Control Channel Monitoring Based on Subcarrier Spacing

Abstract

Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide techniques for supporting subcarrier spacing (SCS)-based control channel monitoring.

Description

[0001] Cross - Reference to Related Applications

[0002] This application claims priority to U.S. Application No. 17 / 028,652, filed on September 22, 2020, which claims the benefit and priority of U.S. Provisional Application No. 62 / 909,980, filed on October 3, 2019. Both of these applications are assigned to the assignee of this application and are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety as if fully set forth herein and for all applicable purposes.

[0003] Background

[0004] Public domain

[0005] Aspects of the present disclosure relate to wireless communication, and more particularly, to techniques for controlling channel monitoring.

[0006] Description of related technologies

[0007] Wireless communication systems are widely deployed to provide various telecommunication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, broadcasting, etc. These wireless communication systems may employ multiple access technologies capable of supporting communication with multiple users by sharing available system resources (e.g., bandwidth, transmit power, etc.). Examples of such multiple access systems include Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Long Term Evolution (LTE) systems, Advanced LTE (LTE - A) systems, Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) systems, Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) systems, Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) systems, Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) systems, Single - Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access (SC - FDMA) systems, and Time Division - Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access (TD - SCDMA) systems, to name just a few.

[0008] In some examples, a wireless multi-access communication system may include a number of base stations (BSs), each capable of supporting communications for multiple communication devices (also referred to as user equipment (UE)) simultaneously. In an LTE or LTE-A network, a set including one or more base stations may define an evolved Node B (eNB). In other examples (e.g., in a next generation, New Radio (NR), or 5G network), a wireless multi-access communication system may include a number of distributed units (DUs) (e.g., edge units (EUs), edge nodes (ENs), radio heads (RHs), smart radio heads (SRHs), transmission reception points (TRPs), etc.) in communication with a number of central units (CUs) (e.g., central nodes (CNs), access node controllers (ANCs), etc.), where a set including one or more distributed units in communication with the central unit may define an access node (e.g., which may be referred to as a base station, 5G NB, next generation Node B (gNB or g B node), TRP, etc.). The base station or distributed unit may communicate with a set of UEs on a downlink channel (e.g., for transmissions from the base station or to the UE) and an uplink channel (e.g., for transmissions from the UE to the base station or distributed unit).

[0009] These multi-access technologies have been adopted in various telecommunication standards to provide a common protocol that enables different wireless devices to communicate at the city, national, regional, and even global levels. New Radio (NR) (e.g., 5G) is an example of an emerging telecommunication standard. NR is an enhanced set of the LTE mobile standard promulgated by 3GPP. It is designed to better support mobile broadband Internet access by improving spectral efficiency, reducing costs, improving services, leveraging new spectrums, and better integrating with other open standards that use OFDMA with cyclic prefix (CP) on the downlink (DL) and uplink (UL). To this end, NR supports beamforming, multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna technology, and carrier aggregation.

[0010] However, as the demand for mobile broadband access continues to grow, there is a need for further improvements to NR and LTE technologies. Preferably, these improvements should be applicable to other multi-access technologies and telecommunication standards that employ these technologies.

[0011] Brief Overview

[0012] The systems, methods, and devices of the present disclosure each have several aspects, with no single aspect solely responsible for their desirable attributes. Without limiting the scope of the present disclosure as expressed by the appended claims, some features will now be briefly discussed. After considering this discussion, and particularly after reading the section entitled "Detailed Description," it will be understood how the features of the present disclosure provide advantages, including improved communication between access points and stations in a wireless network.

[0013] Some aspects relate to a method of wireless communication by a user equipment (UE). The method includes signaling to a serving cell one or more sets of UE capabilities. Each of the one or more sets of UE capabilities indicates a number of per-slot supported spans for monitoring a control channel transmitted by a scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling one or more of uplink communication or downlink communication of the UE with one or more scheduled cells. Each of the one or more sets of UE capabilities further indicates a number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. The one or more sets of UE capabilities are for each of: same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel scheduling communication of the UE with the scheduling cell, or the control channel scheduling communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel scheduling communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel scheduling communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell. The method further includes monitoring the control channel according to the one or more sets of UE capabilities.

[0014] Certain aspects relate to a method of wireless communication by a network that includes one or more cells serving a user equipment (UE). The method includes receiving, by a serving cell, signaling of one or more sets of UE capabilities of the UE. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities indicates a number of per-slot supported spans for monitoring a control channel transmitted by a scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling uplink communication or downlink communication, or both, of the UE with one or more scheduled cells. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities further indicates a number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. The one or more sets of UE capabilities are for each of: same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel schedules communication of the UE with the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell. The method further includes communicating with the UE based on the one or more sets of UE capabilities.

[0015] Some aspects relate to a user equipment (UE) that includes a memory and a processor coupled to the memory. The memory and the processor are configured to signal to a serving cell one or more sets of UE capabilities. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities indicates a number of supported spans per time slot for monitoring a control channel transmitted by a scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling one or more of uplink communication or downlink communication of the UE with one or more scheduled cells. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities further indicates a number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. The one or more sets of UE capabilities are for each of: same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel schedules communication of the UE with the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell. The memory and the processor are further configured to monitor the control channel based on the one or more sets of UE capabilities.

[0016] Certain aspects relate to a serving cell of a network, the network including one or more cells serving a user equipment (UE). The serving cell includes a memory and a processor coupled to the memory. The memory and the processor are configured to receive signaling of one or more UE capability sets of the UE. Each of the one or more UE capability sets indicates a number of supported spans per time slot for monitoring a control channel transmitted by a scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling uplink communication or downlink communication, or both, of the UE with one or more scheduled cells. Each of the one or more UE capability sets further indicates a number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. The one or more UE capability sets are for each of: same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel schedules communication of the UE with the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell. The memory and the processor are further configured to communicate with the UE based on the one or more UE capability sets.

[0017] Some aspects relate to a user equipment (UE). The UE includes means for signaling to a serving cell one or more sets of UE capabilities of the UE. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities indicates a number of supported spans per time slot for monitoring a control channel transmitted by a scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling one or more of uplink communication or downlink communication of the UE with one or more scheduled cells. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities further indicates a number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. The one or more sets of UE capabilities are for each of: same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel schedules communication of the UE with the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell. The UE further includes means for monitoring the control channel in accordance with the one or more sets of UE capabilities.

[0018] Certain aspects relate to a serving cell of a network, the network including one or more cells serving a user equipment (UE). The serving cell includes means for receiving signaling of one or more UE capability sets of the UE. Each of the one or more UE capability sets indicates a number of per-slot supported spans for monitoring a control channel transmitted by a scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling uplink communication or downlink communication, or both, between the UE and one or more scheduled cells. Each of the one or more UE capability sets further indicates a number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. The one or more UE capability sets are for each of: same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel schedules communication between the UE and the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell. The serving cell further includes means for communicating with the UE in accordance with the one or more UE capability sets.

[0019] Some aspects relate to a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by a user equipment (UE), cause the UE to perform a method for wireless communication. The method includes signaling to a serving cell one or more sets of UE capabilities. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities indicates a number of supported spans per time slot for monitoring a control channel transmitted by a scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling uplink communication or downlink communication, or both, between the UE and one or more scheduled cells. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities further indicates a number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. The one or more sets of UE capabilities are for each of: same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel schedules communication between the UE and the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having a lower SCS than the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having a higher SCS than the scheduling cell. The method further includes monitoring the control channel based on the one or more sets of UE capabilities.

[0020] Certain aspects relate to a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by a serving cell of a network, cause the serving cell to perform a method for wireless communication, the network including one or more cells serving a user equipment (UE). The method includes receiving signaling of one or more sets of UE capabilities of the UE. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities indicates a number of per-slot supported spans for monitoring a control channel transmitted by a scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling uplink communication or downlink communication, or both, between the UE and one or more scheduled cells. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities further indicates a number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. The one or more sets of UE capabilities are for each of: same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel schedules communication between the UE and the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell. The method further includes communicating with the UE based on the one or more sets of UE capabilities.

[0021] Aspects of the present disclosure provide apparatuses, devices, processors, and computer-readable media for performing the methods described herein.

[0022] To achieve the foregoing and related ends, one or more aspects include the features hereinafter fully described and particularly pointed out in the claims. The following description and the drawings set forth in detail certain illustrative features of the one or more aspects. However, these features are merely indicative of the various ways in which the principles of the various aspects may be employed. Brief Description of the Drawings

[0024] To understand the manner in which the above-recited features of the present disclosure can be obtained, a more particular description may be had of the above briefly summarized subject matter, some aspects of which are illustrated in the drawings. It should be noted, however, that the drawings illustrate only certain typical aspects of the present disclosure and are not to be considered limiting of its scope, for the description may admit to other equally effective aspects.

[0025] Figure 1 is a block diagram conceptually illustrating an example telecommunications system in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

[0026] Figure 2 is a block diagram conceptually illustrating the design of an example base station (BS) and user equipment (UE) in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

[0027] Figure 3 Illustrates an example of a frame format for a New Radio (NR) system in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

[0028] Figures 4A - 4C Illustrates an example span pattern in a time slot in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

[0029] Figures 5A - 5D Illustrates an example scheduling scenario in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

[0030] Figure 6 Illustrates operations of a wireless communication method performed at a UE in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

[0031] Figure 7 Illustrates operations of a wireless communication method performed at a network entity (e.g., BS) in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

[0032] Figure 8 Illustrates a communication device that may include various components configured to perform operations regarding the techniques disclosed herein, such as Figure 6 the operations illustrated therein.

[0033] Figure 9 Illustrates a communication device that may include various components configured to perform operations regarding the techniques disclosed herein, such as Figure 7 the operations illustrated therein.

