Beam specific channel detection failure

Abstract

The present disclosure provides systems, methods, and devices for wireless communication supporting beam-specific channel sensing. In a first aspect, a method of wireless communication includes performing a channel sensing operation before transmitting a first transmission via a first particular beam of a plurality of beams. The method also includes determining a beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the performing of the channel sensing operation. The method further includes transmitting channel sensing failure information indicating the channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure and one or more previous beam-specific channel sensing failures. Other aspects and features are also claimed and described.

Description

[Technical field]

[0001] CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS This application claims the benefit of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 17 / 184,175, filed Feb. 24, 2021, entitled “BEAM SPECIFIC CHANNEL SENSING FAILURE,” which is expressly incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

[0002] Aspects of the present disclosure relate generally to wireless communication systems, and more particularly, to beam-specific channel sensing operations. Certain features may enable and provide improved communications, including enhanced channel sensing failure detection, reporting, and recovery. [Background technology]

[0003] Wireless communication networks are widely deployed to provide various communication services such as voice, video, packet data, messaging, broadcasts, etc. These wireless networks may be multiple-access networks capable of supporting multiple users by sharing available network resources. Such networks may be multiple-access networks that support communication for multiple users by sharing available network resources.

[0004] A wireless communication network may include several components. These components may include wireless communication devices, such as base stations (or Node Bs), that can support communication for several user equipments (UEs). The UEs may communicate with the base stations via a downlink and an uplink. The downlink (or forward link) refers to the communication link from the base station to the UE, and the uplink (or reverse link) refers to the communication link from the UE to the base station.

[0005] A base station may transmit data and control information to a UE on the downlink or receive data and control information from a UE on the uplink. On the downlink, transmissions from a base station may experience interference due to transmissions from neighboring base stations or from other wireless radio frequency (RF) transmitters. On the uplink, transmissions from a UE may experience interference from uplink transmissions of other UEs communicating with neighboring base stations or from other wireless RF transmitters. This interference may degrade performance on both the downlink and the uplink.

[0006] As the demand for mobile broadband access continues to increase, more UEs access long-range wireless communication networks, and more short-range wireless systems are deployed in regions, increasing the possibility of interference and network congestion. Research and development continues to evolve wireless technologies to not only meet the growing demand for mobile broadband access, but also to evolve and improve the user experience of mobile communications. Summary of the Invention [Means for solving the problem]

[0007] The following summarizes some aspects of the present disclosure in order to provide a basic understanding of the described technology. This summary is not an extensive overview of all contemplated features of the disclosure, nor is it intended to identify key or critical elements of all aspects of the disclosure, nor is it intended to delineate the scope of any or all aspects of the disclosure. Its sole purpose is to present some concepts of one or more aspects of the disclosure in summary form as a prelude to the more detailed description that is presented later.

[0008] In one aspect of the disclosure, a method of wireless communication includes performing, by a wireless communication device, a channel sensing operation prior to transmitting a first transmission over a first particular beam of a plurality of beams. The method also includes determining, by the wireless communication device, a beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the performing of the channel sensing operation. The method further includes transmitting, by the wireless communication device, channel sensing failure information indicative of the channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure and one or more previous beam-specific channel sensing failures.

[0009] In an additional aspect of the present disclosure, an apparatus configured for wireless communication is disclosed. The apparatus includes at least one processor and a memory coupled to the at least one processor. The at least one processor is configured to perform, by the wireless communication device, a channel sensing operation prior to transmitting a first transmission over a first particular beam of the plurality of beams. The at least one processor is also configured to determine, by the wireless communication device, a beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the performing of the channel sensing operation. The at least one processor is further configured to transmit, by the wireless communication device, channel sensing failure information indicative of the channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure and one or more previous beam-specific channel sensing failures.

[0010] In an additional aspect of the present disclosure, an apparatus configured for wireless communication is disclosed. The apparatus includes means for performing, by a wireless communication device, a channel sensing operation prior to transmitting a first transmission over a first particular beam of a plurality of beams. The apparatus also includes means for determining, by the wireless communication device, a beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the performing of the channel sensing operation. The apparatus further includes means for transmitting, by the wireless communication device, channel sensing failure information indicative of the channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure and one or more previous beam-specific channel sensing failures.

[0011] In an additional aspect of the disclosure, a non-transitory computer-readable medium stores instructions that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to perform operations including performing, by a wireless communication device, a channel sensing operation prior to transmitting a first transmission over a first particular beam of the multiple beams. The operations also include determining, by the wireless communication device, a beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the performing of the channel sensing operation. The operations further include transmitting, by the wireless communication device, channel sensing failure information indicative of the channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure and one or more previous beam-specific channel sensing failures.

[0012] In an additional aspect of the disclosure, a method of wireless communication includes transmitting, by a wireless communication device, beam-specific channel sensing failure configuration information. The method further includes receiving, by the wireless communication device, channel sensing failure information indicative of a channel sensing failure for a particular beam based on a plurality of beam-specific channel sensing failures.

[0013] In an additional aspect of the present disclosure, an apparatus configured for wireless communication is disclosed. The apparatus includes at least one processor and a memory coupled to the at least one processor. The at least one processor is configured to transmit, by the wireless communication device, beam-specific channel detection failure configuration information. The at least one processor is further configured to receive, by the wireless communication device, channel detection failure information indicative of a channel detection failure for a particular beam based on the plurality of beam-specific channel detection failures.

[0014] In an additional aspect of the present disclosure, an apparatus configured for wireless communication is disclosed. The apparatus includes means for transmitting, by a wireless communication device, beam-specific channel sensing failure configuration information. The apparatus further includes means for receiving, by the wireless communication device, channel sensing failure information indicative of a channel sensing failure for a particular beam based on a plurality of beam-specific channel sensing failures.

[0015] In an additional aspect of the disclosure, a non-transitory computer-readable medium stores instructions that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to perform operations including transmitting, by a wireless communication device, beam-specific channel sensing failure configuration information, the operations further including receiving, by the wireless communication device, channel sensing failure information indicative of a channel sensing failure for a particular beam based on the plurality of beam-specific channel sensing failures.

[0016] Other aspects, features, and implementations will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reviewing the following description of certain exemplary aspects together with the accompanying figures. Although features may be described in conjunction with some aspects and figures below, various aspects may include one or more of the advantageous features described herein. In other words, although one or more aspects may be described as having some advantageous features, one or more of such features may also be used in accordance with various aspects. Similarly, although exemplary aspects may be described below as device aspects, system aspects, or method aspects, the exemplary aspects may be implemented in various devices, systems, and methods.

[0017] A further understanding of the nature and advantages of the present disclosure can be realized by referring to the following drawings. In the attached drawings, similar components or features may have the same reference label. Furthermore, various components of the same type may be distinguished by following the reference label with a dash and a second label that distinguishes the similar components. When only a first reference label is used in this specification, the description is applicable to any of the similar components having the same first reference label, regardless of the second reference label. [Brief description of the drawings]

[0018] [Figure 1] FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating details of an example wireless communication system in accordance with one or more aspects. [Diagram 2] FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating an example of a base station and user equipment (UE) in accordance with one or more aspects. [Diagram 3] FIG. 13 illustrates an example of a channel sensing operation. [Figure 4] FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating an example wireless communication system that supports use of beam-specific channel sensing operations in accordance with one or more aspects. [Diagram 5]FIG. 1 is a ladder diagram illustrating an example wireless communication system that supports the use of beam-specific channel sensing operations in accordance with one or more aspects. [Figure 6] FIG. 1 is a ladder diagram illustrating an example wireless communication system that supports the use of beam-specific channel sensing operations in accordance with one or more aspects. [Figure 7] FIG. 13 is a block diagram illustrating beam-specific channel sensing counter and timer operation in accordance with one or more aspects. [Figure 8] FIG. 11 is a flow diagram illustrating an example process for supporting the use of beam-specific channel sensing operations in accordance with one or more aspects. [Figure 9] FIG. 11 is a flow diagram illustrating an example process for supporting the use of beam-specific channel sensing operations in accordance with one or more aspects. [Figure 10] 1 is a block diagram of an example UE that supports use of beam-specific channel sensing operations in accordance with one or more aspects. [Figure 11] 1 is a block diagram of an example base station that supports the use of beam-specific channel sensing operations in accordance with one or more aspects. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

[0019] Like reference numbers and designations in the various drawings indicate like elements.

[0020] The detailed description set forth below with reference to the accompanying drawings is intended as a description of various configurations and is not intended to limit the scope of the present disclosure. Rather, the detailed description includes specific details to provide a thorough understanding of the subject matter of the present invention. It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that these specific details are not required in all cases and that in some instances, well-known structures and components are shown in block diagram form for clarity of presentation.

[0021] The present disclosure generally relates to providing or participating in authorized shared access among two or more wireless devices in one or more wireless communication systems, also referred to as wireless communication networks. In various implementations, the techniques and apparatus may be used for wireless communication networks such as code division multiple access (CDMA) networks, time division multiple access (TDMA) networks, frequency division multiple access (FDMA) networks, orthogonal FDMA (OFDMA) networks, single carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA) networks, LTE networks, GSM networks, fifth generation (5G) or new radio (NR) networks (sometimes referred to as "5G NR" networks, systems, or devices), and other communication networks. The terms "network" and "system" described herein may be used interchangeably.

[0022] For example, a CDMA network may implement a radio technology such as universal terrestrial radio access (UTRA), cdma2000, etc. UTRA includes Wideband-CDMA (W-CDMA) and Low Chip Rate (LCR). CDMA2000 covers IS-2000, IS-95, and IS-856 standards.

[0023] The TDMA network may implement a radio technology such as, for example, Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM). The 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) defines standards for the GSM EDGE (Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution) Radio Access Network (RAN), also denoted as GERAN. The GERAN is the radio component of GSM / EDGE, along with the network that connects the base stations (e.g., Ater and Abis interfaces) and the base station controllers (such as the A interface). The radio access network represents the component of the GSM network through which telephone calls and packet data are routed to and from the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) and the Internet to and from the subscriber handsets, also known as user terminals or user equipment (UE). A mobile phone operator's network may include one or more GERANs, which may be combined with a UTRAN in the case of a UMTS / GSM network. In addition, the operator network may also include one or more LTE networks or one or more other networks. Various different network types may use different Radio Access Technologies (RATs) and RANs.

[0024] OFDMA networks may implement radio technologies such as Evolved UTRA (E-UTRA), Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11, IEEE 802.16, IEEE 802.20, Flash OFDM, etc. UTRA, E-UTRA, and GSM are parts of the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS). Specifically, Long Term Evolution (LTE) is a release of UMTS that uses E-UTRA. UTRA, E-UTRA, GSM, UMTS, and LTE are described in documents provided by an organization named "3rd Generation Partnership Project" (3GPP®), and cdma2000 is described in documents from an organization named "3rd Generation Partnership Project 2" (3GPP2). These various radio technologies and standards are known or under development. For example, 3GPP® is a collaboration between groups of telecommunications associations whose purpose is to define globally applicable third generation (3G) mobile phone specifications. 3GPP® LTE is a 3GPP® project aimed at improving the UMTS mobile phone standard. 3GPP® may define specifications for the next generation of mobile networks, mobile systems, and mobile devices. Although the present disclosure may describe some aspects with reference to LTE, 4G, or 5G NR technology, the description is not intended to be limited to a particular technology or application, and one or more aspects described with reference to one technology may be understood to be applicable to another technology. In addition, one or more aspects of the present disclosure may relate to shared access to a wireless spectrum between networks using different radio access technologies or radio air interfaces.

[0025] 5G networks contemplate diverse deployments, diverse spectrum, and diverse services and devices that may be implemented using an OFDM-based unified air interface. To achieve these goals, further enhancements to LTE and LTE-A are being considered in addition to the development of new radio technologies for 5G NR networks. 5G NR is a service-oriented technology that aims to achieve: (1) ultra-high density (e.g., approximately 1 million nodes / km); 2 ), ultra-low complexity (e.g., on the order of tens of bits per second), ultra-low energy (e.g., on the order of 10 years battery life), and deep coverage with the ability to reach difficult locations; (2) to the Massive Internet of Things (IoT) with strong security to protect sensitive personal, financial, or confidential information, ultra-high reliability (e.g., on the order of 99.9999% reliability), ultra-low latency (e.g., on the order of 1 millisecond (ms)), and mission-critical control with users having or lacking widespread mobility; and (3) ultra-high capacity (e.g., on the order of 10 Tbps / km 2 ), ultra-high data rates (e.g., multi-Gbps rates, user experience rates of 100 Mbps or greater), and enhanced mobile broadband including a deep understanding of advanced discovery and optimization.

