Cell discontinuous transmission (DTX)-cell discontinuous reception (DRX) mechanism

Abstract

Various embodiments herein provide techniques related to a user equipment (UE). The UE may be configured to identify an indication related to transmission or reception activity of a cell of the cellular network during an inactivity duration of the cell, the transmission or reception activity related to cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) or cell discontinuous reception (DRX). The UE may also be configured to monitor for reception of the signal based on the indication. Other embodiments may be described and / or claimed.

Description

[0001] CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

[0002] This application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63 / 483,457, filed on February 6, 2023. Background Art

[0003] Energy consumption can be a major contributor to network operating expenses. Energy-saving devices and / or technologies can provide benefits by helping operators cope with unpredictable fuel prices or conserving power. Compared to fourth-generation (4G) networks, fifth-generation (5G) and later systems may feature greater bandwidth, a larger number of transmit / receive (TX / RX) antennas or panels, and higher deployment densities to improve system performance and user experience. Consequently, different vendors may implement proprietary solutions to improve or optimize their network energy consumption. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0004] The embodiments will be readily understood by the following detailed description in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. For ease of description, like reference numerals denote like structural elements. The embodiments are illustrated in the figures of the accompanying drawings by way of example and not limitation.

[0005] Figure 1 Example cell activity / inactivity duration cycles are shown in accordance with various embodiments.

[0006] Figure 2 Alternative cell activity / inactivity duration periods are shown according to various embodiments.

[0007] Figure 3 An example of alignment of cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) and cell discontinuous reception (DRX) activity durations according to various embodiments is shown.

[0008] Figure 4 Examples of medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) related to cell DTX / DRX according to various embodiments are shown.

[0009] Figure 5 Further examples of MAC CEs related to cell DTX / DRX according to various embodiments are shown.

[0010] Figure 6 A wireless network according to various embodiments is schematically illustrated.

[0011] Figure 7 Components of a wireless network according to various embodiments are schematically illustrated.

[0012] Figure 8is a block diagram illustrating components capable of reading instructions from a machine-readable medium or computer-readable medium (eg, a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium) and performing any one or more of the methodologies discussed herein, according to some example embodiments.

[0013] Figure 9 A network according to various embodiments is shown.

[0014] Figure 10 Depicted are example procedures for practicing the various embodiments discussed herein.

[0015] Figure 11 Another example process for practicing the various embodiments discussed herein is depicted.

[0016] Figure 12 Another example process for practicing the various embodiments discussed herein is depicted.

[0017] Figure 13 Another example process for practicing the various embodiments discussed herein is depicted. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0018] The following detailed description refers to the accompanying drawings. The same reference numerals may be used to identify the same or similar elements in different drawings. In the following description, for the purpose of explanation rather than limitation, specific details (e.g., specific structures, architectures, interfaces, technologies, etc.) are set forth to provide a thorough understanding of the various aspects of the various embodiments. However, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art who benefit from this disclosure that the various aspects of the various embodiments can be practiced in other examples that depart from these specific details. In some instances, descriptions of well-known devices, circuits, and methods are omitted to avoid obscuring the description of the various embodiments with unnecessary details. For the purposes of this document, the phrases "A or B" and "A / B" mean (A), (B), or (A and B).

[0019] As mentioned previously, different 5G network vendors can implement proprietary solutions to improve or optimize their network energy consumption. However, such techniques can be limited by a lack of feedback from user equipment (UE) or better coordination between UE and base stations (e.g., gNodeBs (gNBs)), which would make more information available at the gNB to ensure more optimized network energy savings. Solutions that support network energy savings, such as feedback from UEs or control signaling from gNBs, can narrow this gap. One potential contributor to network energy savings is increasing the sleep duration of base stations.

[0020] One such mechanism may be the introduction of a cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) and cell discontinuous reception (DRX) mechanism as described in the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Work Item (WI) as follows: "Specify enhancements to the cell DTX / DRX mechanism, including alignment of cell DTX / DRX and UE DRX in RRC_CONNECTED mode, and inter-node information exchange on cell DTX / DRX".

[0021] In the case of cell DTX / DRX, the cell may be active only during a certain period of time within a cycle, and may transmit to or receive from the UE when the cell is active.

[0022] Cell DTX / DRX can be configured via dedicated radio resource control (RRC) messages, and signaling for activation / deactivation can be accomplished via layer 1 / layer 2 (L1 / L2) signaling or via dedicated RRC messages. L1 / L2 signaling can be accomplished via group common L1 signaling. A cell DTX / DRX cycle may include an active duration and an inactive duration that may repeat periodically. Cell DTX / DRX configuration information may include elements such as a slot offset, a cycle, and an on-duration. The active duration may also be referred to as the on-duration of the DTX / DRX cycle. The inactive duration may also be referred to as an external active duration. Figure 1 An example of a cell activity / inactivity duration period is shown in FIG.

[0023] When cell DTX and cell DRX are activated by L1 / L2 signaling, the UE operation during the active duration and the inactive duration may depend on what level of transmission / reception will be allowed during the inactive duration. The transmission / reception scenarios during the inactive duration may correspond to the following:

[0024] 1. No transmission / reception in the cell

[0025] 2. Only allow synchronization blocks (SSB) in the cell to be sent

[0026] 3. Only SSB and other uplink (UL) / downlink (DL) reference signals are allowed (i.e., channel state information-reference signal (CSLRS) and SSB in DL, and SRS in UL from UEs in the cell)

[0027] 4. Transmission / reception allowed in item 2 or 3, and additionally including periodic data and signaling transmission / reception related to the Physical Random Access Channel (PRACH), Semi-Persistent Scheduling (SPS), Cell Group (CG), and Scheduling Request (SR) from UEs in the cell

[0028] 5. Transmission / reception allowed in item 2 or item 3 and / or item 4, and additionally including DL and UL retransmissions from UEs in the cell.

[0029] In UE DRX for UE energy saving, similar elements related to active time and inactive / external active time are defined. During inactive time, when CSI reporting is disabled, the UE does not monitor the Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) and does not transmit periodic and semi-persistent SRS. Similar UE operation can be defined when the UE is in inactive duration in cell DTX / DRX. In UE DRX, only one transmit / receive scenario exists during inactive time, so only one UE behavior is defined in the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) specifications. For cell DTX / DRX, it may be beneficial to have more than one behavior for both transmit and receive during the inactive duration to allow different levels of network energy saving for cells of the gNB.

[0030] Also note that cell DTX and cell DRX can operate jointly or separately. As used herein, jointly operating means that there is no separate configuration for cell DTX and cell DRX, and their active durations and inactive durations are fully aligned. As used herein, separately operating means that the configuration for cell DTX and cell DRX is configured separately, and their active durations and inactive durations may not be aligned.

[0031] The embodiments herein relate to the use of indication of different levels (different network energy saving modes or levels) for transmission and reception of a (serving) cell or serving cell group (in case of carrier aggregation (CA)) of a gNB in both cell DRX and cell DRX joint operation or standalone operation, and corresponding UE operation for the different levels during inactivity durations.

[0032] Embodiments may enable the network to indicate the transmission / reception level during the inactivity duration via a dedicated RRC message or L1 / L2 indication, and define UE operation in a cell corresponding to each level of transmission / reception during the inactivity duration.

[0033] Typical gNB operations can serve different load conditions (e.g., low load, medium load, or high load), and accordingly, system resource utilization will vary. Under low to medium load conditions, resource utilization is expected to be lower, and the gNB may have a higher chance of inactivity, i.e., no transmission or reception occurs for a certain amount of time, or some transmission or reception may be turned off for a certain period of time, but some transmission or reception may still be allowed to continue to meet UE Quality of Service (QoS) and Radio Resource Measurement (RRM) / scheduling measurement requirements. To indicate when a cell of the gNB is in such inactivity duration, an activity and inactivity duration period may be defined, such as Figure 1 Depicted.

[0034] However, in one embodiment, rather than assuming that all transmission and reception are turned off during the inactivity duration (as in Level #1 below), the network can indicate to the UE which transmission and reception will be turned off or continued during the inactivity duration for cell DTX / DRX. Table 1 below contains some illustrations of different example possible levels / combinations of transmission / reception (TX / RX) during the inactivity duration (in order of maximum network energy saving level (i.e., Level #1) to minimum network energy saving level (i.e., Level #5), excluding the absence of inactivity duration). Other levels with different combinations of transmission / reception are not excluded and may be added or replaced as levels in different embodiments. As used in Table 1, a check mark (√) may indicate successful transmission or reception by a base station (e.g., gNB), while an "X" may indicate no transmission or reception by the base station.

[0035]

[0036] Table 1

[0037] Note that in other embodiments, the term "transmission and reception levels in the inactivity duration" may be defined in other ways, such as NES (Network Energy Saving) mode, mode of NES, NES level, level of NES, etc.

[0038] In this embodiment, one way to provide the UE with an indication related to the level of transmission / reception during the inactivity duration is to signal it in dedicated RRC signaling as part of the cell DTX / DRX configuration for a cell or cell group (in the case of carrier aggregation (CA) where the same cell DTX / DRX configuration is applied). Once the cell DTX / DRX configuration is enabled via higher layer signaling such as RRC signaling or via L1 / L2 signaling, the level of transmission / reception assumed by the UE during the inactivity duration will be based on the level configured as part of the cell DTX / DRX configuration. In the case of multiple cell DTX / DRX configurations, each corresponding level can be provided for each cell DTX / DRX configuration, and when the UE is enabled via RRC signaling or L1 / L2 signaling using the configuration index, the corresponding level of transmission / reception during the inactivity duration is applied. Alternatively, one or more transmission / reception levels in the inactivity duration may be configured separately (i.e., not as part of the cell DTX / DRX configuration), and when the cell DTX / DRX configuration is enabled, one transmission / reception level may be enabled via dedicated RRC signaling or L1 / L2 signaling. As another embodiment, different transmission and reception levels for the inactivity duration may be configured for cell DTX and cell DRX, respectively (an example of which is shown in FIG. Figure 2 ), and thus different levels for cell DTX and cell DRX configuration may be configured and signaled for one or more UEs in a cell via RRC signaling or L1 / L2 signaling.

