Method for enabling dynamic puncturing in a WLAN system

Abstract

Dynamic puncturing in a wireless local area network (WLAN) supporting a 320 MHz bandwidth is disclosed. In one embodiment, the method includes a first station (STA1) transmitting a Null Data Packet Announcement (NDPA) frame including an indicator of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) subchannel puncturing over a wireless medium, followed by a Null Data Packet (NDP) having a U-SIG field specifying an OFDMA puncturing pattern. The NDPA can indicate that a subsequent NDP, preferably occupying an 80 MHz channel, includes an OFDMA puncturing pattern in its U-SIG field. The method can further include transmitting a Beamforming Report Poll (BFRP) on an active resource, e.g., an unpunctured subchannel, to solicit measurements by a receiving station (STA2). STA2 may send a beamforming report (BFR) in response to the BFRP, where the BFR includes a measurement of active resources excluding subchannels that are inactive due to static OFDMA puncturing or dynamic OFDMA puncturing.

Description

[Technical field]

[0001] (CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS) This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 63 / 307,141, filed February 6, 2022, U.S. Provisional Application No. 63 / 312,596, filed February 22, 2022, and U.S. Provisional Application No. 63 / 404,763, filed September 8, 2022, the contents of each of which are incorporated herein by reference. [Background technology]

[0002] A WLAN in infrastructure Basic Service Set (BSS) mode has an Access Point (AP) in the BSS and one or more stations (STAs) associated with the AP. The AP typically has access or interface to a Distribution System (DS) or another type of wired / wireless network that carries traffic within and / or outside the BSS. Traffic originating from outside the BSS to a STA arrives through the AP and is delivered to the STA. Traffic from a STA to a destination outside the BSS is sent to the AP and delivered to the respective destination. Traffic between STAs within a BSS may also be sent through the AP, but the source STA sends traffic to the AP, and the AP delivers the traffic to the destination STA.

[0003] Using 802.11ac infrastructure mode of operation, an AP may transmit beacons on a fixed channel, usually the primary channel. This channel may be 20 MHz wide and is the operating channel of the BSS. This channel is also used by STAs to establish a connection with the AP. The basic channel access mechanism in 802.11 systems is Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance (CSMA / CA). In this mode of operation, all STAs, including the AP, sense the primary channel. If the channel is detected to be busy, the STAs back off. Thus, only one STA may transmit at any given time in a given BSS.

[0004] In 802.11n, High Throughput (HT) STAs may also use 40 MHz wide channels for communication, which is accomplished by combining a primary 20 MHz channel with adjacent 20 MHz channels to form a 40 MHz wide contiguous channel.

[0005] In 802.11ac, Very High Throughput (VHT) STAs may support channels of 20 MHz, 40 MHz, 80 MHz, and 160 MHz width. The 40 MHz and 80 MHz channels are formed by combining consecutive 20 MHz channels, similar to 802.11n described above. The 160 MHz channel may be formed by combining eight consecutive 20 MHz channels, or by combining two non-consecutive 80 MHz channels, which may be referred to as an 80+80 configuration. In the case of the 80+80 configuration, the data, after channel coding, passes through a segment parser and is split into two streams. IFFT and time domain processing may be performed separately for each stream. The streams are then mapped to two channels and the data is transmitted. At the receiver, this mechanism is reversed and the combined data is sent to the media access control (MAC) layer.

[0006] To improve spectral efficiency, 802.11ac introduces the concept of downlink (DL) Multi-User MIMO (MU-MIMO) transmission to multiple STAs during the same symbol time frame, e.g., downlink orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) symbol. The possible use of downlink MU-MIMO is currently also being considered for 802.11ah. It is important to note that downlink MU-MIMO uses the same symbol timing for multiple STAs, as used in 802.11ac, so interference of waveform transmissions to multiple STAs is not an issue. However, all STAs involved in MU-MIMO transmission with the AP must use the same frequency channel or band. This limits the operating bandwidth to the minimum channel bandwidth supported by the STAs involved in the MU-MIMO transmission with the AP. Summary of the Invention

[0007] A method and apparatus for implementing dynamic puncturing is disclosed. A method implemented by a station (STA) to determine whether dynamic puncturing is present may involve receiving a transmission and comparing a punctured channel pattern indicated by an INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS parameter passed from a PHY in the transmission with a punctured channel pattern indicated in a disabled subchannel bitmap field of an extremely high throughput (EHT) operation element within a sounding bandwidth (BW), where dynamic puncturing is present in the transmission provided that the number of punctured subchannels indicated by the RXVECTOR parameter INACATIVE_SUBCHANNELS is greater than the number of punctured subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the EHT operation element.

[0008] The method implemented by a station (STA) to enable dynamic puncturing may impair detection of extra tones (subcarriers) in an OFDM symbol, which are used for one or more of the following: indicating whether dynamic puncturing has been performed in a physical layer protocol data unit (PPDU), indicating whether preamble puncturing has been performed in a PPDU, and / or indicating whether preamble puncturing has been performed in another 20 MHz subchannel.

[0009] According to a first aspect of an embodiment, a method for a first station (STA1) communicating in a wireless network includes transmitting a null data packet announcement (NDPA) frame, the NDPA frame including an indicator of orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) subchannel puncturing of a subsequent null data packet (NDP); transmitting a null data packet (NDP) occupying at least one 80 MHz channel, the NDP having a U-SIG field specifying an OFDMA puncturing pattern; transmitting a beamforming report poll (BFRP) on active resources requesting measurements; and receiving a beamforming report (BFRP) from a second station (STA2) in response to the BFRP. and receiving a beamforming report (BFR), where the beamforming report includes measurements of active resources excluding inactive subchannels of the OFDMA puncturing pattern.

[0010] The method may further define that the measurement of active resources excludes inactive subchannels including static OFDMA puncturing identified from the disabled subchannel bitmap and dynamic OFDMA puncturing identified from one or more U-SIG fields. The indicia of the inactive subchannels may be present in a fractional bandwidth (BW) subfield of the NDPA frame, and / or the dynamic OFDMA puncturing is based on one or more of an OFDMA puncturing pattern and STA2 channel sensing in the NDP U-SIG field. Additionally, the beamforming report may include an identifier of the dynamic OFDMA puncturing.

[0011] In one embodiment, the NDPA frame includes a duplicate non-high throughput (non-HT) physical protocol data unit (PPDU) having a partial BW subfield including an indicator of OFDMA subchannel puncturing with a minimum subchannel resolution of 40 MHz, and the NDP includes an extra-high throughput (EHT) PPDU including a U-SIG having an OFDMA puncturing pattern with a minimum subchannel resolution of 20 MHz. The indicator of OFDMA subchannel puncturing may include an OFDMA puncturing mode signal.

[0012] According to another aspect of an embodiment, a wireless transmit and receive unit (WTRU) can include a processor and a transmitter configured by the processor to transmit, at a transmit opportunity (TXOP), a null data packet announcement (NDPA) frame followed by a null data packet (NDP) frame occupying a subchannel bandwidth of 80 MHz or more, where the NDPA frame indicates that a subsequent NDP frame utilizes an orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) puncturing pattern identified in a signaling field of the NDP frame.

[0013] The OFDMA puncturing pattern signals which subchannels are punctured in the NDP frame, and the transmitter is further configured by the processor to send a beamforming reporting poll (BFRP) during the TXOP.

[0014] The WTRU may further include a receiver configured by the processor to receive a beamforming report (BFR) during the TXOP in response to a BFRP sent from a separate beamformee. The BFR includes measurements of active subchannels and signaling indicating inactive subchannels, including static OFDMA punctured subchannels and dynamic OFDMA punctured subchannels. The static OFDMA punctured subchannels are those identified by signaling in the partial BW subfield of the NDPA frame, and the dynamic OFDMA punctured subchannels are those identified from the U-SIG field of the NDP frame.

[0015] In one embodiment, the NDPA frame includes a duplicated non-high throughput (non-HT) PPDU signaling OFDMA puncturing in a subsequent NDP frame, the NDP frame includes an extremely high throughput (EHT) PPDU, and the signaling field includes a U-SIG field. The NDPA frame includes a partial BW field identifying the punctured subchannels and an OFDMA puncture mode field signaling a remote receiver to check the U-SIG field of the NDP for additional punctured subchannels having different resolution.

[0016] A further aspect of an embodiment includes a wireless transmit and receive unit (WTRU) including a processor, a transmitter configured by the processor to transmit a beamforming report (BFR) including measurements of active subchannels and an indication of inactive subchannels through static and dynamic puncturing of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) subchannels, and a receiver configured by the processor to receive Null Data Packet Announcement (NDPA) frames and Null Data Packet (NDP) frames occupying at least an 80 MHz subchannel, where the inactive subchannels indicated in the BFR include a combination of a punctured OFDMA subchannel identified in a fractional bandwidth (BW) subfield of the NDPA frame and an OFDMA puncturing pattern identified in a U-SIG field of the NDP frame.

[0017] A PPDU carrying a beamforming report, e.g., a beamforming report or a MAC field within a beamforming report, signals dynamic puncturing by identification from the U-SIG field of the NDP frame. In one embodiment, the NDPA frame includes a duplicate non-high throughput (non-HT) physical protocol data unit (PPDU) and the NDP frame includes an ultra-high throughput (EHT) PPDU. The OFDMA subchannels may be further dynamically punctured based on WTRU channel sensing. In a 320 MHz system bandwidth, the punctured OFDMA subchannels identified in the NDPA frame may have a minimum resolution of 40 MHz subchannels and the punctured OFDMA subchannels identified from the NDP frame may have a minimum resolution of 20 MHz subchannels. In one embodiment, the OFDMA puncturing pattern in the U-SIG field includes a 4-bit indicator of an 80 MHz channel, with each bit having a 20 MHz subchannel indexing. Additionally, indication of inactive subchannels due to static and dynamic puncturing of OFDMA subchannels includes the INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS parameter of the TXVECTOR. In a preferred embodiment, the transmitter and receiver are configured to communicate using the 802.11 protocol with 320 MHz bandwidth support. [Brief description of the drawings]

[0018] A more detailed understanding will result from the description given by way of example in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which like reference numbers indicate similar elements and in which: [Figure 1A] FIG. 1A is a system diagram illustrating an example communication system in which one or more disclosed embodiments may be implemented. [Figure 1B] FIG. 1B is a system diagram illustrating an example wireless transmit / receive unit (WTRU) that may be used within the communications system illustrated in FIG. 1A, according to one embodiment. [Figure 1C] FIG. 1C is a system diagram illustrating an example radio access network (RAN) and an example core network (CN) that may be used within the communications system illustrated in FIG. 1A, according to one embodiment. [Figure 1D] FIG. 1D is a system diagram illustrating a further exemplary RAN and a further exemplary CN that may be used within the communications system illustrated in FIG. 1A, according to one embodiment. [Diagram 2] FIG. 2 is an example diagram of a trigger frame (TF) for A-PPDU. [Diagram 3] FIG. 3 is an example diagram of a common information field of an extra-high throughput (EHT) variant of the trigger frame. [Figure 4] FIG. 4 is an example diagram of a special user information field of a trigger frame. [Diagram 5] FIG. 5 is an example diagram of the special user information field of the EHT variant. [Figure 6] FIG. 6 is an example diagram of valid combinations of B54 and B55 in the common information field, B39 in the user information field, and a requested trigger-based (TB) PPDU format. [Figure 7] FIG. 7 is an exemplary diagram of an EHT action element format. [Figure 8] FIG. 8 is an example diagram of an EHT Operation Information subfield. [Figure 9] FIG. 9 is an example diagram of a multi-user request-to-send (MU-RTS) transmission sharing (TXS) trigger frame with a transmission opportunity (TXOP) sharing mode subfield value=1, requesting an uplink (UL) PPDU as specified in 802.11be. [Figure 10]FIG. 10 is an example diagram of a MU-RTS TXS trigger frame with a TXOP sharing mode subfield value=2 as specified in 802.11be. [Figure 11] FIG. 11 is an example diagram of a null data packet (NDP) frame occupied subchannel. [Figure 12] FIG. 12 is an exemplary diagram of an EHT operating on a 320 Mhz channel. [Figure 13] FIG. 13 is an exemplary diagram of cascaded signaling of various embodiments. [Figure 14] FIG. 14 illustrates an exemplary procedure of dynamic puncturing when puncturing information is carried in a non-HT duplicate PPDU. [Figure 15] FIG. 15 illustrates an exemplary procedure for dynamic puncturing when the dynamic puncturing information is carried in a MAC header of a MAC frame. [Figure 16] FIG. 16 illustrates an exemplary non-TB sounding procedure using dynamic puncturing. [Figure 17] FIG. 17 is an example diagram of an MU-RTS TXS trigger frame with TXOP sharing mode subfield value=2, where dynamic puncturing occurs in a frame exchange initiated by non-AP STA1. [Figure 18] FIG. 18 is an example diagram of a sounding procedure using an OFDMA puncturing pattern of one embodiment. [Figure 19] FIG. 19 is an exemplary diagram of an EHT sounding NDP format of one embodiment. [Figure 20] FIG. 20 is an exemplary diagram of an extended EHT action element format for one embodiment. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

[0019] 1A is a diagram illustrating an example communications system 100 in which one or more disclosed embodiments may be implemented. Communications system 100 may be a multiple access system that provides content, such as voice, data, video, messaging, broadcasts, etc., to multiple wireless users. Communications system 100 may enable multiple wireless users to access such content through sharing of system resources, including wireless bandwidth. For example, the communications system 100 may use one or more channel access methods such as code division multiple access (CDMA), time division multiple access (TDMA), frequency division multiple access (FDMA), orthogonal FDMA (OFDMA), single-carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA), zero-tail unique-word discrete Fourier transform Spread OFDM (ZT-UW-DFT-S-OFDM), unique word OFDM (UW-OFDM), resource block filtered OFDM, filter bank multicarrier (FBMC), and the like.

[0020] 1A, communications system 100 may include wireless transmit / receive units (WTRUs) 102a, 102b, 102c, 102d, a radio access network (RAN) 104, a core network (CN) 106, a public switched telephone network (PSTN) 108, the Internet 110, and other networks 112, although it will be understood that the disclosed embodiments contemplate any number of WTRUs, base stations, networks, and / or network elements. Each of WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, 102d may be any type of device configured to operate and / or communicate in a wireless environment. By way of example, the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, 102d, any of which may be referred to as a station (STA), may be configured to transmit and / or receive wireless signals and may include user equipment (UE), mobile stations, landline or mobile subscriber units, subscription-based units, pagers, mobile phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), smartphones, laptops, netbooks, personal computers, wireless sensors, hotspots or Mi-Fi devices, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, watches or other wearables, head-mounted displays (HMDs), vehicles, drones, medical devices and applications (e.g., remote surgery), industrial devices and applications (e.g., robots and / or other wireless devices operating in industrial and / or automated processing chain contexts), home electronic devices, devices operating in commercial and / or industrial wireless networks, etc. Any of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, and 102d may be interchangeably referred to as a UE.

[0021] The communications system 100 may also include a base station 114a and / or a base station 114b. Each of the base stations 114a, 114b may be any type of device configured to wirelessly interface with at least one of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, 102d to facilitate access to one or more communications networks, such as the CN 106, the Internet 110, and / or other networks 112. By way of example, the base stations 114a, 114b may be a base transceiver station (BTS), a Node B, an eNode B (eNB), a Home Node B, a home eNode B, a next generation Node B (eNode B (gNB), etc.), a new radio (NR) Node B, a site controller, an access point (AP), a wireless router, etc. Although the base stations 114a, 114b are each illustrated as a single element, it will be appreciated that the base stations 114a, 114b may include any number of interconnected base stations and / or network elements.