[0026] Devices, networks, and systems may be configured to communicate over one or more portions of the electromagnetic spectrum. The electromagnetic spectrum is often subdivided into various classes, bands, channels, etc., based on frequency or wavelength. In 5G NR, two initial operating bands have been identified with the frequency range designations FR1 (410 MHz-7.125 GHz) and FR2 (24.25 GHz-52.6 GHz). Frequencies between FR1 and FR2 are often referred to as mid-band frequencies. Although portions of FR1 are higher than 6 GHz, FR1 is often referred to (interchangeably) as the "sub-6 GHz" band in various documents and papers. Similar nomenclature issues may arise with respect to FR2, which is often referred to (interchangeably) as the "mmWave" band in documents and papers, even though it is distinct from the extremely high frequency (EHF) band (30 GHz-300 GHz) identified by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) as the "millimeter wave" (mmWave) band.

[0027] With the above aspects in mind, it should be understood that unless otherwise specified, terms such as "sub-6 GHz," as used herein, may broadly refer to frequencies that may be below 6 GHz, may be within FR1, or may include mid-band frequencies. Additionally, it should be understood that unless otherwise specified, terms such as "mmWave," as used herein, may broadly refer to frequencies that may include mid-band frequencies, may be within FR2, or may be within the EHF band.

[0028] 5G NR devices, networks, and systems may be implemented to use optimized OFDM-based waveform features. These features may include advanced wireless technologies such as scalable numerology and transmission time intervals (TTIs), a common flexible framework for efficiently multiplexing services and features in dynamic low-latency time division duplex (TDD) or frequency division duplex (FDD) designs, massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO), robust mmWave transmissions, advanced channel coding, and device-centric mobility. The scalability of numerology in 5G NR, along with the scaling of subcarrier spacing, may efficiently address operating diverse services across diverse spectrums and diverse deployments. For example, in various outdoor and macro coverage deployments of FDD or TDD implementations below 3 GHz, subcarrier spacing may occur at 15 kHz, for example, across bandwidths of 1, 5, 10, 20 MHz, etc. For various other outdoor and small cell coverage deployments of TDD over 3 GHz, subcarrier spacing may occur at 30 kHz over an 80 / 100 MHz bandwidth. For various other indoor wideband implementations using TDD over the unlicensed portion of the 5 GHz band, subcarrier spacing may occur at 60 kHz over a 160 MHz bandwidth. Finally, for various deployments transmitting with mmWave components at 28 GHz TDD, subcarrier spacing may occur at 120 kHz over a 500 MHz bandwidth.

[0029] 5G NR's scalable numerology facilitates scalable TTIs for diverse latency and quality of service (QoS) requirements. For example, shorter TTIs can be used for low latency and high reliability, while longer TTIs can be used for higher spectral efficiency. Efficient multiplexing of long and short TTIs allows transmissions to start on symbol boundaries. 5G NR also contemplates a self-contained, unified subframe design with uplink or downlink scheduling information, data, and acknowledgments in the same subframe. The self-contained, unified subframe supports communication in unlicensed or contention-based shared spectrum, adaptive uplink or downlink that can be flexibly configured per cell to dynamically switch between uplink and downlink to meet current traffic needs.

[0030] For clarity, certain aspects of the apparatus and techniques may be described below with reference to an exemplary 5G NR implementation or with a 5G focus, and 5G terminology may be used as an illustrative example in parts of the following description, but the description is not intended to be limited to 5G application examples.

[0031] Moreover, it should be understood that in operation, a wireless communications network adapted in accordance with the concepts herein may operate in any combination of licensed or unlicensed spectrum depending on loading and availability. Accordingly, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that the systems, apparatus, and methods described herein may be applied to communications systems and applications other than the specific examples shown.

[0032] Although aspects and implementations are described in this application by illustrating some examples, those skilled in the art will understand that additional implementations and use cases may occur in many different configurations and scenarios. The innovations described herein may be implemented across many different platform types, devices, systems, shapes, sizes, packaging configurations. For example, implementations or applications may occur via integrated chip implementations or other non-modular component-based devices (e.g., end-user devices, vehicles, communication devices, computing devices, industrial equipment, retail or purchasing devices, medical devices, AI-enabled devices, etc.). Some examples may or may not be directed to a particular use case or application, but a wide variety of applicability of the described innovations may occur. Implementations may range from chip-level or modular components to non-modular, non-chip-level implementations, and even aggregated, distributed, or original equipment manufacturer (OEM) devices or systems incorporating one or more described aspects. In some practical settings, devices incorporating the described aspects and features may also necessarily include additional components and features in order to implement and practice the claimed and described aspects. It is intended that the innovations described herein may be practiced in a wide variety of implementations, including both large and small devices, chip-level components, multi-component systems (e.g., radio frequency (RF) chains, communication interfaces, processors), distributed configurations, end-user devices, and the like, of various sizes, shapes, and configurations.

[0033] 1 is a block diagram illustrating details of an exemplary wireless communication system according to one or more aspects. The wireless communication system may include a wireless network 100. The wireless network 100 may include, for example, a 5G wireless network. As will be appreciated by those skilled in the art, the components appearing in FIG. 1 likely have related counterparts including other network configurations, for example, cellular network configurations and non-cellular network configurations (e.g., device-to-device or peer-to-peer or ad-hoc network configurations, etc.).

[0034] The wireless network 100 shown in FIG. 1 includes several base stations 105 and other network entities. A base station may be a station that communicates with UEs and may also be referred to as an evolved Node B (eNB), next generation eNB (gNB), access point, etc. Each base station 105 may provide communication coverage for a particular geographic area. In 3GPP, the term "cell" may refer to a particular geographic coverage area of ​​a base station or base station subsystem serving the coverage area, depending on the context in which the term is used. In implementations of the wireless network 100 herein, the base stations 105 may be associated with the same operator or different operators (e.g., the wireless network 100 may include a multi-operator wireless network). In addition, in implementations of the wireless network 100 herein, the base station 105 may provide wireless communications using one or more of the same frequencies as adjacent cells (e.g., one or more frequency bands in a licensed spectrum, an unlicensed spectrum, or a combination thereof). In some examples, an individual base station 105 or UE 115 may be operated by more than one network operating entity. In some other examples, each base station 105 and UE 115 may be operated by a single network operating entity.

[0035] A base station may provide communication coverage for a macro cell, or a small cell such as a pico cell or femto cell, or other type of cell. A macro cell generally covers a relatively large geographic area (e.g., a few kilometers in radius) and may allow unrestricted access by UEs with a service subscription with the network provider. A small cell such as a pico cell generally covers a relatively small geographic area and may allow unrestricted access by UEs with a service subscription with the network provider. A small cell such as a femto cell also generally covers a relatively small geographic area (e.g., a home) and may provide unrestricted access, as well as restricted access by UEs with an association with the femto cell (e.g., UEs in a Closed Subscriber Group (CSG), UEs of a user in a home, etc.). A base station for a macro cell may be referred to as a macro base station. A base station for a small cell may be referred to as a small cell base station, a pico base station, a femto base station, or a home base station. In the example shown in FIG. 1, base stations 105d and 105e are regular macro base stations, while base stations 105a-105c are macro base stations enabled with one of three-dimensional (3D) MIMO, full dimension (FD) MIMO, or massive MIMO. Base stations 105a-105c utilize their higher dimension MIMO capabilities to leverage 3D beamforming with both advanced and azimuth beamforming to increase coverage and capacity. Base station 105f is a small cell base station that may be a home node or a portable access point. A base station may support one or multiple (e.g., two, three, four, etc.) cells.

[0036] The wireless network 100 may support synchronous or asynchronous operation. For synchronous operation, the base stations may have similar frame timing and transmissions from different base stations may be approximately aligned in time. For asynchronous operation, the base stations may have different frame timing and transmissions from different base stations may not be aligned in time. In some scenarios, the network may be enabled or configured to handle dynamic switching between synchronous or asynchronous operation.

[0037] The UEs 115 are dispersed throughout the wireless network 100, and each UE may be fixed or mobile. Although mobile devices are commonly referred to as UEs in standards and specifications promulgated by 3GPP, it should be appreciated that such devices may additionally or otherwise be referred to by those skilled in the art as mobile stations (MS), subscriber stations, mobile units, subscriber units, wireless units, remote units, mobile devices, wireless devices, wireless communication devices, remote devices, mobile subscriber stations, access terminals (ATs), mobile terminals, wireless terminals, remote terminals, handsets, terminals, user agents, mobile clients, clients, gaming devices, augmented reality devices, vehicle components, vehicle devices, or vehicle modules, or some other suitable terminology. Within this document, a "mobile" device or UE does not necessarily have to be capable of movement and may be stationary. Some non-limiting examples of mobile devices that may have one or more implementations of UE 115 include mobile, cellular (cell) phones, smartphones, Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) phones, Wireless Local Loop (WLL) stations, laptops, personal computers (PCs), notebooks, netbooks, smartbooks, tablets, and personal digital assistants (PDAs).The mobile device may additionally be an automobile or other transportation vehicle, a satellite radio, a global positioning system (GPS) device, a logistics controller, a drone, a multicopter, a quadcopter, a smart energy or security device, an IoT or "internet of everything" (IoE) device such as a solar panel or solar array, city lighting, water, or other infrastructure, an industrial automation and enterprise device, an eyewear, a wearable camera, a smart watch, a health or fitness tracker, a mammalian implantable device, a gesture tracking device, a medical device, a consumer and wearable device such as a digital audio player (e.g., MP3 player), a camera, a game console, and a digital home or smart home device such as a home audio, video, and multimedia device, an appliance, a sensor, a vending machine, an intelligent lighting, a home security system, a smart meter, and the like. In one aspect, the UE may be a device that includes a Universal Integrated Circuit Card (UICC). In another aspect, the UE may be a device that does not include a UICC. In some aspects, a UE that does not include a UICC may also be referred to as an IoE device. 1 are examples of mobile smartphone type devices accessing the wireless network 100. A UE may also be a machine specifically configured for connected communications, including machine type communications (MTC), enhanced MTC (eMTC), narrowband IoT (NB-IoT), etc. The UEs 115e-115k shown in FIG. 1 are examples of various machines configured for communications accessing the wireless network 100.

[0038] A mobile device such as the UE 115 may be capable of communicating with any type of base station, such as a macro base station, a pico base station, a femto base station, a relay, etc. In FIG. 1, the communication links (represented as lightning bolts) indicate wireless transmissions between the UE and a serving base station, which is a base station designated to serve the UE on the downlink or uplink, or desired transmissions between base stations, as well as backhaul transmissions between base stations. The UE may operate as a base station or other network node in some scenarios. Backhaul communication between base stations of the wireless network 100 may be performed using wired or wireless communication links.

[0039] In operation in the wireless network 100, the base stations 105a-105c serve the UEs 115a and 115b using coordinated spatial techniques such as 3D beamforming and coordinated multipoint (CoMP) or multi-connectivity. The macro base station 105d performs backhaul communications with the base stations 105a-105c and the small cell base station 105f. The macro base station 105d also transmits multicast services to which the UEs 115c and 115d subscribe and receive. Such multicast services may include mobile television or stream video, or other services for providing local information, such as weather emergencies or alerts such as amber or grey alerts.

[0040] The wireless network 100 of the implementation supports mission-critical communications with ultra-reliable and redundant links for mission-critical devices such as the drone UE 115e. The redundant communication links with the UE 115e include those from the macro base stations 105d and 105e and the small cell base station 105f. Other machine-type devices such as the UE 115f (thermometer), the UE 115g (smart meter), and the UE 115h (wearable device) can communicate through the wireless network 100 with base stations such as the small cell base station 105f and the macro base station 105e directly or by communicating with another user device that relays the information to the network in a multi-hop configuration, such as the UE 115f communicating temperature measurement information to the smart meter UE 115g, which then reports the information to the network through the small cell base station 105f. The wireless network 100 may also provide additional network efficiency through dynamic low-latency TDD or low-latency FDD communications, such as in a vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) mesh network between the UEs 115i-115k communicating with the macro base station 105e.