[0039] As part of an embodiment, the network will select a level of TX / RX during the inactivity duration for a serving cell based on the Quality of Service (QoS) requirements and Radio Resource Management (RRM) / scheduling measurement requirements of the UEs in the serving cell. For example, Level #1 may be selected for a case where the UEs in the cell have delay-tolerant service, and the RRM / scheduling measurement requirements may be relaxed because the UEs all indicate that they are in slow mobility. For a case where the UEs in the cell have delay-tolerant service but require stricter RRM / scheduling measurement requirements because the UEs are moving, Level #2 / Level #3 may be selected. Level #4 is similar to Level #2, except that uplink measurements over SRS are also required. For a case where the UEs in the cell have service that is a more real-time service due to the need to support CG and SPS, and the UEs require stricter user plane latency, Level #5 may be selected. Level #6 is similar to Level #5, except that uplink measurements over SRS are also required. Auxiliary information related to UE mobility may be provided. The criteria for whether relaxed RRM / Radio Link Monitoring (RLM) / Beam Failure Detection (BFD) measurements can be reused for this purpose.

[0040] When the TX / RX level indication during the inactivity duration is configured and enabled, the following table provides examples of UE behavior during the inactivity duration for different TX / RX levels. For UE behavior during the activity duration, the UE will perform the transmission and reception operations specified in the 3GPP specifications as normal. It should be noted that Table 2 below is an example, and in other embodiments, the UE may exhibit additional or alternative behaviors.

[0041]

[0042]

[0043] Table 2

[0044] A.UL and DL retransmission

[0045] For level 1 to level 3 retransmissions, retransmissions (if any) are not scheduled / suspended during the inactivity duration and may be scheduled or resumed during the subsequent activity duration(s). Figure 3 An example case is depicted where the cell DTX and cell DRX activity durations are aligned.

[0046] In both cases, the gNB can consider the inactivity duration when allocating UL resources to carry hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) acknowledgement (ACK) feedback corresponding to the physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) (e.g., PDSCH-to-HARQ-ACK timing, k1 value, physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) or physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) resources used to carry HARQ-ACK feedback, etc.). In case 2, depending on how long the inactivity duration can be, the PDSCH-to-HARQ-ACK timing value can be extended to accommodate the maximum inactivity duration. In the case where cell DTX and cell DRX are not aligned, the PDSCH-to-HARQ-ACK timing value and / or PUCCH / PUSCH resource allocation for carrying HARQ-ACK can take into account both the inactivity duration and the activity duration of cell DRX. For example, HARQ-ACK can be sent only during the activity duration of cell DRX, which can be aligned or misaligned with the activity duration of cell DTX. In another example, if the indicated HARQ-ACK resource falls within the cell DTX / DRX inactivity duration, the UE may skip transmission of HARQ-ACK in that resource. The gNB may schedule another resource for HARQ-ACK transmission in a subsequent activity duration, or the UE may append the HARQ-ACK information to a PUSCH transmission made during a subsequent activity duration.

[0047] For Dynamic Grant (DG) PUSCH and Configured Grant (CG) PUSCH, as in normal operation, whether the gNB successfully receives a transmission may depend on whether the gNB requests a retransmission for the HARQ process via a dynamic grant. Therefore, the gNB may request such a retransmission during the Active Duration. For cases where retransmissions can be performed via CG (e.g., shared spectrum channel access operations, etc.), no retransmissions will be performed during the Inactive Duration because the UE ignores CG opportunities during the duration. However, the Configured Grant Retransmission Timer (CGRT) may need to be extended to accommodate longer retransmission times. Such a configuration change may be included as part of the cell DTX / DRX configuration (if required), or new rules may be specified to allow the CGRT to be counted during the Active Duration.

[0048] As an alternative to retransmissions occurring only during the next active duration (similar to UE DRX), each HARQ process with UL / DL retransmissions has a HARQ Round Trip Time (RTT) timer (for gNB processing time) and a retransmission timer (for the maximum time a retransmission can occur). The active duration of cell DTX / DRX is extended by the HARQ timer for the HARQ process only. The HARQ-RTT timer starts whenever a transmission / retransmission is performed on a HARQ process (i.e., for downlink (DL), after sending HARQ feedback; for uplink (UL), after a PUSCH transmission). Once the HARQ-RTT timer expires, the UE starts the retransmission timer. For the UL, upon receiving HARQ ACK feedback, the UE stops the retransmission timer. Otherwise, the HARQ entity assumes that the transmission was successful after the retransmission timer expires.

[0049] Alternatively, the HARQ timer (if running) is terminated at the start of the inactivity duration, ie the activity time is not extended due to an ongoing HARQ timer.

[0050] B. Scheduling Request (SR)

[0051] For levels #1 to #4, the UE ignores SR opportunities in the inactive duration of cell DRX. For pending SRs, it will be continued in the next valid SR opportunity when the cell is in cell DTX / DRX or the next active duration of cell DRX.

[0052] For levels #5 to #6, SR opportunities in the cell DRX inactivity duration are still available to the UE. The UE will continue to use these opportunities for pending SRs, and the scheduling request procedure is the same as normal.

[0053] C. Physical Random Access Channel (PRACH) and Random Access Channel (RACH) Procedures

[0054] For level #1 to level #4, the UE may ignore PRACH opportunities in the inactive duration of cell DRX.

[0055] For PRACH transmissions that have been initiated but the UE has not received a successful response (RAR or MsgB), the UE may abort the PRACH procedure or continue to retry in the next valid PRACH opportunity when the cell is in cell DTX / DRX or the next active duration in cell DRX.

[0056] For PRACH transmissions that have been initiated but the UE is still in the RAR / MsgB window, the UE may continue to monitor for RAR or MsgB during the inactivity duration or abort the PRACH procedure.

[0057] If a RAR corresponding to the preamble sent in Msg1 is received, or the contention resolution timer or MsgB response window is running, the UE may continue to monitor for RAR or MsgB, or abort the PRACH procedure.

[0058] For level #5 to level #6, PRACH opportunities in the inactive duration of cell DRX are available to UEs in the cell. For the UE, normal operation will continue.

[0059] Interaction between cell DRX / DTX and UE DRX

[0060] Since both UE DRX and cell DRX / DTX may be related to whether or when the UE receives and / or transmits, it may be necessary to coordinate UE behavior between UE DRX and cell DRX / DTX. Because UE DRX may only focus on UE monitoring of PDCCH, while cell DTX / DRX covers not only PDCCH monitoring aspects but also all UL transmission aspects and reference signaling, in one embodiment, if cell DRX / DTX is configured or if cell DRX / DTX is activated and UE DRX is configured, then cell DRX / DTX operation may take precedence over UE DRX operation (i.e., as long as cell DRX / DTX is activated, the UE follows the cell DRX / DTX operation / configuration and the allowed transmission / reception levels). When the network deactivates cell DRX / DTX for the UE, if UE DRX is configured, the UE switches to UE DRX operation. In other words, the UEs in the cell follow a group-common or cell-specific UE DRX configuration, where the parameters of the UE's cell-specific DRX configuration are the same as the cell DTX or cell DTX / DRX configuration.

[0061] An alternative to this is to align the UE DRX of the UEs in the cell with the active duration of the cell DTX. Different levels of transmission and reception in the inactive duration are implemented as exceptions in the UE DRX operation. For example, in the UE DRX off state, SPS data and CG data transmission can still be performed in the legacy UE DRX operation. However, if any of Level #1-Level #4 is indicated for cell DTX / DRX, additional restrictions related to SPS and CG can be added to the UE behavior of UE DRX so that SPS and CG are not considered when the UE is not in active time. In one example of an embodiment, when cell DTX / DRX is enabled, an additional offset can be applied to the start position of the UE's DRX cycle or the start of the on-duration timer. This is to align the DRX cycles of different UEs in the cell. In this case, the UE-specific offset can be mapped to certain cell DTX / DRX configurations.

[0062] Correspondence between indication of enabling / disabling cell DTX / DRX and its transmission and reception during inactivity duration Level L1 / L2 signaling

[0063] In one embodiment, the cell DTX / DRX configuration (for the case where multiple cell DTX / DRX can be configured, there will be more than one cell DTX / DRX configuration) will be pre-configured to the UE. For multiple cell DTX / DRX configurations, only one cell DTX and / or one cell DRX can be enabled at any time. Table 3 below shows example content for various situations:

[0064]

[0065]

[0066] Table 3

[0067] For the use of L1 signaling for indication, the above L1 / L2 content is in the DCI sent in the PDCCH, which is either scrambled with a UE-specific cell radio network temporary identifier (C-RNTI) or scrambled with a UE group / cell-specific UE group / common radio network temporary identifier (RNTI). For the latter, the UE group / common RNTI can be provided in a dedicated RRC message as part of the cell DTX / DRX configuration. The bit width in the downlink control information (DCI) depends on the configuration of case 1 to case 8. For example, if the configuration is case 1, only 1 bit is required in the DCI. However, if the configuration is case 2, the DCI will require more bits to indicate the configuration index.

[0068] For the use of L2 signaling for indication, the above L1 / L2 content is in a new MAC CE for UE-specific cases. In the case where cell DTX / DRX operates separately, the network should be able to enable / disable only cell DRX, only enable / disable cell DTX, or enable / disable both cell DRX and cell DTX. Figure 4 and Figure 5 A new variable length MAC CE format with a new LCID in the sub-header is shown in . Other variations of MAC CE including a variable length MAC CE format to accommodate a larger cell DTX / DRX configuration index or level index are also covered by the embodiments.

[0069] Another example is that due to some further downlink / uplink traffic, there may be occasions when the gNB wants to extend the Active Duration for a UE in a cell. A simple approach is to introduce an inactivity timer triggered by dedicated or common L1 / L2 signaling. Whenever the network (cell) wants to extend the on-duration of cell DTX / DRX for that cell, it can send an indication in common L1 / L2 signaling to extend the Active Duration by the duration of the Inactivity Timer, effectively shortening the inactivity duration of the cell DTX / DRX cycle. The network can use this indication to indicate how many cell DTX / DRX cycles the Inactivity Timer should execute. It can also extend the Active Duration for a UE by one or more cycles using only dedicated L1 / L2 signaling. Furthermore, the Active Duration extension can be performed separately for cell DTX and cell DRX.