[0022] The base station 114a may be part of the RAN 104, which may also include other base stations, such as a base station controller (BSC), a radio network controller (RNC), relay nodes, and / or network elements (not shown). The base station 114a and / or the base station 114b may be configured to transmit and / or receive wireless signals on one or more carrier frequencies, which may be referred to as cells (not shown). These frequencies may be licensed spectrum, unlicensed spectrum, or a combination of licensed and unlicensed spectrum. A cell may provide wireless service coverage for a particular geographic area, which may be relatively fixed or may change over time. A cell may be further divided into cell sectors. For example, the cell associated with the base station 114a may be divided into three sectors. Thus, in one embodiment, the base station 114a may include three transceivers, i.e., one transceiver for each sector of the cell. In one embodiment, the base station 114a may employ multiple-input multiple output (MIMO) technology and may utilize multiple transceivers for each sector of the cell, for example, using beamforming to transmit and / or receive signals in a desired spatial direction.

[0023] The base stations 114a, 114b may communicate with one or more of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, 102d via an air interface 116, which may be any suitable wireless communication link (e.g., radio frequency (RF), microwave, centimeter wave, micrometer wave, infrared (IR), ultraviolet (UV), visible light, etc.). The air interface 116 may be established using any suitable radio access technology (RAT).

[0024] More specifically, as noted above, the communications system 100 may be a multiple access system, but may use one or more channel access schemes, such as CDMA, TDMA, FDMA, OFDMA, SC-FDMA, etc. For example, the base stations 114a and the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c of the RAN 104 may implement a radio technology such as Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) Terrestrial Radio Access (UTRA), which may establish the air interface 116 using wideband CDMA (WCDMA). WCDMA may include communications protocols such as High-Speed ​​Packet Access (HSPA) and / or Evolved HSPA (HSPA+). HSPA may include High-Speed ​​Downlink (DL) Packet Access (HSDPA) and / or High-Speed ​​Uplink (UL) Packet Access (HSUPA).

[0025] In one embodiment, the base station 114a and the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may implement a radio technology such as Evolved UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access (E-UTRA), which may establish the air interface 116 using Long Term Evolution (LTE) and / or LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) and / or LTE-Advanced Pro (LTE-A Pro).

[0026] In one embodiment, the base station 114a and the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may implement a radio technology such as NR radio access, which may establish the air interface 116 using NR.

[0027] In one embodiment, the base station 114a and the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may implement multiple radio access technologies. For example, the base station 114a and the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may implement LTE radio access and NR radio access together, e.g., using dual connectivity (DC) principles. Thus, the air interface utilized by the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may be characterized by multiple types of radio access technologies and / or transmissions sent to and from multiple types of base stations (e.g., eNBs and gNBs).

[0028] In other embodiments, the base station 114a and the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may implement a wireless technology such as IEEE 802.11 (i.e., Wireless Fidelity, WiFi), IEEE 802.16 (i.e., Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access, WiMAX), CDMA2000, CDMA2000 1X, CDMA2000 EV-DO, Interim Standard 2000 (IS-2000), Interim Standard 95 (IS-95), Interim Standard 856 (IS-856), Global System for Mobile communications (GSM), Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE), GSM EDGE (GERAN), or the like.

[0029] 1A may be, for example, a wireless router, a Home NodeB, a Home eNodeB, or an access point, and may utilize any suitable RAT to facilitate wireless connectivity in a localized area, such as an office, a home, a vehicle, a campus, an industrial facility, an air corridor (e.g., for use by drones), a road, etc. In one embodiment, the base station 114b and the WTRUs 102c, 102d may implement a radio technology, such as IEEE 802.11, to establish a wireless local area network (WLAN). In one embodiment, the base station 114b and the WTRUs 102c, 102d may implement a radio technology, such as IEEE 802.15, to establish a wireless personal area network (WPAN). In yet another embodiment, the base station 114b and the WTRUs 102c, 102d may establish a picocell or a femtocell using a cellular-based RAT (e.g., WCDMA, CDMA2000, GSM, LTE, LTE-A, LTE-A Pro, NR, etc.). As shown in FIG. 1A, the base station 114b may have a direct connection to the Internet 110. Thus, the base station 114b may not need to access the Internet 110 through the CN 106.

[0030] The RAN 104 may communicate with the CN 106, which may be any type of network configured to provide voice, data, application, and / or voice over internet protocol (VoIP) services to one or more of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, 102d. The data may have various quality of service (QoS) requirements, such as, for example, different throughput requirements, latency requirements, error tolerance requirements, reliability requirements, data throughput requirements, mobility requirements, etc. The CN 106 may provide call control, billing services, mobile location-based services, prepaid calling, Internet connectivity, video distribution, etc., and / or perform high-level security functions such as user authentication. Although not shown in FIG. 1A, it will be appreciated that the RAN 104 and / or the CN 106 may communicate directly or indirectly with other RANs that use the same RAT as the RAN 104 or a different RAT. For example, in addition to being connected to the RAN 104, which may utilize NR radio technology, the CN 106 may also communicate with another RAN (not shown) employing GSM, UMTS, CDMA2000, WiMAX, E-UTRA, or WiFi radio technology.

[0031] The CN 106 may also serve as a gateway for the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, 102d to access the PSTN 108, the Internet 110, and / or other networks 112. The PSTN 108 may include a circuit-switched telephone network providing plain old telephone service (POTS). The Internet 110 may include a global system of interconnected computer networks and devices that use common communication protocols, such as the transmission control protocol (TCP), the user datagram protocol (UDP), and / or the internet protocol (IP) of the TCP / IP Internet protocol suite. The networks 112 may include wired and / or wireless communication networks owned and / or operated by other service providers. For example, the networks 112 may include another CN connected to one or more RANs that may use the same RAT as the RAN 104 or a different RAT.

[0032] Some or all of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, 102d in the communications system 100 may include multi-mode capabilities (e.g., the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, 102d may include multiple transceivers for communicating with different wireless networks over different wireless links). For example, the WTRU 102c shown in FIG. 1A may be configured to communicate with a base station 114a, which may employ a cellular-based wireless technology, and a base station 114b, which may employ an IEEE 802 wireless technology.

[0033] Figure 1B is a system diagram illustrating an example WTRU 102. As shown in Figure 1B, the WTRU 102 may include, among other things, a processor 118, a transceiver 120, a transmit / receive element 122, a speaker / microphone 124, a keypad 126, a display / touchpad 128, non-removable memory 130, removable memory 132, a power source 134, a global positioning system (GPS) chipset 136, and / or other peripherals 138. It will be understood that the WTRU 102 may include any sub-combination of the foregoing elements while remaining consistent with an embodiment.

[0034] The processor 118 may be a general purpose processor, a special purpose processor, a conventional processor, a digital signal processor (DSP), multiple microprocessors, one or more microprocessors associated with a DSP core, a controller, a microcontroller, an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), any other type of integrated circuit (IC), a state machine, etc. The processor 118 may perform signal coding, data processing, power control, input / output processing, and / or any other functionality that enables the WTRU 102 to operate in a wireless environment. The processor 118 may be coupled to the transceiver 120, which may be coupled to the transmit / receive element 122. Although FIG. 1B illustrates the processor 118 and the transceiver 120 as separate components, it will be understood that the processor 118 and the transceiver 120 may be integrated together in an electronic package or chip.

[0035] The transmit / receive element 122 may be configured to transmit or receive signals to or from a base station (e.g., base station 114a) over the air interface 116. For example, in one embodiment, the transmit / receive element 122 may be an antenna configured to transmit and / or receive RF signals. In one embodiment, the transmit / receive element 122 may be an emitter / detector configured to transmit and / or receive IR, UV, or visible light signals, for example. In yet another embodiment, the transmit / receive element 122 may be configured to transmit and / or receive both RF and light signals. It will be appreciated that the transmit / receive element 122 may be configured to transmit and / or receive any combination of wireless signals.

[0036] 1B as a single element, the WTRU 102 may include any number of transmit / receive elements 122. More specifically, the WTRU 102 may employ MIMO technology. Thus, in one embodiment, the WTRU 102 may include two or more transmit / receive elements 122 (e.g., multiple antennas) for transmitting and receiving wireless signals over the air interface 116.

[0037] The transceiver 120 may be configured to modulate signals transmitted by the transmit / receive element 122 and demodulate signals received by the transmit / receive element 122. As mentioned above, the WTRU 102 may have multi-mode capabilities. Thus, the transceiver 120 may include multiple transceivers to enable the WTRU 102 to communicate via multiple RATs, such as, for example, NR and IEEE 802.11.

[0038] The processor 118 of the WTRU 102 may be coupled to and may receive user-entered data from a speaker / microphone 124, a keypad 126, and / or a display / touchpad 128 (e.g., a liquid crystal display (LCD) display unit or an organic light-emitting diode (OLED) display unit). The processor 118 may also output user data to the speaker / microphone 124, the keypad 126, and / or the display / touchpad 128. In addition, the processor 118 may access information from and store data in any type of suitable memory, such as non-removable memory 130 and / or removable memory 132. The non-removable memory 130 may include random-access memory (RAM), read-only memory (ROM), a hard disk, or any other type of memory storage device. The removable memory 132 may include a subscriber identity module (SIM) card, a memory stick, a secure digital (SD) memory card, etc. In other embodiments, the processor 118 may access information from and store data in memory that is not physically located on the WTRU 102, such as on a server or home computer (not shown).

[0039] The processor 118 may receive power from the power source 134 and may be configured to distribute and / or control the power to other components in the WTRU 102. The power source 134 may be any suitable device for providing power to the WTRU 102. For example, the power source 134 may include one or more dry batteries (e.g., nickel-cadmium (NiCd), nickel-zinc (NiZn), nickel metal hydride (NiMH), lithium-ion (Li-ion), etc.), solar cells, fuel cells, etc.

[0040] The processor 118 may also be coupled to a GPS chipset 136, which may be configured to provide location information (e.g., longitude and latitude) regarding the current location of the WTRU 102. In addition to, or in lieu of, information from the GPS chipset 136, the WTRU 102 may receive location information from a base station (e.g., base stations 114a, 114b) over the air interface 116 and / or determine its location based on the timing of signals being received from two or more nearby base stations. It will be appreciated that the WTRU 102 may obtain location information by way of any suitable location determination method while remaining consistent with an embodiment.

[0041] The processor 118 may further be coupled to other peripherals 138, which may include one or more software and / or hardware modules that provide additional features, functionality, and / or wired or wireless connectivity. For example, the peripherals 138 may include an accelerometer, an electronic compass, a satellite transceiver, a digital camera (for photos and / or videos), a universal serial bus (USB) port, a vibration device, a television transceiver, a hands-free headset, a Bluetooth® module, a frequency modulated (FM) radio unit, a digital music player, a media player, a video game player module, an Internet browser, a virtual reality and / or augmented reality (VR / AR) device, an activity tracker, and the like. The peripherals 138 may include one or more sensors. The sensor may be one or more of a gyroscope, an accelerometer, a Hall effect sensor, a magnetometer, an orientation sensor, a proximity sensor, a temperature sensor, a time sensor, a geolocation sensor, an altimeter, a light sensor, a touch sensor, a magnetometer, a barometer, a gesture sensor, a biometric sensor, a humidity sensor, and the like.

[0042] The WTRU 102 may include a full-duplex radio where the transmission and reception of some or all of the signals (e.g., associated with a particular subframe of both the UL (e.g., for transmission) and DL (e.g., for reception)) may be simultaneous and / or together. The full-duplex radio may include an interference management unit to reduce and or substantially eliminate self-interference via either hardware (e.g., a choke) or signal processing via a processor (e.g., via a separate processor (not shown) or via processor 118). In one embodiment, the WTRU 102 may include a half-duplex radio where the transmission and reception of some or all of the signals (e.g., associated with a particular subframe of either the UL (e.g., for transmission) or DL ​​(e.g., for reception)) may be simultaneous and / or together.

[0043] 1C is a system diagram illustrating the RAN 104 and the CN 106, according to one embodiment. As mentioned above, the RAN 104 may employ E-UTRA radio technology to communicate with the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c over the air interface 116. The RAN 104 may also communicate with the CN 106.

[0044] The RAN 104 may include eNodeBs 160a, 160b, 160c, although it will be understood that the RAN 104 may include any number of eNodeBs while remaining consistent with an embodiment. The eNodeBs 160a, 160b, 160c may each include one or more transceivers for communicating with the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c over the air interface 116. In an embodiment, the eNodeBs 160a, 160b, 160c may implement MIMO technology. Thus, the eNodeB 160a may, for example, use multiple antennas to transmit wireless signals to and / or receive wireless signals from the WTRU 102a.

[0045] Each of the eNodeBs 160a, 160b, 160c may be associated with a particular cell (not shown) and may be configured to handle radio resource management decisions, handover decisions, scheduling of users in the UL and / or DL, etc. As shown in FIG 1C, the eNodeBs 160a, 160b, 160c may communicate with one another via an X2 interface.

[0046] 1C may include a mobility management entity (MME) 162, a serving gateway (SGW) 164, and a packet data network (PDN) gateway (PGW) 166. Although the foregoing elements are illustrated as part of the CN 106, it will be understood that any of these elements may be owned and / or operated by an entity other than the CN operator.

[0047] The MME 162 may be connected to each of the eNodeBs 162a, 162b, 162c in the RAN 104 via an S1 interface and may function as a control node. For example, the MME 162 may be responsible for authenticating users of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, activating / deactivating bearers, selecting a particular serving gateway during initial attachment of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, etc. The MME 162 may provide a control plane function for switching between the RAN 104 and other RANs (not shown) that employ other radio technologies, such as GSM and / or WCDMA.

[0048] The SGW 164 may be connected to each of the eNodeBs 160a, 160b, 160c in the RAN 104 via an S1 interface. The SGW 164 may generally route and forward user data packets to and from the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c. The SGW 164 may perform other functions, such as anchoring the user plane during inter-eNodeB handover, triggering paging when DL data is available to the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, and managing and storing the context of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c.

[0049] The SGW 164 may be connected to a PGW 166, which may provide the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c with access to packet-switched networks, such as the Internet 110, to facilitate communications between the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c and IP-enabled devices.

[0050] The CN 106 may facilitate communications with other networks. For example, the CN 106 may provide the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c with access to circuit-switched networks, such as the PSTN 108, to facilitate communications between the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c and traditional land-line communications devices. For example, the CN 106 may include or communicate with an IP gateway (e.g., an IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) server) that serves as an interface between the CN 106 and the PSTN 108. In addition, the CN 106 may provide the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c with access to other networks 112, which may include other wired and / or wireless networks owned and / or operated by other service providers.

[0051] Although the WTRU is depicted in FIGS. 1A-1D as a wireless terminal, in certain representative embodiments, it is contemplated that such a terminal may use a wired communications interface (e.g., temporarily or permanently) with the communications network.

[0052] In an exemplary embodiment, the other network 112 may be a WLAN.

[0053] A WLAN in infrastructure Basic Service Set (BSS) mode may have an Access Point (AP) of the BSS and one or more stations (STAs) associated with the AP. The AP may have access or interface to a Distribution System (DS) or another type of wired / wireless network that carries traffic within the BSS and / or outside the BSS. Traffic originating from outside the BSS to the STA may arrive through the AP and be distributed to the STA. Traffic originating from the STA to a destination outside the BSS may be sent to the AP to be delivered to the respective destination. Traffic between STAs within the BSS may be sent, for example, through the AP, where the source STA may send traffic to the AP, which may distribute the traffic to the destination STA. Traffic between STAs within the BSS may be considered and / or referred to as peer-to-peer traffic. Peer-to-peer traffic may be sent between (e.g., directly between) the source STA and the destination STA using a direct link setup (DLS). In certain representative embodiments, the DLS may use 802.11e DLS or 802.11z tunneled DLS (TDLS). A WLAN using an Independent BSS (IBSS) mode may not have an AP, and STAs (e.g., all of the STAs) within or using the IBSS may communicate directly with each other. The IBSS mode of communication may be referred to herein as an "ad-hoc" communication mode.

