Communication method and apparatus

Abstract

A communication method and apparatus, relating to the technical field of wireless communications. According to the method, a first communication apparatus can receive a first reference signal by means of a first port and obtain first information on the basis of the first reference signal, and the first communication apparatus can send a second reference signal by means of a second port, wherein the second reference signal can be used by a second communication apparatus, which receives the second reference signal, to perform channel estimation, so as to obtain second channel information. The first communication apparatus can also send the first information to the second communication apparatus, so that the second communication apparatus can perform joint channel estimation on the basis of the first information and the second channel information. Therefore, the joint channel estimation is performed on the basis of an uplink channel estimation result and a downlink channel estimation result, thereby improving the channel estimation performance.

Description

Communication method and device

[0001] CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

[0002] This application claims priority to the Chinese patent application filed with the State Intellectual Property Office of the People's Republic of China on June 28, 2023, with application number 202310784810.X and invention name "A Communication Method and Device", the entire contents of which are incorporated by reference into this application. Technical Field

[0003] The present application relates to the field of mobile communication technologies, and in particular to a communication method and device. Background Art

[0004] Multiple-input, multiple-output (MIMO) technology is widely used in Long Term Evolution (LTE) and New Radio (NR) communications. To achieve optimal MIMO performance, the base station needs to obtain accurate downlink channel information and use it to calculate the precoding vectors from the base station to the terminal, which significantly affects system performance.

[0005] In a time division duplex (TDD) system, because both uplink and downlink frequencies operate in the same frequency band, the uplink and downlink wireless channels are reciprocal (i.e., the uplink and downlink channels are considered identical). The base station receives the sounding reference signal (SRS) sent by the UE and uses this pilot signal to estimate the uplink channel to obtain the uplink CSI. This, based on uplink and downlink reciprocity, is equivalent to obtaining the downlink CSI. The base station uses this information to calculate precoding, thereby improving signal transmission quality or rate.

[0006] However, the estimation accuracy of channel estimation performed only based on uplink channel information or downlink channel information needs to be improved.

[0007] Summary of the Invention

[0008] The present application provides a communication method and apparatus for improving channel estimation accuracy.

[0009] In a first aspect, a communication method is provided. The method can be implemented by a first communication device. The first terminal device can be a terminal device or a component of a terminal device, or can be a network device or a component in a network device. The components in the present application may include, for example, at least one of a chip, a chip system, a processor, a transceiver, a processing unit, or a transceiver unit. Taking the execution subject as the first communication device as an example, the method can be implemented by the following steps: the first communication device receives a first reference signal through a first port, and sends a second reference signal through a second port associated with the first port; the first communication device sends first information, and the first information is obtained based on the first channel information. The first channel information is obtained based on the first reference signal. The first information and the second channel information are used for channel estimation, and the second channel information is obtained based on the second reference signal.

[0010] Based on the first aspect, a first communication device can receive a first reference signal through a first port and obtain first information based on the first reference signal, and the first communication device can send a second reference signal through a second port, wherein the second reference signal can be used by a second communication device that receives the second reference signal to perform channel estimation, thereby obtaining second channel information. The first communication device can also send the first information to the second communication device, so that the second communication device can perform joint channel estimation based on the first information and the second channel information. This joint channel estimation is performed based on the uplink channel estimation results and the downlink channel estimation results, which can improve the accuracy of the channel estimation.

[0011] In a possible implementation, the first communication device may be further configured to receive second information, where the second information is used to indicate: the first information is used to indicate an amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix.

[0012] Based on this implementation, the first communication device may obtain a configuration according to the second information, and determine, according to the configuration, whether the first information fed back is the amplitude, phase, or amplitude and phase of the combining coefficient.

[0013] In one possible implementation, the first communication device may be further configured to send confidence information, where the confidence information includes one or more of a signal to interference plus noise ratio corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient, a signal received power corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient, a signal to interference plus noise ratio corresponding to all combining coefficients corresponding to the first port, a signal to interference plus noise ratio of all combining coefficients corresponding to the first port, a signal to interference plus noise ratio of all combining coefficients of the first matrix, a signal received power of all combining coefficients of the first matrix, a signal received power corresponding to all combining coefficients corresponding to multiple ports in a first port set, and a signal to interference plus noise ratio corresponding to all combining coefficients corresponding to multiple ports in the first port set. The multiple ports in the first port set include the first port, and the multiple ports in the first port set all correspond to the first reference signal. Optionally, the first port set may be a set of multiple (partial or all) transmitting ports of the first communication device.

[0014] Based on this implementation, the confidence information may indicate the confidence level of the first information. For example, when the confidence information satisfies a confidence condition, the second communications device may perform channel estimation based on the first information and the second channel information. Furthermore, when the confidence information does not satisfy the confidence condition, the second communications device may discard the first information, or in other words, not perform channel estimation based on the first information and the second channel information, to ensure that the first information positively contributes to improving the accuracy of the channel estimation, thereby improving the accuracy of the channel estimation.

[0015] In a possible implementation manner, the first communication device may be further configured to receive third information, where the third information is used to indicate the sending of the confidence information.

[0016] In a possible implementation manner, the first communication device may be further configured to receive indication information of the first threshold; and / or receive indication information of the second threshold.

[0017] Based on this implementation, the first communication device may receive indication information of the first threshold and / or indication information of the second threshold, and thus the first communication device may be informed of the first threshold and / or the second threshold through signaling configuration.

[0018] In a possible implementation, the first communication device may be further configured to receive fourth information, where the fourth information is used to indicate a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient, that is, to indicate a position or Doppler frequency shift of the combining coefficient.

[0019] Based on this implementation method, the first communication device can receive fourth information for indicating the position of at least one combining coefficient, so that the first communication device can be informed of the position of at least one combining coefficient that needs to be fed back through signaling instructions to improve feedback accuracy, thereby improving channel estimation accuracy.

[0020] In one possible implementation, the first communication device can also be used to receive fifth information, which is used to indicate a first frame structure and a second frame structure, wherein the first frame structure and the second frame structure both include N subframes, each subframe corresponds to a time domain unit and a frequency domain unit, each subframe in the first frame structure corresponds to a first frequency domain resource, and each subframe in the second frame structure corresponds to a second frequency domain resource, and the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource do not overlap in the frequency domain; a subframe in the first frame structure and a subframe in the second frame structure corresponding to the same time domain unit satisfy: at least one subframe is a special subframe; or, one subframe is an uplink subframe and the other subframe is a downlink subframe.

[0021] Based on this implementation, the first communication device may also receive fifth information indicating a complementary frame structure, and receive the first reference signal and the second reference signal based on the complementary frame structure. The complementary frame structure helps reduce channel estimation delay and improve channel estimation accuracy.

[0022] In a second aspect, a communication method is provided. The method can be implemented by a second communication device. The second communication device can be a network device, a component in a network device, a terminal device, or a component in a terminal device. The components in the present application may include, for example, at least one of a chip, a chip system, a processor, a transceiver, a processing unit, or a transceiver unit. Taking the execution subject as the second communication device as an example, the method can be implemented by the following steps: the second communication device sends a first reference signal and receives a second reference signal, the first reference signal is received by the first port of the first communication device, the second reference signal is sent by the second port of the first communication device, and the first port is associated with the second port. The second communication device can also receive first information and perform channel estimation based on the first information and the second channel information. The first information is obtained based on the first channel information, the first channel information is obtained based on the first reference signal, and the second channel information is obtained based on the second reference signal.

[0023] In a possible implementation, the second communication device may further send second information, where the second information is used to indicate that the first information is used to indicate an amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix.

[0024] In a possible implementation, the second communication device may further receive confidence information. The confidence information may be as described in the first aspect.

[0025] In a possible implementation manner, the second communication device may further send third information, where the third information is used to indicate the sending of the confidence information.

[0026] In a possible implementation manner, the second communication device may further send indication information of the first threshold and / or indication information of the second threshold.

[0027] In a possible implementation, the second communication device may further send fourth information, where the first indication information is used to indicate the spatial domain vector and the frequency domain vector corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient.

[0028] In one possible implementation, the second communication device may further send fifth information, where the fifth information is used to indicate a first frame structure and a second frame structure, wherein the first frame structure and the second frame structure each include N subframes, each subframe corresponds to a time domain unit and a frequency domain unit, each subframe in the first frame structure corresponds to a first frequency domain resource, each subframe in the second frame structure corresponds to a second frequency domain resource, and the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource do not overlap in the frequency domain. A subframe in the first frame structure and a subframe in the second frame structure corresponding to the same time domain unit satisfy the following conditions: at least one subframe is a special subframe; or, one subframe is an uplink subframe and the other subframe is a downlink subframe.

[0029] The beneficial effects of the method shown in the second aspect above can be found in the description of the beneficial effects of the first aspect.

[0030] In any possible implementation manner of the first aspect and the second aspect, the association between the first port and the second port may mean that the first port and the second port correspond to the same physical port or logical port.

[0031] In any possible implementation of the first aspect and the second aspect, the first port is used to receive an uplink reference signal, and the second port is used to send a downlink reference signal; or, the first port is used to receive a downlink reference signal, and the second port is used to send an uplink reference signal.

[0032] Based on this implementation method, when the first port is used to receive an uplink reference signal and the second port is used to send a downlink reference signal, the first communication device may be a network device and the second communication device may be a terminal device; when the first port is used to receive a downlink reference signal and the second port is used to send an uplink reference signal, the first communication device may be a terminal device and the second communication device may be a network device, so joint channel estimation can be implemented in uplink or downlink communication scenarios.

[0033] In any possible implementation of the first aspect and the second aspect, the first channel information includes at least one first matrix, which corresponds to at least one spatial domain vector and multiple frequency domain vectors. The first matrix includes multiple combining coefficients, each combining coefficient is a combining coefficient of a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector, and the first information is used to indicate the amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix.

[0034] Based on this implementation method, the first information can be used to indicate at least one combining coefficient, so that the second communication device can perform joint channel estimation on the position (or Doppler frequency shift) of at least one combining coefficient based on the at least one combining coefficient to improve the channel estimation accuracy of the position of at least one combining coefficient.

[0035] In any possible implementation of the first aspect and the second aspect, the first information includes the amplitude and / or phase of the at least one combining coefficient normalized according to the maximum amplitude combining coefficient. That is, the first information includes the amplitude and / or phase of the normalized combining coefficient. The combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude includes the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude among all the combining coefficients corresponding to the first port, that is, the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude at the port level; or, the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude includes the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude among all the combining coefficients of the first matrix, that is, the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude at the matrix level; or, the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude includes the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude among the at least one combining coefficient, that is, the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude at the first information level; or, the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude includes the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude among all the combining coefficients corresponding to multiple ports in the first port set, that is, the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude at the device level, wherein the multiple ports in the first port set include the first port, and the multiple ports in the first port set all correspond to the first reference signal. For example, one combining coefficient in at least one combining coefficient is expressed as ae jθ , a is the amplitude of the merging coefficient, θ is the phase of the merging coefficient, the amplitude of the merging coefficient with the maximum amplitude is b, then the normalized merging coefficient is expressed as (a / b)e jθ , (a / b) is the amplitude of the normalized merging coefficient, and θ is the phase of the normalized merging coefficient.

[0036] Based on this implementation, the first information may include the magnitude of at least one combining coefficient normalized according to the magnitude of the maximum combining coefficient, thereby reducing feedback overhead. Furthermore, the maximum combining coefficient may be a maximum combining coefficient at the port level, the matrix level, the first information level, or the device level, thereby increasing the flexibility of the normalization scheme.

[0037] In any possible implementation of the first and second aspects, the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient is greater than or equal to a first threshold, or greater than or equal to the first threshold and less than or equal to a second threshold, or less than or equal to the second threshold; or the signal received power corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient is greater than or equal to the first threshold, or greater than or equal to the first threshold and less than or equal to the second threshold, or less than or equal to the second threshold. The first threshold and the second threshold are respectively signal-to-noise ratio thresholds corresponding to the combining coefficient, and are used by the first communication device to determine a combining coefficient that meets the signal-to-noise ratio threshold condition as the at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information, so as to improve feedback accuracy and thereby improve channel estimation accuracy.

[0038] In any possible implementation of the first aspect and the second aspect, the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different carriers, or the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different subbands in the same carrier, so as to realize complementary frame structures in different communication systems.

[0039] In any possible implementation of the first and second aspects, the first port and the second port correspond to different subframes on the first frequency domain resource, or the first port and the second port correspond to different subframes on the second frequency domain resource. Therefore, the joint channel estimation method disclosed in this application can be applied in this complementary frame structure, helping to reduce channel estimation delay and improve channel estimation accuracy.

[0040] In a third aspect, a communication method is provided. The method can be implemented by a first communication device. The first terminal device can be a terminal device or a component of a terminal device. The component in the present application may include, for example, at least one of a chip, a chip system, a processor, a transceiver, a processing unit, or a transceiver unit. Taking the execution subject as the first communication device as an example, the method can be implemented by the following steps: the first communication device receives fifth information, and the fifth information is used to indicate a first frame structure and a second frame structure, wherein the first frame structure and the second frame structure each include N subframes, each subframe corresponds to a time domain unit and a frequency domain unit, each subframe in the first frame structure corresponds to a first frequency domain resource, and each subframe in the second frame structure corresponds to a second frequency domain resource, and the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource do not overlap in the frequency domain; a subframe in the first frame structure and a subframe in the second frame structure corresponding to the same time domain unit satisfy: at least one subframe is a special subframe; or one subframe is an uplink subframe and the other subframe is a downlink subframe.

[0041] This complementary frame structure helps to reduce the transmission delay of feedback information and can ensure that the data or information can be transmitted uplink or downlink in the current or next subframe.

[0042] In a fourth aspect, a communication method is provided. The method may be implemented by a second communication device. The second communication device may be a network device, a component in a network device, a terminal device, or a component in a terminal device. The components in this application may include, for example, at least one of a chip, a chip system, a processor, a transceiver, a processing unit, or a transceiver unit. Taking the execution subject as the second communication device as an example, the method may be implemented by the following steps: the second communication device sends fifth information, where the fifth information is used to indicate a first frame structure and a second frame structure, where the first frame structure and the second frame structure can be referred to in the description of the third aspect.

[0043] In a possible implementation of the third aspect or the fourth aspect, the first frequency domain resources and the second frequency domain resources correspond to different carriers, or the first frequency domain resources and the second frequency domain resources correspond to different subbands in the same carrier.

[0044] The beneficial effects of the third or fourth aspect and its possible implementation methods can be found in the description of the beneficial effects of the corresponding implementation methods of the first aspect, and will not be repeated here.

[0045] In a fifth aspect, a communication device is provided. The device can implement the method described in any one or more of the first to fourth aspects and any possible designs thereof. The device has the functions of the first communication device and / or the second communication device described above. The device can be, for example, a terminal device, a functional module in a terminal device, a network device, or a functional module in a network device.

[0046] In an optional implementation, the device may include a module that performs the methods / operations / steps / actions described in any one or more aspects of the first to fourth aspects. The module may be a hardware circuit, software, or a combination of a hardware circuit and software. In an optional implementation, the device includes a processing unit (sometimes also referred to as a processing module) and a communication unit (sometimes also referred to as a transceiver module, a communication module, etc.). The transceiver unit is capable of implementing a sending function and a receiving function. When the transceiver unit implements the sending function, it may be referred to as a sending unit (sometimes also referred to as a sending module). When the transceiver unit implements the receiving function, it may be referred to as a receiving unit (sometimes also referred to as a receiving module). The sending unit and the receiving unit may be the same functional module, which is called a transceiver unit, and the functional module is capable of implementing a sending function and a receiving function; or, the sending unit and the receiving unit may be different functional modules, and the transceiver unit is a general term for these functional modules.

[0047] Exemplarily, when the apparatus is used to execute the method described in any one or more aspects from the first aspect to the fourth aspect and their possible implementations, the apparatus may include a communication unit and a processing unit.

[0048] In the sixth aspect, an embodiment of the present application also provides a communication device, comprising a processor for executing a computer program (or computer executable instructions) stored in a memory, so that when the computer program (or computer executable instructions) is executed, the device executes the method of any one or more aspects from the first to the fourth aspects and their various possible implementations.

[0049] In one possible implementation, the processor and memory are integrated;

[0050] In another possible implementation, the memory is located outside the communication device.

[0051] The communication device also includes a communication interface, which is used for the communication device to communicate with other devices, such as sending or receiving data and / or signals. Exemplarily, the communication interface can be a transceiver, circuit, bus, module or other type of communication interface.