[0070] Another approach is to use the same common L1 / L2 signaling to enable / disable cell DTX / DRX to indicate to the UE that cell DTX / DRX in the cell is disabled. In the case where the configured cell DTX / DRX takes precedence over UE DRX, the UE will always transmit and receive. In the case where only enabled cell DTX / DRX takes precedence over UE DRX, the UE will follow UE DRX and the active duration can be extended based on UE-specific DRX. And when the extension of the active duration is no longer needed, the network can enable cell DTX / DRX by using common L1 / L2 signaling to turn cell DTX / DRX back on. It is also possible to use only dedicated L1 / L2 signaling to disable / enable only the cell DTX / DRX of the UE.

[0071] An alternative approach could be to introduce an inactivity timer similar to that of UE DRX (or, in the case where cell DTX and cell DRX are configured separately, a common or separate inactivity timer could be configured). For jointly configured cell DTX and cell DRX, the inactivity timer is started whenever the UE receives a new DL assignment or UL grant via PDCCH. For separately configured cell DTX and cell DRX, the inactivity timer for DL is started whenever a new DL assignment is received in PDCCH, while for UL, the inactivity timer is started whenever a new UL grant is received in PDCCH. For this alternative approach, the extension of the active period will depend on the UE's traffic pattern, and the extension of the active duration will vary from UE to UE.

[0072] System and implementation

[0073] Figure 6-Figure 9 Various systems, devices, and components are shown in which aspects of the disclosed embodiments may be implemented.

[0074] Figure 6 A network 600 is shown according to various embodiments. The network 600 may operate in a manner consistent with 3GPP technical specifications for LTE or 5G / NR systems. However, the example embodiments are not limited in this respect, and the described embodiments may be applied to other networks that benefit from the principles described herein, such as future 3GPP systems, etc.

[0075] The network 600 may include a UE 602, which may include any mobile or non-mobile computing device designed to communicate with the RAN 604 via an over-the-air connection. The UE 602 may be communicatively coupled to the RAN 604 via a Uu interface. The UE 602 may be, but is not limited to, a smartphone, a tablet computer, a wearable computer device, a desktop computer, a laptop computer, an in-vehicle infotainment device, an in-car entertainment device, an instrument cluster, a head-up display device, an on-board diagnostic device, a dashboard mobile device, a mobile data terminal, an electronic engine management system, an electronic / engine control unit, an electronic / engine control module, an embedded system, a sensor, a microcontroller, a control module, an engine management system, a networked device, a machine type communication device, an M2M or D2D device, an IoT device, etc.

[0076] In some embodiments, the network 600 may include multiple UEs directly coupled to each other via sidelink interfaces. The UEs may be M2M / D2D devices that communicate using physical sidelink channels (such as, but not limited to, PSBCH, PSDCH, PSSCH, PSCCH, PSFCH, etc.).

[0077] In some embodiments, UE 602 may also communicate with AP 606 via an over-the-air connection. AP 606 may manage WLAN connections, which may be used to offload some / all network traffic from RAN 604. The connection between UE 602 and AP 606 may be consistent with any IEEE 802.11 protocol, where AP 606 may be a Wireless Fidelity (Wi-Fi) In some embodiments, the UE 602, the RAN 604, and the AP 606 may utilize cellular WLAN aggregation (eg, LWA / LWIP). Cellular WLAN aggregation may involve the UE 602 being configured by the RAN 604 to utilize both cellular radio resources and WLAN resources.

[0078] RAN 604 may include one or more access nodes, such as AN 608. AN 608 may terminate air interface protocols for UE 602 by providing access layer protocols, including RRC, PDCP, RLC, MAC, and L1 protocols. In this manner, AN 608 facilitates data / voice connectivity between CN 620 and UE 602. In some embodiments, AN 608 may be implemented in a discrete device or as one or more software entities running on a server computer, for example, as part of a virtual network, which may be referred to as a CRAN or virtual baseband unit pool. AN 608 is also referred to as a BS, gNB, RAN node, eNB, ng-eNB, Node B, RSU, TRxP, TRP, etc. AN 608 may be a macrocell base station or a low-power base station used to provide femtocells, picocells, or other similar cells with smaller coverage areas, smaller user capacity, or higher bandwidth than macrocells.

[0079] In an embodiment where the RAN 604 includes multiple ANs, these ANs may be coupled to each other via an X2 interface (if the RAN 604 is an LTE RAN) or an Xn interface (if the RAN 604 is a 5G RAN). The X2 / Xn interface, which may be divided into a control / user plane interface in some embodiments, may allow the ANs to transfer information related to handover, data / context transfer, mobility, load management, interference coordination, etc.

[0080] Each AN of the RAN 604 may manage one or more cells, cell groups, component carriers, etc., to provide an air interface for network access to the UE 602. The UE 602 may be simultaneously connected to multiple cells provided by the same or different ANs of the RAN 604. For example, the UE 602 and the RAN 604 may use carrier aggregation to allow the UE 602 to connect to multiple component carriers, each corresponding to a PCell or an Scell. In a dual connectivity scenario, the first AN may be a primary node providing an MCG, and the second AN may be a secondary node providing an SCG. The first AN / second AN may be any combination of an eNB, a gNB, an ng-eNB, etc.

[0081] The RAN 604 may provide an air interface over a licensed spectrum or an unlicensed spectrum. To operate in an unlicensed spectrum, a node may employ LAA, eLAA, and / or feLAA mechanisms based on CA techniques utilizing PCell / Scell. Before accessing an unlicensed spectrum, a node may perform medium / carrier sensing operations based on, for example, a listen-before-talk (LBT) protocol.

[0082] In a V2X scenario, the UE 602 or AN 608 may be or function as an RSU, which can refer to any transport infrastructure entity used for V2X communication. The RSU can be implemented in or by a suitable AN or a fixed (or relatively fixed) UE. An RSU implemented in or by a UE may be referred to as a "UE-type RSU," an RSU implemented in or by an eNB may be referred to as an "eNB-type RSU," an RSU implemented in or by a gNB may be referred to as a "gNB-type RSU," and so on. In one example, an RSU is a computing device coupled to roadside RF circuitry that provides connectivity support to passing vehicular UEs. The RSU may also include internal data storage circuitry to store intersection map geometry, traffic statistics, media, and applications / software for sensing and controlling ongoing vehicular and pedestrian traffic. The RSU can provide very low-latency communications required for high-speed events (e.g., collision avoidance, traffic warnings, etc.). Additionally or alternatively, the RSU may provide other cellular / WLAN communication services. The components of the RSU may be housed in a weatherproof enclosure suitable for outdoor installation and may include a network interface controller to provide a wired connection (e.g., Ethernet) to a traffic signal controller or backhaul network.

[0083] In some embodiments, the RAN 604 may be an LTE RAN 610 with an eNB (e.g., eNB 612). The LTE RAN 610 may provide an LTE air interface with the following characteristics: a 15 kHz SCS; a CP-OFDM waveform for the DL and an SC-FDMA waveform for the UL; turbo codes for data and TBCC for control; etc. The LTE air interface may rely on CSI-RS for CSI acquisition and beam management; PDSCH / PDCCH DMRS for PDSCH / PDCCH demodulation; and CRS for cell search and initial acquisition, channel quality measurement, and channel estimation for coherent demodulation / detection at the UE. The LTE air interface may operate in sub-6 GHz frequency bands.

[0084] In some embodiments, the RAN 604 may be an NG-RAN 614 having a gNB (e.g., gNB 616) or an ng-eNB (e.g., ng-eNB 618). The gNB 616 may connect to a 5G-enabled UE using a 5G NR interface. The gNB 616 may connect to the 5G core via an NG interface, which may include an N2 interface or an N3 interface. The ng-eNB 618 may also connect to the 5G core via an NG interface, but may connect to the UE via an LTE air interface. The gNB 616 and the ng-eNB 618 may connect to each other via an Xn interface.

[0085] In some embodiments, the NG interface can be divided into two parts: an NG user plane (NG-U) interface, which carries service data between the nodes of the NG-RAN 614 and the UPF 648 (e.g., the N3 interface); and an NG control plane (NG-C) interface, which is a signaling interface between the nodes of the NG-RAN 614 and the AMF 644 (e.g., the N2 interface).

[0086] The NG-RAN 614 may provide a 5G-NR air interface with the following features: variable SCS; CP-OFDM for DL, CP-OFDM and DFT-s-OFDM for UL; polarization, repetition, simplex, and Reed-Muller codes for control, and LDPC for data. The 5G-NR air interface may rely on CSI-RS, PDSCH / PDCCH DMRS similar to the LTE air interface. The 5G-NR air interface may not use CRS, but may use PBCH DMRS for PBCH demodulation; PTRS for phase tracking of PDSCH; and tracking reference signals for time tracking. The 5G-NR air interface may operate in FR1 bands including bands below 6 GHz or FR2 bands including bands from 24.25 GHz to 52.6 GHz. The 5G-NR air interface may include an SSB, which is an area of the downlink resource grid that includes PSS / SSS / PBCH.

[0087] In some embodiments, the 5G-NR air interface can utilize BWPs for various purposes. For example, BWPs can be used for dynamic adaptation of SCSs. For example, a UE 602 can be configured with multiple BWPs, each configured with a different SCS. When a BWP change is indicated to the UE 602, the transmitted SCS also changes. Another example use case for BWPs involves power conservation. Specifically, a UE 602 can be configured with multiple BWPs with different amounts of frequency resources (e.g., PRBs) to support data transmission in different traffic load scenarios. A BWP containing a smaller number of PRBs can be used for data transmission with light traffic load, while allowing power savings at the UE 602 and, in some cases, at the gNB 616. A BWP containing a larger number of PRBs can be used in scenarios with higher traffic loads.