[0041] FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating an example of a base station 105 and a UE 115 according to one or more aspects. The base station 105 and the UE 115 may be any of the base stations and one of the UEs of FIG. 1. In the case of a restricted association scenario (as described above), the base station 105 may be the small cell base station 105f of FIG. 1, the UE 115 may be the UE 115c or 115d operating in the coverage area of ​​the base station 105f, and the UE 115c or 115d would be included in a list of accessible UEs for the small cell base station 105f to access the small cell base station 105f. The base station 105 may also be some other type of base station. As shown in FIG. 2, the base station 105 may be equipped with antennas 234a-t and the UE 115 may be equipped with antennas 252a-r to facilitate wireless communication.

[0042] In the base station 105, the transmit processor 220 may receive data from a data source 212 and control information from a controller 240, such as a processor. The control information may be for a physical broadcast channel (PBCH), a physical control format indicator channel (PCFICH), a physical hybrid-ARQ (automatic repeat request) indicator channel (PHICH), a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH), an enhanced physical downlink control channel (EPDCCH), an MTC physical downlink control channel (MPDCCH), etc. The data may be for a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH), etc. In addition, the transmit processor 220 may process (e.g., encode and symbol map) the data and control information to obtain data symbols and control symbols, respectively. The transmit processor 220 may also generate reference symbols, for example, for a primary synchronization signal (PSS) and a secondary synchronization signal (SSS), as well as a cell-specific reference signal. The transmit (TX) MIMO processor 230 may perform spatial processing (e.g., precoding) on ​​the data symbols, control symbols, or reference symbols, if applicable, and may provide output symbol streams to modulators (MODs) 232a-t. For example, the spatial processing performed on the data symbols, control symbols, or reference symbols may include precoding. Each modulator 232 may process a respective output symbol stream (e.g., for OFDM, etc.) to obtain an output sample stream. Each modulator 232 may additionally or alternatively process (e.g., convert to analog, amplify, filter, and upconvert) the output sample stream to obtain a downlink signal. The downlink signals from the modulators 232a-t may be transmitted via the antennas 234a-t, respectively.

[0043] At the UE 115, antennas 252a-252r may receive downlink signals from the base station 105 and may provide received signals to demodulators (DEMODs) 254a-254r, respectively. Each demodulator 254 may condition (e.g., filter, amplify, downconvert, and digitize) a respective received signal to obtain input samples. Each demodulator 254 may further process the input samples (e.g., for OFDM, etc.) to obtain received symbols. A MIMO detector 256 may obtain the received symbols from the demodulators 254a-254r, perform MIMO detection on the received symbols, if applicable, and provide detected symbols. A receive processor 258 may process (e.g., demodulate, deinterleave, and decode) the detected symbols and provide decoded data for the UE 115 to a data sink 260 and provide decoded control information to a controller 280, such as a processor.

[0044] On the uplink, at the UE 115, a transmit processor 264 may receive and process data (e.g., for the Physical Uplink Shared Channel (PUSCH)) from a data source 262 and control information (e.g., for the Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH)) from a controller 280. In addition, the transmit processor 264 may also generate reference symbols for a reference signal. The symbols from the transmit processor 264 may be precoded by a TX MIMO processor 266 if applicable, further processed by modulators 254a-254r (e.g., for SC-FDM, etc.), and transmitted to the base station 105. At the base station 105, uplink signals from the UE 115 may be received by antennas 234, processed by a demodulator 232, detected by a MIMO detector 236 if applicable, and further processed by a receive processor 238 to obtain decoded data and control information sent by the UE 115. The receive processor 238 may provide the decoded data to a data sink 239 and provide the decoded control information to a controller 240 .

[0045] The controllers 240 and 280 may direct operation at the base station 105 and the UE 115, respectively. The controller 240 or other processors and modules at the base station 105, or the controller 280 or other processors and modules at the UE 115, may perform or direct the execution of various processes for the techniques described herein, such as to perform or direct the execution shown in Figures 8 and 9 or other processes for the techniques described herein. The memory 242 and the memory 282 may store data and program codes for the base station 105 and the UE 115, respectively. The scheduler 244 may schedule UEs for data transmission on the downlink or uplink.

[0046] In some cases, the UE 115 and the base station 105 may operate in a shared radio frequency spectrum band, which may include licensed or unlicensed (e.g., contention-based) frequency spectrum. In the unlicensed frequency portion of the shared radio frequency spectrum band, the UE 115 or the base station 105 may conventionally perform a medium sensing procedure to compete for access to the frequency spectrum. For example, the UE 115 or the base station 105 may perform a listen-before-talk (LBT) or listen-before-transmitting (LBT) procedure, such as a clear channel assessment (CCA), before communicating to determine if a shared channel is available. In some implementations, the CCA may include an energy detection procedure to determine if there are any other active transmissions. For example, the device may infer that a change in a received signal strength indicator (RSSI) of a power meter indicates that the channel is occupied. In particular, a signal power concentrated within some bandwidth and exceeding a predetermined noise floor may indicate another wireless transmitter. CCA may also include detection of certain sequences indicative of channel usage. For example, another device may transmit a certain preamble before transmitting a data sequence. In some cases, the LBT procedure may include a wireless node adjusting its own backoff window based on the amount of energy detected on the channel or ACK / NACK feedback for its own transmitted packets as a proxy for collisions.

[0047] FIG. 3 shows an exemplary diagram illustrating channel sensing timing. In FIG. 3, multiple slots of a frame are shown. Specifically, FIG. 3 shows a first slot 302, a second slot 304, a third slot 306, and one or more other slots. A slot, such as the second slot 304, may include or be divided into windows, such as a sensing window 312 and a transmission window 314. The sensing window 312 may include a time period (duration) during which a device listens for a device's signal / indication that it intends to transmit in the corresponding transmission window 314. For example, the sensing window 312 may include a time period of LBT operation.

[0048] In some implementations, a transmission window, such as the transmission window 314, may further include a contention window 322. The contention window 322 may be for additional medium contention procedures if multiple devices attempt to secure the transmission window 314. The remaining portion or duration of the transmission window 314 is a transmission duration 324 during which a device may transmit data.

[0049] In some operations, such as when operating in an unlicensed spectrum, a wireless communication device (e.g., a UE or a BS) may have to perform channel sensing (e.g., LBT) prior to its transmission. Such channel sensing may reduce or prevent collisions and enable coexistence with other unlicensed nodes. In some such operations, the wireless communication device may transmit only upon successful channel sensing, such as successfully performing an LBT operation.

[0050] If channel sensing failures occur consistently on a link (e.g., uplink, downlink, or sidelink), it may be beneficial to stop further transmission attempts on this cell and take further action, such as by changing cells. Existing unlicensed and / or NR licensed recovery mechanisms, such as operating based on a maximum number of Radio Link Control Acknowledge Mode (RLC AM) attempts, may be too slow or may never occur.

[0051] As a partial solution to such problems, a new mechanism to detect and recover from consistent uplink (UL) LBT failures was introduced in Release 16 New Radio Unlicensed (R16 NR-U). The detection is per Bandwidth Partition (BWP) and based on all uplink transmissions within this BWP. In such operation, all uplink transmission attempts are treated equally, regardless of the physical channel, LBT type, and Cell Association and Power Control (CAPC) used. For each UL transmission attempt, the physical (PHY) layer indicates to the medium access control (MAC) layer whether there was an LBT failure. The detection mechanism uses timers and counters (similar to BFD and BFR). For example, the lbt-FailureDetectionTimer and lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount parameters can be configured by RRC for these variables.

[0052] The timer is restarted for every LBT failure indication. The counter is incremented for every LBT failure and reset when the timer expires (e.g., when the timer reaches lbt-FailureDetectionTimer). If the counter exceeds a configured threshold (lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount), a consistent UL LBT failure is declared for this particular BWP.

[0053] After an LBT failure is declared for the BWP, certain reporting and / or recovery actions may be initiated. Such actions may include recovery on a secondary cell (SCell) or recovery on a special cell (SpCell). The SpCell may be a primary cell (PCell) or a primary secondary cell (PSCell). The PCell may be an SpCell of a master cell group (MCG) and the PSCell may be an SpCell of a secondary cell group (SCG). In case of recovery on an SCell, when a consistent uplink LBT failure is detected on an SCell, the UE reports this via a MAC CE to the corresponding gNB (Master Node (MN) in case of MCG, Secondary Node (SN) in case of SCG). The report is transmitted on a serving cell different from the SCell where the failure was detected. If there are no available resources to transmit the MAC CE, a Scheduling Request (SR) may be transmitted by the UE.

[0054] In case of recovery on an SpCell (PCell or PSCell), when a consistent uplink LBT failure is detected on the SpCell, the UE switches to another UL BWP (configured with Random Access Channel (RACH) resources on that cell), initiates a RACH procedure, and then reports the failure via the MAC Control Element (CE, MAC CE). When multiple UL BWPs are available for switching, the UE may decide which one to select based on one or more criteria.

[0055] In case of recovery on the PSCell, if a consistent uplink LBT failure is detected on all UL BWPs configured with RACH resources, the UE declares an SCG Radio Link Failure (RLF) and reports the failure to the MN via SCGFailureInformation. Alternatively, in case of recovery on the PCell, if an uplink LBT failure is detected on all UL BWPs configured with RACH resources, the UE declares an RLF.

[0056] In such an implementation, the MAC CE for reporting UL LBT problems has a higher priority than data but a lower priority than the BFR MAC CE. The MAC CE includes a bitmap indicating whether the corresponding serving cell has declared a consistent LBT failure. When a consistent UL LBT failure is declared on the SpCell, the MAC CE is sent on the BWP that the UE switched to during the RACH procedure.

[0057] A new failure type for PSCell consistent UL LBT failure has been added to SCGFailureInformation. However, no new re-establishment cause is introduced in the RRC re-establishment message, and "other" failures are used to indicate.

[0058] One SR configuration (SR id) is configured for SR triggered by UL LBT failure detection on SCell, which can be shared with other logical channels (LCHs). If this SR config id is not configured, RACH operation is triggered.

[0059] The UE shall stop any ongoing Random Access (RA) procedure and initiate a new RA procedure after a BWP switch triggered by an LBT failure detection on the SpCell. The UE shall cancel all UL LBT failures triggered for an SCell upon deactivation of the SCell, and the UE shall cancel any triggered UL LBT failure upon MAC reset affecting the corresponding serving cell.

[0060] In Release 17 (R17), NR-U operation is extended to mmWave bands (e.g., 60 GHz unlicensed spectrum, 37 GHz shared spectrum, etc.). Analog beamforming is typically used in mmWave bands to increase coverage with a large number of antenna elements and reduce cost with a limited number of digital chains. In beamforming operation, some beams (and their corresponding directions) may experience persistent LBT failures, while other beams may not experience persistent LBT failures. Thus, previous LBT operation may prematurely declare failure for all beams and therefore for multiple beams that have not experienced persistent LBT failures.

[0061] Therefore, in systems capable of beamforming, it is beneficial to consider beam-specific channel sensing failure detection, recovery, and reporting. Such designs may be equally applicable to both Uu and PC5 communications. Uu communications are communications that use the Uu logical interface and are between a base station and a wireless device (e.g., UE). PC5 communications are communications that use the PC5 interface and are a type of Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) communications. Such PC5 communications are host-independent (e.g., base station, network device, access point, etc.) and may be between two devices or nodes. Thus, beam-specific channel sensing may be extended from traditional UE and base station communications to device-to-device (D2D) communications.

[0062] In aspects described herein, beam-specific channel sensing failure detection, reporting, and recovery operations are provided to enable enhanced operation in beam-based operations. The channel sensing operations may be time-based, energy-based, or both. For a particular beam, a corresponding counter and timer may be configured to monitor the channel sensing operations of the particular beam. For example, parameters lbt-FailureDetectionTimer and lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount may be programmed or configured, such as by RRC. The timer is reset or restarted for each LBT failure indication for the beam, and the counter is incremented for each LBT failure and reset when the timer expires for that beam (e.g., when the timer reaches lbt-FailureDetectionTimer).