[0052] In the seventh aspect, a computer-readable storage medium is provided, which is used to store computer programs or instructions, which, when executed, enables the method shown in any one or more aspects from the first to the fourth aspects and any possible implementation thereof to be implemented.

[0053] In an eighth aspect, a computer program product comprising instructions is provided, which, when executed on a computer, enables the method shown in any one or more aspects from the first to the fourth aspects and any possible implementation thereof to be implemented.

[0054] In the ninth aspect, an embodiment of the present application also provides a communication device for executing the methods of any one or more aspects of the above-mentioned first to fourth aspects and their various possible implementations.

[0055] In a tenth aspect, a chip system is provided, comprising a logic circuit (or, understood as, the chip system comprising a processor, which may include logic circuits, etc.), and an input / output interface. The input / output interface can be used to input messages or output messages. The input / output interface can be the same interface, i.e., the same interface can implement both sending and receiving functions; or, the input / output interface can include an input interface and an output interface, with the input interface being used to implement the receiving function, i.e., for receiving messages, and the output interface being used to implement the sending function, i.e., for sending messages. The logic circuit can be used to perform operations other than the sending and receiving functions in the methods described in any one or more of the first to fourth aspects above, and any possible implementations thereof; the logic circuit can also be used to transmit messages to the input / output interface, or to receive messages from other communication devices via the input / output interface. The chip system can be used to implement the methods described in any one or more of the first to fourth aspects above, and any possible implementations thereof. The chip system can be composed of a chip, or it can include a chip and other discrete components.

[0056] Optionally, the chip system may further include a memory, which may be used to store instructions, and the logic circuit may call the instructions stored in the memory to implement corresponding functions.

[0057] In the eleventh aspect, a communication system is provided, which may include a first communication device and a second communication device. The first communication device can be used to implement the method shown in the first aspect or the third aspect and any possible implementation thereof, and the second communication device can be used to implement the method shown in the second aspect or the fourth aspect and any possible implementation thereof.

[0058] The technical effects brought about by the above second to eleventh aspects can be found in the description of the above first aspect and will not be repeated here. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0059] FIG1 is a schematic diagram of the architecture of a wireless communication system provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0060] FIG2 is a schematic diagram of the position of the PMI feedback merging coefficients provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0061] FIG3 is a flow chart of a communication method provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0062] FIG4 is a schematic diagram of the position of a feedback combining coefficient provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0063] FIG5( a ) is a schematic diagram of the position of a feedback combining coefficient provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0064] FIG5( b ) is a schematic diagram of the position of another feedback combining coefficient provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0065] FIG5( c ) is a schematic diagram of the position of another feedback combining coefficient provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0066] FIG5( d ) is a schematic diagram of the position of another feedback combining coefficient provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0067] FIG5( e ) is a schematic diagram of the position of another feedback combining coefficient provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0068] FIG5( f ) is a schematic diagram of the position of another feedback combining coefficient provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0069] FIG5( g ) is a schematic diagram of the position of another feedback combining coefficient provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0070] FIG6 is a schematic diagram of a joint channel estimation method provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0071] FIG7 is a schematic diagram of a complementary frame structure provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0072] FIG8 is a schematic diagram of another complementary frame structure provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0073] FIG9 is a schematic diagram of another complementary frame structure provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0074] FIG10 is a schematic structural diagram of a communication device provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0075] FIG11 is a schematic structural diagram of another communication device provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0076] FIG12 is a schematic structural diagram of another communication device provided in an embodiment of the present application. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0077] The present application provides a communication method and apparatus. The method and apparatus are based on the same inventive concept. Since the method and apparatus solve similar problems, the implementation of the apparatus and method can refer to each other, and the repetitive parts will not be repeated.

[0078] In the description of this application, words such as "first" and "second" are used solely for descriptive purposes and should not be construed as indicating or implying relative importance or order. It should be noted that this application does not limit the order of appearance of "first," "second," etc. For example, "second" may appear before "first," and this is not a limitation in this application.

[0079] In the description of this application, "at least one (kind)" refers to one (kind) or more (kinds), and more (kinds) refers to two (kinds) or more than two (kinds). "At least one of the following" or similar expressions refers to any combination of these items, including any combination of single or plural items. For example, at least one of a, b, or c can represent: a, b, c, a and b, a and c, b and c, or a and b and c, where a, b, c can be single or multiple. In the description of this application, " / " means "or", for example, a / b means a or b.

[0080] Figure 1 is a schematic diagram of the architecture of a communication system used in an embodiment of the present application. As shown in Figure 1 , the communication system includes an access network 100 and a core network 200. Optionally, the communication system may also include the Internet 300. The radio access network (RAN) 100 may include at least one RAN node (such as 110a and 110b in Figure 1 ) and may also include at least one terminal (such as 120a-120j in Figure 1 ). The terminal is wirelessly connected to a radio access network device, and the radio access network device is wirelessly or wiredly connected to the core network. The core network device and the radio access network device may be independent and distinct physical devices, or the functions of the core network device and the logical functions of the radio access network device may be integrated into the same physical device, or a single physical device may integrate some of the functions of the core network device and some of the functions of the radio access network device. Terminals and radio access network devices may be connected to each other via wired or wireless connections. Figure 1 is merely a schematic diagram. The communication system may also include other network devices, such as wireless relay devices and wireless backhaul devices, which are not shown in Figure 1 .

[0081] A network device is a network-side device with wireless transceiver capabilities. A network device can be a device in a radio access network (RAN) that provides wireless communication capabilities for terminal devices, and is called a RAN device. The RAN can be an access network in the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP), such as 4G, 5G, or future-oriented 6G networks. The RAN can also be an open access network (O-RAN or ORAN), a cloud radio access network (CRAN), or a communication network of two or more of the above networks. RAN equipment can be a base station, evolved NodeB (eNodeB), transmission reception point (TRP) in LTE or Long Term Evolution Advanced (LTE-A) communication systems, a next-generation nodeB (gNB) in fifth-generation (5G) mobile communication systems, a next-generation base station in sixth-generation (6G) mobile communication systems, a base station in future mobile communication systems, a wireless fidelity (WiFi) system, a long-range radio (LoRa) system, or an access node in a connected vehicle system. RAN equipment can also be a module or unit that performs some of the functions of a base station, such as a centralized unit (CU), a distributed unit (DU), or a radio unit (RU). The CU here completes the functions of the base station's radio resource control protocol and packet data convergence protocol (PDCP), and can also complete the function of the service data adaptation protocol (SDAP); the DU completes the functions of the base station's radio link control layer and medium access control (MAC) layer, and can also complete part of the physical layer or all of the physical layer. For detailed descriptions of the above protocol layers, please refer to the relevant technical specifications of the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP).The CU and DU can be set up separately, or they can also be included in the same network element, such as a baseband unit (BBU). The RU can be included in a radio frequency device or radio frequency unit, such as a remote radio unit (RRU), an active antenna unit (AAU), or a remote radio head (RRH). In different systems, CU, DU, or RU may have different names, but those skilled in the art can understand their meanings. For example, in an ORAN system, CU may also be called O-CU (Open CU), DU may also be called O-DU, and RU may also be called O-RU. Any of the CU (or CU-CP, CU-UP), DU, and RU in this application may be implemented by a software module, a hardware module, or a combination of a software module and a hardware module. The radio access network device may be a macro base station (such as 110a in Figure 1), a micro base station or an indoor station (such as 110b in Figure 1), a relay node, a donor node, etc. The embodiments of this application do not limit the specific technology and specific device form adopted by the radio access network device. For the convenience of description, network equipment is used as the abbreviation of wireless access network equipment, and base station is used as an example of wireless access network equipment.

[0082] A terminal device is a device with wireless transceiver capabilities that can send signals to a base station or receive signals from a base station. A terminal device may also be referred to as a terminal, user equipment (UE), mobile station, mobile terminal, etc. Terminal devices can be widely used in various scenarios, such as device-to-device (D2D), vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communication, machine-type communication (MTC), Internet of Things (IoT), virtual reality, augmented reality, industrial control, autonomous driving, telemedicine, smart grid, smart furniture, smart office, smart wearable, smart transportation, smart city, etc. A terminal device may be a mobile phone, tablet computer, computer with wireless transceiver capabilities, wearable device, vehicle, airplane, ship, robot, robotic arm, smart home device, etc. The embodiments of this application do not limit the specific technology and specific device form adopted by the terminal device.

[0083] In this application, network devices and terminal devices can be fixed or mobile. They can be deployed on land, including indoors or outdoors, handheld or vehicle-mounted; on water; and on aircraft, balloons, and satellites. The embodiments of this application do not limit the application scenarios of network devices and terminal devices.

[0084] The roles of network devices and terminal devices can be relative. For example, the helicopter or drone 120i in Figure 1 can be configured as a mobile base station. To the terminal 120j accessing the wireless access network 100 via 120i, terminal 120i is a network device. However, to base station 110a, 120i is a terminal device, meaning that communication between 110a and 120i occurs via a wireless air interface protocol. Of course, communication between 110a and 120i can also occur via an interface protocol between network devices. In this case, 120i is also a network device relative to 110a. Therefore, both network devices and terminal devices can be collectively referred to as communication devices. 110a and 110b in Figure 1 can be referred to as communication devices with network device functionality, while 120a-120j in Figure 1 can be referred to as communication devices with terminal device functionality.

[0085] Network devices and terminal devices, network devices and network devices, and terminal devices and terminal devices can communicate through authorized spectrum, unauthorized spectrum, or both; can communicate through spectrum below 6 gigahertz (GHz), spectrum above 6 GHz, or spectrum below 6 GHz and spectrum above 6 GHz simultaneously. The embodiments of the present application do not limit the spectrum resources used for wireless communications.

[0086] In the embodiments of the present application, the functions of the network device may also be performed by a module (such as a chip) in the network device, or by a control subsystem that includes the network device functions. The control subsystem that includes the network device functions here may be a control center in the above-mentioned application scenarios such as smart grid, industrial control, smart transportation, and smart city. The functions of the terminal device may also be performed by a module (such as a chip or a modem) in the terminal device, or by a device that includes the terminal device functions.

[0087] In this application, a network device sends a downlink signal or downlink information to a terminal device, and the downlink information is carried on a downlink channel. A terminal device sends an uplink signal or uplink information to a network device, and the uplink information is carried on an uplink channel. In order to communicate with the network device, the terminal device needs to establish a wireless connection with the cell controlled by the network device. The cell with which the terminal device has established a wireless connection is called the serving cell of the terminal device. When the terminal device communicates with the serving cell, it will also be interfered with by signals from neighboring cells.

[0088] The following is an introduction to the technical terms involved in this application.

[0089] 1. Antenna port:

[0090] The antenna port can be simply referred to as a port. It can be understood as a transmitting antenna recognized by the receiving device, or a transmitting antenna that can be distinguished in space. An antenna port can be pre-configured for each virtual antenna, and each virtual antenna can be a weighted combination of multiple physical antennas. Each antenna port can correspond to a reference signal. Therefore, each antenna port can be called a reference signal port, for example, a sounding reference signal (SRS) port, etc. In an embodiment of the present application, the reference signal can be a non-precoded reference signal or a precoded reference signal, and this application does not limit this. When the reference signal is a precoded reference signal, the reference signal port can be a transmitting antenna port. The transmitting antenna port can refer to an independent transceiver unit (TxRU).

[0091] 2. Spatial domain vector:

[0092] A spatial vector can also be called a spatial component vector, beam vector, spatial beam basis vector, or spatial basis vector. A spatial vector can correspond to a beam or a beam direction. A spatial vector can be one of the vectors used to construct a channel matrix. Each element in a spatial vector can represent the weight of each antenna port. Based on the weights of each antenna port represented by each element in the spatial vector, the signals from each antenna port are linearly superimposed to form an area with a strong signal in a certain spatial direction.

[0093] For the convenience of explanation below, it is assumed that the spatial vector is denoted as u. The length of the spatial vector u can be the number of transmitting antenna ports N in a polarization direction. s , N s ≥1 and is an integer. The spatial vector can be, for example, of length N sThis application does not limit this.

[0094] In one implementation, the spatial domain vector is a discrete Fourier transform (DFT) vector. The DFT vector may refer to a vector in a DFT matrix.

[0095] In one implementation, the spatial domain vector is a conjugate transposed vector of the DFT vector. The DFT conjugate transposed vector may refer to a column vector in a conjugate transposed matrix of the DFT matrix.

[0096] In one implementation, the spatial domain vector is an oversampled DFT vector. The oversampled DFT vector may refer to a vector in an oversampled DFT matrix.

[0097] In one implementation, the spatial domain vector may be, for example, a two-dimensional (2D)-DFT vector v defined in the type II codebook in NR protocol 38.214 release 15 (R15). l,m In other words, the spatial domain vector can be a 2D-DFT vector or an oversampled 2D-DFT vector. For the sake of brevity, the detailed description of the 2D-DFT vector is omitted here.

[0098] 3. Frequency domain vector:

[0099] Frequency domain vectors, also known as frequency domain component vectors, frequency domain basis vectors, or frequency domain basis, are vectors that represent the frequency domain channel's variation. A frequency domain vector corresponds to a delay path or a delay domain path. Each frequency domain vector can represent a specific variation. As a signal travels through a wireless channel, it can travel through multiple paths from the transmitting antenna to the receiving antenna. Multipath delay causes frequency-selective fading, which is a frequency domain channel variation. Therefore, different frequency domain vectors can be used to represent the frequency domain channel variation caused by delays on different transmission paths.

[0100] Frequency domain vector u f The length can be recorded as N f , N f is a positive integer, the frequency domain vector can be, for example, of length N fColumn vector or row vector of. The length of the frequency domain vector can be determined by the number of frequency domain units to be reported pre-configured in the reporting bandwidth, or by the length of the reporting bandwidth, or it can be a predefined value. This application does not limit the length of the frequency domain vector. Among them, the reporting bandwidth can, for example, refer to the CSI reporting bandwidth (csi-ReportingBand) carried in the CSI reporting pre-configuration in the high-layer signaling (such as the radio resource control (RRC) message). In this application, predefined can refer to pre-configured or stored in the device, or can be predefined by the protocol.

[0101] For example, the frequency domain vector or frequency domain basis can be a DFT basis related to at least one of the bandwidth of the downlink reference signal and the frequency domain granularity size of the downlink reference signal, or a delay value basis based on M bits of quantization, or a basis based on cyclic shift. Each delay value basis in the M-bit quantized delay value basis corresponds to a delay path or a delay domain path, such as 10ns, which can be predefined or notified to the terminal device by the network device, or the terminal device notifies the network device, and quantized into an M-bit delay value, that is, a delay value basis. The basis based on cyclic shift can be a basis composed of N cyclic shift sequences, each basis is a cyclic shift sequence, and each cyclic shift sequence corresponds to a cyclic shift mode of a delay path or a frequency domain basis.

[0102] After determining the frequency domain basis or frequency domain vector, the indexes corresponding to all frequency domain basis can be determined. Each frequency domain basis corresponds to an index, and each index can be used to determine a frequency domain basis. For example, if there are N frequency domain basis, one possible method is to index the frequency domain basis from 1 to N. Another possible method is to use the value of the frequency domain basis as the index. For example, if the frequency domain basis is the delay value basis, the index of the frequency domain basis corresponding to 10ns can be 10.

[0103] 4. Doppler shift and time domain vector:

[0104] Doppler shift, also known as Doppler frequency offset, represents the frequency shift caused by the movement of a terminal device or network device or other factors. Doppler shift can indicate the magnitude of the frequency offset or a pattern of channel time-domain variation. As signals travel through wireless channels at different times, multipath and the mobility of the transmitter or receiver cause time-selective fading, which is a variation in the time-domain channel. Each delay path of a channel may experience different mobility environments, so each delay path or frequency-domain basis corresponds to one or more Doppler shifts. This correspondence indicates that the energy or amplitude of the coefficient corresponding to the Doppler shift on the delay path or frequency-domain basis is greater than 0, indicating the specific time-domain channel variation experienced by that delay path. Accordingly, the Doppler shift can also be said to be associated with the delay path or frequency-domain basis. A delay path or frequency-domain basis and a corresponding Doppler shift, or a Doppler shift and an associated delay path or frequency-domain basis, constitute a Doppler shift and frequency-domain basis pair. This frequency-domain basis pair also corresponds to the coefficients described above. In the present application, the energy of the combining coefficient may be the amplitude of the combining coefficient or the square of the amplitude, or in other words, the energy of the combining coefficient may be the modulus of the amplitude of the combining coefficient or the square of the modulus.

