Methods and apparatuses for network energy saving cell access

Abstract

Methods and apparatuses for Network Energy Saving (NES) cell access are provided. The method includes receiving a Wake-Up Signal (WUS) configuration from a serving cell, where the WUS configuration is associated with at least one NES cell configured perform a System Information Block 1 (SIB1) transmission upon request; transmitting a WUS to the at least one NES cell based on the WUS configuration; and monitoring for a SIB1 from the at least one NES cell in response to transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell.

Description

METHODS AND APPARATUSES FOR NETWORK ENERGY SAVING CELL ACCESSThe present disclosure is related to wireless communication and, more specifically, to methods and apparatuses for Network Energy Saving (NES) cell access.Various efforts have been made to improve different aspects of wireless communication for the cellular wireless communication systems, such as the 5thGeneration (5G) New Radio (NR) system, by improving data rate, latency, reliability, and mobility. The 5G NR system is designed to provide flexibility and configurability to optimize network services and types, accommodating various use cases, such as enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB), massive Machine-Type Communication (mMTC), and Ultra-Reliable and Low-Latency Communication (URLLC). As the demand for radio access continues to increase, however, there exists a need for further improvements in the art.Summery of InventionThe present disclosure is related to methods and apparatuses for Network Energy Saving (NES) cell access.According to a first aspect of the present disclosure, a User Equipment (UE) for Network Energy Saving (NES) cell access is provided. The UE includes at least one processor, and at least one non-transitory computer-readable medium coupled to the at least one processor and storing one or more computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the UE to receive a Wake-Up Signal (WUS) configuration from a serving cell, where the WUS configuration is associated with at least one NES cell configured perform a System Information Block 1 (SIB1) transmission upon request, transmit a WUS to the at least one NES cell based on the WUS configuration, and monitor for a SIB1 from the at least one NES cell in response to transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell.In some implementations of the first aspect of the present disclosure, the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to transmit a system information request to the serving cell, and monitor for the WUS configuration in a System Information Block (SIB) from the serving cell in response to transmitting the system information request to the serving cell.In some implementations of the first aspect of the present disclosure, the at least one NES cell includes multiple NES cells, and the WUS configuration includes Physical Cell Identities (PCIs) of the multiple NES cells to establish an association between the WUS configuration and the multiple NES cells.In some implementations of the first aspect of the present disclosure, the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to determine that the WUS configuration is common for the multiple NES cells in response to determining that the WUS configuration includes the PCIs of the multiple NES cells.In some implementations of the first aspect of the present disclosure, the at least one NES cell includes multiple NES cells, the WUS configuration includes first area identifier information and second area identifier information, the first area identifier information is associated with a first NES cell of multiple NES cells and the second area identifier information is associated with a second NES cell of the multiple NES cells, and the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to receive and store the SIB1 from the first NES cell, and determine whether the stored SIB1 is reusable for accessing the second NES cell by determining whether the first area identifier information is the same as the second area identifier information.In some implementations of the first aspect of the present disclosure, the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to determine that the stored SIB1 is reusable for accessing the second NES cell in response to determining that the first area identifier information is the same as the second area identifier information.In some implementations of the first aspect of the present disclosure, transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell includes determining whether a Reference Signal Receiving Power (RSRP) value of the at least one NES cell exceeds