[0054] When using an 802.11ac infrastructure mode of operation or a similar mode of operation, an AP may transmit a beacon on a fixed channel, such as a primary channel. The primary channel may be a fixed width (e.g., a 20 MHz wide bandwidth) or a dynamically configured width. The primary channel may be the operating channel of the BSS, but may be used by STAs to establish a connection with the AP. In certain representative embodiments, carrier sense multiple access with collision avoidance (CSMA / CA) may be implemented, for example, in an 802.11 system. With CSMA / CA, STAs (e.g., all STAs), including the AP, may sense the primary channel. If the primary channel is sensed / detected and / or determined to be busy by a particular STA, the particular STA may back off. One STA (e.g., only one station) may transmit at any given time in a given BSS.

[0055] A high-throughput (HT) STA may use a 40 MHz wide channel for communication, which may be formed, for example, through a combination of a primary 20 MHz channel and adjacent or non-adjacent 20 MHz channels.

[0056] A Very High Throughput (VHT) STA may support 20 MHz, 40 MHz, 80 MHz, and / or 160 MHz wide channels. A 40 MHz and / or 80 MHz channel may be formed by combining multiple contiguous 20 MHz channels. A 160 MHz channel may be formed by combining eight contiguous 20 MHz channels or by combining two non-contiguous 80 MHz channels, which may be referred to as an 80+80 configuration. For the 80+80 configuration, after channel encoding, the data may pass through a segment parser that may split the data into two streams. Inverse Fast Fourier Transform (IFFT) processing and time domain processing may be performed separately on each stream. The streams may be mapped to two 80 MHz channels and the data may be transmitted by the transmitting STA. At the receiver of the receiving STA, the operations described above for the 80+80 configuration may be reversed and the combined data may be sent to the Medium Access Control (MAC).

[0057] Sub-1 GHz operation modes are supported by 802.11af and 802.11ah. The channel operating bandwidths and carriers are reduced in 802.11af and 802.11ah compared to those used in 802.11n and 802.11ac. 802.11af supports 5 MHz, 10 MHz, and 20 MHz bandwidths in the TV White Space (TVWS) spectrum, while 802.11ah supports 1 MHz, 2 MHz, 4 MHz, 8 MHz, and 16 MHz bandwidths using non-TVWS spectrum. According to a representative embodiment, 802.11ah may support meter-type control / machine-type communications (MTC), such as MTC devices in macro coverage areas. MTC devices may have limited capabilities, including certain capabilities, for example, support for (e.g., support only for) certain and / or limited bandwidths. The MTC device may include a battery that has a battery life above a threshold (eg, to maintain a very long battery life).

[0058] WLAN systems that may support multiple channels and channel bandwidths, such as 802.11n, 802.11ac, 802.11af, and 802.11ah, include a channel that may be designated as a primary channel. The primary channel may have a bandwidth equal to the maximum common operating bandwidth supported by all STAs in the BSS. The bandwidth of the primary channel may be configured and / or limited by the STAs among all STAs operating in the BSS that support the smallest bandwidth operating mode. In an 802.11ah embodiment, the primary channel may be 1 MHz wide for STAs (e.g., MTC-type devices) that support (e.g., only) the 1 MHz mode, even if the AP and other STAs in the BSS support 2 MHz, 4 MHz, 8 MHz, 16 MHz, and / or other channel bandwidth operating modes. Carrier sensing and / or Network Allocation Vector (NAV) configuration may depend on the status of the primary channel. For example, if a STA (that only supports 1 MHz mode of operation) transmitting to an AP has a busy primary channel, all of the available frequency bands may be considered busy even if most of the available frequency bands are idle.

[0059] In the United States, the available frequency bands that can be used by 802.11ah are 902MHz to 928MHz. In South Korea, the available frequency bands are 917.5MHz to 923.5MHz. In Japan, the available frequency bands are 916.5MHz to 927.5MHz. The total bandwidth available for 802.11ah is 6MHz to 26MHz depending on the country code.

[0060] 1D is a system diagram illustrating the RAN 104 and the CN 106, according to one embodiment. As mentioned above, the RAN 104 may use NR radio technology to communicate with the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c over the air interface 116. The RAN 104 may also communicate with the CN 106.

[0061] The RAN 104 may include gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c, although it will be understood that the RAN 104 may include any number of gNBs while remaining consistent with an embodiment. The gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c may each include one or more transceivers for communicating with the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c over the air interface 116. In an embodiment, the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c may implement MIMO technology. For example, the gNBs 180a, 108b may utilize beamforming to transmit signals to and / or receive signals from the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c. Thus, the gNB 180a may transmit and / or receive wireless signals to and from the WTRU 102a, for example, using multiple antennas. In one embodiment, the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c may implement carrier aggregation technology. For example, the gNB 180a may transmit multiple component carriers to the WTRU 102a (not shown). A subset of these component carriers may be on an unlicensed spectrum, while the remaining component carriers may be on a licensed spectrum. In one embodiment, the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c may implement Coordinated Multi-Point (CoMP) technology. For example, the WTRU 102a may receive coordinated transmissions from the gNBs 180a and 180b (and / or gNB 180c).

[0062] The WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may communicate with the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c using transmissions associated with scalable numerology. For example, the OFDM symbol spacing and / or OFDM subcarrier spacing may vary for different transmissions, different cells, and / or different portions of the wireless transmission spectrum. The WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may communicate with the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c using subframes or transmission time intervals (TTIs) of varying or scalable lengths (e.g., including varying numbers of OFDM symbols and / or varying lengths of absolute time durations).

[0063] The gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c may be configured to communicate with the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c in a standalone configuration and / or a non-standalone configuration. In a standalone configuration, the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may communicate with the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c without accessing another RAN (e.g., eNodeBs 160a, 160b, 160c, etc.). In a standalone configuration, the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may utilize one or more of the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c as mobility anchor points. In a standalone configuration, the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may communicate with the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c using signals in unlicensed bands. In a non-standalone configuration, the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may communicate with and connect to a gNB 180a, 180b, 180c while also communicating with and connecting to another RAN, such as an eNodeB 160a, 160b, 160c. For example, the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may implement DC principles to communicate with one or more gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c and one or more eNodeBs 160a, 160b, 160c substantially simultaneously. In a non-standalone configuration, the eNodeBs 160a, 160b, 160c may act as mobility anchors for the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, and the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c may provide additional coverage and / or throughput for serving the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c.

[0064] Each of the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c may be associated with a particular cell (not shown) and may be configured to handle radio resource management decisions, handover decisions, scheduling of users in UL and / or DL, support for network slicing, DC, interworking between NR and E-UTRA, routing of user plane data to User Plane Functions (UPFs) 184a, 184b, routing of control plane information to Access and Mobility Management Functions (AMFs) 182a, 182b, etc. As shown in FIG. 1D, the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c may communicate with each other via an Xn interface.

[0065] 1D may include at least one AMF 182a, 182b, at least one UPF 184a, 184b, at least one Session Management Function (SMF) 183a, 183b, and possibly a Data Network (DN) 185a, 185b. Although the foregoing elements are illustrated as part of the CN 106, it will be understood that any of these elements may be owned and / or operated by an entity other than the CN operator.

[0066] The AMF 182a, 182b may be connected to one or more of the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c in the RAN 104 via an N2 interface and may function as a control node. For example, the AMF 182a, 182b may be responsible for user authentication of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c, support for network slicing (e.g., handling different protocol data unit (PDU) sessions having different requirements), selection of a particular SMF 183a, 183b, management of registration areas, termination of non-access stratum (NAS) signaling, mobility management, etc. The network slicing may be used by the AMF 182a, 182b to customize the CN support of the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c based on the type of service utilizing the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c. For example, different network slices may be established for different use cases, such as services relying on ultra-reliable low latency (URLLC) access, services relying on enhanced massive mobile broadband (eMBB) access, services for MTC access, etc. The AMF 182a, 182b may provide a control plane function for switching between the RAN 104 and other RANs (not shown) that employ other radio technologies, such as LTE, LTE-A, LTE-A Pro, and / or non-3GPP access technologies, such as WiFi.

[0067] The SMFs 183a, 183b may be connected to the AMFs 182a, 182b in the CN 106 via an N11 interface. The SMFs 183a, 183b may also be connected to the UPFs 184a, 184b in the CN 106 via an N4 interface. The SMFs 183a, 183b may select and control the UPFs 184a, 184b and configure the routing of traffic through the UPFs 184a, 184b. The SMFs 183a, 183b may perform other functions, such as managing and assigning UE IP addresses, managing PDU sessions, controlling policy enforcement and QoS, providing DL data notification, etc. The PDU session type may be IP-based, non-IP-based, Ethernet-based, etc.

[0068] The UPFs 184a, 184b may be connected to one or more of the gNBs 180a, 180b, 180c in the RAN 104 via an N3 interface, which may provide the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c with access to packet-switched networks, such as the Internet 110, to facilitate communications between the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c and IP-enabled devices. The UPFs 184, 184b may perform other functions, such as routing and forwarding packets, enforcing user plane policy, supporting multi-homed PDU sessions, handling user plane QoS, buffering DL packets, providing mobility anchoring, etc.

[0069] The CN 106 may facilitate communication with other networks. For example, the CN 106 may include or communicate with an IP gateway (e.g., an IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) server) that serves as an interface between the CN 106 and the PSTN 108. In addition, the CN 106 may provide the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c with access to other networks 112, which may include other wired and / or wireless networks owned and / or operated by other service providers. In one embodiment, the WTRUs 102a, 102b, 102c may be connected to the local DNs 185a, 185b through the UPFs 184a, 184b via an N3 interface to the UPFs 184a, 184b and an N6 interface between the UPFs 184a, 184b and the DNs 185a, 185b.

[0070] 1A-1D and the corresponding description thereof, one or more or all of the functions described herein with respect to one or more of the WTRUs 102a-102d, base stations 114a-114b, eNodeBs 160a-160c, MME 162, SGW 164, PGW 166, gNBs 180a-180c, AMFs 182a-182b, UPFs 184a-184b, SMFs 183a-183b, DNs 185a-185b, and / or any other devices described herein may be performed by one or more emulation devices (not shown). The emulation devices may be one or more devices configured to emulate one or more or all of the functions described herein. For example, the emulation devices may be used to test other devices and / or to simulate network and / or WTRU functions.

[0071] The emulation device may be designed to implement one or more tests of other devices in a lab environment and / or an operator network environment. For example, one or more emulation devices may perform one or more or all functions while fully or partially implemented and / or deployed as part of a wired and / or wireless communication network to test other devices in the communication network. One or more emulation devices may perform one or more or all functions while temporarily implemented / deployed as part of a wired and / or wireless communication network. The emulation device may be directly coupled to another device for the purpose of testing and / or performing tests using over-the-air wireless communication.

[0072] The one or more emulation devices may perform one or more functions, inclusive, while not being implemented / deployed as part of a wired and / or wireless communication network. For example, the emulation devices may be utilized in test scenarios in a test lab and / or in an undeployed (e.g., test) wired and / or wireless communication network to implement testing of one or more components. The one or more emulation devices may be test equipment. Direct RF coupling and / or wireless communication via RF circuitry (which may include, for example, one or more antennas) may be used by the emulation devices to transmit and / or receive data.

[0073] The IEEE 802.11 Very High Throughput (EHT) Study Group was formed in September 2018. EHT is considered the next major revision to the IEEE 802.11 standard following 802.11ax, which is currently in the Working Group Letter Ballot stage. EHT is formed to explore the possibility of further increasing peak throughput and improving the efficiency of IEEE 802.11 networks. Following the EHT Study Group, an 802.11be Task Group was established to specify the 802.11 EHT standard. Primary use cases and applications addressed include high throughput and low latency applications such as: (1) Video-over-WLAN, (2) Augmented Reality (AR), and (3) Virtual Reality (VR).

[0074] To achieve targets of increased peak throughput and improved efficiency, the list of features discussed in EHT SG and 802.11be includes: (1) multi-AP, (2) multi-band / multi-link, (3) 320 MHz bandwidth, (4) 16 spatial streams, (5) HARQ, (6) AP cooperation, and (7) new designs for 6 GHz channel access.

[0075] EHT supports larger bandwidth (BW), multiple resource unit (RU) allocations, enhanced modulation and coding schemes (MCS), and a larger number of spatial streams. The trigger frame (TF) design needs to be modified to signal the allocations from the AP for these enhanced features, as well as new fields in the U-SIG of the trigger-based physical protocol data unit (TB-PPDU).

[0076] EHT may define frequency domain aggregation of aggregated PPDU (A-PPDU), which consists of multiple PPDUs; (1) PPDU format combination restrictions for EHT and HE are defined; (2) other combinations may be determined; (3) for PPDUs using HE formats, PPDU BW has not yet been determined; (4) the number of PPDUs is to be determined; and (5) A-PPDU is a feature for a future release.

[0077] A-PPDUs in the UL from multiple STAs supporting different revisions may require a backward compatible trigger frame 205, as shown in the example timing diagram 200 of FIG. 2. In this embodiment, the AP may operate on a wideband channel, e.g., a 320 MHz channel. HE TB PPDUs 210, 212 from the HE STAs and EHT STA-2 may be transmitted on a primary 160 MHz subchannel, and EHT TB PPDUs 215 from EHT STA-1 may be transmitted on a secondary 160 MHz subchannel. The EHT trigger frame may use the 802.11ax trigger frame as a baseline. The EHT variant of the common information field is shown in B54 and B55 of the example frame format 300 of FIG. 3. The special user information field and its indicator 310 are optional for the EHT variant trigger frame 300.

[0078] Figure 4 illustrates an exemplary special user information field 400. Figure 5 illustrates an exemplary EHT variant user information field 500. Figure 6 shows a matrix 600 of valid combinations of some bits from Figures 3-4 and the corresponding TB PPDU formats requested by the trigger frame 300.

[0079] Preamble puncturing was introduced in 802.11ax to allow STAs to transmit on some subchannels instead of the entire bandwidth. In other words, a preamble puncturing transmission of a PPDU may result in no data signal being present in one or more of the punctured subchannels within the PPDU bandwidth. Two types of preamble puncturing schemes were adopted in 802.11be: static puncturing and dynamic puncturing.

[0080] In static puncturing, one or more subchannels may be punctured for one or more beacon intervals. The AP may add a disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT operation element to indicate that one or more subchannels are disabled. The STA may set the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of the HE, EHT, or non-HT duplicate PPDU based on the value indicated in the most recently exchanged disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT operation element for that BSS. The STA may not transmit anything on the disabled subchannels. FIG. 7 illustrates an example EHT operation element 700 including an EHT operation information field. FIG. 8 illustrates the format of an EHT operation information field 800 describing the elements and processing of an example EHT operation information subfield.

[0081] 7, if present, the disabled subchannel bitmap 710 is two octets long. However, valid puncturing patterns are defined in Table 1 below.

[0082] [Table 1-1]

[0083] [Table 1-2]

[0084] There are two puncturing patterns defined in 802.11be: non-OFDMA puncturing patterns as shown in Table 1, and OFDMA puncturing patterns. The OFDMA puncturing patterns contain more valid puncturing patterns than the non-OFDMA puncturing patterns. The signaling of the OFDMA puncturing patterns is a 4-bit bitmap that indicates which 20 MHz subchannels are punctured in the associated 80 MHz subchannel. The puncturing bitmap patterns allowed for the 80 MHz subchannels are 1111 (no puncturing), 0111, 1011, 1101, 1110, 0011, 1100, and 1001.

[0085] With dynamic puncturing, a STA may be permitted to puncture additional subchannels other than those indicated by the disabled subchannel bitmap field (e.g., 710; FIG. 7). A STA may decide to puncture new / additional subchannels on its own for various reasons, e.g., it may be based on its physical or virtual channel sensing results. Dynamic puncturing may be explicitly signaled using the U-SIG field in the EHT MU PPDU. A punctured channel information field is carried in the U-SIG field of the EHT MU PPDU to indicate the punctured channels.

[0086] In one embodiment, the preamble puncturing resolution is 20 MHz for EHT MU PPDU in OFDMA and non-OFDMA transmissions for 80 MHz and 160 MHz bandwidths, and the preamble puncturing resolution is 40 MHz for EHT MU PPDU in non-OFDMA transmissions for 320 MHz bandwidth.