[0105] Time domain vectors, also known as time domain component vectors, time domain basis vectors, or Doppler domain basis, are vectors that represent the channel's time domain variation. A time domain vector or Doppler basis corresponds to a Doppler path or Doppler shift. Each time domain vector represents a specific variation. As signals travel through wireless channels at different times, multipath and the mobility of the transmitter or receiver cause time-selective fading, representing a change in the time domain channel. Therefore, different time domain vectors can be used to represent the channel's time domain variation.

[0106] Time domain vector u t The length can be recorded as N t , N t is a positive integer, the time domain vector can be, for example, of length N t The length of the time domain vector can be determined by the number of joint observation moments. For example, if we focus on the measurement results of S times CSI-RS, then N t =S; the time domain vector can be the DFT basis.

[0107] For example, the time domain vector or Doppler basis can be a DFT basis related to at least one of the number of downlink reference signals and the time interval of the downlink reference signals, or a Doppler value basis based on P-bit quantization, or a basis based on cyclic shift. Each Doppler value basis in the P-bit quantized Doppler value basis corresponds to a Doppler offset, such as 20Hz, which can be quantized into a P-bit Doppler offset, i.e., a Doppler value basis, by predefinition or notification of the network device to the terminal device, or notification of the terminal device to the network device. The basis based on cyclic shift can be a basis composed of Q cyclic shift sequences, each basis being a cyclic shift sequence, and each cyclic shift sequence corresponding to a Doppler offset or time domain vector cyclic shift mode.

[0108] After the Doppler basis or time domain vector is determined, the indices corresponding to all Doppler bases can be determined. Each Doppler basis corresponds to an index, and each index can be used to determine a Doppler basis, and thus its corresponding Doppler shift. For example, when there are a total of Q Doppler bases, one possible approach is to number the Doppler bases from 1 to Q as indices. Another possible approach is to use the Doppler shift value corresponding to the Doppler basis as an index. For example, when the Doppler basis is a Doppler value basis, the index of the Doppler basis corresponding to 20 Hz can be 20.

[0109] 5. Space-frequency vector pair:

[0110] A space-frequency vector pair can also be called a space-frequency component vector. A space-domain vector and a frequency-domain vector can be combined to obtain a space-frequency vector pair. In other words, a space-frequency vector pair can include a space-domain vector and a frequency-domain vector. A space-frequency component matrix can be obtained from the space-domain vector and the frequency-domain vector in a space-frequency vector pair. For example, multiplying a space-domain vector by the conjugate transpose of a frequency-domain vector can obtain a space-frequency component matrix. The space-frequency component matrix described here is relative to the space-frequency matrix described below. Since a space-frequency matrix can be obtained by weighted summation of multiple space-frequency component matrices, each item used for weighting can be called a component of a space-frequency matrix, that is, the space-frequency component matrix mentioned here.

[0111] 6. Space-frequency-time vector group:

[0112] A space-frequency-time vector group can also be called a space-frequency-time component vector. A space-domain vector, a frequency-domain vector, and a time-domain vector can be combined to form a space-frequency-time vector group. In other words, a space-frequency-time vector group can include a space-domain vector, a frequency-domain vector, and a time-domain vector. A space-frequency-time component three-dimensional matrix can be obtained from the space-domain vector, the frequency-domain vector, and the time-domain vector in a space-frequency-time vector group. For example, by performing a tensor product multiplication on a space-domain vector, a frequency-domain vector, and a time-domain vector, a space-frequency-time component three-dimensional matrix can be obtained. The space-frequency-time component three-dimensional matrix described here is relative to the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix described below. Since a space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix can be obtained by weighted summation of multiple space-frequency-time component three-dimensional matrices, each item used for weighting can be called a component of a space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix, that is, the space-frequency-time component three-dimensional matrix mentioned here.

[0113] 7. Space-frequency matrix:

[0114] In the embodiments of the present application, the space-frequency matrix can be understood as an intermediate quantity used to determine the channel matrix corresponding to each frequency domain unit. For a terminal device, the space-frequency matrix can be determined by the channel matrix corresponding to each frequency domain unit. For an access network device, the space-frequency matrix can be obtained by taking the weighted sum of multiple space-frequency component matrices to recover the channel matrix.

[0115] For example, the space-frequency matrix can be denoted as H, Among them, w0 to Yes and N f The frequency domain units correspond to N f column vectors, each column vector can be a channel vector or channel matrix corresponding to each frequency domain unit, and the length of each column vector can be N s The N f The column vectors correspond to N f The channel vector of frequency domain units. That is, the space-frequency matrix can be regarded as N f The joint matrix is ​​composed of the channel vectors corresponding to the frequency domain units.

[0116] In one possible design, the space-frequency matrix can correspond to a receive antenna port. This corresponds to a receive antenna port because the terminal device can provide feedback on the frequency domain vector, space domain vector, and combining coefficients for each receive antenna port. The space-frequency matrix determined by the access network device based on the terminal device's feedback is the space-frequency matrix corresponding to the receive antenna port.

[0117] It should be understood that the space-frequency matrix is ​​a form of expression for determining the channel matrix and should not constitute any limitation to this application. For example, the column vectors in the space-frequency matrix can be connected in order from left to right, or arranged according to other predefined rules to obtain a length of N.s ×N f The vector of , which can be called the space-frequency vector.

[0118] It should also be understood that the dimensions of the space-frequency matrix and space-frequency vector shown above are only examples and should not constitute any limitation to this application. For example, the space-frequency matrix can also be of dimension N f ×N s Each row vector may correspond to a frequency domain unit, so as to determine the channel vector of the corresponding frequency domain unit.

[0119] In addition, when the transmitting antenna is configured with multiple polarization directions, the dimension of the space-frequency matrix can be further expanded. For example, for a dual-polarization antenna, the dimension of the space-frequency matrix can be 2N s ×N f or N f ×2N s It should be understood that the present application does not limit the number of polarization directions of the transmitting antenna.

[0120] Furthermore, the space-frequency matrix corresponding to a receiving antenna port can also be expressed as

[0121] One or more spatial domain vectors may constitute a matrix W1, where each column vector in W1 corresponds to a spatial domain vector. One or more frequency domain vectors may constitute a matrix W3, where each column vector in W3 corresponds to a frequency domain vector. Represents the merging coefficient matrix.

[0122] When the number of receiving antenna ports is greater than 1, the spatial domain vectors used by each receiving antenna port may not be exactly the same, that is, each receiving antenna port uses an independent spatial domain vector; the spatial domain vectors used by each receiving antenna port may also be the same, that is, multiple receiving antenna ports share L spatial domain vectors.

[0123] When the number of receiving antenna ports is greater than 1, the frequency domain vectors used by each receiving antenna port may not be exactly the same, that is, each receiving antenna port uses an independent frequency domain vector; the frequency domain vectors used by each receiving antenna port may also be the same, that is, multiple receiving antenna ports share M frequency domain vectors.

[0124] In this case, the channel vector corresponding to each frequency domain unit on the i-th receiving antenna port can be based on the above L spatial domain vectors and M i The frequency domain vectors are constructed.

[0125] If a dual-polarization transmitting antenna is used, L spatial vectors can be selected for each polarization direction. Then, the dimension of W1 can be 2N s×2L. In one possible implementation, the two polarization directions can use the same L spatial vectors At this time, W1 can be expressed as:

[0126] in, Represents the i-th spatial domain vector among the selected L spatial domain vectors, i = 0, 1, ..., L-1.

[0127] For the i-th receiving antenna port, W3 H The dimension can be M i ×N f Each column vector in W3 can be a frequency domain vector. At this time, each spatial domain vector in W1 and each frequency domain vector in W3 can form a spatial frequency vector pair, and each spatial frequency vector pair can correspond to a merging coefficient, so there are 2L spatial domain vectors and M i 2L×M constructed by frequency domain vectors i Space-frequency vector pairs can be combined with 2L×M i The merging coefficients correspond one to one.

[0128] For the i-th receiving antenna port, It can be made of the above 2L×M i The merging coefficient matrix is ​​composed of merging coefficients, and its dimension can be 2L×M i The combined coefficient matrix The lth row in may correspond to the lth spatial vector in the first polarization direction among the 2L spatial vectors. The merging coefficient matrix The L+lth row in the matrix can correspond to the lth spatial vector in the second polarization direction among the 2L spatial vectors. The mth (0≤m≤M i -1 and m is an integer) columns can correspond to M i The mth frequency domain vector among the frequency domain vectors.

[0129] The position of the space-frequency vector pair used to construct the space-frequency matrix specifically refers to the position of the spatial domain vector used to construct the space-frequency matrix within the spatial domain vector reported by the terminal device, and the position of the frequency domain vector used to construct the space-frequency matrix within the frequency domain vector reported by the terminal device. Since each space-frequency vector corresponds to a non-zero combining coefficient (referred to as a non-zero coefficient), the position of the space-frequency vector pair used to construct the space-frequency matrix is ​​also the position of the non-zero coefficient.

[0130] 8. Space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix:

[0131] In the embodiments of the present application, the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix can be understood as an intermediate quantity used to determine the channel vector or matrix corresponding to each frequency domain unit at a specific time. For a terminal device, the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix can be determined by the channel matrix corresponding to each frequency domain unit obtained from downlink reference signals at several different times. For an access network device, the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix can be obtained by taking the weighted sum of multiple space-frequency-time component three-dimensional matrices to recover the channel matrix.

[0132] In one possible design, the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix can correspond to the receiving antenna port, and each receiving port expands its corresponding space-frequency matrix to N in the time dimension. t Dimension, take the space-frequency matrix obtained by the corresponding downlink reference signal in each time dimension, and finally obtain the space-frequency three-dimensional matrix, whose dimension can be N s ×N f ×N t .

[0133] In addition, when the transmitting antenna is configured with multiple polarization directions, the dimension of the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix can be further expanded. For example, for a dual-polarization antenna, the dimension of the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix can be 2N s ×N f ×N t or N f ×2N s ×N t It should be understood that the present application does not limit the number of polarization directions of the transmitting antenna.

[0134] Furthermore, the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix corresponding to a receiving antenna port can also be expressed as:

[0135] Among them, one or more vectors can form a matrix W1, and each column vector in W1 corresponds to a spatial domain vector. One or more frequency domain vectors can form a matrix W3, and each column vector in W3 corresponds to a frequency domain vector. One or more time domain vectors can form a matrix W4, and each column vector in W4 corresponds to a time domain vector.

[0136] Among them, for the N-dimensional matrix R, the dimensions are I1×I2×…×I N , operation⊙ n ,n=1,2,…,N is defined as: for the two-dimensional matrix Q n , with dimensions of a×I n , n∈[1,2,…,N].

[0137] R new =Q n ⊙ n R, whose dimensions are I1×I2×…×I n-1 ×a×In+1 ×…×I N .

[0138] in,

[0139] For the i-th receiving antenna port, It can be made of the above 2L×M i ×S merging coefficients constitute a three-dimensional matrix of merging coefficients, whose dimension can be 2L×M i ×S. The three-dimensional matrix of the combined coefficients The lth first dimension in the 2L spatial vectors may correspond to the lth spatial vector in the first polarization direction, and the combined coefficient three-dimensional matrix The L+lth first dimension in the 2Lth spatial vector corresponds to the lth spatial vector in the second polarization direction. The mth (0≤m≤M i -1 and m is an integer) the second dimension can correspond to M i The mth frequency domain vector in the frequency domain vectors. The three-dimensional matrix of the combined coefficients The s-th (0≤s≤S-1 and s is an integer) third dimension in can correspond to the s-th time domain vector in the S time domain vectors.

[0140] The position of the space-frequency-time vector group used to construct the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix specifically refers to the position of the spatial domain vector used to construct the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix within the spatial domain vector reported by the terminal device, the position of the frequency domain vector used to construct the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix within the frequency domain vector reported by the terminal device, and the position of the time domain vector used to construct the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix within the frequency domain vector reported by the terminal device. Since each space-frequency-time vector group corresponds to a non-zero combining coefficient (referred to as a non-zero space-frequency-time coefficient), the position of the space-frequency-time vector group used to construct the space-frequency-time three-dimensional matrix is ​​also the position of the non-zero space-frequency-time coefficient.

[0141] 9. Space-frequency combining coefficient:

[0142] The space-frequency combining coefficient can also be called combining coefficient, weighting coefficient, etc. Each combining coefficient can correspond to a space domain vector and a frequency domain vector, or in other words, each combining coefficient can correspond to a space-frequency vector pair. Each combining coefficient is a weighting coefficient of the space-frequency component matrix constructed by the space-frequency vector pair to which it corresponds. A combining coefficient corresponds to a space domain vector and a frequency domain vector. Specifically, the combining coefficient matrix The element in the i-th row and j-th column is the combining coefficient corresponding to the space-frequency vector pair composed of the i-th space vector and the j-th frequency vector. For dual-polarization antennas, the above i∈{1,2,...,2L}, the length of each space vector is 2N s.

[0143] Each combining coefficient includes amplitude and phase. For example, the combining coefficient can be expressed as ae jθ , a is the amplitude of the combining coefficient, θ is the phase of the combining coefficient. In addition, when the amplitude b is used to normalize the combining coefficient in this application, the normalized combining coefficient can be expressed as (a / b)e jθ , that is, the amplitude of the normalized merging coefficient is (a / b), and the amplitude of the normalized merging coefficient is θ.

[0144] Some combining coefficients may have amplitudes of zero or close to zero, and their corresponding quantization values ​​may be zero. Combining coefficients whose amplitudes are quantized using a quantization value of zero are referred to as combining coefficients with zero amplitudes. Correspondingly, some combining coefficients have larger amplitudes, and their corresponding quantization values ​​are non-zero. Combining coefficients whose amplitudes are quantized using a non-zero quantization value are referred to as combining coefficients with amplitudes greater than zero.

[0145] 10, space-frequency time combining coefficient:

[0146] The space-frequency-time combining coefficient can also be called combining coefficient, space-frequency-time weighting coefficient, etc. Each space-frequency-time combining coefficient can correspond to a space domain vector, a frequency domain vector and a time domain vector. Each space-frequency-time combining coefficient is a weighting coefficient of the space-frequency-time component three-dimensional matrix constructed by the space-frequency-time vector group to which it corresponds. A space-frequency-time combining coefficient corresponds to a space domain vector, a frequency domain vector and a time domain vector. Specifically, the space-frequency-time combining coefficient three-dimensional matrix The (i, j, k) element in is the space-frequency-time combining coefficient corresponding to the space-frequency-time vector group of the i-th space-domain vector, the j-th frequency-domain vector, and the k-th time-domain vector.

[0147] Each space-frequency time combining coefficient includes amplitude and phase. For example, the space-frequency time combining coefficient can be expressed as ae jθ , a is the amplitude of the combining coefficient in the space-frequency time, and θ is the phase of the combining coefficient in the space-frequency time.

[0148] The amplitude values ​​of some space-frequency combining coefficients may be zero or close to zero, and their corresponding quantization values ​​may be zero. Space-frequency combining coefficients whose amplitudes are quantized using a quantization value of zero are referred to as space-frequency combining coefficients with zero amplitude. Correspondingly, the amplitude values ​​of some space-frequency combining coefficients are large, and their corresponding quantization values ​​are non-zero. Space-frequency combining coefficients whose amplitudes are quantized using a non-zero quantization value are referred to as space-frequency combining coefficients with amplitudes greater than zero.

[0149] 11. Duplex communication:

[0150] In wireless communication systems, communications can be divided into different types according to the types of transmitting nodes and receiving nodes. In LTE or LTE-A communication systems and NR systems, communications can be mainly divided into frequency division duplex (FDD) mode and time division duplex (TDD) mode according to the different duplex modes. For wireless communication systems operating in TDD mode, the downlink carrier and uplink carrier of the system are carriers of the same carrier frequency. For wireless communication systems operating in FDD mode, the downlink carrier and uplink carrier of the system are in different frequency bands.

[0151] 12. Channel Estimation:

[0152] In a TDD system, before transmitting data to a terminal device, the access network device can estimate the uplink channel based on the received uplink reference signal and obtain the downlink channel based on the reciprocity of the uplink and downlink channels, thereby improving the downlink signal transmission quality or rate. However, the quality of the uplink reference signal received by the access network device is limited by the transmit power of the terminal device and the interference of other uplink signals, resulting in errors in the downlink channel obtained by the access network device, which in turn affects the transmission of the downlink signal. In this application, the uplink reference signal includes but is not limited to the SRS; the downlink reference signal includes but is not limited to the CSI-RS.