[0088] RAN 604 is communicatively coupled to CN 620, which includes network elements for providing various functions to support data and telecommunication services to customers / subscribers (e.g., users of UE 602). Components of CN 620 may be implemented in one physical node or in separate physical nodes. In some embodiments, NFV may be used to virtualize any or all of the functions provided by the network elements of CN 620 onto physical compute / storage resources in servers, switches, etc. A logical instantiation of CN 620 may be referred to as a network slice, and a logical instantiation of a portion of CN 620 may be referred to as a network sub-slice.

[0089] In some embodiments, CN 620 may be an LTE CN 622, which may also be referred to as an EPC. LTE CN 622 may include an MME 624, an SGW 626, an SGSN 628, an HSS 630, a PGW 632, and a PCRF 634 coupled to one another via interfaces (or "reference points"), as shown. The functions of the elements of LTE CN 622 may be briefly described as follows.

[0090] The MME 624 may implement mobility management functions to track the current location of the UE 602 to facilitate paging, bearer activation / deactivation, handover, gateway selection, authentication, and the like.

[0091] The SGW 626 may terminate the S1 interface towards the RAN and route data packets between the RAN and the LTE CN 622. The SGW 626 may be the local mobility anchor for handovers between RAN nodes and may also provide an anchor for inter-3GPP mobility. Other responsibilities may include lawful interception, charging, and some policy enforcement.

[0092] The SGSN 628 can track the location of the UE 602 and perform security functions and access control. In addition, the SGSN 628 can perform inter-EPC node signaling for mobility between different RAT networks; PDN and S-GW selection specified by the MME 624; MME selection for handover; etc. The S3 reference point between the MME 624 and the SGSN 628 can implement user and bearer information exchange for inter-3GPP access network mobility in idle / active states.

[0093] HSS 630 may include a database for network users, including subscription-related information used to support network entities' handling of communication sessions. HSS 630 may provide support for routing / roaming, authentication, authorization, naming / addressing resolution, location dependency, etc. The S6a reference point between HSS 630 and MME 624 enables the transfer of subscription and authentication data used to authenticate / authorize user access to LTE CN 620.

[0094] The PGW 632 can terminate the SGi interface toward a data network (DN) 636, which can include an application / content server 638. The PGW 632 can route data packets between the LTE CN 622 and the data network 636. The PGW 632 can be coupled to the SGW 626 via an S5 reference point to facilitate user plane tunneling and tunnel management. The PGW 632 can also include a node (e.g., PCEF) for policy enforcement and charging data collection. Alternatively, the SGi reference point between the PGW 632 and the data network 636 can be an operator-external public or private PDN or an intra-operator packet data network, for example, for providing IMS services. The PGW 632 can be coupled to the PCRF 634 via a Gx reference point.

[0095] PCRF 634 is the policy and charging control element of LTE CN 622. PCRF 634 can be communicatively coupled to application / content server 638 to determine appropriate QoS and charging parameters for service flows. PCRF 632 can provide the associated rules to PCEF (via the Gx reference point) with the appropriate TFT and QCI.

[0096] In some embodiments, CN 620 may be 5GC 640. 5GC 640 may include AUSF 642, AMF 644, SMF 646, UPF 648, NSSF 650, NEF 652, NRF 654, PCF 656, UDM 658, and AF 660 coupled to one another via interfaces (or "reference points"), as shown. The functions of the elements of 5GC 640 may be briefly described as follows.

[0097] The AUSF 642 may store data used for authentication of the UE 602 and handle authentication-related functions. The AUSF 642 may facilitate a common authentication framework for various access types. In addition to communicating with other elements of the 5GC 640 over reference points as shown, the AUSF 642 may also present an interface based on the Nausf service.

[0098] The AMF 644 can allow other functions of the 5GC 640 to communicate with the UE 602 and the RAN 604 and subscribe to notifications about mobility events related to the UE 602. The AMF 644 can be responsible for registration management (e.g., for registering the UE 602), connection management, reachability management, mobility management, lawful interception of AMF-related events, and access authentication and authorization. The AMF 644 can provide transport for SM messages between the UE 602 and the SMF 646 and act as a transparent proxy for routing SM messages. The AMF 644 can also provide transport for SMS messages between the UE 602 and the SMSF. The AMF 644 can interact with the AUSF 642 and the UE 602 to perform various security anchor and context management functions. In addition, the AMF 644 can be the termination point for the RAN CP interface, which may include or be the N2 reference point between the RAN 604 and the AMF 644; and the AMF 644 can be the termination point for NAS (N1) signaling and perform NAS encryption and integrity protection. The AMF 644 may also support NAS signaling with the UE 602 through the N3 IWF interface.

[0099] The SMF 646 may be responsible for SM (e.g., session establishment, tunnel management between the UPF 648 and the AN 608); UE IP address allocation and management (including optional authorization); selection and control of UP functions; configuring traffic steering at the UPF 648 to route traffic to the appropriate destination; terminating the interface toward the policy control function; controlling part of policy enforcement, billing, and QoS; lawful interception (for SM events and interfaces to the LI system); terminating the SM portion of NAS messages; downlink data notification; initiating AN-specific SM information, which is sent to the AN 608 via the AMF 644 over N2; and determining the SSC mode for the session. SM may refer to the management of a PDU session, and a PDU session or "session" may refer to a PDU connection service that provides or enables the exchange of PDUs between the UE 602 and the data network 636.

[0100] The UPF 648 can serve as an anchor point for intra-RAT and inter-RAT mobility, an external PDU session point for interconnecting to the data network 636, and a branch point to support multi-homed PDU sessions. The UPF 648 can also perform packet routing and forwarding, perform packet inspection, implement the user plane portion of policy rules, lawful interception of packets (UP collection), perform service usage reporting, perform user plane QoS processing (e.g., packet filtering, gating, UL / DL rate enforcement), perform uplink service verification (e.g., SDF to QoS flow mapping), transport level packet marking in the uplink and downlink, and perform downlink packet buffering and downlink data notification triggering. The UPF 648 can include an uplink classifier to support routing of service flows to the data network.

[0101] The NSSF 650 may select a set of network slice instances to serve the UE 602. If necessary, the NSSF 650 may also determine the allowed NSSAI and the mapping to the subscribed S-NSSAI. The NSSF 650 may also determine the set of AMFs or the list of candidate AMFs to be used to serve the UE 602 based on appropriate configuration and possibly by querying the NRF 654. The selection of a set of network slice instances for the UE 602 may be triggered by the AMF 644 to which the UE 602 is registered by interacting with the NSSF 650, which may result in a change of the AMF. The NSSF 650 may interact with the AMF 644 via the N22 reference point; and may communicate with another NSSF in the visited network via the N31 reference point (not shown). In addition, the NSSF 650 may present an interface based on the Nnssf service.

[0102] NEF 652 can securely expose services and capabilities provided by 3GPP network functions to third parties, internal exposure / re-exposure, AFs (e.g., AF 660), edge computing or fog computing systems, and the like. In such embodiments, NEF 652 can authenticate, authorize, or throttle the AF. NEF 652 can also convert information exchanged with AF 660 and information exchanged with internal network functions. For example, NEF 652 can convert between AF-Service-Identifiers and internal 5GC information. NEF 652 can also receive information from other NFs based on their exposed capabilities. This information can be stored as structured data at NEF 652 or stored at a data storage device NF using standardized interfaces. The stored information can then be re-exposed by NEF 652 to other NFs and AFs or used for other purposes, such as analysis. In addition, NEF 652 can present an interface based on NNEF services.

[0103] The NRF 654 can support service discovery functionality, receiving NF discovery requests from NF instances and providing information about discovered NF instances to the NF instances. The NRF 654 also maintains information about available NF instances and the services they support. As used herein, the terms "instantiate," "instantiate," and the like can refer to the creation of an instance, and "instance" can refer to the specific occurrence of an object, for example, an object can occur during the execution of program code. Additionally, the NRF 654 can present an interface based on Nnrf services.

[0104] The PCF 656 can provide policy rules to the control plane functions for implementation and can also support a unified policy framework to manage network behavior. The PCF 656 can also implement a front end to access subscription information related to policy decisions in the UDR of the UDM 658. In addition to communicating with functions through reference points as shown, the PCF 656 also exposes an interface based on the Npcf service.

[0105] The UDM 658 can process subscription-related information to support network entities handling communication sessions and can store subscription data for the UE 602. For example, subscription data can be transferred via the N8 reference point between the UDM 658 and the AMF 644. The UDM 658 can include two components: an application frontend and a UDR. The UDR can store subscription data and policy data for the UDM 658 and PCF 656, and / or application data for the NEF 652 (including PFDs for application detection, application request information for multiple UEs 602), and structured data for exposure. The UDR 221 can present a Nudr service-based interface to allow the UDM 658, PCF 656, and NEF 652 to access a specific set of stored data, as well as read, update (e.g., add, modify), delete, and subscribe to notifications of changes to relevant data in the UDR. The UDM can include a UDM-FE, which is responsible for handling credentials, location management, subscription management, etc. Several different frontends can serve the same user in different transactions. The UDM-FE accesses subscription information stored in the UDR and performs authentication credential handling, user identity handling, access authorization, registration / mobility management, and subscription management. In addition to communicating with other NFs through reference points as shown, the UDM 658 can also present an interface based on Nudm services.

[0106] The AF 660 may provide application influence on service routing, provide access to the NEF, and interact with the policy framework for policy control.

[0107] In some embodiments, the 5GC 640 can implement edge computing by selecting an operator / third-party service that is geographically close to the point where the UE 602 attaches to the network. This can reduce latency and load on the network. To provide an edge computing implementation, the 5GC 640 can select a UPF 648 close to the UE 602 and perform service steering from the UPF 648 to the data network 636 via the N6 interface. This can be based on UE subscription data, UE location and information provided by the AF 660. In this way, the AF 660 can influence UPF (re)selection and service routing. Based on operator deployment, the network operator can allow the AF 660 to interact directly with the relevant NF when the AF 660 is considered a trusted entity. In addition, the AF 660 can present an interface based on the Naf service.

[0108] The data network 636 may represent various network operator services, Internet access, or third-party services that may be provided by one or more servers, including, for example, an application / content server 638 .

[0109] Figure 7 Schematically illustrated is a wireless network 700 according to various embodiments. The wireless network 700 may include a UE 702 in wireless communication with an AN 704. The UE 702 and the AN 704 may be similar to, and substantially interchangeable with, similarly named components described elsewhere herein.