[0063] If the counter exceeds a configured threshold (e.g., lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount), a persistent / consistent channel sensing failure is declared for the particular beam in this BWP. The parameters lbt-FailureDetectionTimer and lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount may be the same or different for different beams or beam groups.

[0064] In some beams, if the network (e.g., gNB) does not have scheduled or pre-configured uplink transmissions, the gNB may also configure virtual transmission opportunities for the UE to perform channel sensing failure detection. The UE may perform channel sensing on the virtual transmission opportunities to test the beam for congestion. However, compared to real transmission opportunities (TXOPs), the UE does not transmit upon successful channel sensing of the virtual transmission opportunities. Thus, the network may enable the UE to test the beam when spectrum is available and proactively reduce or prevent channel sensing failure for real data transmissions, thereby reducing latency and improving throughput.

[0065] In some implementations, persistent channel sensing failure is declared only when all beams (or all beams of one or more groups) experience persistent channel sensing failure. In such implementations, subsequent procedures may follow R16 NR-U operations. For example, when persistent channel sensing failure is detected for all beams or all beam groups, R16 NR-U procedures may be used.

[0066] In other implementations, persistent channel sensing failure is declared per beam or per beam group. In such implementations, partial channel sensing failure detection and recovery may be considered. With partial LBT failure detection and recovery, the UE may report the partial channel sensing failure to the gNB via MAC CE or via an L1 channel (e.g., PUCCH). When persistent channel sensing failure is declared for a beam or beam group, the UE may report this to the gNB via one or more other beams or via one or more other beam groups. If a partial channel sensing failure is detected on an Scell, the UE may also report such failure on a serving cell different from the Scell ​​in which the failure was detected.

[0067] Beam-specific channel sensing (e.g., LBT) failure detection, recovery, and reporting may be further extended from Uu to PC5 communications. For example, it is possible to extend PC5-UL LBT failure detection, recovery, and reporting to be beam-specific. For a particular PC5 link, different configurations may be applied to different beams. A channel sensing (e.g., LBT) failure may be declared when all beams experience a channel sensing failure, or a partial channel sensing failure may be declared when a beam or group of beams experience a channel sensing failure.

[0068] For Mode 1 PC5 (all transmission and configuration done by the gNB), the LBT failure detection and configuration parameters for each beam are configured by the gNB. For Mode 2 PC5 (which can operate without the gNB's involvement), the LBT failure detection and configuration parameters for each beam can be specified, pre-configured, or proposed by the receiver.

[0069] Partial LBT failure declaration is also configured by the gNB in ​​Mode 1 or via specified / pre-configured / receiver recommendation in Mode 2. In partial LBT failure detection for beam groups, one node can indicate LBT failure to another node via other beams that do not experience LBT failure. The indication can be sent in MAC CE in PSSCH or via extended PSFCH or via extended sidelink control information. In Mode 1 PC5, the node can also send partial LBT failure report to the gNB.

[0070] FIG. 4 illustrates an example of a wireless communication system 400 supporting beam-specific channel sensing failure operation according to aspects of the disclosure. In some examples, the wireless communication system 400 may implement aspects of the wireless communication system 100. For example, the wireless communication system 400 may include multiple wireless communication devices, and optionally, network entities. In the example of FIG. 4, the wireless communication system 400 includes a base station 105, a UE 115, and optionally a second UE. The use of beam-specific channel sensing failure may reduce latency and improve throughput by increasing the effectiveness of channel sensing failure detection, reporting, and recovery. Thus, network and device performance may be improved.

[0071] The UE 115 and the base station 105 may be configured to communicate over a frequency band, such as FR1 having frequencies between 410 and 7125 MHz, FR2 having frequencies between 24250 and 52600 MHz for mm-Wave, and / or one or more other frequency bands. Note that the subcarrier spacing (SCS) may be equal to 15, 30, 60, or 120 kHz for some data channels. The UE 115 and the base station 105 may be configured to communicate over one or more component carriers (CCs), such as a representative first CC 481, a second CC 482, a third CC 483, and a fourth CC 484. Although four CCs are shown, this is for illustrative purposes only, and more or less than four CCs may be used. One or more CCs may be used to communicate control channel transmissions, data channel transmissions, and / or sidelink channel transmissions.

[0072] Such transmissions may include a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH), a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH), a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH), a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), a physical sidelink control channel (PSCCH), a physical sidelink shared channel (PSSCH), or a physical sidelink feedback channel (PSFCH). Such transmissions may be scheduled by aperiodic and / or periodic grants.

[0073] Each periodic grant may have a corresponding configuration, such as configuration parameters / settings. A periodic grant configuration may include configured grant (CG) configurations and settings. Additionally or alternatively, one or more periodic grants (e.g., their CGs) may have or be assigned a CC ID, such as an intended CC ID.

[0074] Each CC may have a corresponding configuration, such as configuration parameters / settings. The configuration may include bandwidth, bandwidth portion, HARQ process, TCI state, RS, control channel resources, data channel resources, or a combination thereof. Additionally or alternatively, one or more CCs may have or be assigned a cell ID, a bandwidth portion (BWP) ID, or both. The cell ID may include a unique cell ID for the CC, a virtual cell ID, or a specific cell ID of a specific CC among the multiple CCs. Additionally or alternatively, one or more CCs may have or be assigned a HARQ ID. Each CC may also have a corresponding management function, such as beam management, BWP switching function, or both. In some implementations, two or more CCs are quasi-colocated such that the CCs have the same beam and / or the same symbols.

[0075] In some implementations, the control information may be communicated via the UE 115 and the base station 105. For example, the control information may be communicated using a MAC CE transmission, an RRC transmission, an SCI (sidelink control information), transmission, another transmission, or a combination thereof.

[0076] The UE 115, and optionally the second UE 405, may include various components (e.g., structural, hardware components) used to perform one or more functions described herein. For example, these components may include a processor 402, a memory 404, a transmitter 410, a receiver 412, an encoder 413, a decoder 414, a beam specific failure manager 415, a channel sensing manager 416, and antennas 252a-r. The processor 402 may be configured to execute instructions stored in the memory 404 to perform operations described herein. In some implementations, the processor 402 includes or corresponds to the controller / processor 280, and the memory 404 includes or corresponds to the memory 282. The memory 404 may also be configured to store beam data 406, counter data 408, timer data 442, configuration data 444, or combinations thereof, as further described herein.

[0077] The beam data 406 includes or corresponds to data associated with or corresponding to one or more beams of the plurality of beams. For example, the beam data 406 may indicate one or more beams for an active BWP. The beam data 406 may further include data identifying beam groups and / or beam priorities. The beam data 406 may include parameters for beam-specific failure operations, such as determination, reporting, and recovery.

[0078] The counter data 408 includes data associated with or corresponds to beam-specific channel detection failure counters for enhanced beam-specific channel detection failure operation. The beam-specific failure counters allow for counting beam-specific failures for persistent failure determination. For example, when a counter meets a condition, persistent failure of a beam, a group of beams, or all beams is reported. The counter data 408 may include a counter corresponding to each beam of the multiple beams of the beam data 406. Alternatively, the counter data 408 may include counters corresponding to a subset of beams of the multiple beams, e.g., one counter per beam group, or each beam of a single beam group (e.g., primary beams).

[0079] The timer data 442 includes or corresponds to data associated with a beam-specific channel sensing failure timer for enhanced beam-specific channel sensing failure operation. The beam-specific failure timer allows for counting beam-specific failures for persistent failure determination. For example, a beam-specific failure timer may be used to control a beam-specific failure counter. For example, when a timer meets a condition, the persistence counter may be adjusted (e.g., reset). In this manner, the timer may ensure that a persistent beam failure is determined only when all failures tracked by the counter occurred within a particular timer period. Although the timer is tracking time, a unit of transmission may be used to ensure that all such tracked failures are recent / relevant. The timer data 442 may include a timer corresponding to each beam of the multiple beams of the beam data 406. Alternatively, the timer data 442 may include a timer corresponding to a subset of beams of the multiple beams, e.g., one timer per beam group, or a timer corresponding to each beam of a single beam group (e.g., a primary beam).

[0080] The configuration data 444 includes data associated with or corresponds to beam-specific channel sensing failure operations. The configuration data 444 may include configuration and / or condition data for beam-specific channel sensing failure determination, recording, or recovery operations. The configuration data 444 may include mode data, such as specific parameters or thresholds to use based on the operating mode. For example, the configuration may include parameters when operating in an unlicensed spectrum mode, when operating in a SCell, when operating in a PSCell, or combinations thereof. Such configuration and / or parameters for beam-specific channel sensing feedback may include beam groups, counter parameters, timer parameters, thresholds, conditions, modes, etc.

[0081] For example, the mode may indicate partial beam-specific failure or complete beam-specific failure. When partial beam-specific failure is used, the mode may indicate per beam or per group.

[0082] The transmitter 410 is configured to transmit data to one or more other devices, and the receiver 412 is configured to receive data from one or more other devices. For example, the transmitter 410 may transmit data, and the receiver 412 may receive data via a network, such as a wired network, a wireless network, or a combination thereof. For example, the UE 115 may be configured to transmit and / or receive data via a direct device-to-device connection, a local area network (LAN), a wide area network (WAN), a modem-to-modem connection, the Internet, an intranet, an extranet, a cable transmission system, a cellular communication network, any combination of the above, or any other communication network now known or later developed that enables two or more electronic devices to communicate. In some implementations, the transmitter 410 and the receiver 412 may be replaced with a transceiver. Additionally or alternatively, the transmitter 410, the receiver 412, or both may include or correspond to one or more components of the UE 115 described with reference to FIG. 2.

[0083] The encoder 413 and the decoder 414 may be configured to encode and decode data for transmission. The beam-specific failure manager 415 may be configured to determine and perform beam-specific failure operations. For example, the beam-specific failure manager 415 is configured to perform beam-specific failure determination, reporting, and / or recovery operations. As illustrative examples of determination operations, the beam-specific failure manager 415 may adjust or generate the beam data 406, the counter data 408 (beam-specific counters), and the timer data 442 (beam-specific timers). For example, the beam-specific failure manager 415 may increment the beam-specific failure counters, compare the beam-specific failure counters to thresholds, adjust the beam-specific failure timers based on elapsed time or transmissions, reset the beam-specific failure counters based on the beam-specific failure timers, etc. As illustrative examples of reporting operations, the beam-specific failure manager 415 may determine when to report (e.g., after one or more persistent beam-specific failures), to which devices to report, and how to report the failures. As an illustrative example of a recovery action, the beam-specific failure manager 415 may determine which recovery procedure to initiate and with whom to initiate it.

[0084] The channel sensing manager 416 may be configured to determine and perform a channel sensing operation. For example, the channel sensing manager 416 may be configured to determine which channel sensing operation to perform. As another example, the channel sensing manager 416 may be configured to determine whether a channel sensing operation was successful or failed.

[0085] The base station 105 includes a processor 430, a memory 432, a transmitter 434, a receiver 436, an encoder 437, a decoder 438, a beam specific failure manager 439, a channel sensing manager 440, and antennas 234a-r. The processor 430 may be configured to execute instructions stored in the memory 432 to perform operations described herein. In some implementations, the processor 430 includes or corresponds to the controller / processor 240, and the memory 432 includes or corresponds to the memory 242. The memory 432, like the UE 115, may be configured to store beam data 406, counter data 408, timer data 442, configuration data 444, or combinations thereof, as further described herein.

[0086] The transmitter 434 is configured to transmit data to one or more other devices, and the receiver 436 is configured to receive data from one or more other devices. For example, the transmitter 434 may transmit data, and the receiver 436 may receive data via a network, such as a wired network, a wireless network, or a combination thereof. For example, the base station 105 may be configured to transmit and / or receive data via a direct device-to-device connection, a local area network (LAN), a wide area network (WAN), a modem-to-modem connection, the Internet, an intranet, an extranet, a cable transmission system, a cellular communication network, any combination of the above, or any other communication network now known or later developed that allows two or more electronic devices to communicate. In some implementations, the transmitter 434 and the receiver 436 may be replaced with a transceiver. Additionally or alternatively, the transmitter 434, the receiver 436, or both may include or correspond to one or more components of the base station 105 described with reference to FIG. 2.