[0087] Triggered TXOP sharing was introduced in 802.11be to allow an AP to allocate a timeslot in a given TXOP to an associated STA, which can use this timeslot to perform UL non-TB transmissions (mode 1) or peer-to-peer (P2P) transmissions (mode 2).

[0088] FIG. 9 is a sequence diagram showing a messaging procedure 900 for a UL non-TB transmission operating in mode 1. FIG. 10 is a sequence diagram showing a messaging procedure 1000 for a P2P transmission operating in mode 2. In both procedures 900 and 1000, the AP may obtain a TXOP and send a clear-to-send (CTS) to self frame 905, 1005. The AP may then send a MU-RTS TXS trigger frame 910, 1010 that allocates a time slot to non-AP STA1. In the MU-RTS TXS trigger frame 910, 1010, the AP may indicate the TXOP sharing duration and the TXOP sharing mode, e.g., mode 1 in FIG. 9 and mode 2 in FIG. 10. STA1 may respond with a clear-to-send (CTS) frame 915, 1015 to the AP to confirm the time allocation. STA1 can then start transmitting non-trigger based PPDUs to either the AP (920; FIG. 9) or another non-AP STA (1020; FIG. 10), depending on the mode.

[0089] Figure 9 shows an example of an MU-RTS TXS trigger frame 910 with TXOP sharing mode subfield value=1 requesting a UL PPDU. Figure 10 shows an example of an MU-RTS TXS trigger frame 1010 with TXOP sharing mode subfield value=2.

[0090] Currently, the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS defined by IEEE 802.11be communicates the inactive subchannel information from MAC to PHY. STAs can set the TXVECTOR parameter. INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS in HE, EHT, or non-HT duplicate PPDUs may be based on the value indicated in the most recently exchanged disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT Action element for that BSS. To use the frequency spectrum more efficiently and dynamically mitigate interference, additional subchannels other than those indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap may be allowed to be punctured. However, the following issues need to be addressed to fully support dynamic puncturing: (1) in some cases, the receiver may not know all punctured channels because the signaling of punctured channel information is not defined, and (2) the mechanism or procedure between PHY and MAC for passing dynamic punctured channel information is not yet specified.

[0091] In 802.11be, dynamic puncturing is not allowed in non-TB based sounding procedures. However, there are cases where the beamformer may observe high interference in one or more subchannels other than those indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap. Due to limitations in the current standard, the beamformer cannot perform non-TB based sounding even if it is able to acquire the channel, and therefore the beamformer must delay the sounding procedure.

[0092] TXOP sharing is introduced to allow a TXOP holder to share a TXOP with a STA for UL non-TB or P2P transmission. Currently, dynamic puncturing is not allowed for TXOP shared transmission. If a STA is granted a timeslot for TXOP shared transmission and the STA observes that one or more subchannels not identified by the disabled subchannel bitmap have high interference levels or network allocation vectors (NAVs) set, the STA must postpone the entire transmission, thus the granted timeslot may be wasted.

[0093] As mentioned above, TXOP sharing was introduced to allow a TXOP holder to share a TXOP with a STA for UL non-TB transmission or P2P transmission. Transmissions in a shared timeslot may be primarily from the shared STA to the AP or to another non-AP STA. For overlapping BSS (OBSS) STAs, the interference level from the shared timeslot may be different from the OBSS AP. To improve spectrum efficiency, spatial reuse procedures, which are currently not allowed, may be desirable.

[0094] In a 320 MHz bandwidth, the resolution of the subchannels requested for fractional bandwidth feedback in the EHT is 40 MHz, and the resolution of the preamble puncturing indicated by the disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT operation element is 40 MHz. However, in an EHT OFDMA transmission, the resolution of the subcarrier puncturing is 20 MHz. The current EHT specification does not allow fractional bandwidth feedback to be requested for punctured subchannels, so if one of two 20 MHz subchannels of a 40 MHz is punctured, no feedback is requested for that 40 MHz. A solution that allows fractional bandwidth feedback to be requested for a 40 MHz with only one punctured subchannel of the two 20 MHz subchannels is desirable.

[0095] As used herein, "EHT+" designates the next generation or specification released after the current 802.11be revision for very high throughput WLANs as of the priority date of this disclosure. An EHT / EHT+STA can indicate its ability to support dynamic puncturing in an EHT / EHT+Capability element or other type of element / field / frame. For example, the newly defined subfield EHT / EHT+Dynamic Support can be carried in the EHT / EHT+MAC Capability Information field and / or the EHT / EHT+PHY Capability Information field in the EHT / EHT+Capability element.

[0096] An EHT / EHT+AP can indicate support for dynamic puncturing in an EHT / EHT+ operation element. For example, a newly defined subfield EHT / EHT+ Dynamic Support can be carried in the EHT / EHT+ Operation Parameters and / or EHT / EHT+ Operation Information fields in the EHT / EHT+ Operation Element.

[0097] In the following, one exemplary embodiment is described that uses the existing TXVECTOR / RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS to enable dynamic puncturing.

[0098] In one embodiment, the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of the HE, EHT, non-HT duplicate PPDU or future type PPDU can include not only the punctured subchannels indicated in the most recently exchanged disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT / EHT+ operation element, but also the dynamically punctured subchannels determined by the transmitting STA supporting dynamic puncturing. In other words, in an EHT / EHT+BSS set up by an EHT / EHT+AP supporting dynamic puncturing and including a disabled subchannel bitmap filed in the EHT / EHT+ operation element, the EHT / EHT+STA can set the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of the HE, EHT, non-HT duplicate PPDU based on the value indicated in the most recently exchanged disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT / EHT+ operation element for that BSS and additionally punctured subchannels before transmitting this PPDU. If one 20 MHz subchannel is additionally / dynamically punctured in addition to those indicated in the subchannels in the disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT / EHT+ operation element, then the corresponding bit in the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS may be set = 1. This additionally / dynamically punctured subchannel may later be used by other PPDUs if this subchannel becomes available.

[0099] In various embodiments, the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS for HE, EHT, EHT+, and non-HT duplicate PPDUs may be set based on one or more information sources. For example, punctured channel information may be available in the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS through PPDU detection. Punctured channel information may be available in the MAC header and / or MAC body through MAC frame detection. Punctured channel information may also be available through channel sensing.

[0100] In various embodiments, the STA may use (1) information conveyed in the MAC header and / or MAC body, (2) information conveyed in the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS, (3) channel sensing results, e.g., energy detection and / or virtual NAV settings, (4) the union of the inactive subchannels indicated in the MAC header and / or MAC body and the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS, (5) the union of the inactive subchannels indicated in the MAC header and / or MAC body and the channel sensing results, (6) the union of the inactive subchannels indicated in the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS and the channel sensing results, (7) the union of the inactive subchannels indicated in the MAC header and / or MAC body and the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS. The TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS may be set or updated to include the punctured subchannels based on (8) the intersection of the inactive subchannels indicated in the MAC header and / or MAC body and the channel sensing results, (9) the intersection of the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS and the inactive subchannels indicated in the channel sensing results, (10) the union of the MAC header and / or MAC body, the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS, and the inactive subchannels indicated in the channel sensing results, and / or (11) the intersection of the MAC header and / or MAC body, the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS, and the inactive subchannels indicated in the channel sensing results.

[0101] In some embodiments, a parameter DYNAMIC_INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS (or other name) may be defined in the TXVECTOR and / or RXVECTOR to indicate dynamically punctured subchannels other than or in addition to the inactive subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field. STAs that support dynamic puncturing may not transmit on any 20 MHz subchannels that are punctured as indicated in the TXVECTOR parameters INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS and DYNAMIC_INACTIVE SUBCHANNELS. The parameter DYNAMIC_INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS may be included in the TXVECTOR of a non-HT duplicate PPDU or an EHT PPDU or a future type PPDU.

[0102] The STA may set the TXVECTOR parameter DYNAMIC_INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS based on the channel sensing results, including energy detection and NAV setting. For example, the STA may observe that some subchannels may be busy immediately prior to its transmission, and the STA may set one or more busy subchannels not indicated in the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS to inactive in the TXVECTOR parameter DYNAMIC_INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS.

[0103] The STA may set the TXVECTOR parameter DYNAMIC_INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS based on the received PPDU and / or MAC frame if it contains punctured subchannels that are not included in the current TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS.

[0104] In one embodiment, the EHT beamformer can set the TXVECTOR parameter CH_BANDWIDTH or CH_BANDWIDTH_IN_NON_HT, the partial BW information subfield of the EHT NDP announcement frame, depending on the beamformee's operating channel width and / or the beamformer's operating channel width and / or the feedback RU / MRU. For example, in a non-TB sounding sequence, the EHT beamformer can set the TXVECTOR parameter CH_BANDWIDTH or CH_BANDWIDTH_IN_NON_HT to the minimum of the beamformer's operating bandwidth and the beamformee's (also referred to as "BFee" in this disclosure) operating bandwidth. For example, the BW NDP =min(OperatingBW Beamformee ,OperatingBW Beamformer ).

[0105] In the TB sounding sequence, the EHT beamformer can set the TXVECTOR parameter CH_BANDWIDTH or CH_BANDWIDTH_IN_NON_HT depending on the operating channel width of the beamformee. For example, BW NDP =f(OperatingBW Beamformee1 ,OperatingBW Beamformee2,..., OperatingBW BeamformeeN ,Requested RU / MRU size Beamformee1 ,RequestedRU / MRU size Beamformee2 ,...Requested RU / MRU size BeamformeeN ), where N is the total number of beamformees in one TB sounding sequence.

[0106] Table 2 below shows exemplary Null Data Packet Announcement (NDPA) or NDP BW in one TB sounding sequence with two beamformees in several scenarios.

[0107] [Table 2]

[0108] In one embodiment of the TB sounding sequence, the occupied subchannels indicated by the BW field and the puncturing channel information field in the U-SIG field of the NDP may be the same as the union of the requested subchannels indicated in the partial BW information subfield of all the STA information fields indicated in the immediately preceding EHT NDP Announcement (NDPA) frame. The bandwidth of the EHT NDP Announcement frame and the EHT NDP frame may be the same. There are 9 bits in the partial BW information, the first bit represents the resolution bit (e.g., 0 indicates 20 MHz resolution, 1 indicates 40 MHz resolution), and the next 8 bits are the feedback bitmap. Each bit in the feedback bitmap subfield is set to =1 if feedback is requested on the corresponding resolution bandwidth. For example, there are two STAs that are triggered to send feedback to the AP in the TB sounding sequence. The AP and both STAs have a 160 MHz operating bandwidth. An exemplary case of this scenario is described below.

[0109] 11 is an example matrix 1100 of NDP occupied subchannels when there are two STAs and one AP, all of which support 160 MHz bandwidth operation. The lighter boxes 1110 represent requested subchannels as indicated in the Partial BW Information subfield of the STA Information field of the NDP announcement frame, or occupied subchannels as indicated by the U-SIG field of the NDP, and the darker boxes 1120 represent unrequested subchannels as indicated in the Partial BW Information subfield of the STA Information field of the NDP announcement frame.

[0110] In case #1 of FIG. 11, the BW information indicated by the two STAs may be [00111111 part 1], which indicates that feedback of the top seven 20 MHz subchannels (e.g., 996+484+242 tones) is requested, and the first lower 20 MHz subchannel is not requested. In this case, the first lower 20 MHz subchannel in the 160 MHz NDP frame may be punctured. If the NDPA occupies 160 MHz, the bandwidth of the NDP is 160 MHz.

[0111] In the exemplary case #2 of FIG. 11, the partial BW information indicated in the STA information field of STA1 may be [001111111], indicating a requested feedback of the top seven 20 MHz subchannels (e.g., 996+484+242 tones). The partial information BW information indicated in the STA field of STA2 is [010111111], requesting feedback of the lowest 20 MHz subchannel and the highest seven 20 MHz subchannels (e.g., 996+484+242 tones). In this case, the occupied subchannels of the NDP may be all eight 20 MHz subchannels.

[0112] In the exemplary case #3 of FIG. 11, the partial information BW information indicated in the STA field of STA1 and STA2 may be [010000000], which indicates feedback of only the first lower 20 MHz subchannel (e.g., 242 tones) in both STAs. In this case, the occupied subchannel of the NDP indicated by the BW field and the puncturing channel information field in the U-SIG field of the NDP may be at least the first 20 MHz subchannel.

[0113] In the exemplary case #4 of FIG. 11, the partial BW information indicated in the STA information field of STA1 may be [010000000], which indicates feedback of the first lower 20 MHz subchannel (242 tones), and the partial BW information indicated in the STA field of STA2 may be [000100000], which indicates feedback of the second lowest 20 MHz subchannel (242 tones). In this case, the occupied subchannels of the NDP indicated by the BW field and the puncturing channel information field in the U-SIG field of the NDP may be at least the first four 20 MHz subchannels.

[0114] The methods and signaling described below may be used to enable the OFDMA puncturing pattern for UL transmission. A new combination of UL / DL with PPDU type and compressed mode may be defined, as shown in Table 3 below. In this combination, the UL / DL subfield may be set to =1 (for UL) and the PPDU type and compressed mode subfields may be set to =2 to identify that a puncturing pattern is included. In an exemplary embodiment, an EHT MU PPDU may be used and an EHT-SIG field may be present. The RU allocation subfield may or may not be present. The total number of users field may be 0, 1, or multiple. In this mode embodiment, the OFDMA puncturing pattern may be indicated in the Punctured Channel Information subfield in the U-SIG.

[0115] [Table 3]

[0116] An embodiment for setting the punctured channel information subfield in the U-SIG field of the PPDU may follow some rules described below.

[0117] In one embodiment, the ODMA puncturing pattern may be indicated when 4 bits are used in the Punctured Channel Information subfield. The 4-bit bitmap may be used to indicate which 20 MHz subchannels are to be punctured in the associated 80 MHz subblock for OFDMA puncturing, for example in a first case where the PPDU Type and Compressed Mode subfields are set to =0, or in a second case where the UL / DL subfield is set to =1 (UL) and the PPDU Type and Compressed Mode subfields are set to =2.

[0118] When there are 5 bits in the Punctured Channel Information subfield, the subfield may point to an entry in the Bandwidth Dependent Table (i.e., a non-OFDMA puncturing pattern is used) for case 1 (PPDU Type and Compressed Mode subfields are set to 1) or case 2 (UL / DL subfield = 0 (DL) and PPDU Type and Compressed Mode subfields are set to 2).

[0119] In various embodiments, an EHT AP or an EHT+AP can announce the BSS operating channel width using the EHT or EHT+ operation element. In a first option, the announced BSS operating channel width is the maximum width including the primary channel and the punctured 20 MHz subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT / EHT+ operation element. In one embodiment, the rules for utilizing the disabled subchannel bitmap field can be modified to follow the OFDMA puncture pattern defined in IEEE P802.11be / D8.0.

[0120] In a second option, the announced BSS operating channel width may be the maximum width that includes the primary channel, any punctured 20 MHz subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT / EHT+ operating element, and other potentially or dynamically punctured 20 MHz subchannels.

[0121] In a second option, the disabled subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT / EHT+ operation element can identify a further subset of disabled / punctured subchannels. The EHT / EHT+ AP and non-AP STAs can dynamically puncture additional subchannels in each individual transmission. In one embodiment, the disabled subchannel bitmap field can be set to a value that can indicate the disabled subchannels in the primary 40 MHz / 80 MHz / 160 MHz subchannel as accurately or as up-to-date as possible. In one method, the AP may not include any 20 MHz subchannels specified in the disabled subchannel bitmap field. In this option, unavailable subchannels that cannot be indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field can be dynamically indicated in each individual transmission. Thus, the AP may be able to announce a wide BSS operation channel width.