[0110] UE 702 may be communicatively coupled with AN 704 via connection 706. Connection 706 is shown as an air interface for achieving the communicative coupling and may be consistent with a cellular communication protocol, such as a 5G NR protocol or an LTE protocol operating at mmWave or sub-6 GHz frequencies.

[0111] UE 702 may include a host platform 708 coupled to a modem platform 710. Host platform 708 may include application processing circuitry 712, which may be coupled to protocol processing circuitry 714 of modem platform 710. Application processing circuitry 712 may run various applications for UE 702 that generate / consume application data. Application processing circuitry 712 may also implement one or more layer operations to send / receive application data to / from a data network. These layer operations may include transport (e.g., UDP) operations and internet (e.g., IP) operations.

[0112] Protocol processing circuitry 714 may implement one or more of the layer operations to facilitate sending or receiving data over connection 706. The layer operations implemented by protocol processing circuitry 714 may include, for example, MAC, RLC, PDCP, RRC, and NAS operations.

[0113] The modem platform 710 may also include a digital baseband circuit system 716 that may implement one or more layer operations that are performed as "lower" layer operations by the protocol processing circuit system 714 in the network protocol stack. These operations may include, for example, PHY operations, including one or more of the following: HARQ-ACK functions, scrambling / descrambling, encoding / decoding, layer mapping / demapping, modulation symbol mapping, received symbol / bit metric determination, multi-antenna port precoding / decoding (which may include one or more of the following: space-time, space-frequency, or space coding), reference signal generation / detection, preamble sequence generation and / or decoding, synchronization sequence generation / detection, control channel signal blind decoding, and other related functions.

[0114] Modem platform 710 may also include transmit circuitry 718, receive circuitry 720, RF circuitry 722, and an RF front end (RFFE) 724, which may include or be connected to one or more antenna panels 726. Briefly, transmit circuitry 718 may include digital-to-analog converters, mixers, intermediate frequency (IF) components, etc.; receive circuitry 720 may include analog-to-digital converters, mixers, IF components, etc.; RF circuitry 722 may include low-noise amplifiers, power amplifiers, power tracking components, etc.; and RFFE 724 may include filters (e.g., surface / bulk acoustic wave filters), switches, antenna tuners, beamforming components (e.g., phased array antenna components), etc. The selection and arrangement of the components of transmit circuitry 718, receive circuitry 720, RF circuitry 722, RFFE 724, and antenna panels 726 (generally referred to as "transmit / receive components") may be specific to the details of a particular implementation, such as whether the communication is TDM or FDM, at millimeter-wave or sub-6 GHz frequencies, etc. In some embodiments, the transmit / receive components may be arranged in multiple parallel transmit / receive chains, may be provided in the same or different chips / modules, etc.

[0115] In some embodiments, protocol processing circuitry 714 may include one or more instances of control circuitry (not shown) to provide control functionality for the transmit / receive components.

[0116] UE reception may be established by and via antenna panel 726, RFFE 724, RF circuitry 722, receive circuitry 720, digital baseband circuitry 716, and protocol processing circuitry 714. In some embodiments, antenna panel 726 may receive transmissions from AN 704 via receive beamforming signals received by multiple antennas / antenna elements of one or more antenna panels 726.

[0117] UE transmission may be established by and via protocol processing circuitry 714, digital baseband circuitry 716, transmit circuitry 718, RF circuitry 722, RFFE 724, and antenna panel 726. In some embodiments, the transmit component of UE 704 may apply a spatial filter to the data to be transmitted to form a transmit beam that is transmitted by the antenna elements of antenna panel 726.

[0118] Similar to UE 702, AN 704 may include a host platform 728 coupled to a modem platform 730. Host platform 728 may include application processing circuitry 732 coupled to protocol processing circuitry 734 of modem platform 730. The modem platform may also include digital baseband circuitry 736, transmit circuitry 738, receive circuitry 740, RF circuitry 742, RFFE circuitry 744, and an antenna panel 746. The components of AN 704 may be similar to and substantially interchangeable with similarly named components of UE 702. In addition to performing data transmission / reception as described above, the components of AN 708 may also perform various logical functions, including, for example, RNC functions, such as radio bearer management, uplink and downlink dynamic radio resource management, and data packet scheduling.

[0119] Figure 8 is a block diagram illustrating components according to some example embodiments that are capable of reading instructions from a machine-readable medium or computer-readable medium (e.g., a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium) and performing any one or more of the methodologies discussed herein. Specifically, Figure 8 A diagrammatic representation of hardware resources 800 is shown, including one or more processors (or processor cores) 810, one or more memory / storage devices 820, and one or more communication resources 830, each of which can be communicatively coupled via a bus 840 or other interface circuitry. For embodiments in which node virtualization (e.g., NFV) is utilized, a hypervisor 802 can be executed to provide an execution environment for one or more network slices / subslices to utilize the hardware resources 800.

[0120] Processor 810 may include, for example, processor 812 and processor 814. Processor 810 may be, for example, a central processing unit (CPU), a reduced instruction set computing (RISC) processor, a complex instruction set computing (CISC) processor, a graphics processing unit (GPU), a DSP such as a baseband processor, an ASIC, an FPGA, a radio frequency integrated circuit (RFIC), another processor (including those discussed herein), or any suitable combination of the foregoing.

[0121] The memory / storage device 820 may include main memory, disk storage, or any suitable combination thereof. The memory / storage device 820 may include, but is not limited to, any type of volatile, non-volatile, or semi-volatile memory, such as dynamic random access memory (DRAM), static random access memory (SRAM), erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), flash memory, solid-state storage, and the like.

[0122] The communication resources 830 may include interconnect or network interface controllers, components, or other suitable devices to communicate with one or more peripheral devices 804 or one or more databases 806 or other network elements via the network 808. For example, the communication resources 830 may include wired communication components (e.g., for coupling via USB, Ethernet, etc.), cellular communication components, NFC components, (or Low power) components, components and other communication components.

[0123] The instructions 850 may include software, a program, an application, an applet, an app, or other executable code for causing at least one of the processors 810 to perform any one or more of the methods discussed herein. The instructions 850 may reside, in whole or in part, within any one of the processors 810 (e.g., within a cache memory of the processor), the memory / storage device 820, or any suitable combination thereof. In addition, any portion of the instructions 850 may be transferred to the hardware resources 800 from any combination of the peripheral devices 804 or the database 806. Thus, the memory of the processor 810, the memory / storage device 820, the peripheral devices 804, and the database 806 are examples of computer-readable media and machine-readable media.

[0124] Figure 9A network 900 according to various embodiments is shown. The network 900 may operate in a manner consistent with the 3GPP technical specifications or technical reports for 6G systems. In some embodiments, the network 900 may operate simultaneously with the network 600. For example, in some embodiments, the network 900 may share one or more frequency or bandwidth resources with the network 600. As a specific example, a UE (e.g., UE 902) may be configured to operate in both the network 900 and the network 600. This configuration may be based on a UE including a circuit system configured to communicate with the frequency and bandwidth resources of both the networks 600 and 900. Typically, several elements of the network 900 may share one or more characteristics with elements of the network 600. For the sake of brevity and clarity, these elements may not be repeated in the description of the network 900.

[0125] The network 900 may include a UE 902, which may include any mobile or non-mobile computing device designed to communicate with the RAN 908 via an over-the-air connection. The UE 902 may be similar to, for example, the UE 602. The UE 902 may be, but is not limited to, a smartphone, a tablet computer, a wearable computer device, a desktop computer, a laptop computer, an in-vehicle infotainment device, an in-car entertainment device, an instrument cluster, a head-up display device, an on-board diagnostic device, a dashboard mobile device, a mobile data terminal, an electronic engine management system, an electronic / engine control unit, an electronic / engine control module, an embedded system, a sensor, a microcontroller, a control module, an engine management system, a networked device, a machine type communication device, an M2M or D2D device, an IoT device, etc.

[0126] Despite Figure 9 Although not specifically shown in FIG, in some embodiments, the network 900 may include multiple UEs directly coupled to each other via sidelink interfaces. The UEs may be M2M / D2D devices that communicate using physical sidelink channels (e.g., but not limited to, PSBCH, PSDCH, PSSCH, PSCCH, PSFCH, etc.). Similarly, although not shown in FIG, Figure 9 Specific examples are shown, but UE 902 can communicate with AP (e.g., Figure 6 606) are communicatively coupled. Figure 9 Specific examples are shown, but in some embodiments, the RAN 908 may include one or more ANs, e.g. Figure 6 The depicted AN 608. The RAN 908 and / or the AN of the RAN 908 may be referred to as a base station (BS), a RAN node, or by some other terminology or designation.

[0127] The UE 902 and the RAN 908 may be configured to communicate via an air interface that may be referred to as a sixth generation (6G) air interface. The 6G air interface may include one or more features, such as communication in terahertz (THz) or sub-THz bandwidth, or joint communication and sensing. As used herein, the term "joint communication and sensing" may refer to a system that allows wireless communication as well as radar-based sensing via various types of multiplexing. As used herein, THz or sub-THz bandwidth may refer to communication in a frequency range of 80 GHz and above. Such frequency ranges may additionally or alternatively be referred to as "millimeter wave" or "mmWave" frequency ranges.

[0128] The RAN 908 may enable communication between the UE 902 and the 6G core network (CN) 910. Specifically, the RAN 908 may facilitate the transmission and reception of data between the UE 902 and the 6G CN 910. The 6G CN 910 may include various functions, such as NSSF 650, NEF 652, NRF 654, PCF 656, UDM 658, AF 660, SMF 646, and AUSF 642. The 6G CN 910 may also include UPF 648 and DN 636, as shown in FIG. Figure 9 shown.