[0087] The encoder 437 and the decoder 438 may include the same functionality as described with reference to the encoder 413 and the decoder 414, respectively. The beam-specific failure manager 439 may include similar functionality as described with reference to the beam-specific failure manager 415. The channel detection manager 440 may include similar functionality as described with reference to the channel detection manager 416.

[0088] During operation of the wireless communication system 400, the base station 105 may determine that the UE 115 has enhanced channel sensing failure capability. For example, the base station 105 may transmit a message 448 including a beam-specific channel sensing failure operation indicator 490 (e.g., beam-specific channel sensing failure for NR-U operation). The indicator 490 may indicate the enhanced beam-specific channel sensing failure operation, or a particular type or mode of beam-specific channel sensing failure. In some implementations, the base station 105 sends control information to the UE 115 indicating the enhanced beam-specific channel sensing failure operation and / or a particular type of enhanced beam-specific channel sensing failure operation. For example, in some implementations, the message 448 (or another message, such as a configuration transmission 450) is transmitted by the base station 105 or the network entity 405. The configuration transmission 450 may include or indicate using the enhanced beam-specific channel sensing failure operation, or adjusting or implementing a setting for a particular type of enhanced beam-specific channel sensing failure operation. For example, the configuration transmission 450 may include 444, 442, or both, as shown in the example of FIG.

[0089] In operation, the devices of the wireless communication system 400 perform enhanced beam-specific channel sensing failure operations for contention or unlicensed spectrum. For example, the wireless communication devices (e.g., a base station and a UE) exchange transmissions over a downlink or uplink channel in NR-U. Alternatively, the wireless communication devices (e.g., two UEs) exchange transmissions over a sidelink channel. In the example of FIG. 4, the base station 105 optionally transmits an uplink grant message 452 to the UE 115. The uplink grant message 452 may include or indicate one or more uplink grant instances for the UE 115.

[0090] In some implementations, the uplink grant message 452 may include or indicate one or more virtual grant instances for the UE 115. Such virtual grant instances and corresponding virtual transmission opportunities may include opportunities for the UE 115 to perform channel sensing operations and test beams even if the UE 115 has no data to transmit or no intention to transmit at a particular time.

[0091] The UE 115 may receive the uplink grant message 452 and determine one or more uplink grant instances indicated by the base station 105. The UE 115 may optionally determine whether it has data to transmit and whether it attempts to use a specific resource reserved by the base station 105 for uplink transmission. The UE 115 may then attempt to transmit during a specific transmission resource of the specific uplink grant instance. The UE 115 performs a channel sensing operation to secure the medium and transmit a first transmission 454. In response to a successful channel sensing operation, such as a successful LBT operation, the UE 115 transmits the first transmission 454. Alternatively, in response to a failure of the channel sensing operation, the UE 115 does not transmit the first transmission 454.

[0092] In addition, in response to either a successful channel sensing operation or a failed channel sensing operation, the UE 115 may adjust a counter or timer for a particular beam. Additional beam-specific counter and timer adjustment details are further described with reference to FIG.

[0093] The UE 115 may then attempt to transmit during a second particular transmission resource of the second particular uplink grant instance. The UE 115 performs a second channel sensing operation to secure the medium and transmit the second transmission 456. In response to a successful channel sensing operation, such as a successful LBT operation, the UE 115 transmits the second transmission 456. Alternatively, in response to a failure of the channel sensing operation, the UE 115 does not transmit the second transmission 456.

[0094] Similarly, in response to either a success of the second channel sensing operation or a failure of the second channel sensing operation, the UE 115 may adjust a counter or timer for a particular beam. If the counter satisfies a condition, the UE 115 may report a beam-specific failure for the particular beam, i.e., a partial beam-specific failure. For example, the UE 115 may send a report message 458 to the base station 105 via the second beam. Additionally or alternatively, the UE 115 sends the report message 458 or the second report message to a second network entity.

[0095] In other implementations, the UE 115 may switch beams and continue attempting to send data via the second beam. The UE 115 may similarly perform a channel sensing operation and adjust a second counter and timer for the second beam and one or more other beams. After all such available or configured beams, such as all beams for a particular BWP, the UE 115 may then report beam-specific failures for all beams.

[0096] Thus, the UE 115 and base station 105 may be able to perform beam-specific failure operations more effectively. Thus, FIG. 4 illustrates enhanced beam-specific failure operations for a wireless communication device. Use of the enhanced beam-specific failure operations may enable improvements when the device is operating in a contested spectrum. Performing the enhanced beam-specific failure operations enables increased beam-specific failure detection, reporting, and recovery, thus enabling enhanced UE and network performance by increasing throughput and reducing errors and latency.

[0097] 5 and 6 show examples of ladder diagrams for beam-specific channel sensing failure operations according to some aspects. Referring to FIG. 5, FIG. 5 is a ladder diagram 500 of beam-specific channel sensing failure operations for partial beam-specific failure reporting and recovery according to some aspects. In the example of FIG. 5, the ladder diagram shows a UE 115 and a network entity such as a base station 105. The diagram is simplified for illustration and explanation. In practice, many UEs may be connected to the network entity, and optionally, some UEs may be connected to multiple network entities and / or other UEs.

[0098] At 510, the UE 115 performs a channel sensing operation for a particular beam, such as a first beam. For example, the UE 115 monitors signals on a corresponding receive beam, monitoring for signals from a particular direction associated with the first beam. In response to successful channel sensing, the UE 115 may transmit data via the first beam. In response to a channel sensing failure, the UE 115 may not transmit data and may adjust a beam-specific failure counter and / or timer corresponding to the first beam, as further shown and described with reference to FIG. 7.

[0099] At 515, the UE 115 transmits a first transmission via the first beam in response to the success of the channel sensing operation of the first beam at 510. For example, the UE 115 transmits a first data transmission via the first beam. The UE 115 may adjust a beam-specific counter and / or timer. For example, the UE may increment or decrement a timer to indicate that another transmission occurred without failure. In such an implementation, the timer may control the resetting of the counter. Alternatively, if the channel sensing operation was for a virtual grant or a transmission opportunity, the UE 115 would not transmit the first transmission because it only used the channel sensing operation to test the beam and either does not have data to send or does not have the intention to send data.

[0100] At 520, the UE 115 performs a channel sensing operation for a particular beam, such as the first beam. For example, the UE 115 monitors signals on a corresponding receive beam, monitoring for signals from a particular direction associated with the first beam. In response to successful channel sensing, the UE 115 may transmit data via the first beam. In response to a channel sensing failure, the UE 115 may not transmit data and may adjust a beam-specific failure counter and / or timer corresponding to the first beam, as further shown and described with reference to FIG. 7.

[0101] At 525, the UE 115 performs a channel sensing operation for a particular beam, such as the first beam. For example, the UE 115 monitors signals on a corresponding receive beam, monitoring for signals from a particular direction associated with the first beam. In response to successful channel sensing, the UE 115 may transmit data via the first beam. In response to a channel sensing failure, the UE 115 may not transmit data and may adjust a beam-specific failure counter and / or timer corresponding to the first beam, as further shown and described with reference to FIG.

[0102] At 530, the UE 115 transmits a second transmission via the first beam in response to the successful channel sensing operation for the first beam at 525. For example, the UE 115 transmits a second data transmission via the first beam. The UE 115 may adjust beam-specific counters and / or timers as described with reference to 515.

[0103] At 535, the UE 115 performs a channel sensing operation for a particular beam, such as the first beam. For example, the UE 115 monitors signals on a corresponding receive beam, monitoring for signals from a particular direction associated with the first beam. In response to successful channel sensing, the UE 115 may transmit data via the first beam. In response to a channel sensing failure, the UE 115 may not transmit data and may adjust a beam-specific failure counter and / or timer corresponding to the first beam, as further shown and described with reference to FIG. 7.

[0104] At 540, the UE 115 switches beams. For example, the UE 115 switches from a first beam to a second beam in response to determining persistent beam failure for the first beam. For example, the UE 115 may determine that a beam-specific counter for the first beam has met a condition set by a standard, region, or network to determine persistent beam failure for the first beam.

[0105] At 545, the UE 115 generates and transmits a beam-specific failure message in response to determining a persistent beam failure for the first beam. For example, the UE 115 generates channel sensing failure information indicating a channel sensing failure for a single beam (or a subset of beams) based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure determination described above. The channel sensing failure information may be sent by a beam (e.g., a second beam) different from the beam (e.g., the first beam) that experienced the persistent failure. Thus, the UE 115 may be able to report this beam-specific failure to an entity where the error occurred. Conventionally, the device must report the beam failure to the second receiving device because a persistent failure has occurred between the device and the first receiving device.

[0106] The channel sensing failure information, when transmitted from the UE to the base station, may be included in a Layer 1 or 2 transmission, such as a MAC CE or physical layer data or control message, such as a PUSCH or PUCCH, as in the example of Figure 5. In other implementations, the UE 115 may transmit the channel sensing failure information to another device in addition to or as an alternative to the device associated with the failure (e.g., the base station 105).

[0107] At 550, the UE 115 and the base station 105 perform a beam failure recovery operation. For example, the UE 115 performs a recovery operation with the base station 105. When using partial beam-specific channel sensing failure detection and recovery (e.g., operating in a partial beam-specific LBT failure mode), the UE 115 can report the partial beam-specific channel sensing failure to the base station 105 via a MAC CE or L1 channel (e.g., PUCCH).

[0108] If a partial beam-specific channel sensing failure is detected on an Scell, the UE 115 may also report this on a serving cell different from the Scell ​​where the failure was detected. Alternatively, if a persistent beam-specific channel sensing failure is declared for a beam group, the UE 115 may report this to the base station 105 via another beam group (e.g., a particular beam of the group). As yet another example, the UE 115 and the base station 105 may perform recovery operations as described in Release 15 or 16.

[0109] Thus, in the example of Figure 5, the UE performs beam-specific channel sensing failure operations for partial beam reporting and / or recovery, i.e., the UE reports and attempts to recover from persistent beam failure for a single beam or a subset of beams, i.e., less than all beams.

[0110] Referring to FIG. 6, FIG. 6 is a ladder diagram 600 of beam-specific channel sensing failure operation for multiple beams, according to some aspects. In the example of FIG. 6, the ladder diagram shows a UE 115 and a network entity, such as a base station 105. Compared to the example of FIG. 5, in the example of FIG. 6, a beam-specific channel sensing failure configuration or indication thereof may indicate a failure in multiple (or all) beams. For example, a beam failure message may indicate a failure in most or all of the beams of an active BWP.

[0111] At 610, the UE 115 performs a channel sensing operation for a particular beam, such as the first beam. For example, the UE 115 monitors signals having a corresponding receive beam that monitors signals from a particular direction associated with the first beam. In response to successful channel sensing, the UE 115 may transmit data via the first beam. In response to a channel sensing failure, the UE 115 may not transmit data and may adjust a beam-specific failure counter and / or timer corresponding to the first beam, as further shown and described with reference to FIG.

[0112] At 615, the UE 115 switches beams. For example, the UE 115 switches from a first beam to a second beam in response to multiple failed channel sensing operations for the first beam. For example, when a condition is met, such as a beam-specific failure counter for the first beam being equal to a threshold value set by the base station 105. In contrast to FIG. 5, the UE 115 may not transmit a beam failure recovery message in response to a single beam experiencing failure, i.e., a definitive persistent failure for a single beam.

[0113] At 620, the UE 115 performs a channel sensing operation on a second particular beam, such as the second beam. For example, the UE 115 monitors signals on a corresponding receive beam, monitoring for signals from a particular direction associated with the second beam. In response to successful channel sensing, the UE 115 may transmit data via the second beam. In response to a channel sensing failure, the UE 115 may not transmit data and may adjust a beam-specific failure counter and / or timer corresponding to the second beam, as further shown and described with reference to FIG. 7.

[0114] Between 620 and 625, the UE 115 may perform additional channel sensing operations and switch between additional beams. For example, the UE 115 may switch from the second beam to a third beam, and so on.