[0034] For ease of understanding, where possible, the same reference numerals have been used to designate identical elements common to the various figures. It is contemplated that elements disclosed in one aspect may be beneficially utilized in other aspects without specific recitation.

[0035] DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0036] Aspects of the present disclosure provide apparatus, methods, processing systems, and computer-readable media for supporting subcarrier spacing (SCS)-based control channel monitoring.

[0037] In a wireless communication system utilizing carrier aggregation (CA) with cross-carrier scheduling, a cell referred to as a scheduling cell (e.g., the base station (BS) serving the cell) can schedule (e.g., schedule communications on one or more communication resources such as time, frequency, space, code, etc.) one or more other cells referred to as scheduled cells (e.g., one or more BSs serving the other cells, which may be the same as or different from the BS serving the scheduling cell). The scheduling cell and the other cells can serve a UE, and are referred to as the serving cells of the UE. The scheduling cell and the other cells can communicate using different carrier frequencies, hence the term cross-carrier scheduling. In some aspects, the scheduling cell can schedule up to eight (8) cells. In these systems, the subcarrier spacing (SCS) (i.e., the frequency spacing between subcarrier frequencies in a symbol) of the scheduling cell's communication (e.g., uplink and / or downlink transmissions) can be the same as or different from the SCS of the scheduled cells' communication.

[0038] For example, the scheduling cell can have an SCS of 30 kHz, while one or more (e.g., all) of the scheduled cells can have an SCS of 120 kHz. Such a scenario where the scheduled cells have an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell can be referred to in this document as higher SCS cross-carrier scheduling or higher SCS scheduling.

[0039] In another example, the scheduling cell can have an SCS of 120 kHz, while one or more (e.g., all) of the scheduled cells can have an SCS of 30 kHz. Such a scenario where the scheduled cells have an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell can be referred to in this document as lower SCS cross-carrier scheduling or lower SCS scheduling.

[0040] In yet another example, the scheduling cell can have an SCS of 30 kHz, and one or more (e.g., all) of the scheduled cells can also have an SCS of 30 kHz. Such a scenario where the scheduled cells have the same SCS as the scheduling cell can be referred to in this document as same SCS cross-carrier scheduling. Additionally, the scheduling cell can schedule communications on itself (i.e., the scheduling cell is also a scheduled cell), which can be referred to in this document as self-scheduling. Both self-scheduling and same SCS cross-carrier scheduling can be referred to as same SCS scheduling.

[0041] The scheduling cell is configured to transmit a control channel that schedules communications in one or more scheduled cells (such as for one or more UEs). For example, in some aspects, the control channel is a Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) that is used to schedule uplink transmissions on one or more Physical Uplink Shared Channels (PUSCHs) and / or downlink transmissions on one or more Physical Downlink Shared Channels (PDSCHs) in the (such) scheduled cell(s). In some aspects, the PDCCH includes one or more Downlink Control Indicators (DCIs). In some aspects, each DCI indicates a grant of uplink resources (UL grant) or a grant of downlink resources (DL grant) for a UE to communicate in a particular scheduled cell.

[0042] In some aspects, the UE monitors the control channel, receives the one or more DCIs, and decodes the one or more DCIs to determine the scheduling in the one or more scheduled cells. However, in cases where the SCSs are different (i.e., lower SCS scheduling or higher SCS scheduling), the SCS difference can affect the UE's ability to timely decode the PDCCH and prepare traffic for transmission on the PUSCH and / or decode traffic on the PDSCH (such as before necessary Acknowledgment / Negative Acknowledgment (ACK / NACK) reports must be transmitted on one or more uplink channels at a specified time).

[0043] For example, the SCS affects the number of symbols (such as OFDM symbols) within a subframe. Specifically, as the SCS becomes wider or larger, the slot length will become shorter. For example, a 15 kHz SCS (i.e., in a known interspacing parameter design where the interspacing parameter μ = 0, where the SCS or frequency spacing Δf is determined by the equation Δf = 2 μ x 15 kHz) will result in a 1 ms slot, which can also constitute the entire 1 ms subframe. Additionally, a 120 kHz SCS (i.e., in a known interspacing parameter design where the interspacing parameter μ = 3) will result in 8 slots with a duration of 1 ms / 8 or 0.125 ms within a 1 ms subframe, and these slots correspond to slots 0 to 7.

[0044] Based on the SCS used in the scheduling cell and the SCS used in the scheduled cell, a UE may be able to support different control channel monitoring configurations. A control channel monitoring configuration may accommodate or correspond to, for example, a certain number (e.g., one or more) of supported spans per time slot (e.g., separate time spans as further described herein) for the UE to monitor the control channel. Additionally, a control channel monitoring configuration may accommodate or correspond to, for example, a certain number (e.g., one or more) of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. In some examples, the number of supported DCIs refers to the number of all DCIs. In some examples, the number of supported DCIs refers to the number of unicast DCIs. In some examples, the number of supported DCIs refers to the number of unicast DCIs for scheduling DL and / or the number of unicast DCIs for scheduling UL.

[0045] Accordingly, certain aspects herein provide techniques for supporting different control channel monitoring configurations based on the SCS used in the scheduling cell and the SCS used in the scheduled cell. For example, certain aspects provide techniques for a UE to signal to one or more serving cells (e.g., by signaling one or more UE capability sets) which control channel monitoring configurations it supports for which scheduling scenarios (e.g., lower SCS scheduling, higher SCS scheduling, and same SCS scheduling). Additionally, certain aspects provide techniques for the UE and one or more cells to communicate according to the control channel monitoring configurations based on the scheduling scenario.

[0046] The following description provides examples and is not intended to limit the scope, applicability, or examples set forth in the claims. Changes may be made to the functionality and arrangement of the elements discussed without departing from the scope of the disclosure. Various examples may appropriately omit, substitute, or add various procedures or components. For example, the methods described may be performed in an order different from that described, and various steps may be added, omitted, or combined. Also, the features described with reference to some examples may be combined in some other examples. For instance, any number of aspects set forth herein may be used to implement an apparatus or practice a method. Additionally, the scope of the disclosure is intended to cover such apparatus or methods practiced using other structures, functionality, or a combination of structures and functionality that supplement or are additional to the various aspects of the disclosure set forth herein. It should be understood that any aspect of the disclosure disclosed herein may be implemented by one or more elements of the claims. The term "exemplary" is used herein to mean "serving as an example, instance, or illustration." Any aspect described herein as "exemplary" need not be construed as superior or better than other aspects.

[0047] The techniques described herein can be used for various wireless communication technologies such as LTE, CDMA, TDMA, FDMA, OFDMA, SC-FDMA, and other networks. The terms "network" and "system" are often used interchangeably. A CDMA network may implement radio technologies such as Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (UTRA), cdma2000, etc. UTRA includes Wideband CDMA (WCDMA) and other variants of CDMA. Cdma2000 covers the IS-2000, IS-95, and IS-856 standards. A TDMA network may implement radio technologies such as Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM). An OFDMA network can implement radio technologies such as NR (e.g., 5G RA), Evolved UTRA (E-UTRA), Ultra Mobile Broadband (UMB), IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi), IEEE 802.16 (WiMAX), IEEE 802.20, Flash-OFDMA, etc. UTRA and E-UTRA are part of Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS).

[0048] New Radio (NR) is an emerging wireless communication technology being developed in cooperation with the 5G Technology Forum (5GTF). 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE) and LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) are UMTS versions that use E-UTRA. UTRA, E-UTRA, UMTS, LTE, LTE-A, and GSM are described in documents from an organization called the "3rd Generation Partnership Project" (3GPP). Cdma2000 and UMB are described in documents from an organization called the "3rd Generation Partnership Project 2" (3GPP2). The techniques described herein can be used for the wireless networks and radio technologies mentioned above and other wireless networks and radio technologies. For clarity, while aspects may be described herein using terms typically associated with 3G and / or 4G wireless technologies, aspects of the present disclosure can be applied in communication systems based on other generations including NR technologies (such as 5G and later generations).

[0049] New Radio (NR) access (e.g., 5G technology) can support various wireless communication services such as enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) targeted at wide bandwidths (e.g., 80 MHz or higher), millimeter wave (mmW) targeted at high carrier frequencies (e.g., 25 GHz or higher), massive machine type communication MTC (mMTC) targeted at non-backward compatible MTC technologies, and / or mission critical targeted at ultra-reliable low latency communication (URLLC). These services may include latency and reliability requirements. These services may also have different transmission time intervals (TTIs) to meet corresponding quality of service (QoS) requirements. Additionally, these services can coexist in the same subframe.

[0050] Example wireless communication system

[0051] Figure 1 An example wireless communication network 100 in which aspects of the present disclosure may be implemented is described, which includes support for SCS-based control channel monitoring. For example, the wireless communication network 100 may be a New Radio (NR) or 5G network.

[0052] As Figure 1 described, the wireless network 100 may include several base stations (BSs) 110 and other network entities. A BS may be a station that communicates with user equipment (UE). Each BS 110 may provide communication coverage for a specific geographical area. In 3GPP, the term "cell" may refer to the coverage area of a Node B (NB) and / or the Node B subsystem serving that coverage area, depending on the context in which the term is used. In an NR system, the terms "cell" and next-generation Node B (gNB), New Radio base station (NR BS), 5G NB, access point (AP), or transmission reception point (TRP) may be interchangeable. In some examples, a cell may not have to be stationary, and the geographical area of a cell may move according to the location of a mobile BS. In some examples, a single BS may serve multiple cells (such as on different carrier frequencies). In some examples, base stations may be interconnected with each other and / or interconnected to one or more other base stations or network nodes (not shown) in the wireless communication network 100 through various types of backhaul interfaces (such as direct physical connections, wireless connections, virtual networks, or analogs using any suitable transmission network).