an RSRP threshold, and transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell in response to determining that the RSRP value of the at least one NES cell exceeds the RSRP threshold.In some implementations of the first aspect of the present disclosure, the WUS configuration includes a SIB1 transmission pattern indicating time and frequency resources for the SIB1 transmission from the at least one NES cell.In some implementations of the first aspect of the present disclosure, the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to receive a Random Access Response (RAR) after transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell, where the RAR serves as an acknowledgement for the WUS. In some implementations, the UE may consider an On-Demand SIB1 (OD-SIB1) request procedure (e.g., a procedure triggered by a UE while / upon / after the UE transmits a first UL-WUS to the serving RAN for SIB1 request) is successful after receiving the RAR from the serving RAN. In addition, the UE may terminate the OD-SIB1 request procedure after receiving the RAR from the serving RAN. In some other implementations, the UE may consider that an OD-SIB1 request procedure is successful after, or only after, receiving the target SIB1 requested by the UE. In this condition, the UE may terminate the OD-SIB1 request procedure after receiving the requested SIB1 from the serving RAN.According to a second aspect of the present disclosure, a method performed by a User Equipment (UE) for Network Energy Saving (NES) cell access is provided. The method includes receiving a Wake-Up Signal (WUS) configuration from a serving cell, where the WUS configuration is associated with at least one NES cell configured perform a System Information Block 1 (SIB1) transmission upon request, transmitting a WUS to the at least one NES cell based on the WUS configuration, and monitoring for a SIB1 from the at least one NES cell in response to transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell.According to a third aspect of the present disclosure, a Base Station (BS) for supporting Network Energy Saving (NES) cell access is provided. The BS includes at least one processor, and at least one non-transitory computer-readable medium coupled to the at least one processor and storing one or more computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the BS to transmit, via a serving cell of a User Equipment (UE), a Wake-Up Signal (WUS) configuration to the UE, where the WUS configuration is associated with at least one NES cell configured to perform a System Information Block 1 (SIB1) transmission upon request, receive, via the at least one NES cell, a WUS from the UE, and initiate, via the at least one NES cell, the SIB1 transmission in response to receiving the WUS.In some implementations of the third aspect of the present disclosure, the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the BS to receive, via the serving cell, a system information request from the UE, and transmit, via the serving cell, the WUS configuration in a System Information Block (SIB) in response to receiving the system information request.In some implementations of the third aspect of the present disclosure, the at least one NES cell includes multiple NES cells, and the WUS configuration includes Physical Cell Identities (PCIs) of the multiple NES cells to establish an association between the WUS configuration and the multiple NES cells.In some implementations of the third aspect of the present disclosure, the WUS configuration includes a SIB1 transmission pattern indicating time and frequency resources for the SIB1 transmission.In some implementations of the third aspect of the present disclosure, the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the BS to transmit a Random Access Response (RAR) to the UE after receiving the WUS from the UE, where the RAR serves as an acknowledgement for the WUS.Aspects of the present disclosure are best understood from the following detailed disclosure when read with the accompanying drawings. Various features are not drawn to scale. Dimensions of various features may be arbitrarily increased or reduced for clarity of discussion.FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram illustrating a network configuration of Scenario 1, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram illustrating a network configuration of Scenario 2, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram illustrating a network configuration of Scenario 3, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 4 is a flowchart illustrating a method for an on-demand SIB1 request procedure performed by a UE capable of implementing the on-demand SIB1 request