] The term "SMTC" refers to the SSB-based measurement timing configuration configured by SSB-MeasurementTimingConfiguration.

[0238] The term "SSB" refers to SS / PBCH block.

[0239] The term "primary cell" refers to an MCG cell operating on a primary frequency, where the UE either performs an initial connection establishment procedure or initiates a connection re-establishment procedure.

[0240] The term "primary SCG cell" refers to an SCG cell in which a UE performs random access when reconfiguration is performed using a synchronization procedure for DC operation.

[0241] The term "secondary cell" refers to a cell that provides additional radio resources on top of a special cell for a UE configured with CA.

[0242] The term "secondary cell group" refers to a subset of serving cells including a PSCell for a UE configured with DC and zero or more secondary cells.

[0243] The term "serving cell" refers to a primary cell for a UE in RRC_CONNECTED without CA / DC configured, where there is only one serving cell including the primary cell.

[0244] The term "serving cell" refers to a cell group including a special cell for a UE configured with CA / DC and in RRC_CONNECTED and all secondary cells.

[0245] The term "special cell" refers to the PCell of the MCG or the PSCell of the SCG for DC operation; otherwise, the term "special cell" refers to the Pcell.

Claims

1. A method for communication, comprising: determining a monitoring span for monitoring a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) within a time slot, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot; determining at least one of a maximum number of blind decoding BD attempts or a maximum number of control channel elements CCE for channel estimation based on the monitoring span; monitoring the PDCCH within the monitoring span until at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs; as well as The monitoring span is adjusted in response to an indication of a change in the number of monitoring opportunities within the time slot. 2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the starting symbol of the monitoring span is defined relative to a boundary of the time slot. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the starting symbol of the monitoring span is defined relative to a PDCCH monitoring opportunity. The method of claim 1 , wherein the duration of the monitoring span is greater than three symbols. 5 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein at least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span is determined based on a configured channel resource set (CORESET) or a search space configuration.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising receiving a signal from a base station comprising an indication of at least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein a CORESET associated with the PDCCH is completely contained within the monitoring span.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein a CORESET associated with the PDCCH extends beyond the monitoring span, and wherein a first symbol of the CORESET is located within the monitoring span.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining a second monitoring span within the time slot, wherein the second monitoring span does not overlap with the monitoring span.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising determining at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation for the second monitoring span that is different from the at least one of a maximum number of BD attempts or a maximum number of CCEs for channel estimation for the monitoring span.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span is configured to vary across time slots.

12. The method according to claim 1, further comprising: Transmitting, by a user equipment to a base station, a signal indicating one or more PDCCH monitoring capabilities of the user equipment; as well as A signal is received at the user equipment from the base station indicating one or more parameters of the monitoring span, wherein the one or more parameters are determined based at least in part on the PDCCH monitoring capability of the user equipment.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs is determined by X_total_in_slot / maxNumMaxSpans_in_slot, wherein X_total_in_slot is the maximum number of available non-overlapping CCEs or BDs, and maxNumSpans_in_slot is the maximum number of non-overlapping monitoring spans supported within the time slot.

14. The method of claim 1, further comprising discarding one or more PDCCH candidates based on the monitoring span.

15. The method of claim 1, further comprising truncating the monitoring span upon determining that the monitoring span extends across a boundary of the time slot.

16. The method of claim 1, further comprising constraining a PDCCH monitoring search space based on the at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs. 17 . The method of claim 16 , wherein the search space comprises a common search space (CSS) or a user equipment-specific search space (UE-SS).

18. A user equipment UE device, comprising: one or more processors; and a memory storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations including: determining a monitoring span for monitoring a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) within a time slot, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot; determining at least one of a maximum number of blind decoding BD attempts or a maximum number of control channel elements CCE for channel estimation based on the monitoring span; monitoring the PDCCH within the monitoring span until at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs; as well as The monitoring span is adjusted in response to an indication of a change in the number of monitoring opportunities within the time slot.

19. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations comprising: determining a monitoring span for monitoring a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) within a time slot, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot; determining at least one of a maximum number of blind decoding BD attempts or a maximum number of control channel elements CCE for channel estimation based on the monitoring span; monitoring the PDCCH within the monitoring span until at least one of the maximum number of BD attempts or the maximum number of CCEs; as well as The monitoring span is adjusted in response to an indication of a change in the number of monitoring opportunities within the time slot.

20. A method for communication, comprising: determining capability information of a user equipment UE, the capability information comprising at least one of a maximum number of blind decoding BD attempts or a maximum number of control channel elements CCE for channel estimation; determining one or more monitoring spans for monitoring a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) within a time slot based on the capability information, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot; as well as At least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span is transmitted to the UE, wherein the monitoring span is adjusted in response to an indication of a change in the number of monitoring opportunities within the time slot.

21. A base station BS, comprising: Transceiver; one or more processors; and a memory storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations including: determining capability information of a user equipment UE, the capability information comprising at least one of a maximum number of blind decoding BD attempts or a maximum number of control channel elements CCE for channel estimation; determining one or more monitoring spans for monitoring a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) within a time slot based on the capability information, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot; as well as At least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span is transmitted by the transceiver to the UE, wherein the monitoring span is adjusted in response to an indication of a change in the number of monitoring opportunities within the time slot.

22. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations comprising: determining capability information of a user equipment UE, the capability information comprising at least one of a maximum number of blind decoding BD attempts or a maximum number of control channel elements CCE for channel estimation; determining one or more monitoring spans for monitoring a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) within a time slot based on the capability information, the monitoring span having a starting symbol and a duration spanning one or more symbols within the time slot; as well as At least one of the starting symbol or the duration of the monitoring span is transmitted to the UE, wherein the monitoring span is adjusted in response to an indication of a change in the number of monitoring opportunities within the time slot.

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