[0053] According to certain aspects, the UE 120 may be configured to support SCS-based control channel monitoring. As Figure 1 shown, the UE120a includes a control channel manager 124a, which is configured to control the UE 120a to support SCS-based control channel monitoring according to the aspects discussed herein.

[0054] According to certain aspects, the BS 110 may be configured to support SCS-based control channel monitoring. As Figure 1 shown, the BS110a includes a control channel manager 124b, which is configured to control the BS 110a to support SCS-based control channel monitoring according to the aspects discussed herein.

[0055] In general, any number of wireless networks can be deployed in a given geographical area. Each wireless network can support a specific radio access technology (RAT) and can operate on one or more frequencies. The RAT can also be referred to as radio technology, air interface, etc. The frequency can also be referred to as carrier, sub-carrier, frequency channel, tone, sub-band, etc. Each frequency can support a single RAT in a given geographical area to avoid interference between wireless networks of different RATs. In some cases, an NR or 5G RAT network can be deployed.

[0056] A base station (BS) can provide communication coverage for macro cells, pico cells, femto cells, and / or other types of cells. A macro cell can cover a relatively large geographical area (e.g., with a radius of several kilometers) and can allow unconstrained access by UEs with a service subscription. A pico cell can cover a relatively small geographical area and can allow unconstrained access by UEs with a service subscription. A femto cell can cover a relatively small geographical area (e.g., a residence) and can allow constrained access by UEs associated with the femto cell (e.g., UEs in a closed subscriber group (CSG), UEs of users in a residence, etc.). The BS for a macro cell can be referred to as a macro BS. The BS for a pico cell can be referred to as a pico BS. The BS for a femto cell can be referred to as a femto BS or a home BS. In Figure 1 the example shown, BSs 110a, 110b, and 110c can be macro BSs for macro cells 102a, 102b, and 102c, respectively. BS 110x can be a pico BS for pico cell 102x. BSs 110y and 110z can be femto BSs for femto cells 102y and 102z, respectively. A BS can support one or more (e.g., three) cells.

[0057] The wireless communication network 100 can also include relay stations. A relay station is a station that receives the transmission of data and / or other information from an upstream station (e.g., a BS or a UE) and sends the transmission of the data and / or other information to a downstream station (e.g., a UE or a BS). A relay station can also be a UE that relays transmissions for other UEs. In Figure 1 the example shown, relay station 110r can communicate with BS 110a and UE 120r to facilitate communication between BS 110a and UE 120r. A relay station can also be referred to as a relay BS, a relay, etc.

[0058] The wireless network 100 can be a heterogeneous network including different types of BSs (e.g., macro BSs, pico BSs, femto BSs, relays, etc.). These different types of BSs can have different transmit power levels, different coverage areas, and different impacts on interference in the wireless network 100. For example, a macro BS can have a high transmit power level (e.g., 20 watts), while pico BSs, femto BSs, and relays can have lower transmit power levels (e.g., 1 watt).

[0059] The wireless communication network 100 can support synchronous or asynchronous operation. For synchronous operation, each BS can have similar frame timing, and transmissions from different BSs can be approximately aligned in time. For asynchronous operation, each BS can have different frame timing, and transmissions from different BSs may not be aligned in time. The techniques described herein can be used for both synchronous and asynchronous operations.

[0060] The network controller 130 can be coupled to a set of BSs and provide coordination and control for these BSs. The network controller 130 can communicate with the BS 110 via a backhaul. The BSs 110 can also communicate with each other via a wireless or wired backhaul (e.g., directly or indirectly).

[0061] UE 120 (e.g., 120x, 120y, etc.) can be dispersed throughout the wireless network 100, and each UE can be stationary or mobile. The UE can also be referred to as a mobile station, terminal, access terminal, subscriber unit, station, customer premise equipment (CPE), cellular phone, smart phone, personal digital assistant (PDA), wireless modem, wireless communication device, handheld device, laptop computer, cordless phone, wireless local loop (WLL) station, tablet computer, camera, gaming device, netbook, smartbook, ultrabook, appliance, medical device or equipment, biometric sensor / device, wearable device (such as a smart watch, smart clothing, smart glasses, smart wristband, smart jewelry (e.g., smart ring, smart bracelet, etc.)), entertainment device (e.g., music device, video device, satellite radio, etc.), vehicle component or sensor, smart meter / sensor, industrial manufacturing equipment, global positioning system device, or any other suitable device configured to communicate via wireless or wired medium. Some UEs can be considered machine type communication (MTC) devices or evolved MTC (eMTC) devices. MTC and eMTC UEs include, for example, robots, drones, remote devices, sensors, meters, monitors, location tags, etc., which can communicate with a BS, another device (e.g., a remote device), or some other entity. A wireless node can provide connectivity to a network (e.g., a wide area network such as the Internet or a cellular network) or provide connectivity to the network, for example, via a wired or wireless communication link. Some UEs can be considered Internet of Things (IoT) devices, which can be narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) devices.

[0062] Some wireless networks (e.g., LTE) utilize Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) on the downlink and Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiplexing (SC-FDM) on the uplink. OFDM and SC-FDM divide the system bandwidth into multiple (K) orthogonal subcarriers, which are also often referred to as frequency tones, frequency bins, etc. Each subcarrier can be modulated with data. Generally speaking, the modulation symbols are sent in the frequency domain for OFDM and in the time domain for SC-FDM. The spacing between adjacent subcarriers can be fixed, and the total number of subcarriers (K) can depend on the system bandwidth. For example, the subcarrier spacing can be 15 kHz, and the minimum resource allocation (referred to as a "resource block" (RB)) can be 12 subcarriers (or 180 kHz). Thus, for system bandwidths of 1.25, 2.5, 5, 10, or 20 megahertz (MHz), the nominal Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) size can be equal to 128, 256, 512, 1024, or 2048 respectively. The system bandwidth can also be divided into subbands. For example, a subband can cover 1.8 MHz (i.e., 6 resource blocks), and for system bandwidths of 1.25, 2.5, 5, 10, or 20 MHz, there can be 1, 2, 4, 8, or 16 subbands respectively.

[0063] While aspects of the examples described herein may be associated with LTE technology, aspects of the present disclosure may be applicable to other wireless communication systems such as NR. NR can utilize OFDM with CP on both the uplink and downlink and includes support for half-duplex operation using TDD. Beamforming can be supported and the beam direction can be configured dynamically. MIMO transmission with precoding can also be supported. The MIMO configuration in the DL can support up to 8 transmit antennas (multi-layer DL transmission with up to 8 streams) and up to 2 streams per UE. Multi-layer transmission with up to 2 streams per UE can be supported. Aggregation of multiple cells can be supported using up to 8 serving cells.

[0064] In some examples, access to the air interface can be scheduled. A scheduling entity (e.g., a base station) allocates resources for communication among some or all of the devices and equipment within its service area or cell. The scheduling entity can be responsible for scheduling, assigning, reconfiguring, and releasing resources for one or more subordinate entities. That is, for the scheduled communication, the subordinate entities utilize the resources allocated by the scheduling entity. A base station is not the only entity that can act as a scheduling entity. In some examples, a UE can act as a scheduling entity and can schedule resources for one or more subordinate entities (e.g., one or more other UEs), and the other UEs can utilize the resources scheduled by the UE for wireless communication. In some examples, a UE can act as a scheduling entity in a peer-to-peer (P2P) network and / or in a mesh network. In the mesh network example, UEs can communicate directly with each other in addition to communicating with the scheduling entity.

[0065] In Figure 1 it, the solid line with double arrows indicates the desired transmission between the UE and the serving BS (e.g., the scheduling cell and / or the scheduled cell), and the serving BS is the BS designated to serve the UE on the downlink and / or uplink. The thin dashed line with double arrows indicates the interference transmission between the UE and the BS.

[0066] Figure 2 Illustrated are (as depicted in Figure 1 ) example components of BS 110 and UE 120, which can be used to implement aspects of the present disclosure. For example, the antennas 252, processors 266, 258, 264, and / or controller / processor 280 of UE 120 and / or the antennas 234, processors 220, 260, 238, and / or controller / processor 240 of BS 110 can be used to perform the various techniques and methods described herein.

[0067] At BS 110, the transmit processor 220 can receive data from the data source 212 and control information from the controller / processor 240. The control information can be used for the physical broadcast channel (PBCH), physical control format indicator channel (PCFICH), physical hybrid ARQ indicator channel (PHICH), physical downlink control channel (PDCCH), group common PDCCH (GC PDCCH), etc. The data can be used for the physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH), etc. The processor 220 can process (e.g., encode and symbol map) the data and control information to obtain data symbols and control symbols, respectively. The processor 220 can also generate reference symbols (e.g., primary synchronization signal (PSS), secondary synchronization signal (SSS), and cell-specific reference signal (CRS)). The transmit (TX) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) processor 230 can perform spatial processing (e.g., precoding) on the data symbols, control symbols, and / or reference symbols, if applicable, and can provide the output symbol streams to the modulators (MOD) 232a to 232t. Each modulator 232 can process its respective output symbol stream (e.g., for OFDM, etc.) to obtain an output sample stream. Each modulator can further process (e.g., convert to analog, amplify, filter, and up-convert) the output sample stream to obtain a downlink signal. The downlink signals from the modulators 232a to 232t can be transmitted via the antennas 234a to 234t, respectively.

[0068] At the UE 120, antennas 252a through 252r may receive downlink signals from the base station 110 and may provide the received signals to demodulators (DEMOD) 254a through 254r in the transceiver, respectively. Each demodulator 254 may condition (e.g., filter, amplify, down-convert, and digitize) the respective received signal to obtain input samples. Each demodulator may further process the input samples (e.g., for OFDM, etc.) to obtain received symbols. The MIMO detector 256 may obtain the received symbols from all demodulators 254a through 254r, perform MIMO detection on the received symbols when applicable, and provide detected symbols. The receive processor 258 may process (e.g., demodulate, de-interleave, and decode) the detected symbols, provide the decoded data for the UE 120 to the data sink 260, and provide the decoded control information to the controller / processor 280.