feature, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating a method for processing an on-demand SIB1 request at a cell / BS side, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 9 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for the operation where the NES Cell provides a minimum WUS configuration, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 10 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for the operation the NES Cell provides a minimum WUS configuration and Cell A optionally provides other WUS configurations, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 11 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 12 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 13 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 14 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 15 is a flowchart illustrating method / process for NES cell access, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 16 is a flowchart illustrating method / process for supporting NES cell access, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.FIG. 17 is a block diagram illustrating node for wireless communications, in accordance with various aspects of the present disclosure.Some of the abbreviations in the present application are defined as follows and, unless otherwise specified, the abbreviations have the following meanings:Abbreviation　　　　　　　　Full name3GPP　　　　　　　　3rd Generation Partnership Project5G　　　　　　　　　　　　5th Generation5GC　　　　　　　　　　　　5G CoreACK　　　　　　　　AcknowledgementAN-PDB　　　　　　　　Access Network Packet Delay BudgetARFCN　　　　　　　　Absolute Radio Frequency Channel NumberAS　　　　　　　　　　　　Access StratumASN.1　　　　　　　　Abstract Syntax Notation OneBFRQ　　　　　　　　Beam Failure Recovery RequestBS　　　　　　　　　　　　Base StationBSR　　　　　　　　　　　　Buffer Status ReportBWP　　　　　　　　Bandwidth PartC-RNTI　　　　　　　　Cell Radio Network Temporary IdentifierCA　　　　　　　　　　　　Carrier AggregationCAG　　　　　　　　Closed Access GroupCB　　　　　　　　　　　　Codebook-BasedCG　　　　　　　　　　　　Configured GrantCIF　　　　　　　　　　　　Carrier Indicator FieldCJT　　　　　　　　　　　　Coherent Joint TransmissionCN　　　　　　　　　　　　Core NetworkCN-PDB　　　　　　　　Core Network Packet Delay BudgetCORESET　　　　Control Resource SetCPE　　　　　　　　　　　　Customer Premises EquipmentCQI　　　　　　　　　　　　Channel Quality IndicationCRC　　　　　　　　Cyclic Redundancy CheckCSI　　　　　　　　　　　　Channel State InformationCSI-RS　　　　　　　　Channel State Information Reference SignalCS-RNTI　　　　　　　　Configured Scheduling Radio Network Temporary IdentifierCSS　　　　　　　　　　　　Common Search SpaceCU　　　　　　　　　　　　Central UnitDAPS　　　　　　　　Dual Active Protocol StackDC　　　　　　　　　　　　Dual ConnectivityDCI　　　　　　　　　　　　Downlink Control InformationDG　　　　　　　　　　　　Dynamic GrantDI　　　　　　　　　　　　Delay InformationDL　　　　　　　　　　　　DownlinkDL-SCH　　　　　　　　Downlink Shared ChannelDMRS　　　　　　　　Demodulation Reference SignalDR　　　　　　　　　　　　Delay ReportDRB　　　　　　　　Data Radio BearerDTCH　　　　　　　　Dedicated Traffic ChannelDU　　　　　　　　　　　　Distributed UnitETSI　　　　　　　　European Telecommunications Standards InstituteE-UTRA　　　　　　　　Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio AccessEN-DC　　　　　　　　E-UTRA NR Dual ConnectivityEPC　　　　　　　　　　　　Evolved Packet CoreeMBB　　　　　　　　Enhanced Mobile BroadBandeMTC　　　　　　　　Enhanced Machine Type CommunicationeNB　　　　　　　　　　　　Evolved Node BFDD　　　　　　　　Frequency Division DuplexingFDRA　　　　　　　　Frequency Domain Resource AllocationFR　　　　　　　　　　　　Frequency RangeFR1　　　　　　　　　　　　Frequency Range 1FR2　　　　　　　　　　　　Frequency Range 2FWA　　　　　　　　Fixed Wireless AccessGEO　　　　　　　　Geostationary Equatorial OrbitgNB　　　　　　　　　　　　Next Generation Node BGNSS　　　　　　　　Global Navigation Satellite SystemGPS　　　　　　　　　　　　Global Positioning SystemGW　　　　　　　　　　　　GatewayHARQ　　　　　　　　Hybrid Automatic Repeat RequestHO　　　　　　　　　　　　HandoverFR　　　　　　　　　　　　Frequency RangeIAB　　　　　　　　　　　　Integrated Access and BackhaulID　　　　　　　　　　　　IdentityIE　　　　　　　　　　　　Information ElementIoT　　　　　　　　　　　　Internet of ThingsITS　　　　　　　　　　　　Intelligent Transportation SystemITU　　　　　　　　　　　　International Telecommunication UnionL1　　　　　　　　　　　　Layer 1L2　　　　　　　　　　　　Layer 2L3　　　　　　　　　　　　Layer 3LAN　　　　　　　　Local Area NetworkLCH　　　　　　　　Logical ChannelLCID　　　　　　　　Logical Channel IdentityLEO　　　　　　　　　　　　Low Earth OrbitLTE 　　　　　　　　Long Term EvolutionLSB　　　　　　　　　　　　Least Significant BitMAC　　　　　　　　Medium Access ControlMAC CE　　　　　　　　MAC Control ElementMCG　　　　　　　　Master Cell GroupMCS　　　　　　　　Modulation and Coding SchemeMEO　　　　　　　　Medium Earth OrbitMIB　　　　　　　　　　　　Master Information BlockMIMO　　　　　　　　Multi-Input Multi-OutputmMTC　　　　　　　　Massive Machine Type CommunicationsMN　　　　　　　　　　　　Master NodeMsg　　　　　　　　　　　　MessageMTC　　　　　　　　Machine Type CommunicationNACK　　　　　　　　Negative AcknowledgementNAS　　　　　　　　Non-Access StratumNB-IoT　　　　　　　　Narrow Band Internet of ThingsNCB　　　　　　　　Non-Codebook-BasedNDI　　　　　　　　　　　　