[0129] Additionally, the RAN 908 may include various additional functions that supplement or replace the functions of legacy cellular networks (e.g., 4G or 5G networks). Two such functions may include a compute control function (Comp CF) 924 and a compute service function (Comp SF) 936. The Comp CF 924 and the Comp SF 936 may be parts or functions of the compute service plane. The Comp CF 924 may be a control plane function that provides functions such as management of the Comp SF 936, generation and management of compute task contexts (e.g., create, read, modify, delete), interaction with the underlying compute infrastructure for compute resource management, and the like. The Comp SF 936 may be a user plane function that acts as a gateway to connect compute service users (e.g., UE 902) and the compute nodes behind the Comp SF instance. Some functions of the Comp SF 936 may include: parsing compute service data received from users to compute tasks that can be performed by the compute nodes; maintaining a service mesh entry gateway or service API gateway; service and billing policy enforcement; performance monitoring and telemetry collection, and the like. In some embodiments, a Comp SF 936 instance may serve as a user plane gateway for a cluster of compute nodes. A Comp CF 924 instance may control one or more Comp SF 936 instances.

[0130] Two other such functions may include the Communication Control Function (Comm CF) 928 and the Communication Service Function (CommSF) 938. Comm CF 928 and Comm SF 938 may be part of the communication service plane. Comm CF 928 may be a control plane function for managing Comm SF 938, communication session creation / configuration / release, and managing communication session context. Comm SF 938 may be a user plane function for data transmission. Comm CF 928 and Comm SF 938 may be considered as upgrades to SMF 646 and UPF 648. Figure 6 The upgrade provided by CommCF 928 and CommSF 938 enables service-aware transmission. For legacy (e.g., 4G or 5G) data transmission, SMF 646 and UPF 648 can still be used.

[0131] Two other such functions may include a data control function (data CF) 922 and a data service function (data SF) 932, which may be part of the data service plane. The data CF 922 may be a control plane function and provide functions such as data SF 932 management, data service creation / configuration / release, data service context management, etc. The data SF 932 may be a user plane function and serve as a gateway between data service users (e.g., UE 902 and various functions of 6GCN 910) and data service endpoints behind the gateway. Specific functions may include parsing data service user data and forwarding it to the corresponding data service endpoint, generating billing data, and reporting data service status.

[0132] Another such function may be the Service Orchestration and Linking Function (SOCF) 920, which can discover, orchestrate, and link communication / computing / data services provided by functions in the network. Upon receiving a service request from a user, the SOCF 920 may interact with one or more of the Comp CF 924, Comm CF 928, and Data CF 922 to identify Comp SF 936, Comm SF 938, and Data SF 932 instances, configure service resources, and generate a service chain, which may include multiple Comp SF 936, Comm SF 938, and Data SF 932 instances and their associated compute endpoints. Workload processing and data movement may then occur within the generated service chain. The SOCF 920 may also be responsible for maintaining, updating, and releasing the created service chain.

[0133] Another such function may be a service registration function (SRF) 914, which may serve as a registry for system services provided in the user plane, such as services provided by service endpoints behind the Comp SF 936 and Data SF 932 gateways, and services provided by the UE 902. The SRF 914 may be considered a counterpart to the NRF 654, which may serve as a registry for network functions.

[0134] Other such functions may include the evolved service communication proxy (eSCP) and the service infrastructure control function (SICF) 926, which can provide service communication infrastructure for control plane services and user plane services. The eSCP can be related to the 5G service communication proxy (SCP) with the addition of user plane service communication proxy capabilities. Therefore, the eSCP is represented by two parts: eCSP-C 912 and eSCP-U 934, for control plane service communication proxy and user plane service communication proxy, respectively. The SICF 926 can control and configure the eCSP instance in terms of service traffic routing policies, access rules, load balancing configuration, performance monitoring, etc.

[0135] Another such function is the AMF 944. The AMF 944 may be similar to the AMF 644, but with additional functionality. Specifically, the AMF 944 may include potential functional repartitioning, for example, moving message forwarding functionality from the AMF 944 to the RAN 908.

[0136] Another such function is the Service Orchestration Exposure Function (SOEF) 918. The SOEF may be configured to expose service orchestration and linked services to external users such as applications.

[0137] The UE 902 may include an additional functionality referred to as a compute client service function (comp CSF) 904. The compCSF 904 may have both control plane functionality and user plane functionality and may interact with corresponding network-side functions (e.g., SOCF 920, Comp CF 924, Comp SF 936, Data CF 922, and / or Data SF 932) for service discovery, request / response, computing task workload exchange, etc. The Comp CSF 904 may also work with the network-side functions to decide whether computing tasks should be run on elements of the UE 902, the RAN 908, and / or the 6G CN 910.

[0138] UE 902 and / or Comp CSF 904 may include a service mesh proxy 906. The service mesh proxy 906 may serve as a proxy for service-to-service communications in the user plane. The capabilities of the service mesh proxy 906 may include one or more of addressing, security, load balancing, and the like.

[0139] Example Process

[0140] In some embodiments, Figure 6-Figure 9 Or some other figure(s) of this document, the (one or more) electronic devices, (one or more) networks, (one or more) systems, (one or more) chips or (one or more) components or parts or implementations thereof may be configured to perform one or more processes, techniques or methods or parts thereof as described herein. Figure 10 Such a process is depicted in . Figure 10 The process may include or relate to a method to be performed by a user equipment (UE), one or more elements of the UE, and / or an electronic device including or implementing the UE. The process may include: identifying an indication of a level of transmit / receive activity of one or more cells at 1001; and performing physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring or reference signal monitoring based on the level of transmit / receive activity at 1002.

[0141] Figure 11 Another such process is depicted in . Figure 11 The process may include or relate to a method to be performed by an electronic device of a cellular network. The process may include: identifying an indication of a level of transmit / receive activity of one or more cells at 1101; and sending the indication to a user equipment (UE) at 1102.

[0142] Figure 12 Another such process is depicted in . Figure 12 The process may include or relate to a method to be performed by a user equipment (UE), one or more elements of the UE, and / or an electronic device including and / or implementing the UE. The process may include: at 1201, identifying, by the UE, an indication related to a transmission activity or a reception activity of a cell of a cellular network during an inactivity duration of the cell, the transmission activity or the reception activity being related to discontinuous transmission (DTX) or discontinuous reception (DRX) of the cell; and at 1202, monitoring, by the UE, reception of a signal based on the indication.

[0143] Figure 13 Another such process is depicted in . Figure 13The process may include or involve a method to be performed by a base station, one or more elements of the base station, and / or an electronic device including and / or implementing the base station. The process may include: generating, by the base station, an indication related to a transmission activity or a reception activity of a cell of a cellular network during an inactivity duration of the cell, the transmission activity or the reception activity related to discontinuous transmission (DTX) or discontinuous reception (DRX) of the cell, at 1301; and sending, to a user equipment (UE) of the cellular network, at 1302, the indication, wherein the UE is configured to monitor for reception of a signal based on the indication.

[0144] For one or more embodiments, at least one of the components described in one or more of the foregoing figures may be configured to perform one or more operations, techniques, processes, and / or methods as described in the Examples section below. For example, the baseband circuit system described above in conjunction with one or more of the foregoing figures may be configured to operate according to one or more of the examples described below. As another example, the circuit system associated with the UE, base station, network element, etc., as described above in conjunction with one or more of the foregoing figures, may be configured to operate according to one or more of the examples described in the Examples section below.

[0145] Example

[0146] Example 1 may include a method for a 5G NR UE, wherein:

[0147] receiving, by the UE, an indication of the level of transmission and reception of a cell or group of cells during an inactivity duration (in the case of CA where the cells have the same DTX / DRX configuration),

[0148] Among them, the level indicates the transmission / reception activity during the inactivity duration of the UE and specifies the UE operation corresponding to PDCCH monitoring, reception of reference signals, and other dedicated and common signals.

[0149] Example 2 may include the method of Example 1 or some other example herein, wherein different levels of transmission and reception in the inactivity duration are configured when cell DRX / DTX is configured via RRC as part of the cell DTX / DRX configuration or separately.

[0150] Example 3 may include the method of Example 1 or some other example herein, wherein the indication of the level of transmission and reception in the inactive duration of cell DTX and cell DRX is sent via RRC signaling or via L1 / L2 signaling.

[0151] Example 4 may include the method of Example 1 or some other example herein, wherein the level of transmission and reception in the inactivity duration is determined based on QoS requirements and RRM and scheduling measurement requirements of the UE or UE group or single UE in the cell.

[0152] Example 5 may include the method of Example 1 or some other example herein, wherein, if both cell DRX / DTX operation and UE DRX operation are configured and cell DRX / DTX operation is activated / enabled, the cell DRX / DTX operation takes precedence over the UE DRX operation.

[0153] Example 6 may include the method of Example 1 or some other example herein, wherein the activity duration of cell DRX / DTX may be extended via L1 / L2 signaling.

[0154] Example 7 includes a method performed by a user equipment (UE), one or more elements of a UE, and / or an electronic device including or implementing a UE, wherein the method includes:

[0155] identifying an indication of a level of transmit / receive activity for one or more cells; and

[0156] Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) monitoring or reference signal monitoring is performed based on the level of transmission / reception activity.

[0157] Example 8 includes the method of Example 7 and / or some other example herein, wherein the one or more cells are a cell group in carrier aggregation (CA).

[0158] Example 9 includes the method of any of Examples 7-8 and / or some other example herein, wherein the transmission / reception activity is related to cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) / cell discontinuous reception (DRX).

[0159] Example 10 includes the method of Example 9 and / or some other example herein, wherein the level of transmit / receive activity is related to an inactivity duration of DTX / DRX.

[0160] Example 11 includes the method of Example 9 and / or some other example herein, wherein the indication is based on a radio resource control (RRC) configuration related to cell DTX / DRX operation.

[0161] Example 12 includes the method of Example 11 and / or some other example herein, wherein the RRC configuration is sent via layer 1 / layer 2 (L1 / L2) signaling.

[0162] Example 13 includes a method performed by an electronic device of a cellular network, wherein the method includes:

[0163] identifying an indication of a level of transmit / receive activity for one or more cells; and

[0164] An indication is sent to a user equipment (UE).

[0165] Example 14 includes the method of Example 13 and / or some other example herein, wherein the one or more cells are a cell group in carrier aggregation (CA).

[0166] Example 15 includes the method of any of Examples 13-14 and / or some other example herein, wherein the transmission / reception activity is related to cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) / cell discontinuous reception (DRX).