[0069] On the uplink, at the UE 120, the transmit processor 264 may receive and process data from the data source 262 (e.g., data for the physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH)) and control information from the controller / processor 280 (e.g., control information for the physical uplink control channel (PUCCH)). The transmit processor 264 may also generate reference symbols for reference signals (e.g., sounding reference signals (SRS)). The symbols from the transmit processor 264 may be precoded by the TX MIMO processor 266 when applicable, further processed (e.g., for SC-FDM, etc.) by the demodulators 254a through 254r in the transceiver, and transmitted to the base station 110. At the BS 110, the uplink signal from the UE 120 may be received by the antenna 234, processed by the modulator 232, detected by the MIMO detector 236 when applicable, and further processed by the receive processor 238 to obtain the decoded data and control information transmitted by the UE 120. The receive processor 238 may provide the decoded data to the data sink 239 and provide the decoded control information to the controller / processor 240.

[0070] The controller / processors 240 and 280 may direct operations at the base station 110 and the UE 120, respectively. The processor 240 and / or other processors and modules at the BS 110 may execute or direct the execution of the processes of the techniques described herein. The memories 242 and 282 may store data and program code for the BS 110 and the UE 120, respectively. The scheduler 244 may schedule the UE for data transmission on the downlink and / or uplink.

[0071] The controller / processor 280 and / or other processors and modules at the UE 120 may execute or direct the execution of the processes for the techniques described herein. As Figure 2As shown, the controller / processor 280 of UE 120 includes a control channel manager 124a. The controller / processor 240 at BS 110 and / or other processors and modules may execute or direct the execution of the various processes for the techniques described herein. As Figure 2 As shown, the controller / processor 240 of BS 110 includes a control channel manager 124b.

[0072] Although shown at the controller / processor, other components of UE 120 and BS 110 may also be used to perform the operations described herein.

[0073] In LTE, the basic transmission time interval (TTI) or packet duration is a 1 ms subframe. In NR, a subframe is still 1 ms, but the basic TTI is referred to as a slot. A subframe contains a variable number of slots (e.g., 1, 2, 4, 8, 16,... slots), which depends on the subcarrier spacing. An NR RB is 12 consecutive frequency subcarriers. NR may support a base subcarrier spacing of 15 KHz, and other subcarrier spacings may be defined relative to the base subcarrier spacing, e.g., 30 kHz, 60 kHz, 120 kHz, 240 kHz, etc. The symbol and slot lengths scale with the subcarrier spacing. The CP length also depends on the subcarrier spacing.

[0074] Figure 3 is a diagram showing an example of a frame format 300 for NR. The transmission timeline for each of the downlink and uplink may be divided into radio frames. Each radio frame may have a predetermined duration (e.g., 10 ms) and may be divided into 10 subframes with indices 0 to 9, each subframe being 1 ms. Each subframe may include a variable number of slots, which depends on the subcarrier spacing. Each slot may include a variable number of symbol periods (e.g., 7 or 14 symbols), which depends on the subcarrier spacing. An index may be assigned to the symbol periods in each slot. A mini-slot (which may be referred to as a sub-slot structure) refers to a transmission time interval having a duration less than that of a slot (e.g., 2, 3, or 4 symbols).

[0075] Each symbol in a slot may indicate a link direction for data transmission (e.g., DL, UL, or flexible), and the link direction for each subframe may be switched dynamically. The link direction may be based on the slot format. Each slot may include DL / UL data as well as DL / UL control information.

[0076] In NR, a transmission synchronization signal (SS) block is transmitted. The SS block includes a PSS, an SSS, and a two-symbol PBCH. The SS block may be at a fixed slot position (such as Figure 3The symbols 0-3 shown in are transmitted. The PSS and SSS can be used by the UE for cell search and capture. The PSS can provide half-frame timing, and the SS can provide the CP length and frame timing. The PSS and SSS can provide cell identity. The PBCH carries some basic system information, such as the downlink system bandwidth, timing information within the radio frame, SS burst set periodicity, system frame number, etc. The SS blocks can be organized into SS bursts to support beam sweeping. Further system information (such as the remaining minimum system information (RMSI), system information block (SIB), other system information (OSI)) can be transmitted on the physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) in certain subframes.

[0077] The UE can operate in various radio resource configurations, including configurations associated with transmitting pilots using dedicated resource sets (e.g., radio resource control (RRC) dedicated state, etc.) or configurations associated with transmitting pilots using common resource sets (e.g., RRC common state, etc.). When operating in the RRC dedicated state, the UE can select a dedicated resource set for transmitting pilot signals to the network. When operating in the RRC common state, the UE can select a common resource set for transmitting pilot signals to the network. In either case, the pilot signals transmitted by the UE can be received by one or more network access devices (such as an AN, or a DU, or parts thereof). Each receiving network access device can be configured to receive and measure the pilot signals transmitted on the common resource set, and also receive and measure the pilot signals transmitted on the dedicated resource set allocated to the UE, where the network access device is a member of the set of monitoring network access devices for the UE. One or more receiving network access devices or the CU to which the receiving network access device transmits pilot signal measurements can use these measurements to identify the serving cell of the UE or initiate a change to the serving cell for one or more UEs.

[0078] Example control channel monitoring based on SCS

[0079] In some aspects, a time slot includes one or more spans (e.g., segments of control channel symbols corresponding to time instances) that can be used to convey a control channel (e.g., PDCCH). In some aspects, the spans comply with the following properties (e.g., as described in 3GPP TS 38.822, which is incorporated by reference). In some aspects, each span has a length of up to Y consecutive symbols of the time slot. In some aspects, there is a minimum time separation of X symbols (e.g., including across time slots) between the beginnings of two spans. In some aspects, the spans do not overlap. In some aspects, each span is contained within a single time slot. In some aspects, the same span pattern repeats in each time slot. In some aspects, the separation between consecutive spans within a time slot and across time slots may not be equal, but all spans must satisfy the same (X, Y) constraints. In some aspects, each control channel monitoring occasion is fully contained within one span.

[0080] In some aspects, a suitable span pattern can be determined by first generating a bit map b(l), 0 ≤ l ≤ 13, where b(l) = 1 if symbol l of any time slot is part of a monitoring occasion, and b(l) = 0 otherwise. The first span in the span pattern starts at the smallest l that satisfies b(l) = 1. The next span in the span pattern starts at the smallest l that satisfies b(l) = 1 and is not included in the previous span(s).

[0081] In some aspects, a span lasts for max{the maximum of all CORESET durations, the minimum of Y among the candidate values reported by the UE}, except for the last span in the time slot, which may have a shorter duration.

[0082] In some aspects, a UE (such as UE 120) is configured to send signaling (e.g., capability signaling) to a serving cell (e.g., BS 110, which corresponds to a scheduling cell and / or a scheduled cell) that indicates one or more monitoring configurations it supports for control channel (e.g., PDCCH) monitoring. For example, the UE is configured to send a UE capability set to the serving cell (e.g., using RRC signaling). As discussed herein, a given UE capability set can correspond to one or more given scheduling scenarios (e.g., one or more of higher SCS scheduling, lower SCS scheduling, or the same SCS scheduling). Thus, in some aspects, UE 120 is configured to convey multiple UE capability sets to the serving cell, each set corresponding to one or more given scheduling scenarios (e.g., one or more of higher SCS scheduling, lower SCS scheduling, or the same SCS scheduling). In some aspects, different capabilities within a given UE capability set are reported separately by UE 120 to the serving cell. In some aspects, multiple capabilities within a given UE capability set are reported together by UE 120 to the serving cell.

[0083] For example, the UE capability set may include a first UE capability that indicates the number of per-slot spans of the control channel that the UE is capable of monitoring (e.g., one or more). Additionally, the UE capability set may include a second UE capability that indicates the number of one or more DCIs per span per scheduled cell that the UE is capable of processing (e.g., one or more), where the number of DCIs may refer to the total number of DCIs, the total number of unicast DCIs scheduling DL or UL, the number of unicast DCIs scheduling DL, and / or the number of unicast DCIs scheduling UL.

[0084] In some aspects, for the same SCS scheduling, the UE is capable of processing one unicast DCI scheduling DL (e.g., PDSCH) and one unicast DCI scheduling UL (e.g., PUSCH) per scheduled cell (e.g., component carrier (CC)) over the set of monitoring opportunities in a span for frequency division duplexing (FDD) communication. In some aspects, for the same SCS scheduling, the UE is capable of processing one unicast DCI scheduling DL and two unicast DCIs scheduling UL per scheduled cell (e.g., component carrier (CC)) over the set of monitoring opportunities in a span for time division duplexing (TDD) communication. In some aspects, for the same SCS scheduling, the UE is capable of processing two unicast DCIs scheduling DL and one unicast DCI scheduling UL per scheduled cell (e.g., component carrier (CC)) over the set of monitoring opportunities in a span for TDD communication.

[0085] In some aspects, a particular control channel monitoring configuration meets the restrictions of the UE capability set if, in each time slot (e.g., including across time slot boundaries), the span arrangement satisfies the gap separation for at least one (X,Y) in the set of candidate values reported by the UE. For example, UE 120 may report a set of candidate values for the (X,Y) values to the serving cell. In one example, UE 120 may report a set having only the following candidate value: (7,3). In another example, UE 120 may report a set having the following candidate values: (7,3) and (4,3). In yet another example, UE 120 may report a set having the following candidate values: (7,3), (4,3), and (2,2).

[0086] Figures 4A - 4C An example span pattern in a time slot is illustrated. For example, Figure 4A An example span pattern where the (X,Y) value is equal to (X = 7, Y = 3) is illustrated. Additionally, Figure 4B An example span pattern where the (X,Y) value is equal to (X = 4, Y = 3) is illustrated. Additionally, Figure 4C An example span pattern where the (X,Y) value is equal to (X = 2, Y = 2) is illustrated.