[0115] At 625, the UE 115 performs a channel sensing operation on a third particular beam, such as the third beam. For example, the UE 115 monitors signals on a corresponding receive beam, monitoring for signals from a particular direction associated with the third beam. In response to successful channel sensing, the UE 115 may transmit data via the third beam. In response to a channel sensing failure, the UE 115 may not transmit data and may adjust a beam-specific failure counter and / or timer corresponding to the third beam, as further shown and described with reference to FIG. 7.

[0116] At 630, the UE 115 generates and transmits a beam-specific failure message. For example, the UE 115 generates channel sensing failure information indicating channel sensing failure for multiple or all beams based on the above beam-specific channel sensing failure determination. The channel sensing failure information may be included in a layer 1 or 2 transmission, such as a MAC CE or physical layer data or control message, such as a PUSCH or PUCCH, when transmitted from the UE to the base station, as in the example of FIG. 6. In other implementations, the UE 115 may transmit the channel sensing failure information to another device in addition to or as an alternative to the base station 105.

[0117] At 635, the UE 115 and the base station 105 perform beam failure recovery operations. For example, the UE 115 performs recovery operations with the base station 105 to establish a new set of beams. For example, the UE 115 and the base station 105 may perform recovery operations as described in Release 15 or Release 16 as described with reference to FIG. 3. As another example, the UE 115 and the base station 105 may perform recovery operations as described above with reference to FIG. 4 and FIG. 5.

[0118] Thus, in the example of Figure 6, the UE performs beam-specific channel sensing failure operations for multiple or all beams, i.e., the UE reports persistent beam failure and attempts recovery after multiple beam failures, beam failures of a specific group, or after all beams have failed.

[0119] Although the examples of Figures 5 and 6 show the UE sending a failure report message to the base station 105 where the failure occurred and / or performing a failure recovery operation with the base station 105 where the failure occurred, in other implementations other options are possible as described above.

[0120] For example, the UE 115 may send the recovery to a second device in addition to or instead of sending the recovery message to the base station 105. For example, in a sidelink operation, the UE 115 may send a message to another UE. As another example, the UE 115 may send a message to a second network entity on behalf of the base station 105, such as when the base station 105 is a SCell.

[0121] As another example, the operation may be extended to PC5 type communications. For a given PC5 link, different configurations may be applied to different beams. For example, a channel sensing failure may be declared when all beams experience a channel sensing failure, or a partial channel sensing failure may be declared on a beam or group of beams. For Mode 1 PC5 (all transmission and configuration is done by the gNB), the LBT failure detection and configuration parameters for each beam are configured by the gNB. For Mode 2 PC5 (which can operate without gNB involvement), the LBT failure detection and configuration parameters for each beam may be specified or pre-configured or suggested by the receiver. Partial LBT failure declaration is also configured by the base station 105 in Mode 1 or via specified / pre-configured / receiver recommendation in Mode 2. With partial LBT failure detection on a group of beams, one node may indicate LBT failure to another node via other beams that do not experience LBT failure. The indication may be sent in the MAC CE in the PSSCH, or via the extended PSFCH, or via the extended SL control information. In Mode 1 PC5, a node can also send a partial LBT failure report to the gNB.

[0122] FIG. 7 illustrates an example diagram of a logic flow diagram for beam-specific channel operation, according to some aspects. With reference to FIG. 7, FIG. 7 is a diagram 700 illustrating beam-specific channel detection failure timer and counter operation, according to some aspects. In the example of FIG. 8, the diagram illustrates an example logical process flow for beam-specific channel detection failure timer and counter operation. The logical process flow may illustrate actions by a wireless communication device operating in a contention medium.

[0123] As an illustrative example, during operation, the UE may engage in beam-specific channel sensing failure operations, as shown in Figure 7. The UE may perform channel sensing (e.g., LBT) operations and adjust beam-specific counters and timers in response to the channel sensing operations. In the example of Figure 7, the UE includes a per-beam LBT failure detection counter and a per-beam LBT failure detection timer, i.e., beam-specific counters and timers.

[0124] The LBT failure detection counter for a particular beam tracks instances of LBT failure for that particular beam. The LBT failure detection timer for a particular beam allows the counter to track LBT failures that are not too far apart, i.e., failures that are not more than a threshold amount of time or transmissions apart, for that particular beam. The "timers" may be tracked / used in units of transmissions or time.

[0125] The logic flow includes setting counters and timers, at 710. For example, the beam-specific counters and / or timers may be set to values ​​indicated by RRC configuration parameters, such as lbt-FailureMaxCount. In a particular implementation, the timers may be set to zero.

[0126] At 715, the logic flow includes determining whether a timer satisfies a condition. For example, the value of a beam-specific timer is compared to a threshold, such as lbt-FailureDetectionTimer.

[0127] If yes, and the timer satisfies the condition, the logic flow returns to 710 to reset the counter and the timer. Alternatively, if it is determined at 715 that no, and the timer does not satisfy the condition, the logic flow proceeds to 720. At 720, the logic flow includes determining whether the counter satisfies the condition. For example, the value of the beam-specific counter is compared to a threshold such as lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount.

[0128] If yes, and the counter satisfies the condition, the logic flow proceeds to 725. At 725, the logic flow includes declaring a beam-specific channel sensing failure, and the logic flow returns to 710 to reset the counter and timer.

[0129] Alternatively, if at 720, no, it is determined that the counter does not satisfy the condition, the logic flow proceeds to 730. At 730, the logic flow includes performing a channel sensing operation for a particular beam. For example, a particular type of LBT operation may be performed for a particular beam.

[0130] At 735, the logic flow includes determining whether a channel sensing failure occurred for a particular beam. If yes, the logic flow proceeds to 740. At 740, the logic flow includes adjusting a counter, and the logic flow returns to 710 to determine whether a timer threshold has been reached.

[0131] Alternatively, if at 735, no, it is determined that channel sensing has not occurred, the logic flow proceeds to 745. At 745, the logic flow includes adjusting a timer, and the logic flow returns to 710 to determine if a timer threshold has been reached. For example, the timer may be incremented or decremented to adjust toward the threshold. This logic flow may be repeated for one or more beams based on the beam-specific failure mode.

[0132] An example cycle of operation of the logic flow is described below. During operation, at a first time (T0), for each beam, the UE sets a corresponding LBT failure detection counter to a threshold value (e.g., zero) and also sets a corresponding LBT failure detection timer to a threshold value (e.g., lbt-FailureDetectionTimer). One or both thresholds may be configurable. The first time may correspond to a startup, a status change (e.g., RRC status change), a BWP change, etc.

[0133] For a particular beam, the UE adjusts the corresponding LBT failure detection counter and the LBT failure detection timer. For example, at a second time, the UE performs an LBT on a transmission signal of a particular beam. If the LBT fails, the UE adjusts the LBT failure detection counter and resets the LBT failure detection timer to a threshold value (e.g., a start threshold value or a reset threshold value).

[0134] For example, the UE may increment the LBT failure detection counter by one and reset the LBT failure detection timer to the value of the configured lbt-FailureDetectionTimer parameter.

[0135] When the LBT fails, no transmission is sent on the beam.

[0136] If the LBT is successful, the transmission is sent over the particular beam and the counter is not adjusted (e.g., not incremented). A timer counter to adjust (e.g., decrement or increment) based on elapsed time and is not reset to a threshold (e.g., lbt-FailureDetectionTimer).

[0137] At a third time (T3), the UE performs a second LBT operation for the next transmission (e.g., second signal / channel) for the same particular beam as the transmission (e.g., first signal) at T2. If the second LBT fails, the UE adjusts the LBT failure detection counter and resets the LBT failure detection timer to a threshold value (e.g., start threshold or reset threshold).

[0138] If the second LBT is successful, the UE sends a second transmission. In addition, the UE does not adjust the LBT failure detection counter and adjusts the LBT failure detection timer.

[0139] For example, the UE does not increment the LBT failure detection counter, and the UE decrements (or increments) the LBT failure detection timer by one.

[0140] The above process may be repeated at subsequent times (e.g., T4, T5, T6, ..., etc.). If the LBT failure detection counter is equal to (or not below) a threshold (e.g., lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount), the UE declares a persistent LBT failure and a reporting procedure begins.

[0141] If the LBT failure detection timer is equal to a threshold (e.g., decreases to 0) while the LBT failure detection counter is still less than the threshold (e.g., lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount), then a persistent LBT failure is not claimed to be detected and the UE resets the LBT failure detection counter to the threshold (e.g., 0). This cycle of operation may be repeated for other beams if beam-specific persistent LBT failure detection is configured for that beam.

[0142] Additionally or alternatively, in other implementations, one or more of the operations of Figures 4-7 may be added, removed, or substituted. For example, in some implementations, the example steps of Figures 5 and 6 may be used together. For example, the device may switch between the operations of Figures 5 and 6 in response to instructions from a host device or in response to a decision (e.g., a decision regarding beam performance). As another example, some of the operations of Figures 4 and 7 may be used with any of the steps of Figures 5 and 6.

[0143] FIG. 8 is a flow diagram illustrating example blocks performed by a wireless communication device (e.g., a UE or a base station) configured according to one aspect of the disclosure. The example blocks are also described with respect to a UE 115 as shown in FIG. 10. FIG. 10 is a block diagram illustrating a UE 115 configured according to one aspect of the disclosure. The UE 115 includes the structure, hardware, and components as illustrated for the UE 115 of FIG. 2 and / or FIG. 4. For example, the UE 115 includes a controller / processor 280 that operates to execute logic or computer instructions stored in memory 282 and controls the components of the UE 115 that provide the features and functionality of the UE 115. The UE 115 transmits and receives signals via wireless radios 1001a-r and antennas 252a-r under the control of the controller / processor 280. 2 for the UE 115, including modulator / demodulators 254a-r, MIMO detector 256, receive processor 258, transmit processor 264, and TX MIMO processor 266. As shown in the example of FIG. 10, memory 282 stores beam-specific channel sensing failure logic 1002, channel sensing logic 1003, beam-specific counter data 1004, beam-specific timer data 1005, beam data 1006, and configuration data 1007.

[0144] At block 800, a wireless communications device, such as a UE, performs a channel sensing operation prior to transmitting a first transmission over a first particular beam of a plurality of beams. For example, the UE 115 performs an energy sensing operation on / using the particular beam as described with reference to Figures 4-7. For example, the UE 115 performs an LBT operation on the particular beam to determine whether the UE 115 can subsequently transmit.

[0145] In block 801, the UE 115 determines a beam-specific channel sensing failure for a particular beam based on performing a channel sensing operation. For example, the UE 115 determines that a channel sensing operation has failed, as described with reference to Figures 4-7. For example, the detected energy of the medium may be equal to or greater than a threshold amount, or the UE 115 may detect a signal that another device is transmitting or attempting to transmit (e.g., the medium has not been cleared for a sufficiently long duration). In response to this failure, or alternatively in response to success, the UE 115 may adjust corresponding beam-specific counters and timers, as described in Figures 4-7.

[0146] In block 802, the UE 115 transmits channel sensing failure information indicating a channel sensing failure for a particular beam based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure and one or more previous beam-specific channel sensing failures. For example, the UE 115 may generate and transmit a channel sensing failure report indicating a persistent channel sensing failure for at least a particular beam based on a series of two or more failures as described with reference to FIGS. 4-7. In some implementations, the channel sensing failure report may indicate a persistent channel sensing failure for multiple or all beams. The UE 115 may determine to generate and / or transmit a channel sensing failure report based on a counter and / or timer for a particular beam satisfying a threshold or condition. After detecting and reporting a beam-specific failure, the UE 115 and other wireless devices (e.g., the second UE or the base station) may perform one or more operations as described in FIGS. 3-7 to recover from the beam-specific failure.

[0147] A wireless communication device (e.g., a UE or a base station) may perform additional blocks (or the wireless communication device may be configured to further perform additional operations) in other implementations. For example, a wireless communication device (e.g., a UE 115) may perform one or more operations described above. As another example, a wireless communication device (e.g., a UE 115) may perform one or more aspects as presented below.

[0148] In the first aspect, the UE 115 further determines, based on performing a channel sensing operation, not to transmit the first transmission for a particular beam.

[0149] In a second aspect, alone or in combination with the first aspect, the UE 115 performs a second channel sensing operation before performing the channel sensing operation and further before transmitting a second transmission via the first particular beam, and determines a second beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the performance of the second channel sensing operation, and the channel sensing failure information indicates a persistent beam failure for the first particular beam.