[0153] SRS is a reference signal transmitted by terminal devices. In NR systems, network devices can use SRS to obtain uplink channel information. In TDD systems, network devices can also leverage channel reciprocity to obtain downlink channel information by measuring SRS. This information can then be used for precoding data for user transmission.

[0154] Network devices can use uplink SRS signals to transform them from antenna-frequency domain signals into beam-delay domain signals. For each beam, the power delay profile (PDP) is calculated. Furthermore, network devices can perform delay-domain noise reduction. This involves applying a hard window to the non-zero path portion of the delay-domain signal based on the PDP, treating the signal outside the hard window as noise power. The noise outside the hard window is set to zero, and the non-zero path within the hard window is denoised using the estimated noise power. Beam-domain noise reduction can then be performed, where the network device retains only the strongest beams and sets the energy of the remaining beams to zero, treating them as interference or noise. After noise reduction, the network device obtains CSI information through the SRS.

[0155] However, current channel estimation based on uplink reference signals such as SRS in TDD is limited by the uplink power of terminal devices and the limited uplink reference signal resources, resulting in poor quality of reference signals at the cell edge. For example, in SRS channel estimation, there may be signal paths where the signal power is comparable to the interference energy, resulting in inaccurate measurement of weak signal paths. In addition, when there are a large number of RRC connected users, the uplink reference signal transmission period is long, resulting in a mismatch between the precoding and the terminal device's channel at the corresponding moment, leading to performance degradation. Therefore, the reliability of channel estimation needs to be improved.

[0156] In addition, in the FDD system, in order to improve the accuracy of the access network device in acquiring the downlink channel, the terminal device can estimate the downlink channel based on the received downlink reference signal and feed back the downlink channel information to the access network device. Since the downlink channel information fed back by the terminal device is used to assist the network device in channel estimation based on the uplink reference signal, the downlink channel information fed back by the terminal device can be partial information of the downlink channel to reduce feedback overhead. For example, the access network device sends a downlink reference signal to the terminal device. The terminal device can determine the combining coefficient matrix, at least one spatial domain vector and multiple frequency domain vectors corresponding to each receiving antenna port based on the downlink reference signal. Optionally, the terminal device can feed back the channel information to the network device through a precoding matrix indicator (PMI).

[0157] Among them, PMI is an indication signal sent by the terminal device. In the NR system, the terminal device sends PMI to the network device, so that the network device finds the codeword closest to the downlink channel observed by the terminal device in the predefined codebook, and then obtains part of the downlink channel information, and uses the channel information for precoding to transmit data to the user. However, due to the uplink feedback overhead, the feedback of PMI needs to reduce the amount of information of the channel feedback by quantizing the channel measurement results, and the quantized channel measurement results will lead to a decrease in feedback accuracy, so the channel measurement results are reduced. For example, as shown in Figure 2, based on the measurement of the downlink reference signal, the terminal device can feedback PMI to the network device. PMI indicates the merging coefficient of the shaded position in the figure. However, due to the quantization loss of PMI, the feedback accuracy of the illustrated position will be reduced.

[0158] Therefore, the reliability of channel measurement based on uplink reference signals such as SRS and the reliability of channel measurement based on downlink reference signals such as CSI-RS need to be improved.

[0159] The present application provides a communication method that can combine uplink channel estimation results and downlink channel estimation results to perform channel estimation and improve channel estimation performance. The method can be performed by a first communication device and a second communication device. The first communication device can be a terminal device, a network device, a component in a terminal device, or a component in a network device. In the present application, the component may include, for example, at least one of a chip, a chip system, a processor, a transceiver, a processing unit, or a transceiver unit. The method is described below with reference to FIG3. In FIG3, the first communication device is a terminal device and the second communication device is a network device. It can be understood that the method can be implemented with reference to the method when the first communication device is a network device and the second communication device is a terminal device, and will not be repeated in the present application.

[0160] As shown in FIG3 , the communication method provided in the embodiment of the present application may include steps S101 to S103:

[0161] S101: A terminal device receives a first reference signal through a first port and sends a second reference signal through a second port, where the first port is associated with the second port.

[0162] It can be understood that the timing of receiving the first reference signal and sending the second reference signal in S101 is not limited. The first reference signal can be received first and then the second reference signal is sent, or the second reference signal can be sent first and then the first reference signal is received, or the second reference signal can be sent and the first reference signal can be received simultaneously.

[0163] The first reference signal may be a reference signal received by the terminal device from the network device, and the second reference signal may be a reference signal sent by the terminal device to the network device. Optionally, the first reference signal is a downlink reference signal and the second reference signal is an uplink reference signal. For example, the first reference signal may be a CSI-RS and / or the second reference signal may be an SRS.

[0164] In addition, when the first communication device is a network device and the second communication device is a terminal device, the first reference signal may be an SRS, and / or the second reference signal may be a CSI-RS.

[0165] It can be understood that the first port being associated with the second port may refer to an association relationship between the first port and the second port. In this application, the association relationship may also be referred to as a corresponding relationship.

[0166] As an example, the association between the first port and the second port can be reflected as follows: the first port and the second port correspond to the same physical port or antenna. For example, the first port belongs to a first port set, and the ports in the first port set can also be referred to as receive ports, such as receive port 0, receive port 1, receive port 2, and receive port 3. The second port belongs to a second port set, and the ports in the second port set can also be referred to as transmit ports, such as transmit port 0, transmit port 1, transmit port 2, and transmit port 3. The ports in the first port set are all used to receive the first reference signal and / or other reference signals, and the ports in the second port set are all used to transmit the second reference signal and / or other reference signals. The ports in the first port set and the ports in the second port set can have a one-to-one correspondence. For example, receive port 0 and transmit port 0 correspond to the same physical port or antenna, receive port 1 and transmit port 1 correspond to the same physical port or antenna, and so on.

[0167] As another example, the association between the first port and the second port can be reflected as follows: the first port and the second port correspond to the same antenna port or logical port. For example, the first port belongs to a first port set, and the ports in the first port set can also be referred to as receive antenna ports, such as receive antenna port 0, receive antenna port 1, receive antenna port 2, and receive antenna port 3; the second port belongs to a second port set, and the ports in the second port set can also be referred to as transmit antenna ports, such as transmit antenna port 0, transmit antenna port 1, transmit antenna port 2, and transmit antenna port 3. The antenna ports in the first port set are all used to receive the first reference signal and / or other reference signals, and the antenna ports in the second port set are all used to transmit the second reference signal and / or other reference signals. The ports in the first port set and the ports in the second port set can have a one-to-one correspondence. For example, receive antenna port 0 and transmit antenna port 0 correspond to the same antenna port, receive antenna port 1 and transmit antenna port 1 correspond to the same antenna port, and so on.

[0168] Optionally, the association relationship between the ports in the first port set and the ports in the second port set may be configured by the network device, or may be predefined. In the present application, network device configuration may refer to the network device indicating to the communication device via a configuration message, wherein the configuration message may include signaling or messages such as RRC messages, MAC CE or DCI. Predefined may refer to definition through predefined configuration information or protocol.

[0169] For example, the network device may send configuration information to the terminal device to configure the correspondence between the ports in the first port set and the ports in the second port set. For example, the first port set may correspond to the ports with the same port index in the second port set by default. For example, port 0 in the first port set corresponds to port 0 in the second port set. The configuration information may then be used to indicate or configure the index of the ports in the first port set. For another example, the configuration information may also carry multiple indexes of the ports in the first port set and multiple indexes of the ports in the second port set in sequence, wherein the ports with the same index in the first port set and the second port set correspond to each other. For example, the configuration information carries the indexes {3, 2, 1, 0} of the ports in the first port set and the indexes {0, 1, 2, 3} of the ports in the second port set, which means that receiving port 3 corresponds to sending port 0, receiving port 2 corresponds to sending port 1, and so on.

[0170] S102: The terminal device sends first information, where the first information is obtained based on first channel information, which is obtained based on a first reference signal. The first channel information and second channel information are used for channel estimation, and the second channel information is obtained based on a second reference signal.

[0171] The terminal device may determine the first channel information based on the first reference signal. For example, the first reference signal may be a CSI-RS, and the second reference signal may be an SRS. Accordingly, the first channel information may be a PMI or a transmission precoding matrix indicator (TPMI). The network device may obtain the second channel information based on the second reference signal. The second channel information may be CSI information.

[0172] In addition, when the first communication device is a network device and the second communication device is a terminal device, the first reference signal may be an SRS and the second reference signal may be a CSI-RS. Accordingly, the first channel information may be CSI information and the second channel information may be PMI or TPMI.

[0173] Optionally, the network device may receive the first information and perform channel estimation based on the first information and the second channel information. The second channel information may be obtained based on the second reference signal after the network device receives the second reference signal.

[0174] In a possible embodiment, the first information may be used as a PMI, or the first information may be included in the PMI.

[0175] Optionally, the first channel information includes a first matrix, the first matrix corresponds to at least one spatial domain vector and multiple frequency domain vectors, the first matrix includes multiple combining coefficients, each combining coefficient is a combining coefficient of a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector, and the first information is used to indicate the amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix.

[0176] Taking the example of a downlink reference signal as the first reference signal, the terminal device can determine the channel matrix (i.e., the space-frequency matrix) corresponding to each receive antenna port based on the first reference signal, and thus can determine the corresponding combining coefficient matrix based on the space-frequency matrix. The following explanation uses the space-frequency matrix corresponding to a receive antenna port as an example. The terminal device can perform channel estimation based on the downlink reference signal received by that receive antenna port, determine the corresponding space-frequency matrix, and then determine the combining coefficient matrix based on the space-frequency matrix. The combining coefficient matrix is ​​the first matrix.

[0177] Exemplarily, the space-frequency matrix H can be expressed as:

[0178] Among them, each column vector in W1 corresponds to a spatial domain vector, and each column vector in W3 corresponds to a frequency domain vector. is the merging coefficient matrix, the merging coefficient matrix The merging coefficient in the i-th row and j-th column in W1 corresponds to the i-th spatial vector in W1 and the j-th frequency vector in W3. It can be understood that each merging coefficient represents the signal amplitude and phase at the corresponding spatial vector and frequency vector positions.

[0179] Figure 4 shows the merging coefficient matrix, in which each small square represents a merging coefficient. Each small square here only represents the position of a merging coefficient, that is, it represents the correspondence between the merging coefficient and the spatial domain vector and the frequency domain vector. In the horizontal axis direction, the merging coefficients located on the same horizontal axis correspond to the same spatial domain vector; in the vertical axis direction, the merging coefficients located on the same vertical axis correspond to the same frequency domain vector. The dotted box in the figure indicates that the merging coefficients on the same vertical axis correspond to the same frequency domain vector. For example, in the figure, merging coefficient 1 corresponds to spatial domain vector 1 and frequency domain vector 0; merging coefficient 2 corresponds to spatial domain vector 2 and frequency domain vector 4. The position of the merging coefficient can be represented by the index of the spatial domain vector and the frequency domain vector, or in other words, the position of the merging coefficient in the merging coefficient matrix can be determined using the spatial domain vector index and the frequency domain vector index. For example, merging coefficient 1 can be identified as (1, 0), 1 represents the index of the spatial domain vector corresponding to merging coefficient 1, and 0 represents the index of the frequency domain vector corresponding to merging coefficient 1.

[0180] It can be understood that the first channel information is the combining coefficient matrix shown in FIG4 (hereinafter referred to as the first matrix), and the first information may include one or more combining coefficients in the first matrix.

[0181] It can also be understood that the first port corresponds to at least one first matrix, that is, the first information may include at least one first matrix. If the first port corresponds to multiple first matrices, the multiple first matrices may correspond to different time domain vectors.

[0182] Optionally, the terminal device may obtain the second information and, based on the second information, learn which information of the amplitude and phase of the combining coefficient that needs to be fed back by the first information, so as to reasonably feed back the information required by the network device and reduce the feedback overhead. For example, when the second information indicates the amplitude of the feedback combining coefficient, the first information may indicate the amplitude of the combining coefficient without the need to feed back the phase of the combining coefficient. In addition, the terminal device may also learn based on a predefined information that the amplitude and / or phase of the combining coefficient needs to be fed back. For example, the second information may be determined by predefinition or by notification from the network device to the terminal device, or by notification from the terminal device to the network device.

[0183] As a possible embodiment, the amplitude of the combining coefficient included in the first information is normalized based on the amplitude of the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude, thereby reducing feedback overhead. For example, the first information may include the amplitude of the at least one combining coefficient normalized based on the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude. In addition, the first information may also include the phase of the at least one combining coefficient.

[0184] For example, the amplitude of the largest combining coefficient is normalized to 1, and the amplitudes of the other combining coefficients are normalized to values ​​between 0 and 1. The normalization method can be to use a normalization function, or to determine the normalized amplitude value by looking up a table. As an example, one combining coefficient in at least one combining coefficient is represented by ae jθ , a is the amplitude of the combining coefficient, θ is the phase of the combining coefficient, the amplitude of the maximum combining coefficient is b, then the normalized combining coefficient is expressed as (a / b)e jθ , (a / b) is the amplitude of the normalized merging coefficient, and θ is the phase of the normalized merging coefficient.

[0185] In addition, the normalized amplitude values ​​of one or more combining coefficients may be mapped to one or more bits, thereby indicating the normalized amplitude values ​​by one or more bits, thereby achieving amplitude quantization. It is understood that the first information may include the one or more bits for indicating the normalized amplitude values ​​of one or more combining coefficients in a quantized manner.

[0186] The following describes how to determine the maximum merging coefficient.

[0187] (1) The maximum-magnitude combining coefficient may be a combining coefficient with the maximum magnitude among all the combining coefficients of the first matrix.

[0188] For example, if the terminal device obtains the first matrix shown in Figure 4 based on the first reference signal, the maximum amplitude combining coefficient may be the maximum amplitude combining coefficient in the first matrix. The terminal device may normalize the amplitude of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix based on the maximum amplitude combining coefficient, and report the normalized amplitude of at least one combining coefficient. Optionally, the terminal device may also report the phase of at least one combining coefficient.

[0189] (2) The combining coefficient with the largest magnitude may be the combining coefficient with the largest magnitude among all the combining coefficients corresponding to the first port.

[0190] If the first port corresponds to a plurality of first matrices, the first information may include a maximum magnitude combining coefficient among the plurality of first matrices. For example, the plurality of first matrices correspond to different time domain vectors.

[0191] (3) The maximum-magnitude combining coefficient may be the combining coefficient with the largest magnitude among the at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information. For example, when multiple combining coefficients need to be indicated, the combining coefficient with the largest magnitude may be determined from the multiple combining coefficients as the maximum-magnitude combining coefficient, and the other combining coefficients may be normalized.

[0192] For example, the merging coefficients that need to be reported are the merging coefficient 1 (1, 0) and the merging coefficient 2 (2, 4) in the first matrix shown in FIG4 , and the amplitude of the merging coefficient 1 (1, 0) is greater than the amplitude of the merging coefficient 2 (2, 4). In this case, the amplitude of the merging coefficient 1 (1, 0) can be normalized to 1, and the amplitude of the merging coefficient 2 (2, 4) can be normalized to a positive number less than 1 based on the amplitude of the merging coefficient 1 (1, 0). The first information may indicate the normalized amplitude of the merging coefficient 1 (1, 0) and the normalized amplitude of the merging coefficient 2 (2, 4). For example, the first information includes the quantized amplitude. In addition, the first information may also include the phase of the merging coefficient 1 (1, 0) and / or the phase of the merging coefficient 2 (2, 4). In the merging coefficient (x, y), x represents the index of the spatial domain vector corresponding to the merging coefficient, and y represents the index of the frequency domain vector corresponding to the merging coefficient.

[0193] In this implementation, in one possible embodiment, when there are multiple ports in the first port set, the first information corresponding to each port may be normalized based on a combining coefficient with a different maximum amplitude. The first information may include the normalized amplitude of at least one combining coefficient. In addition, the first information may also include the phase of at least one combining coefficient.

[0194] In another possible embodiment, the first information corresponding to the p-th port in the first port set may include: the magnitude relationship between the amplitude of the maximum combining coefficient corresponding to the p-th port and the amplitude of the maximum combining coefficient corresponding to at least one of the P-1 ports other than the p-th port, for example, indicating the ratio or difference between the amplitudes of the two maximum combining coefficients, where 1≤p≤P, P is the total number of ports in the first port set, and P is an integer greater than 1. In addition, the first information may also include the phase of at least one normalized combining coefficient.

[0195] (4) The combining coefficient with the largest magnitude includes the combining coefficient with the largest magnitude among all the corresponding combining coefficients of the multiple ports in the first port set.