[0087] In some aspects, the UE 120 communicates with the serving cell based on a set of UE capabilities reported by the UE 120 to the serving cell for a given scheduling scenario. For example, the UE 120 and the serving cell may communicate one or more DCIs corresponding to the set of UE capabilities in one or more spans of a control channel monitoring configuration. For example, the UE 120 and the serving cell may determine which scheduling scenario corresponds to the communication of the UE 120 based on which cells are serving the UE 120, and may thus determine the corresponding control channel monitoring configuration based on the corresponding set of UE capabilities reported by the UE 120 to the serving cell.

[0088] Figures 5A - 5D Illustrative example scheduling scenarios. For example, Figure 5A Illustrative example of self-scheduling, Figure 5B Illustrative example of same SCS cross-carrier scheduling, Figure 5C Illustrative example of higher SCS cross-carrier scheduling, and Figure 5D Illustrative example of lower SCS cross-carrier scheduling.

[0089] In some aspects, for lower SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the serving cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reporting) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring on the serving cell in less than or equal to the number of (e.g., one or more) spans in a time slot as supported for the same SCS scheduling.

[0090] In some aspects, for lower SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the serving cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reporting) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring on the serving cell in an equal number of (e.g., one or more) spans in a time slot as supported for the same SCS scheduling.

[0091] In some aspects, for lower SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the serving cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reporting) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring on the serving cell in less than the number of (e.g., one or more) spans in a time slot as supported for the same SCS scheduling.

[0092] In some aspects, for the same SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the serving cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reporting) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring on the serving cell in less than or equal to the number of (e.g., one or more) spans in a time slot as supported for higher SCS scheduling.

[0093] In some aspects, for the same SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the scheduling cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reports) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring in a number (e.g., one or more) of spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell that is equal to that supported for a higher SCS scheduling.

[0094] In some aspects, for the same SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the scheduling cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reports) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring in a number (e.g., one or more) of spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell that is less than that supported for a higher SCS scheduling.

[0095] In some aspects, for a lower SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the scheduling cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reports) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring, where in each of one or more spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell, the UE 120 supports a number (e.g., one or more) of DCIs (e.g., the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for FDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for TDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for FDD, and / or the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for TDD) that is less than or equal to that supported for the same SCS scheduling.

[0096] In some aspects, for a lower SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the scheduling cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reports) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring, where in each of one or more spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell, the UE 120 supports a number (e.g., one or more) of DCIs (e.g., the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for FDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for TDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for FDD, and / or the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for TDD) that is equal to that supported for the same SCS scheduling.

[0097] In some aspects, for lower SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the scheduling cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reporting) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring, where in each of one or more spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell, the UE 120 supports less than the number (e.g., one or more) of DCIs supported for the same SCS scheduling (e.g., the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for FDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for TDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for FDD, and / or the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for TDD).

[0098] In some aspects, for the same SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the scheduling cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reporting) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring, where in each of one or more spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell, the UE 120 supports less than or equal to the number (e.g., one or more) of DCIs supported for a higher SCS scheduling (e.g., the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for FDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for TDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for FDD, and / or the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for TDD).

[0099] In some aspects, for the same SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the scheduling cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reporting) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring, where in each of one or more spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell, the UE 120 supports an equal number (e.g., one or more) of DCIs supported for a higher SCS scheduling (e.g., the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for FDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for TDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for FDD, and / or the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for TDD).

[0100] In some aspects, for the same SCS scheduling, the UE 120 (and, in a complementary manner, the scheduling cell) is configured (e.g., based on UE capability reporting) to support and / or perform control channel monitoring, where in each of one or more spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell, the UE 120 supports a number of DCIs (e.g., the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for FDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled DL per scheduled CC for TDD, the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for FDD, and / or the maximum number of unicast DCIs for scheduled UL per scheduled CC for TDD) that is less than the number supported for a higher SCS scheduling (e.g., one or more).

[0101] In some aspects, the UE 120 supports separate capability signaling to indicate support for control channel monitoring for each of higher SCS scheduling, lower SCS scheduling, and the same SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports and / or signals a first set of UE capabilities for higher SCS scheduling, a second set of UE capabilities for lower SCS scheduling, and a third set of UE capabilities for the same SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports separate capability signaling to indicate that the UE 120 supports PDCCH monitoring in a single span in a time slot on the scheduling cell for lower SCS scheduling, that the UE 120 supports PDCCH monitoring in multiple spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell for higher SCS scheduling, and that the UE 120 supports PDCCH monitoring in multiple spans in a time slot on the scheduling cell for the same SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports separate capability signaling to indicate that the UE 120 supports processing 1 DCI for scheduled DL and 1 DCI for scheduled UL for FDD in each span in a time slot on the scheduling cell for lower SCS scheduling, that the UE 120 supports processing 2 DCIs for scheduled DL and 2 DCIs for scheduled UL for FDD in each span in a time slot on the scheduling cell for higher SCS scheduling, and that the UE 120 supports processing 1 DCI for scheduled DL and 1 DCI for scheduled UL for FDD in each span in a time slot on the scheduling cell for the same SCS scheduling.

[0102] In some aspects, the UE 120 supports one capability signaling to indicate support for control channel monitoring for both lower SCS scheduling and same SCS scheduling, and separate capability signaling to indicate support for control channel monitoring for higher SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports and / or signals a first set of UE capabilities applicable to both lower SCS scheduling and same SCS scheduling, and a second set of UE capabilities for higher SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports separate capability signaling to indicate that the UE 120 supports PDCCH monitoring in a single span in a time slot on a scheduled cell for both lower SCS scheduling and same SCS scheduling, and that the UE 120 supports PDCCH monitoring in multiple spans in a time slot on a scheduled cell for higher SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports separate capability signaling to indicate that the UE 120 supports processing 1 DCI for scheduled DL and 1 DCI for scheduled UL for FDD in each span in a time slot on a scheduled cell for both lower SCS scheduling and same SCS scheduling, and that the UE 120 supports processing 2 DCIs for scheduled DL and 2 DCIs for scheduled UL for FDD in each span in a time slot on a scheduled cell for higher SCS scheduling.

[0103] In some aspects, the UE 120 supports one capability signaling to indicate support for control channel monitoring for both higher SCS scheduling and same SCS scheduling, and separate capability signaling to indicate support for control channel monitoring for lower SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports and / or signals a first set of UE capabilities applicable to both higher SCS scheduling and same SCS scheduling, and a second set of UE capabilities for lower SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports separate capability signaling to indicate that the UE 120 supports PDCCH monitoring in multiple spans in a time slot on a scheduled cell for both higher SCS scheduling and same SCS scheduling, and that the UE 120 supports PDCCH monitoring in a single span in a time slot on a scheduled cell for lower SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports separate capability signaling to indicate that the UE 120 supports processing 2 DCIs for scheduled DL and 2 DCIs for scheduled UL for FDD in each span in a time slot on a scheduled cell for both higher SCS scheduling and same SCS scheduling, and that the UE 120 supports processing 1 DCI for scheduled DL and 1 DCI for scheduled UL for FDD in each span in a time slot on a scheduled cell for lower SCS scheduling.

[0104] In some aspects, the UE 120 supports one capability signaling to indicate support for control channel monitoring for both lower SCS scheduling and higher SCS scheduling, and separate capability signaling to indicate support for control channel monitoring for the same SCS scheduling. For example, in some aspects, the UE 120 supports and / or signals a first set of UE capabilities that apply to both lower SCS scheduling and higher SCS scheduling, and a second set of UE capabilities for the same SCS scheduling.

[0105] Figure 6 Operation 600 of a wireless communication method performed by a UE in accordance with some aspects of the present disclosure is shown. Operation 600 begins at block 602, where the UE signals to a serving cell one or more sets of UE capabilities. Each of the one or more sets of UE capabilities indicates the number of per-slot supported spans (e.g., of the scheduling cell) that are used to monitor a control channel transmitted by the scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling one or more of uplink communication and downlink communication of the UE with one or more scheduled cells. Each of the one or more sets of UE capabilities further indicates the number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel. The one or more sets of UE capabilities are for each of: the same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel schedules communication of the UE with the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell.

[0106] Additionally, at block 604, the UE monitors the control channel based on the one or more sets of UE capabilities.

[0107] Figure 7Operation 700 of a wireless communication method performed by a network (e.g., by a BS, serving cell, scheduling cell, etc.), which includes one or more cells serving a user equipment (UE), is shown in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure. Operation 700 begins at block 702, where the serving cell receives signaling of one or more sets of UE capabilities of the UE. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities indicates the number of supported spans per time slot (e.g., of the scheduling cell) for monitoring a control channel transmitted by the scheduling cell, where the control channel is for scheduling one or more of uplink communication or downlink communication of the UE with one or more scheduled cells. Each set of the one or more sets of UE capabilities further indicates the number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per cell per scheduled cell per span in the control channel. The one or more sets of UE capabilities are for each of the following: same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of the following: the control channel schedules communication of the UE with the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell.

[0108] In addition, at block 704, the scheduling cell communicates with the UE based on the one or more sets of UE capabilities.

[0109] In certain aspects of operations 600 and / or 700, the one or more sets of UE capabilities include separate sets of UE capabilities for each of same SCS scheduling, lower SCS scheduling, and higher SCS scheduling.

[0110] In certain aspects of operations 600 and / or 700, the one or more sets of UE capabilities include a first set of UE capabilities for same SCS scheduling and lower SCS scheduling, and a second set of UE capabilities for higher SCS scheduling.