[0150] In a third aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the UE 115 performs a third channel sensing operation before performing the second channel sensing operation and also before transmitting a third transmission via a second particular beam of the multiple beams, and determines a third beam-specific channel sensing failure for the second particular beam based on the performance of the third channel sensing operation, and the channel sensing failure information indicates persistent beam failure for the first particular beam and the second particular beam.

[0151] In a fourth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the preceding aspects, a wireless communications device is configured to operate with a plurality of beams, each beam of the plurality of beams having a corresponding channel sensing failure counter and a corresponding channel sensing timer.

[0152] In a fifth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the preceding aspects, a wireless communications device is configured to operate with multiple beams, the multiple beams including multiple beam groups, each beam group of the multiple groups having a corresponding channel sensing failure counter and a corresponding channel sensing timer.

[0153] In a sixth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, UE115 further sets (e.g., resets) a particular beam channel detection timer (e.g., lbt-FailureDetectionTimer) to a starting value in response to entering the beam-specific channel detection mode, and sets (e.g., resets) a particular beam channel detection counter to a starting value in response to entering the beam-specific channel detection mode.

[0154] In a seventh aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, UE115 sets (e.g., resets) a particular beam channel detection timer (e.g., lbt-FailureDetectionTimer) to a starting value in response to a channel detection failure for the corresponding beam, and adjusts (e.g., increments / decrements) a particular beam channel detection counter (e.g., adjusts its value) in response to a channel detection failure for the corresponding beam.

[0155] In an eighth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, UE115 further adjusts (e.g., increments / decrements) a particular beam channel sensing timer in response to successful channel sensing for the corresponding beam, and maintains (e.g., does not adjust) a particular beam channel sensing counter state (e.g., lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount) in response to successful channel sensing for the corresponding beam.

[0156] In a ninth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the UE 115 further sets (e.g., resets) a particular beam channel sensing counter to a threshold in response to the particular beam channel sensing counter satisfying a reset condition (e.g., a failure indication condition such as an lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount threshold).

[0157] In a tenth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, a threshold or starting value of a channel sensing failure timer (lbt-FailureDetectionTimer) and a threshold or starting value of a channel sensing failure counter (lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount) are different for different beams of a plurality of beams configured for use by the wireless communications device.

[0158] In an eleventh aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, a threshold or starting value of a channel sensing failure timer (lbt-FailureDetectionTimer) and a threshold or starting value of a channel sensing failure counter (lbt-FailureInstanceMaxCount) are different for different modes (e.g., Uu or PC) or different channels (e.g., uplink, downlink, or sidelink).

[0159] In a twelfth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the UE 115 further receives a grant indicating one or more virtual transmission opportunities for a particular beam, performs a second channel sensing operation for the one or more virtual transmission opportunities and the first virtual transmission opportunity for the particular beam, and determines a second beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on unsuccessful execution of the second channel sensing operation, or refrains from transmitting for the first virtual transmission opportunity based on successful execution of the second channel sensing operation.

[0160] In a thirteenth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the UE 115 further performs a third channel sensing operation for one or more virtual transmission opportunities and a second virtual transmission opportunity for the particular beam, and determines a third beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on unsuccessful execution of the third channel sensing operation, or refrains from transmitting for the second virtual transmission opportunity based on successful execution of the third channel sensing operation.

[0161] In a fourteenth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the preceding aspects, the channel sensing failure information indicates that a subset of beams of the plurality of beams experiences a persistent channel sensing failure.

[0162] In a fifteenth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the UE 115 further switches from the particular beam to a second particular beam, attempts to transmit a second transmission on the second particular beam, performs second channel sensing for the second transmission and the second particular beam, determines not to transmit the second transmission on the second particular beam, determines a second beam-specific channel sensing failure for the second particular beam, and channel sensing failure information further indicating the second channel sensing failure for the second particular beam and generated based on the second beam-specific channel sensing failure.

[0163] In a sixteenth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the preceding aspects, the channel sensing failure information indicates that all beams of the plurality of beams experience a persistent channel sensing failure.

[0164] In a seventeenth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the UE 115 further switches from the particular beam to a second particular beam, attempts to transmit a second transmission for the second particular beam, performs second channel sensing for the second transmission and the second particular beam, determines not to transmit the second transmission for the second particular beam, determines a second beam-specific channel sensing failure for the second particular beam, and transmits second channel sensing failure information indicating the second channel sensing failure for the second particular beam based on the second beam-specific channel sensing failure.

[0165] In an eighteenth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the preceding aspects, the channel sensing operation includes or corresponds to a channel sensing operation or an energy sensing operation.

[0166] In a nineteenth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the channel sensing failure information is included in a channel sensing failure report transmission, and the channel sensing failure report transmission includes a MAC CE or physical layer (Layer 1) channel transmission.

[0167] In a twentieth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the preceding aspects, the channel sensing failure report transmission includes a PUCCH, a PUSCH, a PDCCH, a PSCCH, or a PSFCH transmission.

[0168] In a twenty-first aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the preceding aspects, the channel sensing failure report transmission is a UCI, a DCI, or an SCI.

[0169] In a twenty-second aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, a channel sensing failure report transmission is sent to a base station, a UE, or both.

[0170] In a 23rd aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the channel sensing failure information is sent to the first device in a first channel sensing failure report message, and the UE 115 further sends a second channel sensing failure report message to the second device based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure, where the second channel sensing failure report message includes channel sensing failure information indicating a channel sensing failure for a particular beam.

[0171] In a 24th aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, channel sensing failure information is sent to a first device in a first channel sensing failure report message using a second beam different from the particular beam, and the first device is a serving cell in which the beam-specific channel sensing failure occurred.

[0172] In a twenty-fifth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the channel sensing operation includes a listen-before-talk (LBT) operation, and the LBT operation includes a category (CAT) 1 LBT operation, a CAT2 LBT operation, a CAT3 LBT operation, or a CAT4 LBT operation.

[0173] In a twenty-sixth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the channel sensing failure is beam-specific and is for an SCell, and the channel sensing failure report transmission is sent to a master node of a master cell group (MCG) or a secondary node of a secondary cell group (SCG).

[0174] In a twenty-seventh aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the channel sensing failure is beam-specific and is for an SpCell, and the UE 115 further switches to another BWP configured with RACH resources, the other BWP being associated with a second plurality of beams, and performs a RACH procedure on one or more beams of the second plurality of beams, and the channel sensing failure information is included in a MAC CE, and the MAC CE is transmitted in response to performing the RACH procedure.

[0175] In a 28th aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, a channel sensing failure is detected for each beam of each BWP configured with RACH resources, and the UE 115 further determines an SCG Radio Link Failure (RLF) and sends an indication of the SCG RLF to the master node (which may be part of the MCG) via SCGFailureInformation.

[0176] In a 29th aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, a channel sensing failure is detected for each beam of each BWP configured with a RACH resource, and UE 115 further determines an RLF, sends an indication of the RLF, and performs an RRC connection setup operation.

[0177] Accordingly, a wireless communication device may perform enhanced channel sensing failure detection, reporting, and recovery operations. By performing enhanced packet compression operations, throughput may be improved and latency may be reduced through faster and more efficient channel sensing failure detection, reporting, and / or recovery.

[0178] FIG. 9 is a flow diagram illustrating example blocks executed by a wireless communication device (e.g., a UE or a base station) configured according to an aspect of the present disclosure. The example blocks are also described with respect to a base station 105 as shown in FIG. 11. FIG. 11 is a block diagram illustrating a base station 105 configured according to an aspect of the present disclosure. The base station 105 includes the structure, hardware, and components as illustrated for the base station 105 of FIG. 2 and / or FIG. 4. For example, the base station 105 includes a controller / processor 280, which operates to execute logic or computer instructions stored in memory 282 as well as to control the components of the base station 105 that provide the features and functionality of the base station 105. The base station 105 transmits and receives signals via wireless radios 1101a-t and antennas 234a-t under the control of the controller / processor 280. 2 for the base station 105, including modulators / demodulators 232a-t, MIMO detector 236, receive processor 238, transmit processor 220, and TX MIMO processor 230. As shown in the example of FIG. 11, memory 282 stores beam-specific channel sensing failure logic 1102, channel sensing logic 1103, beam-specific counter data 1104, beam-specific timer data 1105, beam data 1106, and configuration data 1107.

[0179] At block 900, a wireless communication device, such as a base station 105, transmits beam-specific channel sensing failure configuration information. For example, the base station 105 transmits a configuration transmission 450 including the setting data 444 as described with reference to FIG. 4. Alternatively, the base station 105 transmits the beam-specific channel sensing failure configuration information in a separate message. The beam-specific channel sensing failure configuration information may indicate one or more settings or configurations for beam-specific channel sensing failure detection, reporting, and / or recovery operations. As illustrative and non-limiting examples, the beam-specific channel sensing failure configuration information may indicate timer and / or counter values, thresholds or conditions, or may indicate a particular mode (e.g., single beam or multiple beam reporting).

[0180] In block 901, the base station 105 receives channel sensing failure information indicating a channel sensing failure for a particular beam based on multiple beam-specific channel sensing failures. For example, the base station 105 may receive a channel sensing failure report indicating a persistent channel sensing failure for at least a particular beam based on a series of two or more failures at another device, as described with reference to FIGS. 4-7. In some implementations, the channel sensing failure report may indicate a persistent channel sensing failure for multiple beams or all beams. After detecting and reporting the beam-specific failures, the base station 105 and other wireless devices (e.g., UEs) may perform one or more operations, such as those described in FIGS. 3-7, to recover from the beam-specific failures.

[0181] A wireless communication device (e.g., a UE or a base station) may perform additional blocks (or the wireless communication device may be configured to further perform additional operations) in other implementations. For example, the wireless communication device may perform one or more operations described above. As another example, the wireless communication device may perform one or more aspects described with reference to FIG. 8.

[0182] In a first aspect, the beam-specific channel sensing failure configuration information includes one or more beam-specific channel sensing failure counter conditions, one or more beam-specific channel sensing failure timer conditions, or both.

[0183] In a second aspect, alone or in combination with the first aspect, the wireless communications device further determines one or more transmission resources indicating an opportunity for the UE to perform channel sensing to check for a persistent channel sensing failure for the particular beam, generates one or more virtual transmission opportunities for the particular beam based on the one or more transmission resources, transmits a grant indicating the one or more virtual transmission opportunities and the particular beam, and receives second channel sensing failure information indicating a second channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the second beam-specific channel sensing failure for the one or more virtual transmission opportunities.

[0184] In a third aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the wireless communications device further determines one or more unscheduled transmission resources, generates one or more virtual transmission opportunities for a particular beam based on the one or more unscheduled transmission resources, and transmits a grant indicating the one or more virtual transmission opportunities and the particular beam, wherein the channel sensing failure information indicating the channel sensing failure for the particular beam is based on the second beam-specific channel sensing failure for the one or more virtual transmission opportunities.

[0185] In a fourth aspect, alone or in combination with one or more of the above aspects, the wireless communications device further removes the one or more unscheduled transmission resources, generates one or more virtual transmission opportunities for the particular beam based on the one or more unscheduled transmission resources, and transmits a grant indicating the one or more virtual transmission opportunities and the particular beam, wherein the channel sensing failure information indicating the channel sensing failure for the particular beam is based on the second beam-specific channel sensing failure for the one or more virtual transmission opportunities.

[0186] Accordingly, a wireless communication device may perform enhanced channel sensing failure detection, reporting, and recovery operations. By performing enhanced packet compression operations, throughput may be improved and latency may be reduced through faster and more efficient channel sensing failure detection, reporting, and / or recovery.

[0187] Those skilled in the art will appreciate that information and signals may be represented using any of a variety of different technologies and techniques. For example, the data, instructions, commands, information, signals, bits, symbols, and chips that may be referred to throughout the above description may be represented by voltages, currents, electromagnetic waves, magnetic fields or particles, optical fields or particles, or any combination thereof.

[0188] The components, functional blocks and modules described herein with respect to Figures 1-11 comprise, among other examples, processors, electronic devices, hardware devices, electronic components, logical circuits, memories, software code, firmware code, etc., or any combination thereof. Additionally, features discussed herein may be implemented via dedicated processor circuitry, via executable instructions, or by a combination thereof.