[0122] In the example channel map 1200 shown in FIG. 12, an EHT AP may be able to operate on a 320 MHz channel 1202. It may observe two 20 MHz subchannels 1205 that may not be available or may not be available later within the 320 MHz channel width 1202. Based on the previous specification definition, it was not possible to indicate in the disabled subchannel bitmap field that both 20 MHz subchannels 1205 are disabled using the existing rules defined in 802.11be. Using the first option of the above embodiment, an EHT / EHT+ AP may set the operating channel width 1203 as 160 MHz, since it can indicate the unavailable 20 MHz subchannels 1205 in the disabled subchannel bitmap when the channel width is 160 MHz.

[0123] According to the second option, the EHT / EHT+ AP can set the operating channel width 1202 as 320 MHz. Based on the previously defined rules, it may not be possible to indicate both 20 MHz subchannels 1205 as disabled in the disabled subchannel bitmap field. In one method, the AP may use the disabled subchannel bitmap to indicate the 20 MHz subchannels that are not available in the primary 160 MHz (1203) for the entire BSS. In individual transmissions at BW 320 MHz, the AP or non-AP STA can dynamically use the PHY header or MAC body to indicate the 20 MHz subchannels that are not available in the secondary 160 MHz channel. In individual transmissions at BW 160 MHz or less, the AP or non-AP STA may not need to indicate the 20 MHz subchannels that are not available in the secondary 160 MHz channel. As used throughout this disclosure, EHT+ may refer to IEEE 802.11 revisions later than the 802.11be draft at the time of this disclosure. Furthermore, EHT+ is not limited to the 802.11 standard, where similar advantages may be applicable to future or other wireless technologies. The above-described embodiments may be applied to one, any, or all of the further embodiments disclosed herein.

[0124] Next, one or more method and apparatus embodiments for enabling dynamic puncturing when puncturing channel information may be carried in the PHY layer in a PPDU are described. As used herein, a "non-HT PPDU" refers to a legacy PPDU (pre-802.11n). A "non-HT duplicate PPDU" refers to a PPDU that uses a non-HT PPDU format for a 20 MHz subchannel and transmits it duplicated in one or more 20 MHz subchannels. A non-HT duplicate PPDU may be used to carry a frame such that legacy STAs can understand the transmission and set their NAV appropriately.

[0125] A non-HT PPDU or a non-HT duplicate PPDU includes a legacy signal (L-SIG) field in the PHY header. The L-SIG field is 24 bits with a 12-bit Length subfield that can have values ​​from 0 to 4095. The L-SIG does not contain signaling for previously defined punctured channels.

[0126] In one embodiment, the puncturing information may be partially carried in the PHY header of the non-HT duplicate PPDU. The non-HT duplicate PPDU may carry a legacy short training field (L-STF), a legacy long training field (L-LTF), and an L-SIG field that may occupy 52 tones (including 48 data tones and 4 pilot tones) per OFDM symbol per 20 MHz bandwidth. However, any STA supporting HT or newer versions may be able to detect 56 tones per OFDM symbol per 20 MHz bandwidth. In other words, there are 4 extra tones that are not used by the non-HT PPDU but may be detected by STAs supporting HT or newer PHY versions. In some embodiments, these "extra" tones may be used to carry information about punctured channel information or dynamically / additionally punctured channel information.

[0127] In one exemplary embodiment, the extra tone may be used to indicate whether dynamic / additional puncturing is performed in the PPDU. In another exemplary embodiment, the extra tone may be used to indicate whether preamble puncturing (including both dynamic and static puncturing) is performed in the PPDU.

[0128] Referring to FIG. 13, another exemplary embodiment may utilize cascaded signaling. In cascaded signaling, an extra tone may be used to indicate whether preamble puncturing is performed in another 20 MHz subchannel. For example, if a non-HT duplicate PPDU is transmitted over a 20 MHz channel, the signaling transmitted over the extra tone may be reserved. If a non-HT duplicate PPDU is transmitted over a channel with a bandwidth greater than 20 MHz, the signaling transmitted over the extra tone on the 20 MHz subchannel with the lowest frequency may be used to indicate whether the next 20 MHz subchannel is punctured. The signaling on the 20 MHz subchannel with the highest frequency may be used to indicate the puncture status of the 20 MHz subchannel with the lowest frequency.

[0129] An example of signaling using different channel bandwidths is shown in FIG. 13. In an example, each block refers to a 20 MHz subchannel, for example, 80 MHz channel 1310 includes four 20 MHz blocks 1302-1308. Each subchannel may be given a subchannel index from lowest frequency to highest frequency, and thus the lowest colored block may be referred to as subchannel-1. In the example shown of a 40 MHz transmission, there are no punctured subchannels. Thus, the punctured channel indications carried in subchannel-1 and subchannel-2 are set to =0. In the example of an 80 MHz transmission 1310, subchannel-2 1304 is punctured. Thus, the punctured channel indication carried in subchannel-1 1302 is set to =1 to indicate that subchannel-2 1304 is punctured. The punctured channel indications carried in the remainder of subchannels 1306 and 1308 are set to =0. Figure 13 further illustrates a 160 MHz transmission 1320 in which the first subchannel 1322 is punctured, and therefore the punctured channel indication carried in the eighth subchannel 1328 is set to =1, and the punctured channel indications carried in the remaining subchannels are set to =0. In a second example of a 160 MHz transmission 1330, two self-contained 80 MHz signaling groups 1340, 1350 using cascaded signaling are shown. In this example, subchannel-1 1342 is punctured, and the punctured channel indication carried in subchannel-4 (the subchannel with the highest frequency in the 80 MHz group 1340) is set to =1, and the punctured channel indications carried in the remaining subchannels are set to =0.It should be noted that while the subchannels are ordered from lowest frequency to highest frequency in these examples, there may be other ways of ordering them, and thus in this disclosure, signaling to indicate the status of a punctured channel in another subchannel is generally referred to as "cascaded" signaling. Additionally, while 20 MHz subchannels are used as an example, other subchannel resolutions may also be used and considered in the same embodiment.

[0130] In an exemplary embodiment, the puncturing information may be fully or partially carried by the SERVICE field of the non-HT duplicate PPDU and / or other types of PPDU. In one example, a single bit in the SERVICE field may be used to indicate that dynamic puncturing or preamble puncturing (including both dynamic and static puncturing) may be implemented in the PPDU. In another embodiment, the above-mentioned combined bandwidth and puncturing channel information signaling method and / or the above-mentioned table may be used.

[0131] In one embodiment, the disabled subchannels bitmap field may indicate a limited number of puncturing patterns using non-OFDMA puncturing patterns (as shown in Table 1). Dynamic puncturing may be allowed at the TXOP level or at the individual transmission level, and dynamic puncturing may follow the OFDMA puncturing patterns to enable more punctured patterns. Note that the disclosed method may allow all valid OFDMA puncturing patterns defined in the 802.11be or 802.11be+ standard. In addition, additional puncturing patterns that have not yet been determined may be allowed.

[0132] According to one exemplary scenario, a TXOP may start with a non-HT PPDU and then follow with an EHT or EHT+PPDU. A bit in the non-HT duplicate PPDU (e.g., using an extra tone or reserved bit in the SERVICE field or in the L-SIG field) or a MAC body carried in the non-HT duplicate PPDU may indicate that the U-SIG field or extended SIG field of the subsequent EHT or EHT+PPDU in the TXOP may use an OFDMA PPDU type / mode and / or an OFDMA puncturing pattern and / or that the receiving STA may need to switch / open the entire bandwidth to receive the subsequent EHT or EHT+PPDU. Here, the entire bandwidth may refer to the minimum of the BSS operating channel width and the maximum bandwidth that the STA is capable of. In a particular embodiment, the U-SIG field or extended SIG field of the subsequent EHT or EHT+PPDU in the TXOP may differ between different 80 MHz subchannels. Here, 80 MHz subchannels are used as an example, but other sizes of subchannels may be possible in future standards. If this bit is set, the EHT / EHT+PPDU in the TXOP may use OFMDA PPDU type / mod (i.e., PPDU type and compressed mode subfields are set to =0 for both DL and UL, or PPDU type and compressed mode subfields are set to =2 for UL) and / or OFMDA puncturing pattern. The intended receiving STA may need to open the entire bandwidth indicated by the non-HT duplicate PPDU to start packet detection and / or perform preamble detection of the EHT or EHT+PPDU if the STA supports that bandwidth. In this way, the STA can detect the U-SIG field or the extended SIG field in each 80 MHz subchannel and know the complete puncturing pattern over the entire bandwidth.The target STA may use the maximum bandwidth supported by the STA to perform initiation of packet detection and / or preamble detection for EHT or EHT+PPDU if the STA cannot support the bandwidth.

[0133] The OFDMA punctured pattern referred to in this embodiment is a bitmap-based puncturing pattern per 80 MHz, and the signaling can be different between different 80 MHz channels in EHT or EHT+PPDU. By using the described type of OFDMA punctured pattern, all of the punctured cases can be signaled and enabled in the TXOP. Upon receiving the EHT / EHT+PPDU transmitted by the TXOP holder, the TXOP responder STA can extract the information of the punctured channels carried in the PPDU through the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS or other parameters.

[0134] This indication may also be used to determine whether the receiver can combine signals in different 20 MHz subchannels to achieve better performance. In a non-HT dup PPDU initiating a TXOP, if the indication bit is not set, the receiver may combine received signals on different 20 MHz subchannels (not shown in the disabled subchannel bitmap) to achieve diversity and power gain. Otherwise, the receiver may not combine signals on the 20 MHz subchannels. In a non-EHT / EHT+ PPDU transmitted in a TXOP, if the indication bit is not set, the receiver may combine received L-SIG fields, USIG fields, or extended SIG fields on different 20 MHz subchannels (not shown in the disabled subchannel bitmap) to achieve diversity and power gain. Otherwise, the receiver may not combine signals on the 20 MHz subchannels. This indication may also be used to allow the receiver to perform energy or signal detection per 20 MHz so that the receiver can achieve a punctured subchannel.

[0135] In a particular embodiment, the puncturing information may be partially carried in the L-SIG field of the non-HT duplicate PPDU. The L-SIG field has one reserved bit that may be used to indicate dynamic / additional puncturing (puncturing more subchannels than those indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap) or preamble puncturing (both static and dynamic puncturing) is performed in the PPDU. The cascaded signaling method mentioned above may be applied here. This indication may be used to determine whether the receiver can combine signals in different 20 MHz subchannels to achieve better performance. If there are no punctured subchannels, the receiver may combine received signals on different 20 MHz subchannels to obtain diversity and power gains. If not, it may be necessary to combine signals on non-punctured 20 MHz subchannels as mentioned above. This indication may be used to allow the receiver to perform energy or signal detection per 20 MHz so that the receiver can fully realize the punctured subchannels.

[0136] 14, an example method 1400 of communicating in a wireless network using dynamic puncturing with dynamic puncturing information signaling carried in a non-HT duplicate PPDU is described. In this example, dynamic puncturing information is used as the signaling field name, although other names, such as wideband detection indication, duplicate SIG indication, etc., may be used.

[0137] As shown in Figure 14, the AP may announce the static preamble puncturing using a disabled subchannel bitmap field in an EHT operation element in a management frame 1405, such as a beacon frame or an association response frame (not shown) or other frame. The STAs associated with the AP, for example, STA1 and / or STA2 in this embodiment, may set the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of the HE, EHT, EHT+, or non-HT duplicate PPDU based on the disabled subchannel bitmap field in step 1407. The punctured subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap from the AP are referred to as statically punctured subchannels.

[0138] A STA, for example, STA1, may acquire a channel and initiate a TXOP 1410. Here, STA1 may be an AP or a non-AP STA and may be referred to as a "TXOP holder."

[0139] In 1412, based on the latest channel sensing result, STA1 may decide to puncture additional subchannels other than the subchannels indicated by the disabled subchannel bitmap field (any additional subchannels to be punctured are referred to as dynamically punctured subchannels). Here, the channel sensing referred to in step 1412 may be energy detection or virtual sensing (i.e., NAV setting). In other words, if STA1 observes a high level of interference or notices existing transmissions in some subchannels, STA1 may be able to decide to initiate a TXOP on an unoccupied subchannel (i.e., puncture an occupied subchannel). This decision may need to follow a puncturing pattern or rule not described herein.

[0140] Other STAs that may transmit or receive in the TXOP, for example STA2, may not use any of the punctured subchannels indicated by the TXOP holder STA1. Punctured subchannels may include statically punctured subchannels and dynamically punctured subchannels.

[0141] STA1 may update 1412 the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of the HE, EHT, EHT+, or non-HT duplicate PPDU to include subchannels that are not available to the TXOP 1410. The TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS may convey information of punctured subchannels, including statically punctured subchannels and dynamically punctured subchannels. It should be appreciated that the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS is referred to by way of example for conveying statically and dynamically punctured subchannels from the MAC layer to the PHY layer, and the embodiments are not limited in this respect. In the described embodiment, information regarding statically and dynamically punctured subchannels may be conveyed in one or more TXVECTOR parameters with other names. Similarly, the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS is one exemplary parameter for conveying statically and dynamically punctured subchannels from the PHY layer to the MAC layer. Information regarding statically and dynamically punctured subchannels may be conveyed in one or more RXVECTOR parameters having other names or designations, and embodiments are not limited in this respect.

[0142] STA1 may prepare to transmit a PPDU. In the illustrated case, the PPDU may be a non-HT duplicate PPDU 1420, and STA1 may not transmit on punctured subchannels based on the updated TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS. STA1 may signal the punctured subchannels (including dynamically punctured subchannels and / or statically punctured subchannels) explicitly in the PPDU 1420. Here, the signaling may indicate a complete list of punctured subchannels. Alternatively or in addition, the signaling may indicate that static puncturing, dynamic puncturing, or both may be applied in the PPDU and / or in subsequent frame exchanges in the same TXOP. In one embodiment, the signaling may indicate that the intended STA may need to switch to a wideband receive mode to detect the PPDU in the TXOP.

[0143] A STA, for example, STA2, may be the desired recipient of STA1's transmission. Upon receiving the non-HT duplicate PPDU 1420 transmitted by STA1, STA2 may extract the punctured channel information carried in the PPDU through the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS at 1422. In one method, the punctured channel information may be partially signaled in the PPDU 1420, and the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS may be obtained by explicit signaling and receiver measurements. For example, if the signaling indicates that one or more subchannels may be punctured in the PPDU 1420, but a complete list of punctured subchannels is not available, the receiver of STA2 may perform per-subchannel energy detection. If the energy detected on a subchannel is below a certain energy threshold, the STA2 receiver may determine that the subchannel is a punctured subchannel and indicate so using the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS, 1422. The energy threshold may be predefined or determined and signaled by the associated AP using a management / control / data frame.

[0144] In one method, STA2 can set the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS based on the latest RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS and the latest received disabled subchannel bitmap field, e.g., from the AP beacon 1405. In this way, the PPDU transmitted from STA2 has the same punctured subchannels as the PPDU transmitted from STA1. That is, STA1, as the TXOP holder, can determine the punctured subchannels for the TXOP. STA2 may not be allowed to puncture additional subchannels.

[0145] In another method, STA2 may set the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS based on the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS, the most recently received disabled subchannel bitmap field, and its most recent sensing result. For example, the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS may be set as the subchannel union of the punctured subchannels indicated by the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS, the subchannels identified as busy by the last channel sensing result, and the disabled subchannels in the most recently received disabled subchannel bitmap field. In one embodiment, this last method may be used only when the responding STA (e.g., STA2 in this embodiment) may not request any transmission. In this method, the PPDU transmitted from STA2 may have additional punctured subchannels compared to the PPDU transmitted from STA1. That is, STA2 may not be allowed to puncture additional subchannels in the TXOP initiated by STA1.

[0146] STA2 may prepare to transmit using the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS. In other words, STA2 may not transmit anything on the punctured subchannels indicated in the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS. STA2 may signal the punctured channels in either the PHY header or the MAC header / body in the transmitted PPDU 1430.

[0147] The extended PPDU may refer to a PPDU that may be defined in the latest active revision or a future revision such that the signaling field may contain punctured channel information, e.g., EHT MU PPDU or EHT+PPDU, etc. To enable dynamic puncturing with extended PPDU, the procedure mentioned in Fig. 14 may be applied.