[0111] In certain aspects of operations 600 and / or 700, the one or more sets of UE capabilities include a first set of UE capabilities for higher SCS scheduling and lower SCS scheduling, and a second set of UE capabilities for same SCS scheduling.

[0112] In some aspects of operation 600 and / or 700, the one or more UE capability sets include a first UE capability set for the same SCS scheduling and higher SCS scheduling, and a second UE capability set for the same SCS scheduling.

[0113] In some aspects of operation 600 and / or 700, the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of per-slot supported spans for the same SCS scheduling of the scheduling cell and a second number of per-slot supported spans for a lower SCS scheduling, where the second number is less than or equal to the first number. In some such aspects, the second number is equal to the first number. In some such aspects, the second number is less than the first number.

[0114] In some aspects of operation 600 and / or 700, the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of per-slot supported spans for a higher SCS scheduling of the scheduling cell and a second number of per-slot supported spans for the same SCS scheduling, where the second number is less than or equal to the first number. In some such aspects, the second number is equal to the first number. In some such aspects, the second number is less than the first number.

[0115] In some aspects of operation 600 and / or 700, the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for the same SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for a lower SCS scheduling, where the second number is less than or equal to the first number. In some such aspects, the second number is equal to the first number. In some such aspects, the second number is less than the first number.

[0116] In some aspects of operation 600 and / or 700, the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for a higher SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for the same SCS scheduling, where the second number is less than or equal to the first number. In some such aspects, the second number is equal to the first number. In some such aspects, the second number is less than the first number.

[0117] In some aspects of operations 600 and / or 700, each set in the one or more UE capability sets indicates the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell in the control channel, including each set in the one or more UE capability sets indicating one or more of the following: the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling for frequency division duplex (FDD) communication in the control channel; the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling for FDD communication in the control channel; the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling for time division duplex (TDD) communication in the control channel; or the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling for TDD communication in the control channel. The number of DCIs may refer to the total number of all DCIs monitored by the UE, the total number of all unicast DCIs scheduling the DL or UL, the number of unicast DCIs scheduling the DL, and / or the number of unicast DCIs scheduling the UL.

[0118] In some aspects of operations 600 and / or 700, the control channel includes a physical downlink control channel, and one or both of the uplink communication or the downlink communication includes communication on one or more of a physical uplink shared channel or a physical downlink shared channel.

[0119] Figure 8 Illustrated is a communication device 800 that may include various components (e.g., corresponding to apparatus - plus - function components) configured to perform operations for the techniques disclosed herein, such as the operations illustrated in Figure 6 The communication device 800 includes a processing system 802 coupled to a transceiver 808. The transceiver 808 is configured to transmit and receive signals for the communication device 800 (such as the various signals described herein) via an antenna 810. The processing system 802 may be configured to perform processing functions for the communication device 800, including processing signals received by and / or to be transmitted by the communication device 800.

[0120] The processing system 802 includes a processor 804 coupled to a computer - readable medium / memory 812 via a bus 806. In some aspects, the computer - readable medium / memory 812 is configured to store instructions (e.g., computer - executable code) that, when executed by the processor 804, cause the processor 804 to perform the operations illustrated in Figure 6 or other operations for performing the various techniques discussed herein for supporting SCS - based control channel monitoring. In some aspects, the computer - readable medium / memory 812 stores code 814 for signaling (such as in the box 602 of Figure 6 and code for monitoring (such as in Figure 6the code 816 in the frame 604).

[0121] In some aspects, the processor 804 has circuitry configured to implement code stored in the computer-readable medium / memory 812. The processor 804 includes circuitry 820 for signaling (such as Figure 6 in the frame 602) and circuitry 824 for monitoring (such as Figure 6 in the frame 604).

[0122] Figure 9 Illustrated is a communication device 900 that may include various components (e.g., corresponding to apparatus-plus-function components) configured to perform operations for the techniques disclosed herein (such as Figure 7 the operations illustrated therein). The communication device 900 includes a processing system 902 coupled to a transceiver 908. The transceiver 908 is configured to transmit and receive signals for the communication device 900 (such as the various signals described herein) via an antenna 910. The processing system 902 may be configured to perform processing functions for the communication device 900, including processing signals received and / or to be transmitted by the communication device 900.

[0123] The processing system 902 includes a processor 904 coupled to a computer-readable medium / memory 912 via a bus 906. In some aspects, the computer-readable medium / memory 912 is configured to store instructions (e.g., computer-executable code) that, when executed by the processor 904, cause the processor 904 to perform Figure 7 the operations illustrated therein or other operations for performing the various techniques discussed herein for supporting SCS-based control channel monitoring. In some aspects, the computer-readable medium / memory 912 stores code 914 for receiving (such as Figure 7 in the frame 702) and code 916 for communicating (such as Figure 7 in the frame 704).

[0124] In some aspects, the processor 904 has circuitry configured to implement code stored in the computer-readable medium / memory 912. The processor 904 includes circuitry 920 for receiving (such as Figure 7 in the frame 702) and circuitry 824 for communicating (such as Figure 7 in the frame 704).

[0125] The methods disclosed herein include one or more steps or acts for implementing the method. These method steps and / or acts may be interchanged with one another without departing from the scope of the claims. In other words, unless a specific order of the steps or acts is specified, the order and / or use of the specific steps and / or acts may be altered without departing from the scope of the claims.

[0126] Additional considerations

[0127] The techniques described herein can be used in a variety of wireless communication technologies such as NR (e.g., 5G NR), 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE), LTE-Advanced (LTE-A), Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA), Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA), Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA), Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access (SC-FDMA), Time Division Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access (TD-SCDMA), and other networks. The terms "network" and "system" are often used interchangeably. CDMA networks may implement radio technologies such as Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (UTRA), cdma2000, etc. UTRA includes Wideband CDMA (WCDMA) and other variants of CDMA. cdma2000 covers the IS-2000, IS-95, and IS-856 standards. TDMA networks may implement radio technologies such as Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM). OFDMA networks may implement radio technologies such as NR (e.g., 5G RA), Evolved UTRA (E-UTRA), Ultra Mobile Broadband (UMB), IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi), IEEE 802.16 (WiMAX), IEEE 802.20, Flash-OFDMA, etc. UTRA and E-UTRA are part of the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS). LTE and LTE-A are UMTS versions that use E-UTRA. UTRA, E-UTRA, UMTS, LTE, LTE-A, and GSM are described in documents from an organization named "Third Generation Partnership Project" (3GPP). cdma2000 and UMB are described in documents from an organization named "Third Generation Partnership Project 2" (3GPP2). NR is an emerging wireless communication technology under development.

[0128] The techniques described herein can be used in the wireless networks and radio technologies mentioned above and other wireless networks and radio technologies. For clarity, while aspects may be described herein using terms commonly associated with 3G, 4G, and / or 5G wireless technologies, aspects of the present disclosure may be applied in communication systems based on other generations.

[0129] In 3GPP, the term "cell" may refer to the coverage area of a Node B (NB) and / or the NB subsystem serving that coverage area, depending on the context in which the term is used. In the NR system, the terms "cell" and BS, Next Generation Node B (gNB or g B node), Access Point (AP), Distributed Unit (DU), carrier, or Transmission and Reception Point (TRP) may be used interchangeably. A BS may provide communication coverage for macro cells, picocells, femtocells, and / or other types of cells. A macro cell may cover a relatively large geographical area (e.g., with a radius of several kilometers) and may allow unconstrained access by UEs with a service subscription. A picocell may cover a relatively small geographical area and may allow unconstrained access by UEs with a service subscription. A femtocell may cover a relatively small geographical area (e.g., a residence) and may allow constrained access by UEs associated with that femtocell (e.g., UEs in a Closed Subscriber Group (CSG), UEs of users in a residence, etc.). The BS for a macro cell may be referred to as a macro BS. The BS for a picocell may be referred to as a pico BS. The BS for a femtocell may be referred to as a femto BS or a home BS.

[0130] A UE may also be referred to as a mobile station, terminal, access terminal, subscriber unit, station, Customer Premises Equipment (CPE), cellular phone, smart phone, Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), wireless modem, wireless communication device, handheld device, laptop computer, cordless phone, Wireless Local Loop (WLL) station, tablet computer, camera, gaming device, netbook, smartbook, ultrabook, appliance, medical device or equipment, biometric sensor / device, wearable device (such as a smart watch, smart clothing, smart glasses, smart wristband, smart jewelry (e.g., smart ring, smart bracelet, etc.)), entertainment device (e.g., music device, video device, satellite radio, etc.), vehicle component or sensor, smart meter / sensor, industrial manufacturing equipment, Global Positioning System (GPS) device, or any other suitable device configured to communicate via wireless or wired media. Some UEs may be considered Machine Type Communication (MTC) devices or Evolved MTC (eMTC) devices. MTC and eMTC UEs include, for example, robots, drones, remote devices, sensors, meters, monitors, location tags, etc., which may communicate with a BS, another device (e.g., a remote device), or some other entity. A wireless node may provide connectivity to a network (e.g., a Wide Area Network (such as the Internet) or a cellular network) or provide connectivity to the network, for example, via a wired or wireless communication link. Some UEs may be considered Internet of Things (IoT) devices, which may be Narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) devices.

[0131] Some wireless networks (e.g., LTE) utilize Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) on the downlink and Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiplexing (SC-FDM) on the uplink. OFDM and SC-FDM divide the system bandwidth into multiple (K) orthogonal subcarriers, which are also often referred to as frequency tones, frequency bins, etc. Each subcarrier can be modulated with data. Generally, modulation symbols are transmitted in the frequency domain for OFDM and in the time domain for SC-FDM. The spacing between adjacent subcarriers can be fixed, and the total number of subcarriers (K) can depend on the system bandwidth. For example, the subcarrier spacing can be 15 kHz, and the minimum resource allocation (referred to as a "resource block" (RB)) can be 12 subcarriers (or 180 kHz). Thus, for system bandwidths of 1.25, 2.5, 5, 10, or 20 megahertz (MHz), the nominal Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) size can be equal to 128, 256, 512, 1024, or 2048, respectively. The system bandwidth can also be divided into subbands. For example, a subband can cover 1.8 MHz (e.g., 6 RBs), and for system bandwidths of 1.25, 2.5, 5, 10, or 20 MHz, there can be 1, 2, 4, 8, or 16 subbands, respectively. In LTE, the basic transmission time interval (TTI) or packet duration is a 1 ms subframe.