New Data IndicatorNES　　　　　　　　　　　　Network Energy SavingNPN　　　　　　　　Non-Public NetworkNR　　　　　　　　　　　　New RadioNR-U　　　　　　　　NR UnlicensedNTN　　　　　　　　Non-Terrestrial NetworkOD-SIB1 On-Demand System Information Block 1OD-SSB　　　　　　　　On-Demand Synchronization Signal BlockPA　　　　　　　　　　　　Power AmplifierPBCH　　　　　　　　Physical Broadcast ChannelPCell　　　　　　　　Primary CellPCI　　　　　　　　　　　　Physical Cell IdentityPDB　　　　　　　　　　　　Packet Delay BudgetPDCCH　　　　　　　　Physical Downlink Control ChannelPDCP　　　　　　　　Packet Data Convergence ProtocolPDSCH　　　　　　　　Physical Downlink Shared ChannelPDU　　　　　　　　Protocol Data UnitPHY　　　　　　　　PhysicalPLMN 　　　　　　　　Public Land Mobile NetworkPMI　　　　　　　　　　　　Precoding Matrix indicatorPNI-NPN　　　　　　　　Public Network Integrated Non-Public NetworkPRACH　　　　　　　　Physical Random Access ChannelPSDB　　　　　　　　PDU Set Delay BudgetPUCCH　　　　　　　　Physical Uplink Control ChannelPUSCH　　　　　　　　Physical Uplink Shared ChannelQCL　　　　　　　　Quasi-CoLocationQoS　　　　　　　　　　　　Quality of ServiceRA　　　　　　　　　　　　Random AccessRACH　　　　　　　　Random Access ChannelRAN　　　　　　　　Radio Access NetworkRAR　　　　　　　　Random Access ResponseRAT　　　　　　　　　　　　Radio Access TechnologyRE　　　　　　　　　　　　Resource ElementRel-15　　　　　　　　Release 15Rel-16　　　　　　　　Release 16Rel-17 　　　　　　　　Release 17Rel-18　　　　　　　　Release 18RF　　　　　　　　　　　　Radio FrequencyRLC　　　　　　　　　　　　Radio Link ControlRS　　　　　　　　　　　　Reference SignalRLF　　　　　　　　　　　　Radio Link FailureRSTD　　　　　　　　Reference Signal Time Difference MeasurementRNTI　　　　　　　　Radio Network Temporary IdentifierRO　　　　　　　　　　　　RACH OccasionRRC　　　　　　　　Radio Resource ControlRRM　　　　　　　　Radio Resource ManagementRS　　　　　　　　　　　　Reference SignalRSRP　　　　　　　　Reference Signal Received PowerRSRQ　　　　　　　　Reference Signal Receiving QualityRV　　　　　　　　　　　　Redundancy VersionRX　　　　　　　　　　　　ReceptionSCell　　　　　　　　Secondary CellSCG　　　　　　　　　　　　Secondary Cell GroupSDT　　　　　　　　　　　　Small Data TransmissionSI　　　　　　　　　　　　System InformationSIB　　　　　　　　　　　　System Information BlockSL　　　　　　　　　　　　SidelinkSLIV　　　　　　　　Start and Length Indicator ValueSN　　　　　　　　　　　　Secondary NodeSNPN　　　　　　　　Stand-alone Non-Public NetworkSpCell　　　　　　　　Special CellSR　　　　　　　　　　　　Scheduling RequestSRB　　　　　　　　　　　　Signaling Radio BearerSRS　　　　　　　　　　　　Sounding Reference SignalSRI　　　　　　　　　　　　SRS Resource IndicatorSSB　　　　　　　　　　　　Synchronization Signal BlockSSS　　　　　　　　　　　　Secondary Synchronization SignalSUL　　　　　　　　　　　　Supplementary UplinkTA　　　　　　　　　　　　Timing AdvanceTAG　　　　　　　　　　　　Timing Advance GroupTAT 　　　　　　　　Time Alignment TimerTAU　　　　　　　　　　　　Tracking Area UpdateTB　　　　　　　　　　　　Transport BlockTCI　　　　　　　　　　　　Transmission Configuration IndicationTDD　　　　　　　　Time Division DuplexingTDRA　　　　　　　　Time Domain Resource AllocationTN　　　　　　　　　　　　Terrestrial NetworkTPC　　　　　　　　　　　　Transmission Power ControlTPMI　　　　　　　　Transmit Precoder Matrix IndicationTRP　　　　　　　　　　　　Transmission Reception PointTRS 　　　　　　　　Tracking Reference SignalTRX　　　　　　　　Transmission / ReceptionTS　　　　　　　　　　　　Technical SpecificationTX　　　　　　　　　　　　TransmissionUCI　　　　　　　　　　　　Uplink Control InformationUE　　　　　　　　　　　　User EquipmentUL　　　　　　　　　　　　UplinkUL-CG　　　　　　　　Uplink-Configured GrantUPF　　　　　　　　　　　　User Plane FunctionURLLC　　　　　　　　Ultra-Reliable and Low-Latency CommunicationsUSIM　　　　　　　　Universal Subscriber Identity ModuleUSS 　　　　　　　　UE-specific Search SpaceUTC　　　　　　　　Coordinated Universal TimeV2X　　　　　　　　　　　　Vehicle-to-EverythingVSAT　　　　　　　　Very Small Aperture TerminalXR　　　　　　　　　　　　Extended RealityThe following contains specific information related to implementations of the present disclosure. The drawings and their accompanying detailed disclosure are merely directed to implementations. However, the present disclosure is not limited to these implementations. Other variations and implementations of the present disclosure will be obvious to those skilled in the art.Unless noted otherwise, like or corresponding elements among the drawings may be indicated by like or corresponding reference numerals. Moreover, the drawings and illustrations in the present disclosure are generally not to scale and are not intended to correspond to actual relative dimensions.For consistency and ease of understanding, like features may be identified (although, in some examples, not illustrated) by the same numerals in the drawings. However, the features in different implementations may be different in other respects and shall not be narrowly confined to what is illustrated in the drawings.References to “one implementation,” “an implementation,” “example implementation,” “various implementations,” “some implementations,” “implementations of the present application,” etc., may indicate that the implementation(s) of the present application so described may include a particular feature, structure, or characteristic, but not every