[0167] Example 16 includes the method of Example 15 and / or some other example herein, wherein the level of transmit / receive activity is related to an inactivity duration of DTX / DRX.

[0168] Example 17 includes the method of Example 15 and / or some other example herein, wherein the indication is sent in a radio resource control (RRC) configuration related to cell DTX / DRX operation.

[0169] Example 18 includes the method of Example 17 and / or some other example herein, wherein the RRC configuration is sent via layer 1 / layer 2 (L1 / L2) signaling.

[0170] Example 19 includes a method performed by a user equipment (UE), one or more elements of a UE, and / or an electronic device including and / or implementing a UE, wherein the method includes: identifying, by the UE, an indication related to a transmission activity or a reception activity of a cell of a cellular network during an inactivity duration of the cell, the transmission activity or the reception activity being related to cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) or cell discontinuous reception (DRX); and monitoring, by the UE, reception of a signal based on the indication.

[0171] Example 20 includes the method of Example 19 and / or some other example herein, wherein the indication is received via higher layer signaling.

[0172] Example 21 includes the method of Example 20 and / or some other example herein, wherein the higher layer signaling is radio resource control (RRC) signaling or layer 1 / layer 2 (L1 / L2) signaling.

[0173] Example 22 includes the method of any of Examples 19-21 and / or some other example herein, wherein the indication relates to transmit activity or receive activity of a plurality of cells, and wherein the plurality of cells have the same configuration of cell DTX or cell DRX.

[0174] Example 23 includes the method of any of Examples 19-22 and / or some other example herein, wherein the monitoring of reception of the signal relates to physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring.

[0175] Example 24 includes the method of any of Examples 19-23 and / or some other example herein, wherein the monitoring for receipt of the signal is related to receipt of a reference signal.

[0176] Example 25 includes a method of any of Examples 19-24 and / or some other example herein, wherein the UE is further configured to: during the inactivity duration, identify that the UE is configured with UE DRX operation during the inactivity duration; during the inactivity duration, act according to cell DTX or cell DRX; and during the inactivity duration, not act according to the UE DRX operation.

[0177] Example 26 includes a method performed by a base station, one or more elements of a base station, and / or an electronic device that includes and / or implements a base station, wherein the method includes: generating, by the base station, an indication related to a transmission activity or a reception activity of a cell of a cellular network during an inactivity duration of the cell, the transmission activity or the reception activity being related to cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) or cell discontinuous reception (DRX); and sending the indication to a user equipment (UE) of the cellular network, wherein the UE is configured to monitor for reception of a signal based on the indication.

[0178] Example 27 includes the method of Example 26 and / or some other example herein, wherein the indication is sent via higher layer signaling.

[0179] Example 28 includes the method of Example 27 and / or some other example herein, wherein the higher layer signaling is radio resource control (RRC) signaling or layer 1 / layer 2 (L1 / L2) signaling.

[0180] Example 29 includes the method of any of Examples 26-28 and / or some other example herein, wherein the indication relates to transmit activity or receive activity of a plurality of cells, and wherein the plurality of cells have the same configuration of cell DTX or cell DRX.

[0181] Example 30 includes the method of any of Examples 26-29 and / or some other example herein, wherein the monitoring for reception of the signal relates to physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring.

[0182] Example 31 includes the method of any of Examples 26-30 and / or some other example herein, wherein the monitoring for receipt of the signal is related to receipt of a reference signal.

[0183] Example 32 includes a method of any of Examples 26-31 and / or some other example herein, wherein the UE is further configured to: during the inactivity duration, identify that the UE is configured with UE DRX operation during the inactivity duration; during the inactivity duration, act according to cell DTX or cell DRX; and during the inactivity duration, not act according to the UE DRX operation.

[0184] Example Z01 may include an apparatus comprising means for performing one or more elements of a method described in or related to any of Examples 1-18, or any other method or process described herein.

[0185] Example Z02 may include one or more non-transitory computer-readable media that include instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of an electronic device, cause the electronic device to perform one or more elements of a method described in or related to any of Examples 1-18 or any other method or process described herein.

[0186] Example Z03 may include an apparatus including logic, modules, or circuitry to perform one or more elements of the method described in or related to any of Examples 1-18, or any other method or process described herein.

[0187] Example Z04 may include a method, technique, or process as described in or relating to any of Examples 1-18 (or portions or components thereof).

[0188] Example Z05 may include a device comprising: one or more processors; and one or more computer-readable media comprising instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform the above-described methods, techniques, or processes, as described in or related to any of Examples 1-18 (or portions or components thereof).

[0189] Example Z06 can include a signal as described in or relating to any of Examples 1-18 (or portions or components thereof).

[0190] Example Z07 may include a datagram, packet, frame, segment, protocol data unit (PDU), or message as described in or related to any of Examples 1-18 (or a portion or component thereof), or as otherwise described in this disclosure.

[0191] Example Z08 can include a signal encoded with data as described in or relating to any of Examples 1-18 (or portions or components thereof), or as otherwise described in this disclosure.

[0192] Example Z09 may include a signal encoded using a datagram, packet, frame, segment, protocol data unit (PDU), or message, as described in or related to any of Examples 1-18 (or portions or components thereof), or as otherwise described in this disclosure.

[0193] Example Z10 may include an electromagnetic signal carrying computer-readable instructions, wherein the computer-readable instructions are executed by one or more processors to cause the one or more processors to perform the above-mentioned methods, techniques, or processes, as described in any one of Examples 1-18 (or portions thereof) or related to any one of Examples 1-18.

[0194] Example Z11 may include a computer program comprising instructions, wherein execution of the program by a processing element causes the processing element to perform the above-mentioned method, technique, or process, as described in any one of Examples 1-18 (or part thereof) or related to any one of Examples 1-18.

[0195] Example Z12 may include signals in a wireless network as shown and described herein.

[0196] Example Z13 may include a method of communicating in a wireless network as shown and described herein.

[0197] Example Z14 may include a system for providing wireless communications as shown and described herein.

[0198] Example Z15 may include an apparatus for providing wireless communications as shown and described herein.

[0199] Unless otherwise expressly stated, any of the above examples may be combined with any other example (or combination of examples). The foregoing description of one or more implementations provides illustration and description, but is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the scope of the embodiments to the precise forms disclosed. Modifications and variations are possible in light of the above teachings or may be acquired from practice of the various embodiments.

[0200] abbreviation

[0201] Unless otherwise used herein, the terms, definitions, and abbreviations may be consistent with those defined in 3GPP TR 21.905 v16.0.0 (2019-06). For the purposes of this document, the following abbreviations may be applied to the examples and embodiments discussed herein.

[0202]

[0203]

[0204]

[0205]

[0206]

[0207]

[0208]

[0209]

[0210]

[0211]

[0212]

[0213]

[0214]

[0215]

[0216]

[0217] the term

[0218] For the purposes of this document, the following terms and definitions apply to the examples and embodiments discussed herein.

[0219] The term "application" can refer to a complete and deployable grouping environment that implements a certain function in an operating environment. The term "AI / ML application" can refer to an application that includes some AI / ML models and application-level descriptions.

[0220] As used herein, the term "circuitry" refers to a hardware component (e.g., an electronic circuit, a logic circuit, a processor (shared, dedicated, or group) and / or memory (shared, dedicated, or group), an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC), a field programmable device (FPD) (e.g., a field programmable gate array (FPGA), a programmable logic device (PLD), a complex PLD (CPLD), a high capacity PLD (HCPLD), a structured ASIC, or a programmable SoC), a digital signal processor (DSP), etc.) that is configured to provide the described functionality, is part of, or includes the hardware component. In some embodiments, the circuitry may execute one or more software or firmware programs to provide at least some of the described functionality. The term "circuitry" may also refer to a combination of one or more hardware elements (or a combination of circuits used in an electrical or electronic system) and program code for executing the functionality of the program code. In these embodiments, the combination of hardware elements and program code may be referred to as a specific type of circuitry.

[0221] As used herein, the term "processor circuitry" refers to a circuitry that is capable of sequentially and automatically performing a sequence of arithmetic or logical operations or recording, storing and / or transmitting digital data, is part of or includes the circuitry. The processing circuitry may include one or more processing cores for executing instructions and one or more memory structures for storing program and data information. The term "processor circuitry" may refer to one or more application processors, one or more baseband processors, a physical central processing unit (CPU), a single-core processor, a dual-core processor, a triple-core processor, a quad-core processor and / or any other device capable of executing or otherwise operating computable instructions (e.g., program code, software modules and / or functional processes). The processing circuitry may include more hardware accelerators, which may be microprocessors, programmable processing devices, etc. One or more hardware accelerators may include, for example, computer vision (CV) and / or deep learning (DL) accelerators. The terms "application circuitry" and / or "baseband circuitry" may be considered synonymous with "processor circuitry" and may be referred to as "processor circuitry."

[0222] As used herein, the term "interface circuitry" refers to, is a part of, or includes circuitry that enables information to be exchanged between two or more components or devices. The term "interface circuitry" may refer to one or more hardware interfaces, such as a bus, an I / O interface, a peripheral component interface, a network interface card, and the like.

[0223] As used herein, the term "user equipment" or "UE" refers to a device with radio communication capabilities and may describe a remote user of network resources in a communication network. The term "user equipment" or "UE" may be considered synonymous with, and may be referred to as, a client, a mobile device, a mobile device, a mobile terminal, a user terminal, a mobile unit, a mobile station, a mobile user, a subscriber, a user, a remote station, an access agent, a user agent, a receiver, a radio device, a reconfigurable radio device, a reconfigurable mobile device, or the like. Furthermore, the term "user equipment" or "UE" may include any type of wireless / wired device or any computing device having a wireless communication interface.

[0224] As used herein, the term "network element" refers to a physical or virtualized device and / or infrastructure used to provide wired or wireless communication network services. The term "network element" may be considered synonymous with and / or referred to as a networked computer, networking hardware, network device, network node, router, switch, hub, bridge, radio network controller, RAN equipment, RAN node, gateway, server, virtualized VNF, NFVI, etc.