[0196] For example, the first port set includes receiving port 0 to receiving port 3. Therefore, the combining coefficient with the largest amplitude may be the combining coefficient with the largest amplitude among all combining coefficients included in all combining coefficient matrices corresponding to receiving port 0 to receiving port 3.

[0197] In this implementation, the terminal device may also send the amplitude and / or phase of the maximum amplitude combining coefficient to the network device.

[0198] (5) The maximum amplitude combining coefficient is a set amplitude, for example, a public maximum amplitude configured by the network device or predefined.

[0199] Optionally, for any implementation of the maximum amplitude combining coefficient shown in (1) to (4), the terminal device may also feed back the phase and / or amplitude of the maximum amplitude combining coefficient.

[0200] As a possible embodiment, resources of the first reference signal may be divided into multiple subbands or multiple subcarriers, and the first information may correspond to one or more subbands or one or more subcarriers.

[0201] For a single-carrier system, any reference signal may occupy one or more subbands in a carrier, and accordingly, the first reference signal may occupy one or more subbands. If the first reference signal occupies multiple subbands, the terminal device may determine multiple first matrices and / or first information based on the channel estimation result of each subband, where each first matrix includes multiple combining coefficients within a subband range, and each first information may represent the amplitude and / or phase of the combining coefficients within a subband range.

[0202] In addition, for a multi-carrier system, any reference signal may occupy one or more subcarriers, and the terminal device may determine multiple first matrices and / or first information based on the channel estimation results of each subband or subcarrier, each first matrix includes multiple combining coefficients within a subband range or a subcarrier range, and each first information may represent the amplitude and / or phase of the combining coefficient within a subband range or a subcarrier range.

[0203] Optionally, if the first reference signal corresponds to multiple subbands or multiple subcarriers, the positions of the combining coefficients indicated by the first information corresponding to any two subbands corresponding to the first port may be the same. For example, first information 1 and first information 2 correspond to two subbands occupied by the first reference signal, and both first information 1 and first information 2 correspond to the first port, wherein first information 1 may indicate at least one combining coefficient 1 in first matrix 1, and first information 2 is used to indicate at least one combining coefficient 2 in first matrix 2. The spatial domain vector and frequency domain vector corresponding to at least one combining coefficient 1 in first matrix 1 are the same as the spatial domain vector and frequency domain vector corresponding to at least one combining coefficient 2 in first matrix 2. Therefore, optionally, for first information 1 and first information 2, the terminal device may feed back the spatial domain vector position and frequency domain vector position to the network device once to indicate the common position of the combining coefficients indicated by first information 1 and first information 2. In addition, first information 1 may carry the amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient 1, and first information 2 may carry the amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient 2.

[0204] Optionally, if the first reference signal corresponds to multiple subbands or multiple subcarriers, the first information corresponding to any two subbands or subcarriers can be normalized using the amplitude of the maximum-magnitude combining coefficients in multiple first matrices corresponding to the multiple subbands or multiple subcarriers. For example, first information 1 and first information 2 correspond to two subbands occupied by the first reference signal, and both first information 1 and first information 2 correspond to first ports. First information 1 can indicate at least one combining coefficient 1 in first matrix 1, and first information 2 is used to indicate at least one combining coefficient 2 in first matrix 2. Optionally, at least one combining coefficient 1 in first matrix 1 and at least one combining coefficient 2 in first matrix 2 can be quantized using the maximum value of the amplitude of the maximum-magnitude combining coefficient in first matrix 1 and the amplitude of the maximum-magnitude combining coefficient in first matrix 2. The maximum value of the amplitude of the maximum-magnitude combining coefficient in first matrix 1 and the amplitude of the maximum-magnitude combining coefficient in first matrix 2 can be carried in first information 1, first information 2, or a separate piece of information, without specific limitation. In addition, optionally, the first information 1 may carry the normalized amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient 1, and the first information 2 may carry the normalized amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient 2.

[0205] Optionally, if the first reference signal corresponds to multiple subbands or multiple subcarriers, the first information corresponding to any two subbands or subcarriers can be normalized using a combining coefficient at the same position, where the position of the combining coefficient corresponds to the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude in multiple first matrices corresponding to the multiple subbands or multiple subcarriers, or in other words, the positions of the combining coefficients with the maximum amplitude in the multiple first matrices are the same. For example, the first information 1 and the first information 2 correspond to two subbands occupied by the first reference signal, and the first information 1 and the first information 2 both correspond to the first port, wherein the first information 1 can indicate at least one combining coefficient 1 in the first matrix 1, and the first information 2 is used to indicate at least one combining coefficient 2 in the first matrix 2. When the bandwidths corresponding to the two subbands are the same, the sizes of the two first matrices 1 are the same as the size of the first matrix 2, that is, the two matrices contain the same number of combining coefficients, and / or the number of spatial domain vectors and the number of frequency domain vectors corresponding to the combining coefficients are the same. In this case, it can be considered that the position of the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude in the first matrix 1 is the same as the position of the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude in the first matrix 2, that is, the spatial domain vector and frequency domain vector of the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude in the first matrix 1 are respectively the same as the spatial domain vector and frequency domain vector of the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude in the first matrix 2. Therefore, optionally, the terminal device can indicate to the network device the position of the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude in one of the first matrices 1 or 2 to save feedback overhead. The indication of the position of the combining coefficient with the maximum amplitude can be carried in the first information 1 or the first information 2 or in a separate information, without specific limitation. In addition, optionally, the first information 1 can carry the normalized amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient 1, and the first information 2 can carry the normalized amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient 2.

[0206] As a possible embodiment, at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information satisfies any one or more of the following conditions, or in other words, the combining coefficient reported by the terminal device satisfies any one or more of the following conditions:

[0207] Condition 1: At least one combining coefficient is a combining coefficient corresponding to a specific position in the first matrix indicated by the network device. That is, the network device may indicate the position of the at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix. For example, the network device may send fourth information to the terminal device indicating the space-frequency vector pair or Doppler shift corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient. The space-frequency vector pair may be a combination of a space-domain vector and a frequency-domain vector.

[0208] For example, the network device may represent the combining coefficients that require feedback via a beam-delay domain vector (or a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector). Exemplarily, the second information may indicate (x, y), where x represents the index of the spatial domain vector corresponding to the combining coefficient, and y represents the index of the frequency domain vector corresponding to the combining coefficient.

[0209] Optionally, the network device may indicate to the terminal device the space-frequency vector pairs of combining coefficients that require feedback. Therefore, after the terminal device obtains the first matrix based on the first reference signal, the combining coefficients that require feedback to the network device may be determined based on the space-frequency vector pairs indicated by the network device, thereby improving feedback reliability and reducing feedback overhead.

[0210] Optionally, the network device may obtain second channel information based on a second reference signal, and determine the position of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix based on the second channel information. For example, the second channel information may be a combining coefficient matrix obtained by the network device based on the second reference signal. The network device may determine, based on the second channel information, at least one position in the combining coefficient matrix where channel estimation accuracy needs to be improved, i.e., determine at least one space-frequency vector pair, which may serve as the position of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix. The network device may also send information about at least one space-frequency vector pair to the terminal device, so that the terminal device learns the position of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix.

[0211] Condition 2: At least one combining coefficient is a combining coefficient whose energy among the multiple combining coefficients included in the combining coefficient matrix is ​​greater than or equal to the first threshold and less than or equal to the second threshold, and the second threshold is less than or equal to the energy value of the combining coefficient with the largest energy among the multiple combining coefficients. In the present application, energy may refer to signal received power. Alternatively, in condition 2, at least one combining coefficient is a combining coefficient whose energy or signal to interference plus noise ratio information among the multiple combining coefficients included in the combining coefficient matrix is ​​greater than or equal to the first threshold and less than or equal to the second threshold, and the second threshold is less than or equal to the signal to interference plus noise ratio information of the combining coefficient with the largest signal to interference plus noise ratio information among the multiple combining coefficients. Wherein, the signal to interference plus noise ratio information is used to represent the sum of interference and noise, for example, the signal to interference plus noise ratio information includes a signal to interference plus noise ratio (SINR) or a normalized SINR.

[0212] As an example, the SINR corresponding to the first port may be obtained by the terminal device measuring the first signal or other reference signals sent by the network device. For example, the terminal device may measure the CSI-RS to obtain the SINR corresponding to the first port.

[0213] The following describes the implementation of condition 2 using energy as an example. A solution using SINR as a measure of whether condition 2 is satisfied may be implemented with reference to this and will not be described in detail.

[0214] For example, as shown in FIG5(a), it is assumed that the energy of each of the multiple combining coefficients can be as shown in the figure, and the energy of the unmarked combining coefficients is 0. For example, the energy of the combining coefficient (1, 0) in the figure is 0, and the energy of the combining coefficient (1, 1) is 0.1.

[0215] In conjunction with Figure 5(a), assuming the first threshold is 0.3 and the second threshold is 0.5, then as shown in Figure 5(b), the merging coefficients that meet condition 2 are merging coefficient (1, 7), merging coefficient (1, 13), merging coefficient (1, 15), merging coefficient (2, 6), merging coefficient (2, 7), merging coefficient (2, 8), merging coefficient (2, 13), merging coefficient (2, 14), merging coefficient (3, 7), and merging coefficient (3, 8). The small cells filled with shaded cells in the figure represent merging coefficients that meet condition 2.

[0216] Condition three: The at least one combining coefficient is Y2 combining coefficients with the smallest energy among Y1 combining coefficients whose energies are greater than or equal to the first threshold, and Y2 is an integer less than Y1 and greater than 0. Alternatively, in condition three, the at least one combining coefficient is Y2 combining coefficients with the smallest signal to interference plus noise ratio information among Y1 combining coefficients whose signal to interference plus noise ratio information is greater than or equal to the first threshold, and Y2 is an integer less than Y1 and greater than 0.

[0217] The following describes the implementation of condition three using energy as an example. A solution using signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio information as a measure of whether condition three is met can be implemented with reference to this, and will not be described in detail.

[0218] In conjunction with Figure 5(a), the first threshold is 0.3, the value of Y1 is 10, and the value of Y2 is 5. Then, as shown in Figure 5(c), the merging coefficients that meet condition three are merging coefficient (1, 7), merging coefficient (1, 15), merging coefficient (2, 6), merging coefficient (2, 8), and merging coefficient (3, 7). The small cells filled with shaded cells in the figure represent merging coefficients that meet condition three.

[0219] In one implementation, when selecting the Y2 merging coefficients with the smallest energy from the Y1 merging coefficients, the Y2 merging coefficients can be selected from the Y1 merging coefficients in order from the smallest to the largest energy of the Y1 merging coefficients. If, during the selection process, there are multiple merging coefficients with equal energy, when all of the multiple merging coefficients with equal energy are used as part of the Y2 merging coefficients, the number of selected merging coefficients is greater than Y2, then only a portion of the multiple merging coefficients with equal energy can be selected (for example, a portion can be randomly selected or selected in other ways), so that the number of finally selected merging coefficients is equal to Y2. Of course, all of the multiple merging coefficients with equal energy can also be used as part of the Y2 merging coefficients, and this application is not limited to this.

[0220] For example, in conjunction with Figure 5(a), the first threshold is 0.3, the value of Y1 is 10, and if the value of Y2 is 4. At this time, the merging coefficients (1, 7), (1, 15), and (2, 6) are selected in sequence. Since the energy of the merging coefficients (2, 8) and (3, 7) is equal, if both merging coefficients are selected, the final number of merging coefficients will be greater than Y2. At this time, one of the merging coefficients can be randomly selected. Here, taking the merging coefficient (2, 8) as an example, the merging coefficients that meet condition three as shown in Figure 5(d) can be the merging coefficients (1, 7), (1, 15), (2, 6), and (2, 8). The small grids filled with shaded cells in the figure represent the merging coefficients that meet condition three.

[0221] Condition 4: At least one combining coefficient is Y4 combining coefficients with the smallest energy among Y3 combining coefficients with the largest energy among the multiple combining coefficients, where Y4 is an integer less than Y3 and greater than 0. Alternatively, in Condition 4, at least one combining coefficient is Y4 combining coefficients with the smallest signal to interference plus noise ratio information among Y3 combining coefficients with the largest signal to interference plus noise ratio information among the multiple combining coefficients, where Y4 is an integer less than Y3 and greater than 0.

[0222] The following describes the implementation of condition 4 using energy as an example. A solution using signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio information as a measure of whether condition 4 is satisfied can be implemented with reference to this, and will not be described in detail.

[0223] In conjunction with Figure 5(a), if the value of Y3 is 5 and the value of Y4 is 2, then the two combining coefficients with the lowest energy are selected from the five combining coefficients with the highest energy. As shown in Figure 5(e), the combining coefficients that meet condition four are (2, 15) and (3, 9). The small cells filled with shaded cells in the figure represent the combining coefficients that meet condition four.

[0224] Similarly, in one implementation, when selecting the Y4 merging coefficients with the smallest energy from the Y3 merging coefficients, the Y4 merging coefficients can be selected from the Y3 merging coefficients in order from the smallest to the largest energy of the Y3 merging coefficients. If, during the selection process, there are multiple merging coefficients with equal energy, when all of the multiple merging coefficients with equal energy are used as part of the Y4 merging coefficients, the number of selected merging coefficients is greater than Y4. Then, only a portion of the merging coefficients with equal energy can be selected (for example, a portion can be randomly selected or selected in other ways), so that the number of finally selected merging coefficients is equal to Y4. Of course, all of the multiple merging coefficients with equal energy can also be used as part of the Y4 merging coefficients, and this application is not limited to this.

[0225] Condition 5: At least one combining coefficient is, among the Y3 combining coefficients with the highest energy among the multiple combining coefficients, a combining coefficient whose energy is less than or equal to a second threshold, where the second threshold is less than the energy of the combining coefficient with the highest energy among the multiple combining coefficients. At least one combining coefficient is, among the Y3 combining coefficients with the highest signal to interference plus noise ratio information among the multiple combining coefficients, a combining coefficient whose signal to interference plus noise ratio information is less than or equal to a second threshold, where the second threshold is less than the signal to interference plus noise ratio information of the combining coefficient with the highest signal to interference plus noise ratio information among the multiple combining coefficients.

[0226] The following describes the implementation of condition five using energy as an example. A solution using signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio information as a measure of whether condition five is met can be implemented with reference to this, and will not be described in detail.

[0227] In conjunction with Figure 5(a), if the value of Y3 is 5 and the second threshold is 0.7, then as shown in Figure 5(f), the merging coefficients that meet condition five are merging coefficients (1, 14), merging coefficients (2, 10), merging coefficients (2, 15), and merging coefficients (3, 9). The small cells filled with shaded cells in the figure represent merging coefficients that meet condition five.

[0228] Condition six: at least one combining coefficient is a combining coefficient whose energy is greater than or equal to a first threshold among the multiple combining coefficients.

[0229] In conjunction with Figure 5(a), if the first threshold is 0.7, then as shown in Figure 5(g), the merging coefficients that meet condition six are merging coefficients (1, 14), merging coefficients (2, 10), and merging coefficients (2, 11). The small grids filled with shaded cells in the figure represent merging coefficients that meet condition six.

[0230] In a possible embodiment, in any one of conditions 2 to 6, the terminal device may select a spatial domain vector and / or a frequency domain vector of at least one combining coefficient, and indicate the selected spatial domain vector and / or frequency domain vector (i.e., indicate the position of at least one combining coefficient) to the network device to notify the network device to focus on measuring this portion of the channel information. For example, the network device may send a beamformed CSI-RS according to the spatial domain vector selected by the terminal device, and the CSI-RS serves as a first reference signal. The terminal device performs measurement based on the first reference signal, thereby focusing on obtaining at least one combining coefficient corresponding to the selected spatial domain vector and / or frequency domain vector.

[0231] An optional manner is that the terminal device carries information for indicating the position of at least one combining coefficient in the first information, that is, the spatial domain vector and / or frequency domain vector of at least one combining coefficient is indicated by the first information, and the position of at least one combining coefficient is indicated. For example, the first information may carry the spatial domain vector and / or frequency domain vector of at least one combining coefficient. For another example, when the terminal device receives fourth information from the network device, that is, when the terminal device receives position indications of multiple combining coefficients from the network device, the first information may carry indication information for indicating the respective positions of the multiple combining coefficients. For example, the multiple positions indicated by the fourth information may be numbered (or sorted), and the first information may carry the relationship between the position number and the amplitude and / or phase of the combining coefficient to indicate the position corresponding to the amplitude and / or phase of the combining coefficient; alternatively, the amplitude and / or phase of multiple combining coefficients may be carried in the first information in ascending or descending order of the number, so that the network device can know the position corresponding to the amplitude and / or phase of each combining coefficient. In this example, the terminal device can also indicate the sorting rules of the positions of the merging coefficients to the network device, or adopt a sorting rule that both the terminal device and the network device have known, for example, the sorting rule is indicated by the network device, or both the terminal device and the network device can know it through predefined information.