possible implementation of the present application necessarily includes the particular feature, structure, or characteristic. Further, repeated use of the phrase “in one implementation,” or “in an example implementation,” “an implementation,” do not necessarily refer to the same implementation, although they may. Moreover, any use of phrases like “implementations” in connection with “the present application” are never meant to characterize that all implementations of the present application must include the particular feature, structure, or characteristic, and should instead be understood to mean “at least some implementations of the present application” includes the stated particular feature, structure, or characteristic.The term “coupled” is defined as connected, whether directly or indirectly through intervening components, and is not necessarily limited to physical connections. The term “comprising,” when utilized, means “including, but not necessarily limited to”; it specifically indicates open-ended inclusion or membership in the so-described combination, group, series, and the equivalent.The expression “at least one of A, B and C” or “at least one of the following: A, B and C” means “only A, or only B, or only C, or any combination of A, B and C.” The terms “system” and “network” may be used interchangeably. The term “and / or” is only an association relationship for describing associated objects and represents that three relationships may exist such that A and / or B may indicate that A exists alone, A and B exist at the same time, or B exists alone. The character “ / ” generally represents that the associated objects are in an “or” relationship.For the purposes of explanation and non-limitation, specific details, such as functional entities, techniques, protocols, and standards, are set forth for providing an understanding of the disclosed technology. In other examples, detailed disclosure of well-known methods, technologies, systems, and architectures are omitted so as not to obscure the present disclosure with unnecessary details.Persons skilled in the art will immediately recognize that any network function(s) or algorithm(s) disclosed may be implemented by hardware, software, or a combination of software and hardware. Disclosed functions may correspond to modules which may be software, hardware, firmware, or any combination thereof.A software implementation may include computer executable instructions stored on a computer-readable medium, such as memory or other type of storage devices. One or more microprocessors or general-purpose computers with communication processing capability may be programmed with corresponding executable instructions and perform the disclosed network function(s) or algorithm(s).The microprocessors or general-purpose computers may include Application-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs), programmable logic arrays, and / or one or more Digital Signal Processor (DSPs). Although some of the disclosed implementations are oriented to software installed and executing on computer hardware, alternative implementations implemented as firmware, as hardware, or as a combination of hardware and software are well within the scope of the present disclosure. The computer-readable medium includes but is not limited to Random Access Memory (RAM), Read Only Memory (ROM), Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory (EPROM), Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory (EEPROM), flash memory, Compact Disc Read-Only Memory (CD-ROM), magnetic cassettes, magnetic tape, magnetic disk storage, or any other equivalent medium capable of storing computer-readable instructions.A radio communication network architecture such as a Long-Term Evolution (LTE) system, an LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) system, an LTE-Advanced Pro system, or a 5G NR Radio Access Network (RAN) typically includes at least one base station (BS), at least one UE, and one or more optional network elements that provide connection within a network. The UE communicates with the network such as a Core Network (CN), an Evolved Packet Core (EPC) network, an Evolved Universal Terrestrial RAN (E-UTRAN), a 5G Core (5GC), or an internet via a RAN established by one or more BSs.A UE may include, but is not limited to, a mobile station, a mobile terminal or device, or a user communication radio terminal. The UE may be a portable radio equipment that includes, but is not limited to, a mobile phone, a tablet, a wearable device, a sensor, a vehicle, or a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) with wireless communication capability. The UE is configured to receive and transmit signals over an air