[0132] NR can utilize OFDM with CP on both the uplink and downlink and includes support for half-duplex operation using TDD. In NR, a subframe is still 1 ms, but the basic TTI is referred to as a slot. A subframe contains a variable number of slots (e.g., 1, 2, 4, 8, 16... slots), which depends on the subcarrier spacing. An NR RB is 12 consecutive frequency subcarriers. NR can support a base subcarrier spacing of 15 kHz, and other subcarrier spacings can be defined relative to the base subcarrier spacing, e.g., 30 kHz, 60 kHz, 120 kHz, 240 kHz, etc. Symbol and slot lengths scale with the subcarrier spacing. The CP length also depends on the subcarrier spacing. Beamforming can be supported and the beam direction can be configured dynamically. MIMO transmission with precoding can also be supported. In some examples, the MIMO configuration in the DL can support up to 8 transmit antennas (multi-layer DL transmission with up to 8 streams) and up to 2 streams per UE. In some examples, multi-layer transmission with up to 2 streams per UE can be supported. Up to 8 serving cells can be used to support the aggregation of multiple cells.

[0133] In some examples, access to an air interface can be scheduled. A scheduling entity (e.g., a BS) allocates resources for communication among some or all of the devices and equipment within its service area or cell. The scheduling entity may be responsible for scheduling, assigning, reconfiguring, and releasing resources for one or more subordinate entities. That is, for the scheduled communication, the subordinate entities utilize the resources allocated by the scheduling entity. A base station is not the only entity that can serve as a scheduling entity. In some examples, a UE may act as a scheduling entity and may schedule resources for one or more subordinate entities (e.g., one or more other UEs), and the other UEs may utilize the resources scheduled by the UE for wireless communication. In some examples, a UE may act as a scheduling entity in a peer-to-peer (P2P) network and / or in a mesh network. In a mesh network example, UEs may communicate directly with each other in addition to communicating with the scheduling entity.

[0134] In some examples, two or more subordinate entities (e.g., UEs) may communicate with each other using sidelink signals. Real-world applications of such sidelink communication may include public safety, proximity services, UE-to-network relay, vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication, Internet of Everything (IoE) communication, IoT communication, mission-critical mesh, and / or various other suitable applications. Generally, a sidelink signal may refer to a signal that is communicated from one subordinate entity (e.g., UE1) to another subordinate entity (e.g., UE2) without relaying the communication through a scheduling entity (e.g., a UE or a BS), even though the scheduling entity may be used for scheduling and / or control purposes. In some examples, sidelink signals may be communicated using licensed spectrum (different from wireless local area networks, which typically use unlicensed spectrum).

[0135] The methods disclosed herein include one or more steps or acts for implementing the methods. These method steps and / or acts may be interchanged with one another without departing from the scope of the claims. In other words, unless a specific order of the steps or acts is specified, the order and / or use of the specific steps and / or acts may be altered without departing from the scope of the claims.

[0136] As used herein, the phrase reciting "at least one of" a list of items refers to any combination of those items, including a single member. As an example, "at least one of a, b, or c" is intended to cover: a, b, c, a-b, a-c, b-c, and a-b-c, as well as any combination having multiple identical elements (e.g., a-a, a-a-a, a-a-b, a-a-c, a-b-b, a-c-c, b-b, b-b-b, b-b-c, c-c, and c-c-c, or any other ordering of a, b, and c).

[0137] As used herein, the term "determine" encompasses a variety of actions. For example, "determine" can include computing, calculating, processing, deriving, researching, looking up (e.g., looking up in a table, database, or other data structure), ascertaining, and the like. Moreover, "determine" can include receiving (e.g., receiving information), accessing (e.g., accessing data in a memory), and the like. Also, "determine" can include parsing, selecting, choosing, establishing, and the like.

[0138] The foregoing description is provided to enable any person skilled in the art to practice the various aspects described herein. Various modifications to these aspects will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art, and the general principles defined herein can be applied to other aspects. Thus, the claims are not intended to be limited to the aspects shown herein, but are to be accorded the full scope consistent with the language of the claims, where the recitation of a singular element is not intended to mean "one and only one" (unless specifically so stated) but rather "one or more." Unless specifically stated otherwise, the term "some / a" means one or more. Elements of the various aspects described throughout this disclosure that are presently known or later come to be known to those of ordinary skill in the art as all structural and functional equivalents are expressly incorporated herein by reference and are intended to be covered by the claims. Moreover, nothing disclosed herein is intended to be dedicated to the public, whether or not such disclosure is expressly recited in the claims. No element of a claim should be construed under the provisions of 35 U.S.C. § 112(f) unless the element is expressly recited using the phrase "means for" or, in the case of a method claim, the element is recited using the phrase "step for."

[0139] The various operations of the methods described above can be performed by any suitable means capable of performing the corresponding functions. These means can include a variety of hardware and / or software components and / or modules, including but not limited to circuits, application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), or processors. Generally, where there are operations illustrated in the figures, these operations may have corresponding paired means-plus-function components with similar numbers.

[0140] The various illustrative logical blocks, modules, and circuits described in connection with the present disclosure may be implemented or performed with a general-purpose processor, a digital signal processor (DSP), an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC), a field programmable gate array (FPGA) or other programmable logic device (PLD), discrete gate or transistor logic, discrete hardware components, or any combination thereof designed to perform the functions described herein. A general-purpose processor may be a microprocessor, but in the alternative, the processor may be any commercially available processor, controller, microcontroller, or state machine. The processor may also be implemented as a combination of computing devices, e.g., a combination of a DSP and a microprocessor, multiple microprocessors, one or more microprocessors in conjunction with a DSP core, or any other such configuration.

[0141] If implemented in hardware, an example hardware configuration may include a processing system in a wireless node. The processing system may be implemented with a bus architecture. Depending on the particular application and overall design constraints of the processing system, the bus may include any number of interconnecting buses and bridges. The bus may link together various circuits including a processor, machine-readable media, and a bus interface. The bus interface may be used to connect a network adapter, etc. to the processing system via the bus. The network adapter may be used to implement the signal processing functions of the PHY layer. In the case of user terminal 120 (see Figure 1 ), a user interface (e.g., keypad, display, mouse, joystick, etc.) may also be connected to the bus. The bus may also link various other circuits such as a timing source, peripherals, voltage regulators, power management circuits, and similar circuits, which are well known in the art and will not be described further herein. The processor may be implemented with one or more general and / or special purpose processors. Examples include microprocessors, microcontrollers, DSP processors, and other circuitry capable of executing software. Depending on the particular application and overall design constraints imposed on the overall system, those of ordinary skill in the art will recognize how best to implement the functionality described with respect to the processing system.

[0142] If implemented in software, each function may be stored on or transmitted via a computer-readable medium as one or more instructions or code. Software should be construed broadly to mean instructions, data, or any combination thereof, whether referred to as software, firmware, middleware, microcode, hardware description language, or otherwise. Computer-readable media include both computer storage media and communication media, including any medium that facilitates the transfer of a computer program from one place to another. The processor may be responsible for managing the bus and general processing, including executing software modules stored on a machine-readable storage medium. The computer-readable storage medium may be coupled to the processor such that the processor can read from and write to the storage medium. In an alternative, the storage medium may be integrated into the processor. As an example, the machine-readable medium may include a transmission line, a carrier modulated with data, and / or a computer-readable storage medium separate from a wireless node, all of which may be accessed by the processor via a bus interface. Alternatively or additionally, the machine-readable medium or any part thereof may be integrated into the processor, such as may be the case with a cache and / or a general register file. As an example, examples of the machine-readable medium may include RAM (Random Access Memory), flash memory, ROM (Read-Only Memory), PROM (Programmable Read-Only Memory), EPROM (Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory), EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory), registers, magnetic disks, optical disks, hard drives, or any other suitable storage medium, or any combination thereof. The machine-readable medium may be embodied in a computer program product.

[0143] Software modules may include a single instruction or many instructions and may be distributed across several different code segments, across different programs, and across multiple storage media. The computer-readable medium may include several software modules. These software modules include instructions that, when executed by an apparatus such as a processor, cause the processing system to perform various functions. These software modules may include a transmission module and a reception module. Each software module may reside in a single storage device or be distributed across multiple storage devices. As an example, when a triggering event occurs, a software module may be loaded from a hard drive into RAM. During the execution of the software module, the processor may load some instructions into the cache to improve access speed. One or more cache lines may then be loaded into the general register file for the processor to execute. When referring to the functionality of a software module hereinafter, it will be understood that such functionality is implemented by the processor when the processor executes instructions from the software module.

[0144] Similarly, any connection is properly termed a computer-readable medium. For example, if software is delivered from a web site, server, or other remote source using a coaxial cable, fiber optic cable, twisted pair, Digital Subscriber Line (DSL), or wireless technology such as infrared (IR), radio, and microwave, then the coaxial cable, fiber optic cable, twisted pair, DSL, or wireless technology such as infrared, radio, and microwave is included in the definition of the medium. As used herein, disk and disc include compact disc (CD), laser disc, optical disc, digital versatile disc (DVD), floppy disk, and disc, where disk typically magnetically reproduces data, while disc optically reproduces data with a laser. Thus, in some aspects, a computer-readable medium may include a non-transitory computer-readable medium (e.g., a tangible medium). Additionally, for other aspects, a computer-readable medium may include a transitory computer-readable medium (e.g., a signal). Combinations of the above should also be included within the scope of computer-readable media.