[0232] In addition, the terminal device may also indicate the position of at least one combining coefficient to the network device through information or messages other than the first information.

[0233] In the above conditions 2 to 6, the values ​​of Y1, Y2, Y3 and Y4 can be determined by the network device or the network device configuration, or by the terminal device, or can be pre-agreed values ​​or predefined values, which is not limited in this application.

[0234] In the present application, after the network device obtains the first information, it can improve the accuracy of the channel estimation based on the first information. For example, the network device can perform channel estimation based on the uplink reference signal from the terminal device, thereby obtaining a combining coefficient matrix with noise / interference, hereinafter referred to as the second matrix. The network device can calculate the energy distribution of each row of combining coefficients in the second matrix, and obtain a non-zero combining coefficient estimate based on the energy distribution. Due to the presence of noise / interference, the energy of some combining coefficients in the second matrix changes. For example, a combining coefficient has an energy of 0 in the absence of noise / interference, but due to noise / interference, the energy of the combining coefficient may be greater than 0. In this case, it is impossible to distinguish which combining coefficients have an energy determined based on noise / interference. In order to eliminate noise / interference, an energy threshold can be set, and combining coefficients greater than or equal to the energy threshold are regarded as non-zero combining coefficients, and combining coefficients less than the energy threshold are regarded as noise / interference, that is, the energy of combining coefficients less than the energy threshold is set to zero, thereby reducing noise / interference.

[0235] However, in the absence of noise / interference, the energy of some combining coefficients is very small. When there is noise / interference, the energy of these combining coefficients may be equivalent to the energy of the combining coefficients corresponding to the noise / interference. If an energy threshold is set, these combining coefficients with smaller energy will be directly set to zero by the network device as noise / interference, resulting in a decrease in the accuracy of space-frequency channel estimation. In this application, after the network device obtains the first information, it can determine the position of at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information. Even if the energy of the combining coefficient corresponding to the position indicated by the first information in the second matrix is ​​less than the energy threshold, the network device will no longer set the energy of these combining coefficients to 0, but will retain the energy of these combining coefficients, thereby reducing noise / interference while retaining the corresponding space-frequency vector pairs and improving the accuracy of channel estimation.

[0236] It can be understood that in the present application, the first threshold corresponding to the energy may be different from the first threshold corresponding to the signal to interference plus noise ratio information, and / or the second threshold corresponding to the energy may be different from the second threshold corresponding to the signal to interference plus noise ratio information.

[0237] The following takes the method for determining the first threshold and the second threshold corresponding to energy as an example to illustrate the method for determining the first threshold and the second threshold in the present application. The method for determining the first threshold and the second threshold corresponding to signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio information can be implemented accordingly.

[0238] In this application, there may be multiple implementations of the first threshold.

[0239] In a possible embodiment, the first threshold and / or the second threshold may be predefined, or may be indicated by the network device to the terminal device, or may be indicated by the terminal device to the network device. For example, the network device may send indication information of the first threshold to the terminal device so that the terminal device learns the first threshold, and / or the network device may send indication information of the second threshold to the terminal device so that the terminal device learns the second threshold. Taking the first threshold as an example, the indication information of the first threshold may be an index of the first threshold in a table, or may be at least one bit mapped by the first threshold. The indication information of the first threshold may refer to the implementation.

[0240] In another implementation, the first threshold is the product of the energy of the combining coefficient with the largest energy among the multiple combining coefficients and the first coefficient, and the first coefficient is greater than 0 and less than 1.

[0241] In another implementation, the first threshold is the energy of the first combining coefficient.

[0242] The first merging coefficient may satisfy any of the following conditions:

[0243] In case 1, the sum of the merging coefficients whose energy is greater than or equal to the energy of the first merging coefficient among the multiple merging coefficients is the first total energy, the sum of the energies of the multiple merging coefficients is the second total energy, and the ratio of the first total energy to the second total energy is equal to the first ratio.

[0244] Case 2: The multiple merging coefficients include a first merging coefficient and a second merging coefficient, the sum of the energies of the merging coefficients in the multiple merging coefficients that are greater than or equal to the energy of the first merging coefficient is the first total energy, the sum of the energies of the multiple merging coefficients is the second total energy, and the sum of the energies of the merging coefficients in the multiple merging coefficients that are greater than or equal to the energy of the second merging coefficient is the third total energy; the energy of the first merging coefficient is greater than the energy of the second merging coefficient, and when the multiple merging coefficients are sorted from large to small according to energy, the first merging coefficient and the second merging coefficient are adjacent in sequence, that is, when the multiple merging coefficients are sorted from large to small according to energy, the first merging coefficient and the second merging coefficient do not include merging coefficients whose energy is greater than or less than the energy of the second merging coefficient.

[0245] In case 2, the ratio of the first total energy to the second total energy is smaller than the first ratio, and the ratio of the third total energy to the second total energy is larger than the first ratio.

[0246] Case 3: The multiple combining coefficients include a first combining coefficient and a third combining coefficient. The sum of the energies of the combining coefficients with an energy greater than or equal to the first combining coefficient among the multiple combining coefficients is a first total energy, the sum of the energies of the multiple combining coefficients is a second total energy, and the sum of the energies of the combining coefficients with an energy greater than or equal to the third combining coefficient among the multiple combining coefficients is a fourth total energy. The energy of the third combining coefficient is greater than the energy of the first combining coefficient, and when the multiple combining coefficients are sorted from large to small according to energy, the third combining coefficient and the first combining coefficient are adjacent in sequence. That is, when the multiple combining coefficients are sorted from large to small according to energy, there is no combining coefficient between the third combining coefficient and the first combining coefficient whose energy is greater than or less than the energy of the first combining coefficient.

[0247] In case three, the ratio of the first total energy to the second total energy is greater than the first ratio, and the ratio of the fourth total energy to the second total energy is less than the first ratio.

[0248] In this application, the value of the first ratio is not limited, for example, the first ratio is 95%. The first ratio can be configured by the network device, determined by the terminal device, or a pre-agreed value, which is not limited in this application.

[0249] In the present application, there may be multiple implementations of the second threshold. In one implementation, the second threshold is the product of the energy of the largest combining coefficient among the multiple combining coefficients and the second coefficient, where the second coefficient is greater than 0 and less than 1.

[0250] In another implementation, the second threshold is the energy of the fourth combining coefficient in the first set.

[0251] The first set includes all merging coefficients whose energy is greater than or equal to the first threshold among the multiple merging coefficients, or the first set includes Y3 merging coefficients with the largest energy among the multiple merging coefficients.

[0252] In this application, the fourth combining coefficient may satisfy any of the following conditions:

[0253] Case four: the sum of the energies of the merging coefficients in the first set that are less than or equal to the energy of the fourth merging coefficient is the fifth total energy, the sum of the energies of all the merging coefficients included in the first set is the sixth total energy, and the ratio of the fifth total energy to the sixth total energy is equal to the second ratio.

[0254] Case five: the first set includes the fourth combining coefficient and the fifth combining coefficient. The sum of the energies of the combining coefficients in the first set that are less than or equal to the energy of the fourth combining coefficient is the fifth total energy. The sum of the energies of all the combining coefficients included in the first set is the sixth total energy. The sum of the energies of the combining coefficients in the first set that are less than or equal to the energy of the fifth combining coefficient is the seventh total energy.

[0255] The energy of the fourth combining coefficient is greater than the energy of the fifth combining coefficient, and when all the combining coefficients included in the first set are sorted from large to small according to energy, the fourth combining coefficient and the fifth combining coefficient are adjacent in sequence, that is, when all the combining coefficients included in the first set are sorted from large to small according to energy, the fourth combining coefficient and the fifth combining coefficient do not include combining coefficients whose energy is greater than or less than the energy of the fifth combining coefficient.

[0256] In case five, the ratio of the fifth total energy to the sixth total energy is greater than the second ratio, and the ratio of the seventh total energy to the sixth total energy is less than the second ratio.

[0257] Case six: the first set includes the fourth combining coefficient and the sixth combining coefficient. The sum of the energies of the combining coefficients in the first set that are less than or equal to the energy of the fourth combining coefficient is the fifth total energy. The sum of the energies of all the combining coefficients included in the first set is the sixth total energy. The sum of the energies of the combining coefficients in the first set that are less than or equal to the energy of the sixth combining coefficient is the eighth total energy.

[0258] The energy of the sixth combining coefficient is greater than the energy of the fourth combining coefficient, and when all combining coefficients included in the first set are sorted from large to small according to energy, the sixth combining coefficient and the fourth combining coefficient are adjacent in sequence. That is, when all combining coefficients included in the first set are sorted from large to small according to energy, there is no combining coefficient between the sixth combining coefficient and the fourth combining coefficient whose energy is greater than or less than the energy of the fourth combining coefficient.

[0259] In case six, the ratio of the fifth total energy to the sixth total energy is smaller than the second ratio, and the ratio of the eighth total energy to the sixth total energy is larger than the second ratio.

[0260] In this application, the value of the second ratio is not limited, for example, the second ratio is 40%. The second ratio can be configured by the network device, determined by the terminal device, or a pre-agreed value, which is not limited in this application.

[0261] Through the above method, the terminal device only needs to feed back a part of the combining coefficients of all the combining coefficients included in the first matrix through the first information, thereby reducing feedback overhead and improving feedback efficiency.

[0262] Optionally, the first information may further include confidence information corresponding to at least one combining coefficient. The confidence information may include signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information or energy information. The confidence information may be used to measure the confidence of the combining coefficient. In the present application, the confidence information corresponds to the first port, so that the network device determines whether to perform joint channel estimation based on the first information and the second channel information based on the confidence information. Exemplarily, when it is determined that the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio meets certain conditions, the network device may combine the first information and the second channel information to perform channel estimation, for example, when the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information or the energy information meets at least one of conditions one to six described above.

[0263] Taking the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information as an example, the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information corresponding to the first port may include:

[0264] (1) The signal to interference plus noise ratio (SINR) corresponding to at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information, or referred to as the SINR information at the feedback PMI level.

[0265] In one possible embodiment of the present application, the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio information corresponding to the multiple combining coefficients may be the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratios of the multiple combining coefficients. For example, the terminal device may send the signal-to-noise ratio information corresponding to the multiple combining coefficients to the network device. The signal-to-noise ratio information corresponding to the multiple combining coefficients may be carried in the first information or other information, and is not specifically limited in this application.

[0266] In another possible embodiment of the present application, the terminal device may further sum the signal energies corresponding to the multiple combining coefficients, and sum the interference and noise energies of the multiple combining coefficients, and represent the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information corresponding to the multiple combining coefficients by the ratio of the summed signal energy to the summed interference and noise energy.

[0267] In another possible embodiment of the present application, the signal to interference plus noise ratio information corresponding to the multiple combining coefficients may also be an average of the signal to interference plus noise ratios of the multiple combining coefficients.

[0268] In addition, the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio information corresponding to the multiple combining coefficients may also be information obtained by normalizing and quantizing the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratios of the multiple combining coefficients. For example, the information includes multiple n-bits of information, each of which may correspond to a combining coefficient and be used to indicate the normalized and quantized signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio of the combining coefficient, where n is a positive integer.

[0269] For example, the first information is used to indicate the amplitude and / or phase of the combining coefficient 1 (1, 0) in the first matrix shown in Figure 4, and is used to indicate the amplitude and / or phase of the combining coefficient 2 (2, 4). The first information may also indicate the signal to interference plus noise ratio corresponding to the combining coefficient 1 (1, 0) and the signal to interference plus noise ratio corresponding to the combining coefficient 2 (2, 4), a normalized and quantized signal to interference plus noise ratio, or the sum of the signal to interference plus noise ratios.

[0270] For another example, when the first port corresponds to multiple combining coefficient matrices (or space-frequency matrices), if the amplitudes and / or phases of the combining coefficients in the multiple combining coefficient matrices are respectively indicated by multiple first information, the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SIN) of one or more combining coefficients at a common position in the multiple combining coefficient matrices can be indicated. In this case, the SIN information is referred to as feedback path-level SIN information. The multiple combining coefficient matrices include the first matrix.

[0271] The common position refers to the position of the same combining coefficient corresponding to multiple combining coefficient matrices corresponding to multiple space-frequency matrices. For example, when the first information indicates the amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient in combining coefficient matrix 1 and the amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient in combining coefficient matrix 2, the terminal device can indicate the signal to interference plus noise ratio corresponding to combining coefficient 1 (1, 0) in combining coefficient matrix 1 and / or combining coefficient matrix 2 to the network device as the signal to interference plus noise ratio information corresponding to both combining coefficient matrix 1 and combining coefficient matrix 2.

[0272] Similarly, the energy in this application may be energy information corresponding to at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information. In this application, the energy information corresponding to multiple combining coefficients may be the energy of each of the multiple combining coefficients (such as signal received power), the sum of the energy of each of the multiple combining coefficients, or the average of the energy of each of the multiple combining coefficients. In addition, the energy information corresponding to the multiple combining coefficients may also be information after normalization and quantization of the energy information of the multiple combining coefficients.

[0273] (2) Signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information corresponding to the first port, i.e., the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information corresponds to all combining coefficients of the first port. When the first port corresponds to multiple combining coefficient matrices, the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information may correspond to multiple combining coefficient matrices, i.e., one piece of signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information may be fed back for each of the multiple combining coefficient matrices. The multiple combining coefficient matrices include the first matrix.

[0274] For example, the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio information may include the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio corresponding to any combining coefficient matrix, used to represent the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio information corresponding to all combining coefficient matrices. The signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio corresponding to any combining coefficient matrix may be the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio corresponding to at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information corresponding to the combining coefficient matrix, for example, the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio corresponding to all combining coefficients, or may be the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio of one or more combining coefficients after normalization and quantization, or may be the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio of one or more combining coefficients, or may be the ratio of the sum of the capabilities of multiple combining coefficients to the sum of interference and noise, or may be the average of the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratios of multiple combining coefficients. For example, the first information may include the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio corresponding to the first port. For example, when the terminal device feeds back multiple combining coefficients corresponding to the first port via multiple first information, the multiple first information may carry the same signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio.

[0275] Similarly, the energy in this application may be the signal receiving power corresponding to all combining coefficients corresponding to the first port.

[0276] (3) The signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio of all the combined coefficients of the first matrix.

[0277] For example, the first information is used to indicate the amplitude and / or phase of one or more combining coefficients in the first matrix shown in FIG4 . In this case, the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratios corresponding to all combining coefficients in the first matrix may be indicated, or the normalized and quantized signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratios corresponding to all combining coefficients may be indicated, or the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratios corresponding to all combining coefficients may be indicated, or the ratio of the sum of the capabilities of all multiple combining coefficients to the sum of interference and noise may be indicated, or the average of the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratios of all multiple combining coefficients may be indicated.

[0278] In this manner, when the first port set includes multiple ports, the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio information sent by the terminal device to the network device may include the signal-to-interference-and-noise ratios of the multiple ports.

[0279] Similarly, the energy in this application may be the signal receiving power of all the combining coefficients of the first matrix.

[0280] (4) Signal-to-interference-and-noise ratios corresponding to all combining coefficients corresponding to the multiple ports in the first port set.

[0281] For example, when all ports in the first port set correspond to multiple combining coefficient matrices, the signal to interference plus noise ratio information may be the signal to interference plus noise ratios corresponding to all combining coefficients of all combining coefficient matrices, or may indicate the normalized and quantized signal to interference plus noise ratios corresponding to all combining coefficients, or may indicate the signal to interference plus noise ratios corresponding to all combining coefficients, or may be the ratio of the sum of the capabilities of all multiple combining coefficients to the sum of interference and noise, or may be the average of the signal to interference plus noise ratios of all multiple combining coefficients.

[0282] Similarly, the energy in the present application may be the signal receiving power corresponding to all the combining coefficients corresponding to the multiple ports in the first port set.