interface to one or more cells in a RAN.The BS may be configured to provide communication services according to at least a Radio Access Technology (RAT) such as Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX), Global System for Mobile communications (GSM) that is often referred to as 2G, GSM Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE) RAN (GERAN), General Packet Radio Service (GPRS), Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS) that is often referred to as 3G based on basic wideband-code division multiple access (W-CDMA), high-speed packet access (HSPA), LTE, LTE-A, evolved LTE (eLTE) that is LTE connected to 5GC, NR (often referred to as 5G), and / or LTE-A Pro. However, the scope of the present disclosure is not limited to these protocols.The BS may include, but is not limited to, a node B (NB) in the UMTS, an evolved node B (eNB) in LTE or LTE-A, a radio network controller (RNC) in UMTS, a BS controller (BSC) in the GSM / GERAN, an ng-eNB in an Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (E-UTRA) BS in connection with 5GC, a next generation Node B (gNB) in the 5G-RAN, or any other apparatus capable of controlling radio communication and managing radio resources within a cell. The BS may serve one or more UEs via a radio interface.The BS may be operable to provide radio coverage to a specific geographical area using multiple cells forming the RAN. The BS may support the operations of the cells. Each cell may be operable to provide services to at least one UE within its radio coverage.Each cell (often referred to as a serving cell) may provide services to serve one or more UEs within its radio coverage, such that each cell schedules the DL (and optionally UL resources) to at least one UE within its radio coverage for DL (and optionally UL packet transmissions from the UE). The BS may communicate with one or more UEs in the radio communication system via the plurality of cells.A cell may allocate sidelink (SL) resources for supporting the Proximity Service (ProSe) or Vehicle to Everything (V2X) service. Each cell may have overlapped coverage areas with other cells.In Multi-RAT Dual Connectivity (MR-DC) cases, the primary cell of a Master Cell Group (MCG) or a Secondary Cell Group (SCG) may be referred to as a Special Cell (SpCell). A Primary Cell (PCell) may include the SpCell of an MCG. A Primary SCG Cell (PSCell) may include the SpCell of an SCG. MCG may include a group of serving cells associated with the Master Node (MN), including the SpCell and optionally one or more Secondary Cells (SCells). An SCG may include a group of serving cells associated with the Secondary Node (SN), including the SpCell and optionally one or more SCells.As described above, the frame structure for NR supports flexible configurations for accommodating various next generation (e.g., 5G) communication requirements, such as Enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB), Massive Machine Type Communication (mMTC), and Ultra-Reliable and Low-Latency Communication (URLLC), while fulfilling high reliability, high data rate, and low latency requirements. The Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiplexing (OFDM) technology in the 3GPP may serve as a baseline for an NR waveform. The scalable OFDM numerology, such as adaptive sub-carrier spacing, channel bandwidth, and Cyclic Prefix (CP), may also be used.Two coding schemes may be considered for NR, specifically Low-Density Parity-Check (LDPC) code and Polar Code. The coding scheme adaption may be configured based on channel conditions and / or service applications.At least the DL transmission data, a guard period, and UL transmission data should be included in a transmission time interval (TTI) of a single NR frame. The respective portions of the DL transmission data, the guard period, and the UL transmission data should also be configurable based on, for example, the network dynamics of NR. SL resources may also be provided in an NR frame to support ProSe services or V2X services.Any two or more of the following paragraphs, (sub)-bullets, points, actions, behaviors, terms, or claims described in the present disclosure may be combined logically, reasonably, and properly to form a specific method.Any sentence, paragraph, (sub)-bullet, point, action, behaviors, terms, or claims described in the present disclosure may be implemented independently and separately to form a specific method.Dependency, e.g., “based on”, “more specifically”, “preferably”, “in one embodiment”, “in some implementations”, etc., in the present disclosure is just one possible example which would not restrict the specific method.