[0145] Accordingly, some aspects may include a computer program product for performing the operations presented herein. For example, such a computer program product may include a computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon (and / or encoded thereon) that are executable by one or more processors to perform the operations described herein, such as instructions for performing the operations described and illustrated in Figure 6 and / or Figure 7 herein.

[0146] Furthermore, it should be appreciated that modules and / or other suitable means for performing the methods and techniques described herein may be downloaded and / or otherwise obtained by a user terminal and / or a base station where applicable. For example, such devices can be coupled to a server to facilitate transfer of means for performing the methods described herein. Alternatively, the various methods described herein can be provided via a storage means (e.g., RAM, ROM, a physical storage medium such as a compact disc (CD) or floppy disk, etc.) such that once the storage means is coupled to or provided to the user terminal and / or base station, the device can obtain the various methods. Additionally, any other suitable technology can be utilized that is adapted to provide the methods and techniques described herein to a device.

[0147] It will be understood that the claims are not limited to the exact configurations and components described above. Various modifications, substitutions, and alterations can be made in the layout, operation, and details of the methods and apparatuses described above without departing from the scope of the claims.

Claims

1. A method for wireless communication by a user equipment UE, the method comprises: signaling to a serving cell one or more UE capability sets of the UE, each of the one or more UE capability sets indicating a number of supported spans per time slot of a scheduling cell for monitoring a control channel transmitted by the scheduling cell, the control channel being used for scheduling uplink communication or downlink communication or one or more of them between the UE and one or more scheduled cells, each of the one or more UE capability sets further indicating a number of supported downlink control indicators DCIs per span per scheduled cell in the control channel, the one or more UE capability sets for each of: same subcarrier spacing SCS scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel schedules communication between the UE and the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the SCS of the scheduling cell; lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and monitoring the control channel according to the one or more UE capability sets, wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for same SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for lower SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than the first number; or wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for higher SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for same SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than the first number.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the one or more UE capability sets include separate UE capability sets for each of same SCS scheduling, lower SCS scheduling, and higher SCS scheduling.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the one or more UE capability sets include a first UE capability set for same SCS scheduling and lower SCS scheduling, and a second UE capability set for higher SCS scheduling.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported spans per time slot of the scheduling cell for same SCS scheduling and a second number of supported spans per time slot of the scheduling cell for lower SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than or equal to the first number.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported spans per time slot for higher SCS scheduling in the scheduling cell and a second number of supported spans per time slot for the same SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than or equal to the first number.

6. The method according to claim 1, wherein each of the one or more UE capability sets indicates the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell in the control channel, and each of the one or more UE capability sets indicates one or more of the following: The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling for frequency division duplex (FDD) communication in the control channel; The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling for FDD communication in the control channel; The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling for time division duplex (TDD) communication in the control channel; or The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling for TDD communication in the control channel.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein the number of supported DCIs includes one of the following: The number of unicast DCIs for scheduling the downlink; and The number of unicast DCIs for scheduling the uplink.

8. A method for wireless communication by a network, the network including one or more cells serving a user equipment (UE), the method comprises: Receiving, by a serving cell, signaling of one or more UE capability sets of the UE, each of the one or more UE capability sets indicating a number of supported spans per time slot in a scheduling cell, the supported spans being for monitoring a control channel transmitted by the scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling one or more of uplink communication or downlink communication between the UE and one or more scheduled cells, and each of the one or more UE capability sets further indicating the number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel, for each of the following: Same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of the following: the control channel schedules communication between the UE and the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the SCS of the scheduling cell; Lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel scheduling communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; And Higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel scheduling communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell; And Communicating with the UE according to the one or more UE capability sets. wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for the same SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for a lower SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than the first number; or wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for a higher SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for the same SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than the first number.

9. The method according to claim 8, wherein the one or more UE capability sets include separate UE capability sets for each of the same SCS scheduling, lower SCS scheduling, and higher SCS scheduling.

10. The method according to claim 8, wherein the one or more UE capability sets include a first UE capability set for the same SCS scheduling and a lower SCS scheduling, and a second UE capability set for a higher SCS scheduling.

11. The method according to claim 8, wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of per-slot supported spans for the same SCS scheduling of the scheduling cell and a second number of per-slot supported spans for a lower SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than or equal to the first number.

12. The method according to claim 8, wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of per-slot supported spans for a higher SCS scheduling of the scheduling cell and a second number of per-slot supported spans for the same SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than or equal to the first number.

13. The method according to claim 8, wherein the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell in the control channel indicated by each of the one or more UE capability sets includes each of the one or more UE capability sets indicating one or more of the following: the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling of frequency division duplex (FDD) communication in the control channel; the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling of FDD communication in the control channel; the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling of time division duplex (TDD) communication in the control channel; or the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling of TDD communication in the control channel.

14. The method according to claim 8, wherein the number of supported DCIs includes one of the following: the number of unicast DCIs for scheduling the downlink; and the number of unicast DCIs for scheduling the uplink.

15. A user equipment (UE), comprising:[[]] a memory; and a processor coupled to the memory, the processor and the memory being configured to:[[]] Signaling to a serving cell a set or sets of one or more UE capabilities, each set of the one or more UE capabilities indicating a number of per-slot supported spans for monitoring a control channel transmitted by the scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling one or more of uplink communication and downlink communication of the UE with one or more scheduled cells, each set of the one or more UE capabilities further indicating a number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel, the one or more UE capability sets being for each of: Same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of: the control channel scheduling communication of the UE with the scheduling cell, or the control channel scheduling communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the scheduling cell; Lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel scheduling communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; And Higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel scheduling communication of the UE with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell; And Monitoring the control channel according to the one or more UE capability sets, Wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for same SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for lower SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than the first number; or Wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for higher SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for same SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than the first number.

16. The UE according to claim 15, wherein the one or more UE capability sets include separate UE capability sets for each of same SCS scheduling, lower SCS scheduling, and higher SCS scheduling.

17. The UE according to claim 15, wherein the one or more UE capability sets include a first UE capability set for same SCS scheduling and lower SCS scheduling, and a second UE capability set for higher SCS scheduling.

18. The UE according to claim 15, wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of per-slot supported spans for the scheduling cell for same SCS scheduling and a second number of per-slot supported spans for lower SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than or equal to the first number.

19. The UE according to claim 15, wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported spans per time slot for higher SCS scheduling of the scheduling cell and a second number of supported spans per time slot for the same SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than or equal to the first number.

20. The UE according to claim 15, wherein each of the one or more UE capability sets indicates the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell in the control channel, and each of the one or more UE capability sets indicates one or more of the following: The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling of frequency division duplex (FDD) communication in the control channel; The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling of FDD communication in the control channel; The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling of time division duplex (TDD) communication in the control channel; or The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling of TDD communication in the control channel.

21. The UE according to claim 15, wherein the number of supported DCIs includes one of the following: The number of unicast DCIs for scheduling the downlink; and The number of unicast DCIs for scheduling the uplink.

22. A serving cell of a network, the network including one or more cells serving a user equipment (UE), the serving cell comprising: a memory; and a processor coupled to the memory, the processor and the memory being configured to: receive signaling of one or more UE capability sets of the UE, each of the one or more UE capability sets indicating the number of supported spans per time slot of a scheduling cell, the supported spans being for monitoring a control channel transmitted by the scheduling cell, the control channel being for scheduling one or more of uplink communication or downlink communication between the UE and one or more scheduled cells, and each of the one or more UE capability sets further indicating the number of supported downlink control indicators (DCIs) per span per scheduled cell in the control channel, the one or more UE capability sets for each of the following: The same subcarrier spacing (SCS) scheduling, including one or more of the following: the control channel schedules communication between the UE and the scheduling cell, or the control channel schedules communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having the same SCS as the SCS of the scheduling cell; Lower SCS scheduling, including the control channel scheduling communication between the UE and at least one scheduled cell having an SCS lower than the SCS of the scheduling cell; and Higher SCS scheduling, including the control channel scheduling is performed by the UE communicating with at least one scheduled cell having an SCS higher than the SCS of the scheduling cell; And Communicating with the UE according to the one or more UE capability sets, Wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for the same SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for a lower SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than the first number; or Wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of supported DCIs for a higher SCS scheduling and a second number of supported DCIs for the same SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than the first number.

23. The serving cell according to claim 22, wherein the one or more UE capability sets include separate UE capability sets for each of the same SCS scheduling, lower SCS scheduling, and higher SCS scheduling.

24. The serving cell according to claim 22, wherein the one or more UE capability sets include a first UE capability set for the same SCS scheduling and lower SCS scheduling, and a second UE capability set for higher SCS scheduling.

25. The serving cell according to claim 22, wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of per-slot supported spans for the scheduling cell for the same SCS scheduling and a second number of per-slot supported spans for a lower SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than or equal to the first number.

26. The serving cell according to claim 22, wherein the one or more UE capability sets indicate a first number of per-slot supported spans for the scheduling cell for a higher SCS scheduling and a second number of per-slot supported spans for the same SCS scheduling, wherein the second number is less than or equal to the first number.

27. The serving cell according to claim 22, wherein the number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell in the control channel indicated by each of the one or more UE capability sets includes each of the one or more UE capability sets indicating one or more of the following: The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling for frequency division duplex (FDD) communication in the control channel; The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling for FDD communication in the control channel; The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for downlink scheduling for time division duplex (TDD) communication in the control channel; or The number of supported DCIs per span per scheduled cell for uplink scheduling for TDD communication in the control channel.

28. The serving cell according to claim 22, wherein the number of supported DCIs includes one of the following: The number of unicast DCIs for scheduling the downlink; and The number of unicast DCI for scheduling the uplink.

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