[0148] In another embodiment, the information of the punctured channel may be carried in the MAC frame, e.g., the MAC header and / or the MAC body. For example, the information of the punctured channel may be carried in the A-Control field in the MAC header. A new Control ID may be used for the control of the punctured channel, as shown in Table 4 below. Note that the Control ID value 11 is used as an example. The length of the control information subfield may be 16 bits, 24 bits, or other sizes.

[0149] [Table 4]

[0150] The control information subfield in the PCC control subfield contains the punctured channel information. In one method, a bitmap may be used in which each bit may indicate a 20 MHz subchannel. If a bit is set to 0 (or 1), the corresponding 20 MHz subchannel may not be punctured. If the bit is set to the opposite, e.g., 1 (or 0), the corresponding 20 MHz subchannel may be punctured.

[0151] In an exemplary embodiment, both bandwidth information and punctured channel information may be carried in the A-Control field in the MAC header. In one method, separate Control ID values ​​may be provided for the bandwidth field and the punctured channel control field. In one method, Control ID values ​​may be provided for the bandwidth and punctured channel combined control field (CBP). The control information subfield in the CBP control subfield may include a bandwidth and punctured channel combined information (CBPCI) subfield and a reserved subfield. An example of a lookup table with signaling for the combined information CBPCI is shown in Table 5 below. When a particular CBPCI value is indicated, the corresponding bandwidth and punctured pattern is utilized. In the punctured patterns in the table, "1" indicates a non-punctured subchannel, "x" indicates a punctured subchannel, and each subchannel is 20 MHz.

[0152] [Table 5]

[0153] The signaling method described in Table 4 may be a general method for combined signaling of bandwidth and puncture patterns, if desired. For example, this may be used in a PHY layer header, such as a USIG or EHT-SIG or other type of SIG field. Table 4 provides a simplified example, and the actual signaling may have additional or fewer punctured patterns, additional or fewer bandwidth types, different resolution of subchannels, etc.

[0154] In other exemplary embodiments, the punctured channel information may be carried in the MAC body of some control frames, such as the MU-RTS frame, the NDPA frame, the trigger frame, the MU-BAR frame, and so on.

[0155] In one method, the disabled subchannel bitmap field may indicate a limited number of puncturing patterns using non-OFDMA puncturing patterns (e.g., as shown in Table 1). Dynamic puncturing may be allowed at the TXOP level, but the dynamic puncturing may follow the OFDMA puncturing patterns to enable more punctured patterns. Note that the disclosed method may allow all valid OFDMA puncturing patterns defined in 802.11be. Additionally, additional puncturing patterns not currently defined in 802.11be may be allowed.

[0156] A TXOP may start with a non-HT PPDU, followed by an EHT or EHT+PPDU. The non-HT PPDU may carry information of punctured channels using one or more of the methods mentioned above. In one embodiment, a control frame may be defined to carry a complete list of punctured channels and / or TXOP operating bandwidth for the remaining TXOP, and may be transmitted at the beginning of the TXOP or in the middle of the TXOP to announce the punctured subchannels and bandwidth for the remaining TXOP. In one embodiment, one bit in the MAC frame carried by the non-HT duplicate PPDU (e.g., in the MAC header and / or A-Control field, and / or control wrapper, and / or MAC body) may indicate that the U-SIG field or extended SIG field of the following EHT or EHT+PPDU in the TXOP may use OFDMA PPDU type / mode and / or OFDMA puncturing pattern, and the U-SIG field may differ between different 80 MHz subchannels. Or, the bit may indicate that the intended receiving STA needs to switch to wideband receiving mode to receive the PPDU in the TXOP. This bit may be referred to as a dynamic puncturing information field. If this bit is set, the EHT / EHT+PPDU in the TXOP may use OFMDA PPDU type / mod (i.e., PPDU type and compressed mode subfields are set to =0 for both DL and UL, or PPDU type and compressed mode subfields are set to 2 for UL) and / or OFMDA puncturing pattern. The intended receiving STA may need to open the entire bandwidth indicated by the non-HT duplicate PPDU to start packet detection and / or perform preamble detection for the EHT or EHT+PPDU if the STA supports that bandwidth. In this way, the STA can detect the U-SIG field or the extended SIG field in each 80 MHz subchannel and know the complete puncturing pattern over the entire bandwidth.Similar to the above, the target STA can use the maximum bandwidth it supports to initiate packet detection and / or perform preamble detection for EHT or EHT+PPDU if the STA cannot support the bandwidth. Here, dynamic puncturing information is used as the signaling field name, although other names, e.g., wideband detection indication, duplicate SIG indication, etc., may be used.

[0157] The OFDMA punctured pattern referred to here is a bitmap-based puncturing pattern per 80 MHz, and the signaling can be different between different 80 MHz channels in EHT or EHT+PPDU. By using the OFDMA punctured pattern, all of the punctured cases can be signaled and enabled in the TXOP. Upon receiving the EHT / EHT+PPDU transmitted by the TXOP holder, the TXOP responder STA can extract the information of the punctured channels carried in the PPDU through the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS as described above.

[0158] Referring to Figure 15, a method 1500 of wireless communication using dynamic puncturing is described when dynamic puncturing information is carried in the MAC header and / or MAC body. In this embodiment, it may not be necessary to define the RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS as in the embodiment described with reference to Figure 14, since the MAC layer can directly extract the information of the punctured channels by decoding the MAC frame. Although Figure 15 illustrates a non-HT duplicate PPDU, other types of PPDUs may be used.

[0159] As shown in Figure 15, the AP may announce the static preamble puncturing using a disabled subchannel bitmap field in an EHT operation element in a management frame 1505, such as a beacon frame or an association response frame, as described above. STAs associated with the AP, such as STA1 and / or STA2 in this embodiment, may set the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of the HE, EHT, EHT+, or non-HT duplicate PPDU based on the disabled subchannel bitmap field at 1507. The punctured subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap are referred to as statically punctured subchannels.

[0160] A STA, for example, STA1, may acquire a channel and initiate a TXOP at 1510. Here, STA1 may be an AP or a non-AP STA. STA1 is referred to as a TXOP holder. At 1512, based on the latest channel sensing result, STA1 may decide to puncture additional subchannels other than the subchannels indicated by the disabled subchannel bitmap field (any additional subchannels to be punctured are referred to as dynamically punctured subchannels). The channel sensing referred to here may be energy detection or virtual sensing (i.e., NAV setting). In other words, if STA1 observes a high level of interference or notices existing transmissions in some subchannels, STA1 may be able to decide to initiate a TXOP on an unoccupied subchannel. This decision may need to follow an existing puncturing pattern or rule. Other STAs that may transmit or receive in a TXOP may not use any punctured subchannels indicated by STA1, the TXOP holder. The punctured subchannels may include statically punctured subchannels from the bitmap and dynamically punctured subchannels, if any. STA1 may update the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of the HE, EHT, EHT+, or non-HT duplicate PPDU to include subchannels that are not available in the TXOP. The TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS may carry information of the punctured subchannels, including statically punctured subchannels and dynamically punctured subchannels. STA1 may prepare to transmit a PPDU 1520 carrying at least one MAC frame. STA1 may not transmit on the punctured subchannels based on the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS.STA1 may explicitly signal the punctured subchannels (including dynamically punctured subchannels and / or statically punctured subchannels) in the MAC header or MAC body of the MAC frame of PPDU 1520. The signaling may indicate a complete list of punctured subchannels. Alternatively, it may indicate that static puncturing or dynamic puncturing, or both, may be applied in the PPDU and / or subsequent frame exchanges in the same TXOP. In one embodiment, the signaling may indicate that the intended STA may need to switch to a wideband receive mode to detect the PPDU in the TXOP.

[0161] A STA, for example, STA2, may be the intended recipient of STA1's transmission. Upon receiving the frame 1520 transmitted by STA1, STA2 may extract the punctured channel information carried in the MAC header and / or MAC body of the PPDU 1520. In one embodiment, STA2 may set TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS based on the punctured channel information received at the MAC layer and the most recently received disabled subchannel bitmap (if this is not included in the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS) (1522). In another method, STA2 may set TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS based on the punctured channel information received at the MAC layer and the most recently received disabled subchannel bitmap (if this is not included in the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS) and its most recent channel sensing result. For example, the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS may be set as the subchannel union of the punctured subchannels indicated in the received MAC frame, the subchannels identified as busy by the last channel sensing result, and the subchannels indicated in the most recently received Invalidated Subchannel Bitmap field. In one embodiment, this second method may be used only when the responding STA (e.g., STA2 in this embodiment) may not request any transmissions.

[0162] STA2 may prepare to transmit (1530) using the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS. In other words, STA2 may not transmit anything on the punctured subchannels indicated in the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS. STA2 may signal the punctured channels in either the PHY header or the MAC header / body in the transmitted PPDU 1530. Although FIG. 15 illustrates non-HT duplicate PPDUs 1520, 1530, other types of PPDUs may be used.

[0163] In non-TB sounding sequences, a single user (SU) beamformer may solicit partial bandwidth feedback from the SU beamformee in the EHT or EHT over non-TB sounding sequences. In non-TB sounding sequences supporting dynamic puncturing implemented by the beamformer, the occupied subchannels indicated by the BW field and the puncturing channel information field in the U-SIG field of the null data packet (NDP) may be the same as the requested subchannels indicated in the partial BW information subfield of the immediately preceding EHT NDP announcement (NDPA) frame. NDP announcement frames carried by an EHT multi-user (MU) PPDU or non-HT duplicate PPDU may not be transmitted on the subchannels indicated in INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS. The punctured subchannels indicated by the BW field and puncturing channel information field in the U-SIG of the NDP may include additional punctured subchannels other than those indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the latest EHT operation element for non-TB sounding initiated by a STA that supports dynamic puncturing. In other words, both the statically punctured subchannels indicated by the disabled subchannel bitmap field and the additional / dynamically punctured subchannels may not be requested in the partial BW information subfield of the immediately preceding EHT NDP announcement (NDPA) frame. In a particular embodiment, both the NDPA frame and the NDP PPDU may be dynamically punctured.

[0164] 16 illustrates an example configuration 1600 for communicating in a wireless network using non-TB sounding with dynamic puncturing. In this example, TXVECTOR INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS parameter indications and EHT NDP announcement frame partial BW information subfield indications are given for the cases where the beamformer operating BW is 80 MHz (1605) and the beamformee operating BWs are 20 MHz (1610), 40 MHz (1615), 80 MHz (1620), 160 MHz (1625), and 320 MHz (1630), respectively.

[0165] When the beamformee receives the NDPA and NDP, the beamformee's PHY layer may detect the pattern of punctured subchannels and set INACTIVE_SUBCHANNEL as the punctured subchannel pattern based on the detection. The INACTIVE_SUBCHANNEL is then passed from the PHY layer to the MAC layer. Alternatively, the receiving STA may use the partial BW information subfield of the EHT NDPA frame to determine the pattern of punctured channels (or the subchannels requested for feedback). The punctured subchannels may include those indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the latest EHT operation element and additional punctured subchannels if dynamic puncturing is present in this non-TB sounding sequence. Various scenarios are presented in Figure 16.

[0166] There are multiple ways for the receiver / beamformee to determine if dynamic puncturing is present in a non-TB sounding sequence or any one-to-one transmission. One option is to compare the pattern of punctured channels indicated by the INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS passed from the PHY with the pattern of punctured channels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the EHT operation element in the sounding BW (or NDP BW or received PPDU BW). If the number of punctured subchannels indicated by the RXVECTOR parameter INACATIVE_SUBCHANNELS is greater than the number of punctured subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the EHT operation element, dynamic puncturing is present in the transmission, e.g., non-TB sounding. If the number of punctured subchannels indicated by the RXVECTOR parameter INACATIVE_SUBCHANNELS is equal to the number of punctured subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the EHT operation element, then dynamic puncturing is not present in the transmission, e.g., non-TB sounding. Another option is to compare the punctured subchannels indicated in the partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame with the punctured subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the EHT operation element in the sounding BW (or NDP BW or received PPDU BW). If the number of punctured subchannels indicated in the partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame is greater than the number of punctured subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the EHT operation element, then dynamic puncturing is present in this transmission, e.g., non-TB sounding.If the number of punctured subchannels indicated in the Partial BW Information subfield of the NDP announcement frame is equal to the number of punctured subchannels indicated in the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field of the EHT Operation element, then no dynamic puncturing is present in the transmission, e.g., non-TB sounding.

[0167] In one embodiment, to accommodate dynamic puncturing, an exemplary extended configuration for the BW, partial BW information subfield in the EHT NDP announcement frame is shown below in Table 6. Table 7 below provides an extended 5-bit punctured channel indication for the non-OFDMA case in the EHT MU PPTU.

[0168] [Table 6]

[0169] [Table 7]

[0170] The partial BW information subfield in the NDPA frame may be modified to convey possible requested RU / MRU and RU / MRU combinations with OFDMA puncturing patterns.

[0171] With the existing permitted OFDMA puncturing patterns, which for 80 MHz subchannels are 1111 (no puncturing), 0111, 1011, 1101, 1110, 0011, 1100, and 1001, 2-hole puncturing may be possible in the 160 MHz case. Any combination of permitted 80 MHz puncturing patterns is a valid OFDMA puncturing pattern for 160 MHz operation. For example, 11101100 is a valid OFDMA puncturing pattern with 2 holes for 160 MHz operation, and "0" means that the corresponding 20 MHz subchannel is punctured (hole). Similarly, in a 320 MHz channel, 4-hole puncturing may be possible.

[0172] To support OFDMA puncturing patterns, the partial BW information subfield may be modified to signal the requested non-punctured RU / MRU / subchannel or RU / MRU / subchannel combination on which channel measurements may be performed. The existing partial BW information subfield is 9 bits long, where the first bit may indicate the bitmap resolution and the remaining 8 bits carry the 8-bit bitmap. If the BW of the NDPA frame is 160 MHz or less, the first bit is set to =0, indicating that the bitmap resolution is 20 MHz. If the BW of the NDPA frame is 320 MHz, the first bit is set to =1, indicating that the bitmap resolution is 40 MHz.

[0173] If the BW of the NDPA frame is less than or equal to 160 MHz, the partial BW information field may be modified by adding allowed values ​​to support OFDMA puncturing patterns. Table 8 below shows an example of valid settings for the partial BW information subfield in the NDPA when the feedback back RU / MRU size is 242+242, the BW of the NDPA is 160 MHz, and the beamformee operating channel width is 160 MHz / 320 MHz.

[0174] [Table 8]

[0175] If the BW of the NDPA frame is 320 MHz, it may be difficult to support all OFDMA puncturing patterns because the bitmap carried in the existing partial BW information field has a resolution of 40 MHz. Therefore, the 242+242 RU / MRU requirement may be difficult. However, more valid settings may be added to the partial BW information subfield to enable more (if not all) OFDMA puncturing patterns.

[0176] Table 9 below shows an example of a valid setting of the partial BW information subfield in the NDPA when the feedback back RU / MRU size is 484+484, the BW of the NDPA is 320 MHz, and the operating channel width of the beamformee is 320 MHz.

[0177] [Table 9]

[0178] Table 10 below shows an example of a valid setting of the partial BW information subfield in the NDPA when the feedback back RU / MRU size is 484+484+484+484, the BW of the NDPA is 320 MHz, and the beamformee operating channel width is 320 MHz.

[0179] [Table 10]

[0180] In an exemplary channel sounding sequence, the beamformee may experience high interference in one or more of the subchannels requested in the NDPA for measuring and sending beamforming feedback reports. In one embodiment, the beamformee may puncture these subchannels in addition to the punctured subchannels indicated by the NDPA and NDP. The beamformee then prepares feedback reports for the requested subchannels, excluding the additionally or "dynamically" punctured subchannels.

[0181] In one embodiment, the beamformee in non-TB and TB sounding may puncture additional subchannels of the requested subchannel indicated by the partial BW information of the NDPA, such that the beamforming feedback report may include only feedback for the requested subchannel excluding the additionally punctured subchannel.