“A and / or B” in the present disclosure may refer to either A or B, both A and B, or at least one of A and B.In this disclosure, “X / Y” may encompass the meanings of “X or Y,” “X and Y,” and “X and / or Y,” as indicated by two or more of the sentences, paragraphs, sub-bullets, points, actions, behaviors, terms, alternatives, aspects, examples, embodiments, or claims described in the following invention(s).One aspect of the present disclosure may be applied in various contexts, including communications, communication equipment (such as mobile telephone apparatus, base station apparatus, wireless LAN apparatus, and / or sensor devices), integrated circuits (such as communication chips), and software programs, among others.The terms “an antenna port” and “antenna ports,” as discussed in the present disclosure, may refer to “an antenna port used for transmission of PUSCH(s) / PUCCH(s)” and “antenna ports used for transmission of PUSCH(s) / PUCCH(s),” respectively.Some of the terms, definitions, and / or abbreviations included in the present disclosure may either be sourced from existing documents (such as those from ETSI, ITU, or other sources) or may be newly created by experts from the 3GPP whenever there was a need for a precise vocabulary.Examples of some selected terms in the present disclosure are provided as follows.Antenna Panel: A conceptual term for a UE antenna implementation. It may be assumed that a panel may be an operational unit for controlling a transmit spatial filter (beam). A panel may typically include multiple antenna elements. In some implementations, a beam may be formed by a panel, and in order to form two beams simultaneously, two panels may be needed. Such simultaneous beamforming by multiple panels may be subject to the UE capability. A similar definition for “panel” may be applicable by applying spatial receiving filtering characteristics.Beam: A beam may include a spatial (domain) filtering. In one example, the spatial filtering may be applied in the analog domain by adjusting a phase and / or amplitude of the signal before being transmitted by a corresponding antenna element. In another example, the spatial filtering may be applied in the digital domain by the Multi-Input Multi-Output (MIMO) technique in the wireless communication system. For example, “a UE made a PUSCH transmission by using a specific beam” may mean that the UE made the PUSCH transmission by using the specific spatial / digital domain filter. The “beam” may also be, but is not limited to be, represented as an antenna, an antenna port, an antenna element, a group of antennas, a group of antenna ports, or a group of antenna elements. The beam may also be formed by a certain reference signal resource. In short, the beam may be equivalent to a spatial domain filter through which the EM wave is radiated. Beam information may include details about the selected or utilized beam or spatial filter. In some implementations, the individual beams (e.g., spatial filters) may be used to transmit individual reference signals. Consequently, a beam or beam information may be represented by one or more reference signal resource indices.DCI: DCI may include downlink control information, and there may be various DCI formats used in a PDCCH. The DCI format may be a predefined format in which the downlink control information may be packed / formed and transmitted in a PDCCH.TCI state: a TCI state may include parameters for configuring a QCL relationship between one or more DL reference signals and a target reference signal set. For example, a target reference signal set may be the DMRS ports of a PDSCH or a PDCCH.HARQ: A functionality that ensures the delivery between peer entities at Layer 1 (e.g., Physical Layer). A single HARQ process may support one Transport Block (TB) when the physical layer is not configured for the downlink / uplink spatial multiplexing, and when the physical layer is configured for downlink / uplink spatial multiplexing, a single HARQ process may support one or more TBs. There may be one HARQ entity per serving cell. Each HARQ entity may support a parallel (number of) DL and UL HARQ process.In the present disclosure, although the term “gNB” may have been used throughout the document, it should be understood that the term “gNB” may be replaced by any other type of BS (e.g., an eNB). Additionally, unless specifically noted otherwise, the terms “SSB” and “OD-SSB” may be used interchangeably in the present disclosure.A Synchronization Signal Block (SSB) may include, or consist of, a Primary Synchronization Signal (PSS), a Secondary Synchronization Signal (SSS), and a Physical Broadcast Channel (PBCH) payload. The PSS and the SSS may be pseudo-random sequences with a length equal to 127. The PBCH payload