[0283] Optionally, the terminal device may receive the third information and obtain the type of confidence information based on the third information, so as to reasonably feedback the information required by the network device and reduce the feedback overhead. For example, when the third information instructs the terminal device to feedback the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio information corresponding to at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information, the confidence information fed back by the terminal device may include the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio corresponding to the combining coefficient corresponding to the first information, without including the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio corresponding to other ports other than the first port or other combining coefficient matrices other than the first matrix. In addition, the terminal device may also obtain the type of confidence information based on predefinition. For example, the third information may be determined by predefinition, notification to the terminal device by the network device, or notification to the network device by the terminal device.

[0284] S103: The network device may perform channel estimation according to the first information and the second channel information.

[0285] Therefore, the network device can enhance the accuracy of the second channel information according to the first information, or in other words, correct the channel estimation result, thereby improving the accuracy of the channel estimation.

[0286] In one possible embodiment, a network device may jointly perform channel estimation based on the first information and the second channel information. As shown in Figure 6, the first ports in the first port set include the first port 1 to the first port p, and the ports in the second port set include the second port 1 to the second port p, where p is a positive integer. First port 1 is associated with second port 1, first port 2 is associated with second port 2, and so on. First port p is associated with second port p. As shown in Figure 6, in the combining coefficient matrix corresponding to the first port 1 to the first port p, the black area indicates at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information. The network device may jointly estimate the channel based on the combining coefficient in the black area and the combining coefficient indicated by the second channel information in the shaded area to improve the accuracy of the channel estimation in the shaded area. The second channel information corresponds to the second port. For example, the channel estimation information corresponding to the second port 1 is the channel estimation result obtained based on the second reference signal transmitted by the second port 1. Taking the second reference signal as a CSI-RS as an example, the second channel information is, for example, CSI information.

[0287] Optionally, in the implementation of joint channel estimation, the network device can select a combining coefficient 1 from at least one combining coefficient indicated by the first information, and select a combining coefficient 2 with the same or similar position from the second channel information, based on the position information of the combining coefficient. Furthermore, the network device can perform a weighted average of the amplitude of the combining coefficient 1 and the amplitude of the combining coefficient 2, and / or perform a weighted average of the phase of the combining coefficient 1 and the phase of the combining coefficient 2, and use the weighted average result as the combining coefficient for the position corresponding to the combining coefficient 2 under the joint channel estimation. The position information of the combining coefficient 1 can be reported by the terminal device, or obtained based on the fourth information sent by the network device to the terminal device.

[0288] The weighted weights may be determined based on the confidence information reported by the terminal device. For example, when the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) corresponding to the second port is lower than the SINR information reported by the terminal device, the first information may be deemed to provide combining coefficient information with higher confidence. During merging, the first information may be assigned a higher weight based on the SINR information to combine the combining coefficients. Conversely, if the SINR information reported by the terminal device is lower, the first information may be assigned a lower weight to combine the combining coefficients.

[0289] In any possible embodiment of the present application, the terminal device and the network device may use complementary frame structures to transmit the first reference signal and the second reference signal. For example, the first frame structure and the second frame structure are complementary frame structures, where both include N subframes, each subframe corresponding to a time domain unit and a frequency domain unit.

[0290] It can be understood that each subframe in the first frame structure corresponds to a first frequency domain resource, and each subframe in the second frame structure corresponds to a second frequency domain resource, wherein the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource do not overlap in the frequency domain. For example, the first frame structure is a time slot format corresponding to at least one subframe corresponding to the first frequency domain resource, and the second frame structure is a time slot format corresponding to at least one subframe corresponding to the second frequency domain resource. Optionally, the first frequency domain resource is a carrier (CC), a subband, or multiple subcarriers, and correspondingly, the second frequency domain resource is a CC, a subband, or multiple subcarriers.

[0291] The form of the time slot format may refer to the description of the time slot format in the relevant 3GPP protocols, for example, the description in table 11.1.1-1 in technical specification (TS) 38.213, which is named time slot format for a normal cyclic prefix (CP). At least one of the subframes in the first frame structure and the subframes in the second frame structure corresponding to the same time domain unit is a special subframe (S subframe), or one of the subframes is an uplink (U) subframe and the other is a downlink (D) subframe. That is, for two CCs in a time slot or two subbands or subframes of other frequency domain granularity, the two subframes in the same time slot position include at least one S subframe, or one of the two subframes is a U subframe and the other is a D subframe.

[0292] As a possible implementation, as shown in Figure 8, for a multi-carrier system, the first frame structure and the second frame structure may correspond to different carriers. For example, the first frame structure corresponds to the first carrier, and the second frame structure corresponds to the second carrier. The first carrier includes a U subframe, an S subframe and / or a D subframe, and the second carrier includes a D subframe, an S subframe and / or a U subframe. For example, for any time slot, if the first carrier is configured as a U subframe, the second carrier configuration should be an S subframe or a D subframe; if the first carrier is configured as a D subframe, the second carrier configuration should be an S subframe or a U subframe; if the first carrier is configured as an S subframe, the second carrier configuration can be an S subframe, a D subframe, or a U subframe.

[0293] As another possible implementation, as shown in Figure 9, for a single-carrier system, the first frame structure and the second frame structure may correspond to different subbands in the same carrier. For example, the first frame structure corresponds to the first subband, and the second frame structure corresponds to the second subband. The first subband includes a U subframe, and an S subframe and / or a D subframe. The second subband includes a D subframe, and an S subframe and / or a U subframe. For any time slot, if the first subband is configured as a U subframe, the second subband configuration should be an S subframe or a D subframe; if the first subband is configured as a D subframe, the second subband configuration should be an S subframe or a U subframe; if the first subband is configured as an S subframe, the second subband configuration can be an S subframe, a D subframe, or a U subframe.

[0294] It can be understood that the above first port and second port correspond to different subframes on the first frequency domain resource, or the first port and second port correspond to different subframes on the second frequency domain resource.

[0295] For example, taking Figure 9 as an example, the second port corresponds to the uplink subframe U1, and the first port corresponds to the downlink subframe D1, or in other words, the second port sends the second reference signal through the uplink subframe U1, and the first port receives the first reference signal through the downlink subframe D1. Among them, the terminal device can also indicate the spatial domain vector selected by the terminal device through subframe U2, so that the network device sends the beamformed CSI-RS in the downlink subframe D1. The CSI-RS is used as the first reference signal, and the terminal device is measured according to the first reference signal, so as to focus on obtaining at least one combining coefficient corresponding to the selected spatial domain vector and / or frequency domain vector to improve the channel estimation performance. It can be seen that by adopting this frame structure, the terminal device can indicate the spatial domain vector selected by the terminal device to the network device in the same OFDM symbol, and receive the first reference signal beamformed according to the spatial domain vector, which can reduce the channel estimation delay and thus improve the channel estimation accuracy.

[0296] In addition, still taking Figure 9 as an example, if the network device indicates to the terminal device the position of at least one combining coefficient that needs to be fed back based on the channel estimation result of the second reference signal, the network device can receive the second reference signal in the uplink subframe U1, and the network device can also indicate the position of at least one combining coefficient to the terminal device in the downlink subframe D2, so that the terminal device focuses on measuring the combining coefficient at the corresponding position based on the first reference signal of the downlink subframe D1 to improve feedback efficiency. It can be seen that by adopting this frame structure, the terminal device can send the second reference signal to the network device in the same OFDM symbol and receive the position information of the combining coefficient obtained by the network device based on the second reference signal, which can improve the channel estimation efficiency, reduce the channel estimation delay, and thus improve the channel estimation accuracy.

[0297] For example, the first reference signal is a downlink signal and the second reference signal is an uplink signal. The first reference signal can be carried in the D subframe or S subframe of the first frame structure and / or the second frame structure, and the second reference signal can be carried in the U subframe or S subframe of the first frame structure and / or the second frame structure.

[0298] Optionally, the first frame structure and the second frame structure may be predefined or configured by a network device. If the first frame structure and the second frame structure are configured by the network device, the network device may send an indication of the first frame structure and the second frame structure to the communication device. The indication may be referred to as fifth information, and is used to indicate the time-frequency position of the U subframe, S subframe, and / or D subframe in the first frame structure and the second frame structure.

[0299] Exemplarily, the fifth information may be included in signaling or information such as an RRC message, a MAC control element (CE), or downlink control information (DCI), and sent by the terminal device to the network device, or by the network device to the terminal device. In addition, the fifth information may also be predefined, and this application does not impose any specific restrictions.

[0300] In one possible embodiment, when transmitting a first reference signal, any two ports in the first port set shown in the present application may correspond to different subbands or subcarriers, wherein at least the two subbands or subcarriers corresponding to the ports may adopt the complementary frame structure shown in Figure 8 or Figure 9, or in other words, any two ports in the first port set may correspond to complementary frame structures. Any two subbands or subcarriers may be designed with repeated reference signal sequences to reduce the cross-correlation between reference signals transmitted by any two ports in the first port set in different subbands or subcarriers. In addition, the full band occupied by the first reference signal adopts a low peak to average power ratio (PAPR).

[0301] In the present application, the number of inverse fast Fourier transform (IFFT) points used for frequency-time transformation of the first reference signal, such as CSI-RS, may be greater than the number of frequency domain granularities, for example, 2 to the power of m, where m is the number of frequency domain granularities. The number of frequency domain granularities refers to the number of subcarriers or the number of resource elements (REs). Optionally, the number of frequency domain granularities may be predefined or may be configured by a network device. If the number of frequency domain granularities is configured by a network device, the network device may send an indication or configuration information of the number of frequency domain granularities to the communication device for indicating or configuring the value of the number of frequency domain granularities.

[0302] Exemplarily, the indication or configuration information may be included in signaling or information such as an RRC message, MAC CE or DCI.

[0303] It can be understood that the present application does not limit the application of the complementary frame structure shown in any of Figures 7 to 9 to other communication scenarios. For example, in channel measurement scenarios other than the present application, a complementary frame structure can also be used. Still taking Figure 9 as an example, the network device can send a downlink reference signal in subframe D2, and the terminal device can perform channel estimation on the downlink reference signal, and feedback channel estimation information to the network device through subframe U1, such as feedback PMI, thereby reducing the channel estimation delay and improving the reliability of the channel estimation result.

[0304] This approach ensures that uplink or downlink transmission can occur in every subframe. When data, signaling information, or feedback information needs to be transmitted with extremely low latency, the complementary frame structure design ensures that the data or information can be transmitted uplink or downlink in the current or next subframe. The feedback information may include, for example, hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) information, or acknowledgement (ACK) or negative acknowledgement (NACK) information.

[0305] Based on the same concept, an embodiment of the present application also provides a communication device. The communication device may include hardware structures and / or software modules corresponding to the functions shown in the above method. Those skilled in the art should easily appreciate that, in combination with the units and method steps of each example described in the embodiments disclosed in this application, the present application can be implemented in the form of hardware or a combination of hardware and computer software. Whether a function is executed in hardware or by computer software driving hardware depends on the specific application scenario and design constraints of the technical solution.

[0306] Figures 10 to 12 are schematic diagrams of the structure of a possible communication device provided by an embodiment of the present application. This communication device can be used to implement the functions of the terminal device and / or network device in the above-mentioned method embodiment, thereby also achieving the beneficial effects of the above-mentioned method embodiment. In one possible implementation, the terminal device and / or network device can be the terminal device or network device shown in Figure 1. For relevant details and effects, please refer to the description of the above-mentioned embodiment.

[0307] As shown in Figure 10, communication device 1000 includes a processing unit 1010 and a communication unit 1020. Communication unit 1020 can implement corresponding communication functions, and processing unit 1010 is used to process data. Communication unit 1020 can also be a transceiver unit or an input / output interface. Communication device 1000 can be used to implement the functions of the terminal device and / or network device in the method embodiment shown in Figure 3 above.

[0308] For example, when implementing the functions of the terminal device, the communication unit 1020 may be configured to receive a first reference signal through a first port and send a second reference signal through a second port, and to send first information. The processing unit 1010 may be configured to obtain first information based on the first reference signal.

[0309] Optionally, the communication unit 1020 may be further configured to receive at least one of the second information, the third information, the fourth information, and the fifth information. In addition, the communication unit 1020 may be further configured to send confidence information.

[0310] For another example, when implementing the functions of the network device, the communication unit 1020 may be configured to send a first reference signal and receive a second reference signal and first information. The processing unit 1010 may be configured to perform joint channel estimation based on the first information and the second channel information.

[0311] Optionally, the communication unit 1020 may be further configured to send at least one of the second information, the third information, the fourth information, and the fifth information. Furthermore, the communication unit 1020 may be further configured to receive confidence information. The processing unit 1010 may be configured to perform joint channel estimation based on the first information and the second channel information when the confidence information satisfies a condition.

[0312] The meanings of the above technologies can be found in the description of the method embodiment section and will not be repeated here.

[0313] It is understood that the division of modules in the embodiments of the present application is illustrative and is merely a logical functional division. In actual implementation, other division methods may be used. Furthermore, the functional modules in the various embodiments of the present application may be integrated into a single processor, or may exist physically separately, or two or more modules may be integrated into a single module. The aforementioned integrated modules may be implemented in the form of hardware or software functional modules.

[0314] As shown in Figure 11, a communication device 1100 provided in an embodiment of the present application is used to implement the communication method provided in the present application. The communication device 1100 can be a communication device that applies the communication method, or a component in a communication device, or a device that can be used in conjunction with a communication device. The communication device 1100 can be a terminal device and / or a network device. Specifically, the communication device 1100 can be a chip system or a chip. In the embodiment of the present application, the chip system can be composed of a chip, or can include a chip and other discrete devices. The communication device 1100 includes at least one processor 1120 for implementing the communication method provided in the embodiment of the present application. The communication device 1100 can also include an input / output interface 1110, which can include an input interface and / or an output interface. In the embodiment of the present application, the input / output interface 1110 can be used to communicate with other devices via a transmission medium, and its functions can include sending and / or receiving. For example, when the communication device 1100 is a chip, it transmits to other chips or devices via the input / output interface 1110. The processor 1120 can be used to implement the method shown in the above method embodiment.

[0315] Exemplarily, the processor 1120 may be used to execute actions executed by the processing unit 1010 , and the input / output interface 1110 may be used to execute actions executed by the communication unit 1020 , which will not be described in detail.

[0316] Optionally, the communication device 1100 may further include at least one memory 1130 for storing program instructions and / or data. The memory 1130 is coupled to the processor 1120. The coupling in the embodiments of the present application is an indirect coupling or communication connection between devices, units, or modules, which can be electrical, mechanical, or other forms, and is used for information exchange between devices, units, or modules. The processor 1120 may operate in conjunction with the memory 1130. The processor 1120 may execute program instructions stored in the memory 1130. At least one of the at least one memory may be integrated with the processor.

[0317] In an embodiment of the present application, the memory 1130 may be a non-volatile memory, such as a hard disk drive (HDD) or a solid-state drive (SSD), etc., or a volatile memory (volatile memory), such as a random-access memory (RAM). A memory is any other medium that can be used to carry or store a desired program code in the form of an instruction or data structure and can be accessed by a computer, but is not limited thereto. The memory in the embodiment of the present application may also be a circuit or any other device that can implement a storage function, for storing program instructions and / or data.

[0318] In the embodiments of the present application, the processor 1120 may be a general-purpose processor, a digital signal processor, an application-specific integrated circuit, a field programmable gate array or other programmable logic device, a discrete gate or transistor logic device, or a discrete hardware component, and may implement or execute the methods, steps, and logic block diagrams disclosed in the embodiments of the present application. A general-purpose processor may be a microprocessor or any conventional processor. The steps of the methods disclosed in the embodiments of the present application may be directly implemented as being executed by a hardware processor, or may be executed by a combination of hardware and software modules in the processor.

[0319] As shown in Figure 12, a communication device 1200 provided in an embodiment of the present application is used to implement the communication method provided in the present application. The communication device 1200 can be a communication device that applies the communication method shown in the embodiment of the present application, or it can be a component in a communication device, or it can be a device that can be used in combination with a communication device. The communication device 1200 can be a network device and / or a terminal device. Among them, the communication device 1200 can be a chip system or a chip. In the embodiment of the present application, the chip system can be composed of a chip, or it can include a chip and other discrete devices. Part or all of the communication methods provided in the above embodiments can be implemented by hardware or by software. When implemented by hardware, the communication device 1200 may include: an input interface circuit 1201, a logic circuit 1202 and an output interface circuit 1203.

[0320] Optionally, taking the device being used to implement the function of the receiving end as an example, the input interface circuit 1201 can be used to execute the above-mentioned receiving action performed by the communication unit 1020, the output interface circuit 1203 can be used to execute the above-mentioned sending action performed by the communication unit 1020, and the logic circuit 1202 can be used to execute the above-mentioned action performed by the processing unit 1010, which will not be repeated.