[0182] In one embodiment, in non-TB sounding, the beamformee can send feedback in the PPDU using preamble puncturing that includes additionally punctured subchannels and additional puncturing indicated in the U-SIG (or any other signaling field in the preamble of the PPDU carrying the beamforming feedback report).

[0183] In one embodiment, the beamformee may send feedback in a TB PPDU with additional punctured subchannels such that in TB sounding, feedback may be sent in a subset of resources allocated by the beamformer in the Beamforming Report Poll (BFRP) Trigger Frame (TF). The beamformee may indicate the additional punctured subchannels in the U-SIG (or any other signaling field in the preamble of the PPDU carrying the beamforming feedback report).

[0184] In a particular embodiment, the MIMO control field may carry an indication of additionally punctured subchannels to enable the beamformer to correctly interpret the beamforming report. The MIMO control field is carried in the beamforming report transmitted from the beamformee to the beamformer. The punctured subchannel information carried in the MIMO control field may indicate subchannels for which the beamforming report may not include CSI / CQI information even if the beamformer requests CSI / CQI information for the subchannel. In one embodiment, the partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field may be set by the beamformee rather than copying the partial BW information subfield from the NDPA to the MIMO control field. Thus, the partial BW information may be used as an indicator of additionally punctured subchannels if the reported subchannels indicated by the partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field are a superset of the subchannels requested by the partial BW information subfield of the NDPA. In this example, the partial BW subfield in the MIMO control field in the beamforming report is used to carry the reported subchannel information. It may be possible that other fields / sub-fields may be used in the beamforming report to indicate reported or non-reported sub-channels.

[0185] In another embodiment, some of the reserved bits in the MIMO control field may be named as additional puncturing subfields and may be used as indications for additional punctured subchannels. In one method, with the exemplary encoding shown in Table 11 below, three bits may be used as additional puncturing subfields, with the order of the subchannels being from the subchannel with the lowest frequency to the subchannel with the highest frequency.

[0186] [Table 11]

[0187] In yet a further embodiment, the additional puncturing subfield in the MIMO control field may signal the additionally punctured subchannel by indicating the difference between the partial BW subfield and the actual puncturing. As an example, the partial BW subfield may indicate a puncturing pattern 011110000 (=240), and the beamformee may puncture the additional subchannel such that the new puncturing pattern is 011111100 (=252). In one embodiment, a value=1 in the puncturing pattern bitmap means that the corresponding subchannel is punctured (not reported). The beamformee may calculate the difference between the two puncturing patterns as (252-240=12), which may be represented as the binary sequence "1100". The beamformee may then indicate the difference "1100" in the additional puncturing subfield.

[0188] Static and dynamic puncturing may be used in the MU-RTS TXS embodiments described herein. In one embodiment, static puncturing may be advertised by a disabled subchannels bitmap field in the EHT operations element, which may be included in a beacon or other control and management frame.

[0189] Referring to FIG. 17, a method 1700 for communicating in a wireless network using MU-RTS TXS may include an AP sending an MU-RTS trigger frame 1705 with a special user information field that may indicate punctured channel information, or any trigger frame. Such a special information field may be indicated using a special reserved user association ID (AID). The punctured channel information may include information of disabled channels as indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap, and may also indicate any additionally punctured channels that the AP may puncture when initiating the triggered TXS session. In the MU-RTS trigger frame 1705, the AP may grant suspended RUs or M-RUs to one or more STAs. In another implementation, the AP may grant consecutive RUs in one user information field and use the special user information field to indicate any punctured RUs / subchannels.

[0190] Dynamic puncturing may occur during a shared TXOP 1710 triggered by the AP. In this case, the AP may allocate a portion of time in a given TXOP to an associated non-AP EHT STA, for example, non-AP STA1 as shown in method 1700 of FIG. 17, to transmit one or more non-TB PPDUs. After sending a CTS response 1712 to the AP, non-AP STA1 determines one or more subchannels that may not be signaled as punctured subchannels in the disabled subchannel bitmap field in the EHT operation element. Non-AP STA1 punctures these subchannels in addition to the subchannels indicated in the subchannel bitmap disabled field in the EHT operation element.

[0191] In this embodiment, non-AP STA1 indicates all punctured subchannels in the following places: 1) the punctured channel information field in the U-SIG field of the transmitted EHT MU-PPDU 1714, and / or 2) the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS, and / or 3) and / or the TXVECTOR parameters INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS and DYNAMIC_INACTIVE SUBCHANNELS. The receiving STA, for example, non-AP STA2 in method 1700 of FIG. 17, detects all punctured subchannels, sets the detected punctured subchannels as punctured subchannels in RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS or RXVECTOR parameters INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS and DYNAMIC_INACTIVE SUBCHANNELS (if present), and passes these parameters from the PHY layer to the MAC layer. When the MAC layer of non-AP STA2 receives the latest punctured subchannel information, it allocates data for its transmission only on unpunctured subchannels excluding the punctured subchannels indicated in the subchannel bitmap disabled field in the EHT operation element and the additional / dynamically punctured subchannels indicated by non-AP STA1. When non-AP STA2 starts transmitting a response 1716 to non-AP STA1, it should pass the latest punctured subchannels contained in the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS or TXVECTOR INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS and DYNAMIC_INACTIVE SUBCHANNELS from the MAC layer to the PHY layer.

[0192] The method 1700 of FIG. 17 illustrates an example protocol using an MU-RTS TXS trigger frame 1705 with TXOP sharing mode subfield value=2 and dynamic puncturing in a frame exchange initiated by non-AP STA1. This protocol can also be applied when using an MU-RTS TXS trigger frame with TXOP sharing mode subfield value=1. Upon receiving the MU-RTS frame, non-AP STA1 performs dynamic puncturing when transmitting a CTS response 1712 or a data frame to the AP. There are multiple ways for a non-AP STA to determine whether dynamic puncturing is present in this one-to-one transmission. One option is to compare the punctured channel pattern indicated by the INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS passed from the PHY with the punctured channel pattern indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the EHT operation element in the NDP BW (or received PPDU BW). If the number of punctured subchannels indicated by the RXVECTOR parameter INACATIVE_SUBCHANNELS is greater than the number of punctured subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the EHT operation element, dynamic puncturing is present in the transmission. If the number of punctured subchannels indicated by the RXVECTOR parameter INACATIVE_SUBCHANNELS is equal to the number of punctured subchannels indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field of the EHT operation element, dynamic puncturing is not present in the transmission.

[0193] In another embodiment, the non-AP STA starts spatial reuse within the time allocated in the MU-RTS TX TF 1705. The purpose of the spatial reuse operation that the non-AP STA starts within the time allocated in the MU-RTS TX TF is to allow the medium to be reused more frequently between overlapping basic service sets (OBSSs) in dense deployment scenarios by early identification of signals from the OBSSs and interference management. For EHT STAs that support spatial reuse capability for high efficiency (HE) WLANs as defined by 802.11ax, a parameterized spatial reuse (PSR) based option may be used. A PSR transmission (PSRT) PPDU transmission indicates this by setting the PSR-based spatial reuse (SR) support subfield=1 in the EHT PHY capability information in the EHT capability element. As shown in FIG. 17, the non-AP STA1 may send an extended CTS 1712 to indicate that the immediately following transmission will enable spatial reuse.

[0194] In 320 MHz bandwidth operation, the resolution of the subchannel requested for partial bandwidth feedback in EHT is 40 MHz. In the case of EHT+, if a wider bandwidth is supported (e.g., 640 MHz, etc.), the resolution of the subchannel requested for partial bandwidth feedback may be a value other than 20 MHz. However, in the case of narrower bandwidth operation, the preamble puncturing resolution is still 20 MHz. In one embodiment, the beamformer may request partial bandwidth feedback for a 40 MHz subchannel if at least one of its 20 MHz subchannels is not punctured. In the NDPA frame, or in the PPDU carrying the NDPA frame, the AP may indicate that OFDMA puncturing mode may be used in the subsequent NDP PPDU. The beamformee may identify which, if any, of the two 20 MHz subchannels of the requested 40 MHz feedback are punctured from the punctured channel information field of the U-SIG or extended SIG of the NDP PPDU and the partial BW information subfield in the EHT / EHT+NDPA frame. The beamformee may then prepare beamforming feedback for the unpunctured 20 MHz subchannels of the requested 40 MHz feedback and send it back to the beamformer.

[0195] According to an example embodiment, one of the reserved bits in the STA information field in the NDPA frame may be used to indicate that the partial BW information covers the upper or lower 160 MHz of a 320 MHz bandwidth or greater. This bit may have special meaning when the NDP PPDU bandwidth is 320 MHz. The upper / lower 160 MHz bit, together with the resolution bit of the partial BW information subfield, may enable support of 20 MHz sounding resolution in a 320 MHz bandwidth, as shown in Table 12 below.

[0196] If the beamformer may request the beamformee to measure CSI / CQI on subchannels from both the upper and lower 160 MHz subchannels, the beamformer may include two STA information fields on which the AID11 subfield may be set to the same value, i.e., based on the AID of the beamformee. AID11 is a subfield defined in the NDP Announcement (NDPA) frame to identify the STA. In one method, one reserved bit in the STA information field may be used to indicate that more than one STA information field is provided to the beamformee so that the beamformee can continue to decode the NDPA frame even if it is decoding a single STA information field address for it.

[0197] [Table 12]

[0198] In another embodiment, one of the reserved bits in the STA information field may be designated as a resolution subfield and used to indicate that the partial BW information subfield is either a bitmap with 40 MHz subchannel resolution or a lookup table with 20 MHz subchannel resolution. The resolution subfield may have meaning when the NDP PPDU bandwidth is 320 MHz. If the resolution subfield is set to =0, the partial BW information subfield for 320 MHz may be used as a bitmap such that 9 bits may be set as "1XXXXXXXX", where the sequence "XXXXXXXX" refers to the requested subchannels with 40 MHz resolution such that each bit "X" may refer to one 40 MHz subchannel in the 320 MHz channel bandwidth. If the resolution subfield is set to =1, the entire partial BW information subfield for 320 MHz may be used as a lookup table allowing up to 512 different combinations such that each combination maps to a specified set of requested subchannels with a resolution of 20 MHz subchannels in the 320 MHz bandwidth. An example of the encoding of the resolution subfield is shown in Table 13 below.

[0199] [Table 13]

[0200] In a particular embodiment, assuming additional / dynamic puncturing is performed, i.e., subchannels other than those indicated by the disabled subchannel bitmap in the sounding TXOP are punctured, one bit in the NDPA frame or one bit in the SIG field of the PPDU carrying the NDPA frame may be used to indicate that the U-SIG field or Extended SIG field of the subsequent NDP PPDU may use an OFDMA puncturing pattern, and the U-SIG field or Extended SIG field may change from one 80 MHz subchannel to another 80 MHz subchannel. The intended beamformee STA may perform preamble detection of the NDP PPDU using the entire bandwidth indicated by the NDPA frame if the STA supports that bandwidth. The intended beamformee STA may perform preamble detection of the NDP PPDU using the maximum bandwidth supported by the beamformee STA if the STA cannot support the bandwidth indicated in the NDPA frame.

[0201] For example, an NDPA frame is transmitted using a non-HT dup PPDU on the 160 MHz bandwidth. The beamformer can identify 20 MHz subchannels in the primary 80 MHz subchannel that are indicated as disabled in the disabled subchannel bitmap, and 20 MHz subchannels in the secondary 80 MHz subchannels are not available for transmission for some reason, such as channel sensing results. The beamformer can use a bit in the NDPA frame or a PPDU carrying the NDPA frame to indicate that the U-SIG field of a subsequent NDP PPDU may use an OFDMA puncturing pattern. Beamformee 1 may be able to detect a signal on the 160 MHz channel. Upon receipt of a bit in the NDPA transmission, Beamformee 1 can open the entire 160 MHz bandwidth to detect the NDP PPDU. In the U-SIG field carried on the primary 80 MHz subchannel, Beamformee 1 can notice that one 20 MHz subchannel is punctured, and in the U-SIG field carried on the secondary 80 MHz subchannel, Beamformee 1 can notice that one 20 MHz subchannel is punctured. The RXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of Beamformee 1 may include both 20 MHz subchannels (not punctured). In this case, Beamformee 1 can puncture both 20 Mhz subchannels in the remaining transmission of the TXOP. Beamformee 2 may be able to detect a signal on the 80 MHz channel. Upon reception of the bits in the NDPA transmission, Beamformee 2 can open the entire 80 MHz bandwidth to detect the NDP PPDU. Beamformee 2 can notice the punctured subchannel on the primary 80 MHz. This is not an issue since Beamformee 2 transmits / receives only on the primary 80 MHz channel.

[0202] FIG. 18 illustrates a method 1800 for communicating in a wireless network using a sounding procedure including an OFDMA puncturing pattern for beamforming, according to an example embodiment.

[0203] As shown in FIG. 18, at 1818, the beamformee (e.g., STA2) may combine the punctured subchannel information carried in the partial BW field in the NDPA frame 1814 with the punctured channel information field in the U-SIG field or extended SIG field in the subsequent NDP PPDU 1816 to determine, for example, the requested RU / MRU or subchannel for measurement requested in the NDPA frame 1814. In other words, the partial BW field in the NDPA frame 1814 may have a resolution of 20 MHz or 40 MHz depending on the sounding bandwidth. At 1818, STA2 may use the partial BW field in the NDPA frame to determine the RU / MRU on which it may need to measure CSI and / or CQI. STA2 may then check the punctured subchannel in the U-SIG field or extended SIG field in the subsequent NDP PPDU if the requested RU / MRU is further punctured, and STA2 may then measure CSI and / or CQI on the unpunctured portion of the RU / MRU. In the beamforming feedback frame 1822, the beamforming STA2 may transmit a report 1822 including a MIMO control field with the fractional BW field set to the same value as in the NDPA frame 1814. Furthermore, one reserved bit in the MIMO control field may be used to indicate that the information of the punctured channel carried in the U-SIG field of the NDP frame 1816 may be measured and used to help determine the unpunctured portion of the RU / MRU to be reported in the BFR 1822.

[0204] As before, the disabled subchannel bitmap field may be carried in a management frame, such as a beacon frame 1805, and transmitted by the AP or possibly non-AP STAs. In one method, the disabled subchannel bitmap field may use a non-OFDMA puncture pattern, 1807. STAs receiving the beacon 1805 may set their TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of the HE, EHT, EHT+, or non-HT duplicate PPDU based on the disabled subchannel bitmap field.

[0205] STA1 (beamformer, e.g., AP or non-AP STA) may acquire a channel and start a sounding TXOP 1810. STA1 may update the TXVECTOR parameter INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS of the HE, EHT, EHT+, or non-HT duplicate PPDU to include additional subchannels other than those indicated in the disabled subchannel bitmap field. In one method, STA1 may decide to use an OFDMA puncture pattern to signal the inactive subchannels 1812.

[0206] STA1 may transmit a Null Data Packet Announcement (NDPA) frame 1814, which may be carried in a non-HT duplicate PPDU. A bit or other indication in the NDPA frame or in the SIG field of the PPDU carrying the NDPA frame may be used to indicate that the U-SIG field of the subsequent NDP PPDU 1816 may use an OFDMA puncturing pattern and may change from one 80 MHz subchannel to another 80 MHz subchannel. This bit may be indicated as a puncturing mode field (or other name such as wideband operation mode indication). Upon receiving the NDPA frame, STA2 (beamformee) may prepare to receive the NDP frame with a bandwidth that is the minimum of the TXOP operating bandwidth considered in the NDPA frame and the maximum bandwidth it supports. As used herein, this bandwidth may be indicated as BW_full.