[0189] Moreover, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the various exemplary logic blocks, modules, circuits, and algorithm steps described herein in connection with the present disclosure may be implemented as electronic hardware, computer software, or a combination of both. To clearly illustrate this interchangeability of hardware and software, the various exemplary components, blocks, modules, circuits, and steps have been described above generally in terms of their functionality. Whether such functionality is implemented as hardware or software depends on the specific application and design constraints imposed on the overall system. Those skilled in the art may realize the described functionality in various ways for each specific application, but such implementation decisions should not be interpreted as causing a departure from the scope of the present disclosure. In addition, those skilled in the art will readily recognize that the order or combination of components, methods, or interactions described herein are merely examples, and that the components, methods, or interactions of various aspects of the present disclosure may be combined or performed in ways different from those shown and described herein.

[0190] The various example logic, logic blocks, modules, circuits, and algorithmic processes described in connection with the implementations disclosed herein may be implemented as electronic hardware, computer software, or a combination of both. Interchangeability of hardware and software has been described generally in terms of functionality and illustrated in the various example components, blocks, modules, circuits, and processes described above. Whether such functionality is implemented in hardware or software depends on the particular application and design constraints imposed on the overall system.

[0191] The hardware and data processing devices used to implement the various example logic, logic blocks, modules, and circuits described in connection with the aspects disclosed herein may be implemented or performed with general purpose single-chip or multi-chip processors, digital signal processors (DSPs), application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) or other programmable logic devices, discrete gate or transistor logic, discrete hardware components, or any combination thereof designed to perform the functions described herein. A general purpose processor may be a microprocessor, or any conventional processor, controller, microcontroller, or state machine. In some implementations, a processor may be implemented as a combination of computing devices, such as a combination of a DSP and a microprocessor, multiple microprocessors, one or more microprocessors in conjunction with a DSP core, or any other such configuration. In some implementations, particular processes and methods may be performed by circuitry specific to a given function.

[0192] In one or more aspects, the functions described may be implemented in hardware, digital electronic circuitry, computer software, firmware, or any combination thereof, including the structures disclosed herein and their structural equivalents. Implementations of the subject matter described herein may also be implemented as one or more computer programs, i.e., as one or more modules of computer program instructions encoded on a computer storage medium for execution by or for controlling the operation of a data processing apparatus.

[0193] If implemented in software, the functions may be stored on or transmitted over a computer-readable medium as one or more instructions or code. The processes of the methods or algorithms disclosed herein may be implemented in processor-executable software modules that may reside on a computer-readable medium. Computer-readable media includes both computer storage media and communication media, including any medium that may enable a computer program to be transferred from one place to another. A storage medium may be any available medium that can be accessed by a computer. By way of example and not limitation, such computer-readable media may include random access memory (RAM), read-only memory (ROM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), CD-ROM or other optical disk storage, magnetic disk storage or other magnetic storage devices, or any other medium that may be used to store desired program code in the form of instructions or data structures and that may be accessed by a computer. Also, any connection may be properly referred to as a computer-readable medium. Disk and disc as used herein include compact disc (CD), laser disc, optical disc, digital versatile disc (DVD), floppy disk, and Blu-ray disc, where disks usually reproduce data magnetically and discs reproduce data optically using lasers. Combinations of the above should also be included within the scope of computer-readable media. In addition, operations of a method or algorithm may reside on machine-readable and computer-readable media, which may be incorporated into a computer program product as one or any combination or set of code and instructions.

[0194] Various modifications to the implementations described in this disclosure may be readily apparent to those skilled in the art, and the general principles defined herein may be applied to several other implementations without departing from the spirit or scope of the present disclosure. Thus, the claims are not intended to be limited to the implementations shown herein, but are to be accorded the widest scope consistent with the present disclosure, the principles and novel features disclosed herein.

[0195] In addition, those skilled in the art will readily appreciate that the terms "upper" and "lower" may be used to facilitate description of the figures, and refer to relative positions that correspond to the orientation of the figure on a suitably oriented page, and may not reflect the proper orientation of any implemented device.

[0196] Also, some features described in the context of separate implementations herein may be implemented in combination in a single implementation. Conversely, various features described in the context of a single implementation may also be implemented separately in multiple implementations or in any suitable subcombination. Moreover, although features may be described above as acting in some combinations and may initially be claimed as such, one or more features from the claimed combination may, in some cases, be deleted from the combination, and the claimed combination may be directed to a subcombination or a variation of the subcombination.

[0197] Similarly, although operations are shown in the figures in a particular order, this should not be understood as requiring such operations to be performed in the particular order or sequentially shown, or that all of the illustrated operations be performed, to achieve desirable results. Additionally, the figures may generally depict one or more exemplary processes in the form of a flow diagram. However, other operations not shown may be incorporated into the illustrative process depicted in the schematic. For example, one or more additional operations may be performed before, after, simultaneously with, or between any of the depicted operations. In some circumstances, multitasking and parallel processing may be advantageous. Moreover, the separation of various system components in the implementations described above should not be understood as requiring such separation in all implementations, and it should be understood that the described program components and systems may generally be integrated together in a single software product or packaged in multiple software products. In addition, some other implementations fall within the scope of the following claims. In some cases, the actions recited in the claims may be performed in a different order and still achieve desirable results.

[0198] The term "or" as used herein, including in the claims, when used in a list of two or more items means that any one of the listed items may be employed alone, or any combination of two or more of the listed items may be employed. For example, if a composition is described as including components A, B, or C, the composition may include only A, only B, only C, a combination of A and B, a combination of A and C, a combination of B and C, or a combination of A, B, and C. Also, "or" used in a list of items beginning with "at least one of" as used herein, including in the claims, indicates a disjunctive list, such as a list of "at least one of A, B, or C" meaning A or B or C or AB or AC or BC or ABC (i.e., A and B and C), or any of these in any combination thereof. The term "substantially" is defined primarily, but not necessarily completely, as understood by those skilled in the art (including as specified, e.g., substantially 90 degrees includes 90 degrees, and substantially parallel includes parallel). In any disclosed implementation, the term "substantially" may be replaced with "within [percent]" of what is specified, where percent includes 0.1, 1, 5, or 10 percent.

[0199] The above description of the disclosure is provided to enable any person skilled in the art to make or use the disclosure. Various modifications of the disclosure will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art, and the general principles defined herein may be applied to other variations without departing from the spirit or scope of the disclosure. Thus, the disclosure is not intended to be limited to the examples and designs described herein, but is to be accorded the widest scope consistent with the principles and novel features disclosed herein. [Explanation of symbols]

[0200] 100 Wireless Network 105 Base station 115 UE 212 Data Source 220 Transmit Processor 230 Transmit (TX) MIMO Processor 232a~232t Modulator (MOD) 234a~234t Antenna 236 MIMO Detector 238 Receive Processor 239 Data Sink 240 Controller 242 Memory 244 Scheduler 252a~252r Antenna 254a~254r Demodulator (DEMOD) 256 MIMO detector 258 Receive Processor 260 Data Sink 262 Data Sources 264 Transmit Processor 266 TX MIMO Processor 280 Controller 282 Memory 302 First Slot 304 Second Slot 306 Third Slot 312 Detection Window 314 Send Window 322 Conflict Window 324 Transmission Duration 400 Wireless Communication System 402 processor 404 Memory 405 UE 405 Network Entity 406 Beam Data 408 Counter Data 410 Transmitter 412 Receiver 413 Encoder 414 Decoder 415 Beam Specific Failure Manager 416 Channel Detection Manager 430 Processor 432 Memory 434 Transmitter 436 Receiver 437 Encoder 438 Decoder 439 Beam Specific Failure Manager 440 Channel Detection Manager 442 Timer Data 444 Configuration Data 448 Messages 450 Config Send 452 Uplink Grant Message 454 First Transmission 456 Second Transmission 458 Report Message 490 Beam-specific Channel Detection Failure Operation Indicator 1001a~r Wireless Radio 1002 Beam-specific channel detection failure logic 1003 Channel Detection Logic 1004 Beam specific counter data 1005 Beam specific timer data 1006 Beam Data 1007 Setting data 1101a-t wireless radio 1102 Beam-specific channel detection failure logic 1103 Channel Detection Logic 1104 Beam specific counter data 1105 Beam specific timer data 1106 Beam Data 1107 Configuration data

Claims

1. 1. A method of wireless communication, comprising: performing, by the wireless communication device, a channel sensing operation prior to transmitting a first transmission over a first particular beam of the plurality of beams; determining, by the wireless communications device, a beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on performing the channel sensing operation; transmitting, by the wireless communications device, channel sensing failure information indicative of a channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure and one or more previous beam-specific channel sensing failures; The method includes:

2. 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the channel sensing operation includes a listen-before-talk (LBT) operation, and the LBT operation includes a category (CAT) 1 LBT operation, a CAT2 LBT operation, a CAT3 LBT operation, or a CAT4 LBT operation.

3. prior to performing said channel sensing operation; performing, by the wireless communication device, a second channel sensing operation prior to transmitting a second transmission via the first particular beam; determining, by the wireless communications device, a second beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on performing the second channel sensing operation, the channel sensing failure information indicating a persistent beam failure for the first particular beam; The method of claim 1, further comprising:

4. prior to performing the second channel sensing operation; performing, by the wireless communication device, a third channel sensing operation prior to transmitting a third transmission via a second particular beam of the plurality of beams; determining, by the wireless communications device, a third beam-specific channel sensing failure for the second particular beam based on performing the third channel sensing operation, wherein the channel sensing failure information indicates persistent beam failure for the first particular beam and the second particular beam; 4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

5. in response to entering the beam-specific channel sensing mode, setting a particular beam channel sensing timer to a starting value; responsive to entering the beam-specific channel sensing mode, setting a particular beam channel sensing counter to a starting value; The method of claim 1, further comprising:

6. setting a particular beam channel sense timer to a starting value in response to a channel sense failure for a corresponding beam; adjusting a particular beam channel sense counter in response to the channel sense failure for the corresponding beam; The method of claim 1, further comprising:

7. setting the particular beam channel detection counter to a threshold in response to the particular beam channel detection counter satisfying a reset condition.

7. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

8. adjusting a particular beam channel sensing timer in response to successful channel sensing for a corresponding beam; maintaining a particular beam channel sense counter state in response to the successful channel sense of the corresponding beam; The method of claim 1, further comprising:

9. setting the particular beam channel detect counter to a threshold in response to the particular beam channel detect timer satisfying a reset condition.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

10. 1. An apparatus configured for wireless communication, comprising: means for performing, by the wireless communication device, a channel sensing operation prior to transmitting a first transmission over a first particular beam of the plurality of beams; means for determining, by the wireless communications device, a beam-specific channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on performing the channel sensing operation; means for transmitting, by the wireless communications device, channel sensing failure information indicative of a channel sensing failure for the particular beam based on the beam-specific channel sensing failure and one or more previous beam-specific channel sensing failures. An apparatus comprising:

11. The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the channel sensing failure information indicates that all beams of the plurality of beams experience a persistent channel sensing failure.

12. means for switching, by the wireless communication device, from the particular beam to a second particular beam; means for attempting to transmit, by the wireless communication device, a second transmission on the second particular beam; and means for performing, by the wireless communications device, second channel sensing for the second transmission and the second particular beam; means for determining, by the wireless communication device, not to transmit the second transmission on the second particular beam; means for determining, by the wireless communications device, a second beam-specific channel sensing failure for the second particular beam; means for transmitting, by the wireless communications device, second channel sensing failure information indicative of a second channel sensing failure for the second particular beam based on the second beam-specific channel sensing failure; The apparatus of claim 10, further comprising:

13. 11. The apparatus of claim 10, wherein the channel sensing failure information is included in a channel sensing failure report transmission, the channel sensing failure report transmission comprising a medium access control control element (MAC CE) or a physical layer channel transmission.

14. The channel sensing failure report transmission comprises a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH), a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH), a physical sidelink control channel (PSCCH), or a physical sidelink feedback channel (PSFCH) transmission; or 14. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the channel sensing failure report transmission is uplink control information (UCI), downlink control information (DCI), or sidelink control information (SCI).

15. A computer program comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform a method according to any one of claims 1 to 9.

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