[0321] Optionally, the communication device 1200 may be a chip or an integrated circuit in a specific implementation.

[0322] Part or all of the operations and functions performed by the communication device described in the above method embodiments of the present application can be completed using a chip or an integrated circuit.

[0323] An embodiment of the present application provides a computer-readable storage medium storing a computer program, wherein the computer program includes instructions for executing the above method embodiment.

[0324] An embodiment of the present application provides a computer program product comprising instructions, which, when executed on a computer, enables the computer to execute the above method embodiment.

[0325] An embodiment of the present application provides a communication system including a terminal device and a network device to implement the process shown in Figure 3. In addition, in combination with or independently of Figure 3, in the communication system, the network device may send fifth information to the terminal device to indicate a complementary frame structure, and accordingly, the terminal device may receive and / or send signals according to the complementary frame structure.

[0326] It is understood that the processor in the embodiments of the present application may be a central processing unit (CPU), or may be other general-purpose processors, digital signal processors (DSP), application-specific integrated circuits (ASIC), field programmable gate arrays (FPGA), or other programmable logic devices, transistor logic devices, hardware components, or any combination thereof. The general-purpose processor may be a microprocessor or any conventional processor.

[0327] In the above embodiments, all or part of the embodiments can be implemented by software, hardware, firmware, or any combination thereof. When implemented using software, all or part of the embodiments can be implemented in the form of a computer program product. The computer program product includes one or more computer instructions. When the computer instructions are loaded and executed on a computer, all or part of the processes or functions according to the embodiments of the present application are generated. The computer can be a general-purpose computer, a special-purpose computer, a computer network, or other programmable device. The computer instructions can be stored in a computer-readable storage medium or transmitted from one computer-readable storage medium to another computer-readable storage medium. For example, the computer instructions can be transmitted from one website, computer, server, or data center to another website, computer, server, or data center via a wired (e.g., coaxial cable, optical fiber, digital subscriber line (DSL)) or wireless (e.g., infrared, wireless, microwave, etc.) method. The computer-readable storage medium can be any available medium that can be accessed by a computer or a data storage device such as a server or data center that includes one or more available media integrated therein. The available medium may be a magnetic medium (eg, a floppy disk, a hard disk, a magnetic tape), an optical medium (eg, a high-density digital video disc (DVD)), or a semiconductor medium (eg, an SSD).

[0328] Note: A portion of this patent application contains material which is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner reserves all rights reserved except for copies of the materials in the patent file or patent record in the Patent Office.

[0329] The terminal devices and network devices in the above-mentioned apparatus embodiments correspond to the terminal devices and network devices in the method embodiments, respectively. The corresponding modules or units perform the corresponding steps. For example, the communication unit (transceiver) performs the receiving or sending steps in the method embodiments, and other steps except sending and receiving can be performed by the processing unit (processor). The functions of the specific units can be referred to in the corresponding method embodiments. Among them, there can be one or more processors.

[0330] As used in this specification, the terms "component," "module," "system," and the like are used to refer to computer-related entities, hardware, firmware, a combination of hardware and software, software, or software in execution. For example, a component can be, but is not limited to, a process running on a processor, a processor, an object, an executable file, an execution thread, a program, and / or a computer. By way of illustration, both an application running on a computing device and a computing device can be a component. One or more components can reside in a process and / or an execution thread, and a component can be located on one computer and / or distributed between two or more computers. In addition, these components can be executed from various computer-readable media having various data structures stored thereon. Components can communicate, for example, via local and / or remote processes based on signals having one or more data packets (e.g., data from two components interacting with another component across a local system, a distributed system, and / or a network, such as the Internet interacting with other systems via signals).

[0331] Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the various illustrative logical blocks and steps described in conjunction with the embodiments disclosed herein can be implemented using electronic hardware, or a combination of computer software and electronic hardware. Whether these functions are implemented in hardware or software depends on the specific application and design constraints of the technical solution. Professionals and technicians may use different methods to implement the described functions for each specific application, but such implementation should not be considered beyond the scope of this application.

[0332] Those skilled in the art will clearly understand that, for the convenience and brevity of description, the specific working processes of the systems, devices and units described above can refer to the corresponding processes in the aforementioned method embodiments and will not be repeated here.

[0333] In the several embodiments provided in this application, it should be understood that the disclosed systems, devices and methods can be implemented in other ways. For example, the device embodiments described above are merely schematic. For example, the division of units is only a logical function division. In actual implementation, there may be other division methods, such as multiple units or components can be combined or integrated into another system, or some features can be ignored or not executed. Another point is that the mutual coupling or direct coupling or communication connection shown or discussed can be through some interfaces, indirect coupling or communication connection of devices or units, which can be electrical, mechanical or other forms.

[0334] Units described as separate components may or may not be physically separate, and components shown as units may or may not be physical units, that is, they may be located in one place or distributed across multiple network units. Some or all of these units may be selected to achieve the purpose of this embodiment according to actual needs.

[0335] In addition, the functional units in the various embodiments of the present application may be integrated into a single processing unit, each unit may exist physically separately, or two or more units may be integrated into a single unit. If the functions are implemented in the form of software functional units and sold or used as independent products, they may be stored in a computer-readable storage medium.

[0336] The above are only specific embodiments of the present application, but the scope of protection of this application is not limited thereto. Any changes or substitutions that can be easily conceived by a person skilled in the art within the technical scope disclosed in this application should be included in the scope of protection of this application. Therefore, the scope of protection of this application should be based on the scope of protection of the claims.

Claims

1. A communication method, characterized in that: include: receiving a first reference signal through a first port and sending a second reference signal through a second port, the first port being associated with the second port; Sending first information, where the first information is obtained based on first channel information, which is obtained based on the first reference signal, the first information and second channel information are used for channel estimation, and the second channel information is obtained based on the second reference signal.

2. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that The first port is associated with the second port, comprising: The first port and the second port correspond to the same physical port or logical port.

3. The method according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that The first port is used to receive an uplink reference signal, and the second port is used to send a downlink reference signal; or, The first port is used to receive a downlink reference signal, and the second port is used to send an uplink reference signal.

4. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that: The first channel information includes at least one first matrix, the first matrix corresponds to at least one spatial domain vector and multiple frequency domain vectors, the first matrix includes multiple combining coefficients, each combining coefficient is a combining coefficient of a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector, and the first information is used to indicate the amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix.

5. The method according to claim 4, characterized in that The method further comprises: Second information is received, where the second information is used to indicate that the first information is used to indicate an amplitude and / or a phase of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix.

6. The method according to claim 4 or 5, characterized in that The first information comprises an amplitude and / or a phase of the at least one combining coefficient normalized according to a combining coefficient with a maximum amplitude; The maximum magnitude combining coefficient includes the maximum magnitude combining coefficient among all combining coefficients corresponding to the first port; or, The maximum magnitude combining coefficient includes the maximum magnitude combining coefficient among all combining coefficients of the first matrix; or, The maximum magnitude combining coefficient includes the maximum magnitude combining coefficient among the at least one combining coefficient; or, The maximum amplitude combining coefficient includes the maximum amplitude combining coefficient among all corresponding combining coefficients of multiple ports in a first port set, the multiple ports in the first port set include the first port, and the multiple ports in the first port set all correspond to the first reference signal.

7. The method according to any one of claims 3 to 6, characterized in that: The method further comprises: Send confidence information, the confidence information including one or more of the following: A signal to interference and noise ratio corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient; The signal receiving power corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient; The signal to interference and noise ratio corresponding to all combining coefficients corresponding to the first port; The signal receiving power corresponding to all the combining coefficients corresponding to the first port; The signal to interference and noise ratio of all combined coefficients of the first matrix; The signal receiving power of all the combining coefficients of the first matrix; signal received powers corresponding to all combining coefficients corresponding to a plurality of ports in a first port set, the plurality of ports in the first port set including the first port, the plurality of ports in the first port set all corresponding to the first reference signal; The signal to interference plus noise ratios corresponding to all the combining coefficients corresponding to the multiple ports in the first port set.

8. The method according to claim 7, characterized in that The method further comprises: Receive third information, where the third information is used to indicate the sending of the confidence information.

9. The method according to any one of claims 3 to 8, characterized in that: The signal to interference noise ratio corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient is greater than or equal to a first threshold, or greater than or equal to the first threshold and less than or equal to a second threshold, or less than or equal to the second threshold; or, The signal receiving power corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient is greater than or equal to a first threshold, or greater than or equal to the first threshold and less than or equal to a second threshold, or less than or equal to the second threshold.

10. The method according to claim 9, characterized in that The method further comprises: receiving indication information of the first threshold; and / or, Receive indication information of the second threshold.

11. The method according to any one of claims 4 to 10, characterized in that: The method further comprises: Fourth information is received, where the fourth information is used to indicate a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient.

12. The method according to any one of claims 4 to 11, characterized in that: The first information is also used to indicate a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient.

13. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 12, characterized in that: The method further comprises: Receive fifth information, where the fifth information is used to indicate a first frame structure and a second frame structure, where the first frame structure and the second frame structure each include N subframes, each subframe corresponds to a time domain unit and a frequency domain unit, each subframe in the first frame structure corresponds to a first frequency domain resource, each subframe in the second frame structure corresponds to a second frequency domain resource, and the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource do not overlap in the frequency domain; A subframe in the first frame structure and a subframe in the second frame structure corresponding to the same time domain unit satisfy: At least one subframe is a special subframe; or, One subframe is an uplink subframe, and the other subframe is a downlink subframe.

14. The method according to claim 13, characterized in that, The first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different carriers, or the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different subbands in the same carrier.

15. The method according to claim 13 or 14, characterized in that The first port and the second port correspond to different subframes on the first frequency domain resources, or the first port and the second port correspond to different subframes on the second frequency domain resources.

16. A communication method, characterized in that: include: Sending a first reference signal and receiving a second reference signal, wherein the first reference signal is received by a first port of a first communication device, and the second reference signal is sent by a second port of the first communication device, and the first port is associated with the second port; receiving first information, where the first information is obtained according to first channel information, the first channel information is obtained according to the first reference signal, and the second channel information is obtained according to the second reference signal; Channel estimation is performed according to the first information and the second channel information.

17. The method according to claim 16, characterized in that The first port is associated with the second port, comprising: The first port and the second port correspond to the same physical port or logical port.

18. The method according to claim 16 or 17, characterized in that The first port is used to receive an uplink reference signal, and the second port is used to send a downlink reference signal; or, The first port is used to receive a downlink reference signal, and the second port is used to send an uplink reference signal.

19. The method according to any one of claims 16 to 18, characterized in that: The first channel information includes at least one first matrix, the first matrix corresponds to at least one spatial domain vector and multiple frequency domain vectors, the first matrix includes multiple combining coefficients, each combining coefficient is a combining coefficient of a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector, and the first information is used to indicate the amplitude and / or phase of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein: The method further comprises: Second information is sent, where the second information is used to indicate that the first information is used to indicate an amplitude and / or a phase of at least one combining coefficient in the first matrix.

21. The method according to claim 19 or 20, characterized in that The first information comprises an amplitude and / or a phase of the at least one combining coefficient normalized according to a combining coefficient with a maximum amplitude; The maximum magnitude combining coefficient includes the maximum magnitude combining coefficient among all combining coefficients corresponding to the first port; or, The maximum magnitude combining coefficient includes the maximum magnitude combining coefficient among all combining coefficients of the first matrix; or, The maximum magnitude combining coefficient includes the maximum magnitude combining coefficient among the at least one combining coefficient; or, The maximum amplitude combining coefficient includes the maximum amplitude combining coefficient among all corresponding combining coefficients of multiple ports in a first port set, the multiple ports in the first port set include the first port, and the multiple ports in the first port set all correspond to the first reference signal.

22. The method according to any one of claims 18 to 21, characterized in that: The method further comprises: receiving confidence information; Determine, according to the confidence information, to perform channel estimation according to the first information and the second channel information; The confidence information includes one or more of the following: A signal to interference and noise ratio corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient; The signal receiving power corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient; The signal to interference and noise ratio corresponding to all combining coefficients corresponding to the first port; The signal receiving power corresponding to all the combining coefficients corresponding to the first port; The signal to interference and noise ratio of all combined coefficients of the first matrix; The signal receiving power of all the combining coefficients of the first matrix; signal received powers corresponding to all combining coefficients corresponding to a plurality of ports in a first port set, the plurality of ports in the first port set including the first port, the plurality of ports in the first port set all corresponding to the first reference signal; The signal to interference plus noise ratios corresponding to all the combining coefficients corresponding to the multiple ports in the first port set.

23. The method of claim 21, wherein: The method further comprises: Send third information, where the third information is used to indicate the sending of the confidence information.

24. The method according to any one of claims 18 to 23, characterized in that: The signal to interference noise ratio corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient is greater than or equal to a first threshold, or greater than or equal to the first threshold and less than or equal to a second threshold, or less than or equal to the second threshold; or, The signal receiving power corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient is greater than or equal to a first threshold, or greater than or equal to the first threshold and less than or equal to a second threshold, or less than or equal to the second threshold.

25. The method of claim 24, wherein: The method further comprises: sending indication information of the first threshold; and / or, Send indication information of the second threshold.

26. The method according to any one of claims 19 to 25, characterized in that: The method further comprises: Send fourth information, where the first indication information is used to indicate a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient.

27. The method according to any one of claims 19 to 26, characterized in that: The first information is also used to indicate a spatial domain vector and a frequency domain vector corresponding to the at least one combining coefficient.

28. The method according to any one of claims 18 to 27, characterized in that: The method further comprises: Sending fifth information, where the fifth information is used to indicate a first frame structure and a second frame structure, wherein the first frame structure and the second frame structure each include N subframes, each subframe corresponds to a time domain unit and a frequency domain unit, each subframe in the first frame structure corresponds to a first frequency domain resource, each subframe in the second frame structure corresponds to a second frequency domain resource, and the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource do not overlap in the frequency domain; A subframe in the first frame structure and a subframe in the second frame structure corresponding to the same time domain unit satisfy: At least one subframe is a special subframe; or, One subframe is an uplink subframe, and the other subframe is a downlink subframe.

29. The method of claim 28, wherein: The first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different carriers, or the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different subbands in the same carrier.

30. The method according to claim 28 or 29, characterized in that The first port and the second port correspond to different subframes on the first frequency domain resources, or the first port and the second port correspond to different subframes on the second frequency domain resources.

31. A communication method, characterized in that: The method further comprises: Receive fifth information, where the fifth information is used to indicate a first frame structure and a second frame structure, where the first frame structure and the second frame structure each include N subframes, each subframe corresponds to a time domain unit and a frequency domain unit, each subframe in the first frame structure corresponds to a first frequency domain resource, each subframe in the second frame structure corresponds to a second frequency domain resource, and the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource do not overlap in the frequency domain; A subframe in the first frame structure and a subframe in the second frame structure corresponding to the same time domain unit satisfy: At least one subframe is a special subframe; or, One subframe is an uplink subframe, and the other subframe is a downlink subframe.

32. The method of claim 31, wherein: The first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different carriers, or the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different subbands in the same carrier.

33. A communication method, characterized in that: The method further comprises: Sending fifth information, where the fifth information is used to indicate a first frame structure and a second frame structure, wherein the first frame structure and the second frame structure each include N subframes, each subframe corresponds to a time domain unit and a frequency domain unit, each subframe in the first frame structure corresponds to a first frequency domain resource, each subframe in the second frame structure corresponds to a second frequency domain resource, and the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource do not overlap in the frequency domain; A subframe in the first frame structure and a subframe in the second frame structure corresponding to the same time domain unit satisfy: At least one subframe is a special subframe; or, One subframe is an uplink subframe, and the other subframe is a downlink subframe.

34. The method of claim 33, wherein: The first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different carriers, or the first frequency domain resource and the second frequency domain resource correspond to different subbands in the same carrier.

35. A communication device, characterized in that: The method comprises a processor configured to execute a computer program or instructions to implement the method according to any one of claims 1 to 34.

36. The device according to claim 35, characterized in that The device further comprises a memory and / or a transceiver, wherein the memory is used to store the computer program or instructions, and the transceiver is used for the device to communicate.

37. A computer-readable storage medium, characterized in that: The storage medium stores a computer program or instruction. When the computer program or instruction is executed by the communication device, the method according to any one of claims 1 to 34 is implemented.

38. A chip, characterized in that: The chip is coupled to a memory, and the chip reads a computer program stored in the memory to execute the method according to any one of claims 1 to 34.

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