[0207] STA1 may transmit an NDP PPDU 1816, which may be an EHT MU PPDU or an EHT+PPDU, and an OFDMA puncturing pattern may be used to signal which subchannels may be punctured in the NDP PPDU transmission 1816. In step 1818, STA2 may need to decode the entire NDP PPDU using the bandwidth mentioned above (i.e., BW_full) so that it can decode the U-SIG field on all decodable 80 MHz subblocks. Theoretically, the subcarriers that may be punctured may be identified in the disabled subchannel bitmap of the management frame 1805 (i.e., static puncturing), and additional or dynamic puncturing may be implemented in step 1812 by the beamformer and even by the beamformee (e.g., STA2) when measuring and providing feedback in the BFR 1822. At stage 1818, STA2 may identify the dynamic puncturing by STA1 based on NDPA 1814 and NDP 1816 and update its INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS parameter accordingly.

[0208] To allow the NDP PPDU 1816 to use the OFDMA puncturing pattern, one or more embodiments described below may be employed. In one embodiment, the PPDU type and compressed mode subfields in the U-SIG field are set to =3 (indicating that the NDP PPDU is transmitted with the OFDMA puncturing pattern), the EHT-SIG MCS field is set to =0, and the EHT-SIG symbol number field is set to =0 to indicate a sounding NDP with an OFDMA puncturing pattern. Thus, the table of combinations of UL / DL with PPDU type and compressed mode fields may be modified as shown in Table 14 below. When the PPDU type and compressed mode subfields are set to =3, the punctured channel information subfield in the U-SIG field may indicate the OFDMA puncturing pattern.

[0209] [Table 14]

[0210] Alternatively, a sounding NDP with an OFDMA puncturing pattern is signaled when the PPDU type and compressed mode fields are set to =0, the EHT-SIG MCS field is set to =0, and the EHT-SIG number of symbols field is set to =0.

[0211] After the NDP 1816, STA1 may transmit a beamforming report poll (BFRP) 1820 that triggers a beamformee, e.g., STA2, to feed back the measured characteristics of the channel in a beamforming report (BFR) 1822. Other trigger frames, not limited to BFRP and BFR, may be sent by STA1 and responded to by STA2. In response to the BFRP 1820, STA2 measures / determines CSI feedback for that BFR. Note that STA2 can obtain the OFDMA puncture pattern by detecting 1818 the USIG or extended SIG fields in all 80 MHz subblocks, so that it can update the INACTIVE_SUBCHANNELS parameter and limit the feedback measurement in BFR 1822 to non-punctured subchannels. Furthermore, STA2 itself may decide to dynamically puncture subchannels, e.g., based on sensing or energy detection. All punctured subchannels are included in its INACTIVE_SUBCHANNEL parameter and the puncturing may be signaled to STA1, for example, in BFR1822.

[0212] The sounding NDP PPDU format with OFDMA puncturing patterns may extend the established NDP PPDU format 1900 as shown in FIG. 19. The punctured channel information subfield in the U-SIG 1910 may indicate the OFDMA puncturing pattern or other puncturing patterns that may include more valid patterns than the established non-OFDMA puncturing patterns. The RU assignment subfield may not be present in the EHT-SIG field 1920. Note that the U-SIG field 1910 may be the same for each 20 MHz subchannel in an 80 MHz subblock. However, the punctured channel information subfield may be different for different 80 MHz subblocks since it may be provided for each 80 MHz signaling.

[0213] To support the sounding procedure using OFDMA puncture patterns in the method 1800 of FIG. 18, the NDPA frame 1814 may be modified or extended. A puncture pattern mode subfield of the type described above may be carried in the STA information field in the NDPA frame 1814. When this subfield is set, the beamformee may need to prepare to receive the NDP frame 1816 (including the pre-EHT portion) using BW_full. A full puncture channel information subfield may be included to carry full puncture channel information, and the subfield may be, for example, 12-16 bits long. In one method, the subfield may be carried in a special STA information field that may be identified by a special AID. In one method, this special AID is different from any special AID used in 802.11ax.

[0214] When the puncture pattern mode subfield is set to indicate an OFDMA puncture pattern, the partial BW subfield may have a new meaning. In an exemplary embodiment, the existing 9-bit partial BW subfield and some reserved bits may be used together to indicate the requested subchannel or RU / MRU on which sounding feedback may be measured. In an embodiment, this signaling may correspond to a lookup table resident in the device (e.g., STA2). In another embodiment, the leading bit of the partial BW subfield may be used to indicate the 160 MHz subchannel of the requested sounding feedback. If the total bandwidth of the NDPA transmission is 320 MHz, two STA information fields with the same AID may be used to carry information for a single beamformee, with each STA information field corresponding to a specific 160 MHz subchannel. In other embodiments, the partial BW subfield may follow the existing signaling method. The beamformee may measure based on the subchannels / RU / MRU indicated in the fractional BW subfield, excluding the punctured subchannels indicated in the U-SIG field of the NDP PPDU 1816.

[0215] In another embodiment of the method 1800 including a sounding procedure with OFDMA puncture patterns, a STA may indicate its capability to support a sounding procedure with OFDMA puncturing or wideband reception for a pre-EHT or pre-extended portion of an EHT or extended PPDU of various embodiments. As shown in FIG. 19, the pre-extended portion of an extended PPDU 1900 may include an L-STF field 1930, an L-LTF field 1940, an L-SIG field 1950, and an extended SIG field. When this capability bit is set, the STA may be able to decode the pre-EHT or pre-extended portion of the EHT or extended PPDU and the EHT or extended portion of the PPDU using the same bandwidth. Additionally, the STA may be able to decode 1818 an OFDMA puncture pattern carried in the U-SIG field in two or more 80 MHz sub-blocks.

[0216] As used herein, the term OFDMA puncture pattern is not limiting and may be generalized to include any puncture pattern, which may include more puncture patterns than non-OFDMA puncturing patterns or static puncture patterns.

[0217] Referring to FIG. 20, an exemplary embodiment of an EHT operation element 2000 is shown. In this example, one subfield (e.g., referred to as disabled subchannel puncturing pattern) in the extended EHT operation information field 2010 may be used with the disabled subchannel bitmap field 2020 used for non-OFDMA and / or OFDMA puncturing patterns in the previously described embodiments. For example, when the disabled subchannel bitmap present subfield 2020 and the extended EHT operation information field 2010 are set to 1, the disabled subchannel puncturing pattern subfield in the extended EHT operation information field may include 1 bit indicating that the disabled subchannel bitmap follows an OFDMA puncturing pattern or a non-OFDMA puncturing pattern. The OFDMA puncturing pattern may follow one type of puncturing pattern. The puncturing pattern may be one where every 4 bits represents one 80 MHz channel. For example, this 4-bit bitmap is indexed by the 20 MHz subchannels in ascending order. For each bit, a value of 0 indicates that the corresponding 20 MHz sub-channel is punctured, otherwise a value of 1 is used. Puncturing patterns are defined for 80 MHz sub-blocks, e.g., 1111 (no puncturing), 0111, 1011, 1101, 1110, 0011, 1100, and 1001. Or, every 8 bits represents one 160 MHz channel. For example, this 8-bit bitmap is indexed by the 20 Mhz sub-channels in ascending order. For each bit, a value of 0 indicates that the corresponding 20 MHz channel is punctured, otherwise a value of 1 is used. Each 160 MHz puncturing pattern can follow the puncturing patterns defined in non-OFDMA transmission with 160 MHz channels, or some newly defined puncturing patterns.

[0218] Alternatively, the disabled subchannel puncturing pattern subfield in the extended EHT operation information field 2010 may include more than one bit (e.g., two bits) to indicate whether the puncturing pattern in the disabled subchannel bitmap field uses a non-OFDMA puncturing pattern, or whether the puncturing pattern in the disabled subchannel bitmap field uses an 80 MHz non-OFDMA puncturing pattern (which means that every 4 bits represent a bitmap of an 80 MHz channel), or whether the puncturing pattern in the disabled subchannel bitmap field 2010 uses a 160 MHz non-OFDMA puncturing pattern (which means that every 8 bits represent a bitmap of a 160 MHz channel). Alternatively, no additional subfield is needed to indicate whether the puncturing pattern in the disabled subchannel bitmap 2020 uses a non-OFDMA puncturing pattern or an OFDMA puncturing pattern. The puncturing pattern of the disabled subchannel bitmap 2020 only indicates the OFDMA puncturing pattern, for example, using an 80 MHz OFDMA puncturing pattern (which means that every 4 bits represent the bitmap of an 80 MHz channel) or a 160 MHz OFDMA puncturing pattern (which means that every 8 bits represent the bitmap of a 160 MHz channel).

[0219] Table 15 below shows an example definition and encoding of the Disabled Subchannel Puncturing Pattern subfield in the Extended EHT Operation Information.

[0220] [Table 15]

[0221] The terminology and corresponding procedures discussed herein may be extended to other future generations of 802.11 amendments or related schemes. The term "preamble puncturing" may refer to a general puncturing case, which may be static puncturing, dynamic puncturing, or static and dynamic puncturing. The terms "dynamic puncturing" and "additional puncturing" may be used interchangeably.

[0222] Although terminology such as "upper or lower 160 MHz" is used above, the disclosed methods can be applied to "primary / secondary 160 MHz". This can be done by replacing "upper or lower 160 MHz" with "primary or secondary 160 MHz". That is, replace "lower 160 MHz" with "primary 160 MHz" or "secondary 160 MHz" and replace "upper 160 MHz" with "secondary 160 MHz" or "primary 160 MHz". Furthermore, the methods disclosed in different embodiments may be used together.

[0223] Although the features and elements of the present invention are described in the preferred embodiments in a particular combination, each feature or element can be used alone without other features and elements of the preferred embodiments, or can be used in various combinations with or without other features and elements of the present invention. Although the solution described herein takes into account the protocols of the 802.11 specification, it is understood that the solution described herein is not limited to this scenario and is further applicable to other wireless systems. Although SIFS is used to indicate various inter-frame spacings in the design and procedure examples, all other inter-frame spacings such as RIFS, AIFS, DIFS, or other allowed time intervals may be applied to the same solution. Although four RBs per triggered TXOP are shown as an example in some figures, the actual number of RBs / channels / bandwidth utilized may vary. Certain bits are used to signal in-BSS / OBSS as an example, but other bits may be used to signal this information. Several trigger type values ​​are used as an example to identify the newly defined trigger frame variants, but other values ​​may be used. Multi-AP and MAP are used interchangeably to refer to the same concept. A Long Training Field (LTF) can be any type of predefined sequence known at both the transmitter and receiver sides.

[0224] Although the features and elements are described above in certain combinations, one skilled in the art will understand that each feature or element may be used alone or in any combination with the other features and elements. In addition, the methods described herein may be implemented in a computer program, software, or firmware embodied in a computer-readable medium for execution by a computer or processor. Examples of computer-readable media include electronic signals (transmitted over wired or wireless connections) and computer-readable storage media. Examples of computer-readable storage media include, but are not limited to, read-only memory (ROM), random-access memory (RAM), registers, cache memory, semiconductor memory devices, magnetic media such as internal hard disks and removable disks, magneto-optical media, and optical media such as CD-ROM disks and digital versatile disks (DVDs). A processor in association with software may be used to implement a radio frequency transceiver for use in a WTRU, UE, terminal, base station, RNC, or any host computer.

Claims

1. A method for use in a first station (STA1), the method comprising: receiving a Null Data Packet Announcement (NDPA) frame, the NDPA frame including an indicator of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) subchannel puncturing of a subsequent Null Data Packet (NDP); receiving the NDP, the NDP occupying at least one 80 MHz channel, the NDP including a U-SIG field indicating an OFDMA puncturing pattern; and transmitting a beamforming report (BFR) to a second station (STA2), the BFR including measurement information associated with subchannels present within the NDP based on the OFDMA puncturing pattern.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the NDPA frame includes an inactive subchannel indication in a fractional bandwidth (BW) subfield.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the OFDMA puncturing pattern indicates OFDMA subcarriers that are not used in the NDP.

4. 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the NDPA frame includes a duplicate non-high throughput (non-HT) physical protocol data unit (PPDU) having a partial BW subfield including the indicia of the OFDMA subchannel puncturing at a minimum subchannel resolution of 40 MHz, and the NDP includes an very high throughput (EHT) PPDU including the U-SIG field having the OFDMA puncturing pattern at a minimum subchannel resolution of 20 MHz.

5. The STA2 comprises an access point, and the method includes: The method of claim 1 , further comprising receiving a Beamforming Report Poll (BFRP) requesting the BFR.

6. 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the indicator of OFDMA subchannel puncturing comprises an OFDMA puncturing mode signal indicating a finer resolution of subchannel puncturing in the NDP.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the measurement information excludes punctured subchannels identified in an invalid subchannel bitmap.

8. A station (STA1), A transceiver; a processor in communication with the transceiver, the processor and the transceiver comprising: receiving a Null Data Packet Announcement (NDPA) frame, the NDPA frame including an indicator of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) subchannel puncturing of a subsequent Null Data Packet (NDP); receiving the NDP occupying at least one 80 MHz channel, the NDP including a U-SIG field indicating an OFDMA puncturing pattern; A station (STA1) configured to transmit a beamforming report (BFR) to a second station (STA2), the BFR including measurement information associated with subchannels present within the NDP based on the OFDMA puncturing pattern.

9. The STA1 of claim 8, wherein the NDPA frame includes an inactive subchannel indication in a fractional bandwidth (BW) subfield.

10. The STA1 of claim 8 , wherein the OFDMA puncturing pattern indicates OFDMA subcarriers that are not used in the NDP.

11. STA1 of claim 8, wherein the NDPA frame includes a duplicate non-high throughput (non-HT) physical protocol data unit (PPDU) having a partial BW subfield including the indicator of the OFDMA subchannel puncturing at a minimum subchannel resolution of 40 MHz, and the NDP includes an ultra-high throughput (EHT) PPDU including the U-SIG having the OFDMA puncturing pattern at a minimum subchannel resolution of 20 MHz.

12. The STA2 includes an access point, and the processor and the transceiver include: The STA1 of claim 8, further configured to receive a Beamforming Report Poll (BFRP) requesting the BFR.

13. The STA1 of claim 8 , wherein the indicator of the OFDMA subchannel puncturing includes an OFDMA puncturing mode signal indicating a higher resolution of subchannel puncturing in the NDP.

14. 10. The STA1 of claim 8, wherein the measurement information associated with subchannels that are not punctured according to the OFDMA puncturing pattern further excludes punctured subchannels identified in a disabled subchannel bitmap.

15. An access point (AP), A transceiver; a processor in communication with the transceiver, the processor and the transceiver comprising: transmitting a Null Data Packet Announcement (NDPA) frame, the NDPA frame including an indicator of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) subchannel puncturing of a subsequent Null Data Packet (NDP); Transmitting the Null Data Packet (NDP), occupying at least one 80 MHz channel, the NDP including a U-SIG field indicating an OFDMA puncturing pattern; Sending a beamforming report poll (BFRP) to a first station (STA1) requesting a beamforming report (BFR); and An access point (AP) configured to receive the BFR from the STA1 in response to the BFR, the BFR including measurement information associated with subchannels that are not punctured based on the OFDMA puncturing pattern.

16. The AP of claim 15, wherein the NDPA frame includes an inactive subchannel indication in a fractional bandwidth (BW) subfield.

17. 16. The AP of claim 15, wherein the NDPA frame includes a duplicate non-high throughput (non-HT) physical protocol data unit (PPDU) having a partial BW subfield including the indicator of the OFDMA subchannel puncturing at a minimum subchannel resolution of 40 MHz, and the NDP includes an very high throughput (EHT) PPDU including the U-SIG having the OFDMA puncturing pattern at a minimum subchannel resolution of 20 MHz.

18. The AP of claim 15 , wherein the indicator of OFDMA subchannel puncturing comprises an OFDMA puncturing mode signal.

19. 16. The AP of claim 15, wherein the processor and the transceiver are further configured to transmit a beacon including an indication of a punctured subchannel in a disabled subchannel bitmap field.

20. 20. The AP of claim 19, wherein the measurement information associated with non-punctured subchannels further excludes punctured subchannels identified in the disabled subchannel bitmap field.

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