[0225] As used herein, the term "computer system" refers to any type of interconnected electronic devices, computing devices, or components thereof. Additionally, the terms "computer system" and / or "system" may refer to various components of a computer that are communicatively coupled to one another. Furthermore, the terms "computer system" and / or "system" may refer to multiple computing devices and / or multiple computing systems that are communicatively coupled to one another and configured to share computing and / or networking resources.

[0226] As used herein, the terms "apparatus," "computer apparatus," and the like refer to a computer device or computer system having program code (e.g., software or firmware) specifically designed to provide specific computing resources. A "virtual apparatus" is a virtual machine image to be implemented by a hypervisor-equipped apparatus that virtualizes or emulates a computer apparatus or is otherwise dedicated to providing specific computing resources.

[0227] As used herein, the term "resource" refers to a physical or virtual component within a computing environment, a physical or virtual device, and / or a physical or virtual component within a specific device, such as computer equipment, mechanical equipment, memory space, processor / CPU time, processor / CPU usage, processor and accelerator load, hardware time or usage, power, input / output operations, ports or network slots, channel / link allocation, throughput, memory usage, storage, network, database, and application, workload units, etc. "Hardware resources" may refer to computing, storage, and / or network resources provided by (one or more) physical hardware elements. "Virtualized resources" may refer to computing, storage, and / or network resources provided by a virtualized infrastructure to an application, device, system, etc. The term "network resources" or "communication resources" may refer to resources accessible to a computer device / system via a communication network. The term "system resources" may refer to any type of shared entity that provides a service, and may include computing and / or network resources. System resources may be considered to be a set of coherent functions, network data objects, or services accessible through a server, wherein such system resources reside on a single host or multiple hosts and are clearly identifiable.

[0228] As used herein, the term "channel" refers to any transmission medium, tangible or intangible, for transmitting data or data streams. The term "channel" may be synonymous and / or equivalent to "communication channel," "data communication channel," "transmission channel," "data transmission channel," "access channel," "data access channel," "link," "data link," "carrier," "radio frequency carrier," and / or any other similar terms representing a path or medium through which data is transmitted. Additionally, the term "link," as used herein, refers to a connection between two devices over a RAT for the purpose of transmitting and receiving information.

[0229] As used herein, the terms "instantiate," "instantiate," and the like refer to the creation of an instance. "Instance" also refers to a specific occurrence of an object, such as an object may occur during the execution of program code.

[0230] The terms "coupled", "communicatively coupled" and their derivatives are used herein. The term "coupled" can mean that two or more elements are in direct physical or electrical contact with each other, can mean that two or more elements are in indirect contact with each other but still cooperate or interact with each other, and / or can mean that one or more other elements are coupled or connected between elements that are referred to as being coupled to each other. The term "directly coupled" can mean that two or more elements are in direct contact with each other. The term "communicatively coupled" can mean that two or more elements can contact each other by means of communication (including by wired or other interconnected connections, by wireless communication channels or links, etc.).

[0231] The term "information element" refers to a structural element that contains one or more fields. The term "field" refers to the individual contents of an information element or a data element that contains content.

[0232] The term "SMTC" refers to the SSB-based measurement timing configuration configured by SSB-MeasurementTimingConfiguration.

[0233] The term "SSB" refers to SS / PBCH block.

[0234] The term "primary cell" refers to an MCG cell operating on a primary frequency, where the UE performs an initial connection establishment procedure or initiates a connection re-establishment procedure.

[0235] The term "primary SCG cell" refers to an SCG cell in which a UE performs random access when performing reconfiguration using a synchronization procedure for DC operation.

[0236] The term "secondary cell" refers to a cell that provides additional radio resources on top of a special cell for a UE configured with CA.

[0237] The term "secondary cell group" refers to a subset of serving cells for a UE configured with DC, which includes a PSCell and zero or more secondary cells.

[0238] The term "serving cell" refers to a primary cell for a UE in RRC_CONNECTED where CA / DC is not configured, and there is only one serving cell including the primary cell.

[0239] The term "serving cell" or "serving cells" refers to a set of cells including special cell(s) and all secondary cells for a UE in RRC_CONNECTED configured with CA / .

[0240] The term "special cell" refers to the PCell of an MCG or the PSCell of an SCG for DC operation; otherwise, the term "special cell" refers to the Pcell.

[0241] The term "machine learning" or "ML" refers to the use of a computer system to implement algorithms and / or statistical models to perform (one or more) specific tasks without using explicit instructions, but instead relying on patterns and inferences. ML algorithms build or estimate (one or more) mathematical models (called "ML models", etc.) based on sample data (called "training data", "model training information", etc.) in order to make predictions or decisions without being explicitly programmed to perform such tasks. Generally, an ML algorithm is a computer program that learns from experience about a certain task and a certain performance measure, and an ML model can be any object or data structure created after training an ML algorithm using one or more training data sets. After training, the ML model can be used to make predictions on new data sets. Although the term "ML algorithm" refers to a different concept than the term "ML model", for the purposes of this disclosure, these terms discussed herein can be used interchangeably.

[0242] The terms "machine learning model," "ML model," etc., may also refer to the ML methods and concepts used by ML-assisted solutions. An "ML-assisted solution" is a solution that uses ML algorithms to solve specific use cases during operation. ML models include supervised learning (e.g., linear regression, k-nearest neighbors (KNN), decision tree algorithms, support vector machines, Bayesian algorithms, ensemble algorithms, etc.), unsupervised learning (e.g., K-means clustering, principal component analysis (PCA), etc.), reinforcement learning (e.g., Q-learning, multi-armed bandit learning, deep RL, etc.), neural networks, etc. Depending on the implementation, a specific ML model may have many sub-models as components, and all sub-models may be trained together. Separately trained ML models may also be linked together in an ML pipeline during inference. An "ML pipeline" is a set of functional, functional, or functional entities specific to an ML-assisted solution; an ML pipeline may include one or more data sources and actors within the data pipeline, model training pipeline, and model evaluation pipeline. An "actor" is the entity that hosts the ML-assisted solution using the output of ML model inference. The term "ML training host" refers to the entity that hosts the training of a model, such as a network function. The term "ML inference host" refers to the entity that hosts the model during inference mode, which includes model execution and any online learning (if applicable). The ML host notifies the actors of the output of the ML algorithm, and the actors make decisions about actions (actors perform "actions" as a result of the output of the ML-assisted solution). The term "model inference information" refers to the information used as input to the ML model to determine (one or more) inferences; the data used to train the ML model and the data used to determine inferences can overlap, however, "training data" and "inference data" refer to different concepts.

Claims

1. A user equipment (UE), comprising: a memory for storing an indication related to a transmission activity or a reception activity of a cell of a cellular network during an inactivity duration of the cell, the transmission activity or the reception activity being related to cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) or cell discontinuous reception (DRX); as well as One or more processors configured to facilitate monitoring for receipt of a signal based on the indication.

2. The UE according to claim 1, wherein: The indication is received via higher layer signaling.

3. The UE according to claim 2, wherein: The higher layer signaling is radio resource control (RRC) signaling or layer 1 / layer 2 (L1 / L2) signaling.

4. The UE according to claim 1, wherein: The indication is related to transmission activities or reception activities of a plurality of cells, and wherein the plurality of cells have the same configuration of cell DTX or cell DRX.

5. The UE according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein: The monitoring of reception of the signal relates to Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) monitoring.

6. The UE according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein: The monitoring of the reception of the signal is correlated with the reception of a reference signal.

7. The UE according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein: The one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to: identifying, during the inactivity duration, that the UE is configured with UE DRX operation during the inactivity duration; During the inactivity duration, taking action according to cell DTX or cell DRX; as well as During the inactivity duration, no action is performed according to the UE DRX operation.

8. One or more non-transitory computer-readable media comprising instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause a base station of a cellular network to: generating an indication related to a transmit activity or a receive activity of a cell of a cellular network during an inactivity duration of the cell, the transmit activity or the receive activity related to cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) or cell discontinuous reception (DRX); and sending the indication to a user equipment (UE) of the cellular network, wherein: The UE is configured to monitor for reception of a signal based on the indication.

9. One or more non-transitory computer-readable media according to claim 8, wherein: The indication is sent via higher layer signaling.

10. One or more non-transitory computer-readable media according to claim 9, wherein: The higher layer signaling is radio resource control (RRC) signaling or layer 1 / layer 2 (L1 / L2) signaling.

11. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable media of claim 8, wherein: The indication is related to transmission activities or reception activities of a plurality of cells, and wherein the plurality of cells have the same configuration of cell DTX or cell DRX.

12. One or more non-transitory computer-readable media according to any one of claims 8-11, wherein: The monitoring of reception of the signal relates to Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) monitoring.

13. One or more non-transitory computer-readable media according to any one of claims 8 to 11, wherein: The monitoring of the reception of the signal is correlated with the reception of a reference signal.

14. A user equipment (UE), comprising: one or more processors; as well as One or more non-transitory computer-readable media comprising instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the UE to: identifying an indication related to a transmit activity or a receive activity of a cell of a cellular network during an inactivity duration of the cell, the transmit activity or the receive activity related to cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) or cell discontinuous reception (DRX); as well as Reception of the signal is monitored based on the indication.

15. The UE according to claim 14, wherein: The indication is received via higher layer signaling.

16. The UE according to claim 15, wherein: The higher layer signaling is radio resource control (RRC) signaling or layer 1 / layer 2 (L1 / L2) signaling.

17. The UE according to claim 14, wherein: The indication is related to transmission activities or reception activities of a plurality of cells, and wherein the plurality of cells have the same configuration of cell DTX or cell DRX.

18. The UE according to any one of claims 14 to 17, wherein: The monitoring of reception of the signal relates to Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) monitoring.

19. The UE according to any one of claims 14 to 17, wherein: The monitoring of the reception of the signal is correlated with the reception of a reference signal.

20. The UE according to any one of claims 14 to 17, wherein: The instruction is further configured to cause the UE to perform the following operations: identifying, during the inactivity duration, that the UE is configured with UE DRX operation during the inactivity duration; During the inactivity duration, taking action according to cell DTX or cell DRX; as well as During the inactivity duration, no action is performed according to the UE DRX operation.

Images