may include a Master Information Block (MIB) (24 bits in total) and an 8 bits payload. The information in the MIB may include: a System Frame Number (SFN), a sub-carrier space (SCS), a DeModulation Reference Signal (DMRS) configuration, an Access Control, and mainly a configuration for a System Information Block 1 (SIB1) acquisition. By decoding the PSS and the SSS, a User Equipment (UE) may be able to identify a Physical Cell Identity (PCI) for a corresponding cell and may determine the symbol boundary. Consequently, with the decoding of the PBCH, the UE may determine the frame boundary and may try to decode the Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH).In New Radio (NR), to enable beamforming, the SSB patterns may be introduced such that the respective SSBs (with the corresponding space direction) may be transmitted in a time domain (as a transmission pattern). An SSB index may be used to distinguish the SSB and may help the UE determine the frame boundary as well. The next generation NodeB (gNB) may perform beam sweeping across different SSBs and the UE may choose the best SSB (e.g., with the best Reference Signal Receiving Power (RSRP)) to acquire the System Information (SI), the paging reception and may perform a Random Access Channel (RACH) procedure when the UE would like to make a Radio Resource Control (RRC) connection establishment. When decoding the MIB, the UE may know the configuration of the PDCCH which may include a Control Resource Set #0 (CORESET#0) and a Search Space #0 (SS#0), and then the UE may derive an entry of a default table to identify the time / frequency resource where the SIB1 is transmitted. Upon the SIB1 reception, the UE may get the cell (re)selection information, the Public Land Mobile Network Identifier (PLMN ID), the Cell Identifier (ID), and the common serving cell information for upcoming operations.Network Energy Saving (NES) technology may be considered of great importance for environmental sustainability, for reducing the environmental impact through greenhouse gas emissions reduction, and for achieving operational cost savings. As the 5G technology may become pervasive across industries and geographical areas, and the handling of more advanced services and applications may require very high data rates, such as Extended Reality (XR), the networks may become denser and may use more antennas, larger bandwidths, and more frequency bands. The environmental impact of the 5G technology may need to stay under control, and novel solutions to improve the network energy savings may need to be developed.The 3GPP Rel-18 work on NES for New Radio (NR) technology may have led to the specification of beneficial techniques, primarily for the Radio Resource Control (RRC) connected mode (or RRC_CONNECTED state), the user-specific signals and channels, and the low load scenarios. The techniques specified in Release-18 may include the SSB-less Secondary Cell (SCell) operation for inter-band Carrier Aggregation (CA) for Frequency Range 1 (FR1) and co-located cells, the enhancement on the cell DTX / DRX mechanism including the alignment of the cell DTX / DRX operations and the UE DRX operations in the RRC connected mode, the inter-node information exchange on the cell DTX / DRX operations, the techniques in the spatial and power domains to enable efficient adaptation of spatial elements as well as efficient adaptation of power offset values between the Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) and the Channel State Information-Reference Signal (CSI-RS), the mechanisms to prevent legacy UEs from camping on cells adopting the Rel-18 NES techniques, the Conditional Handover (CHO) procedure enhancement(s), and the inter-node beam activation and enhancements on restricting paging in a limited area, and the corresponding Radio Resource Management (RRM) / Radio Frequency (RF) core requirements.In the upcoming Release-19 work, one of the objectives may be to specify procedures and signaling method(s) to support an on-demand System Information Block 1 (SIB1) for User Equipments (UEs) in an idle / inactive mode. More specifically, the objectives may include a triggering method by an uplink Wake-Up Signal (WUS) using an existing signal / channel, a Wake-up-signal configuration provisioning to a UE, and an information exchange between next generation NodeBs (gNBs) at least for the configuration of the WUS.Three scenarios (scenario 1, scenario 2, and scenario 3) are described for cases where cell broadcasts an SSB but not broadcast a SIB1.Scenario 1:FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram illustrating a network configuration of Scenario 1, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. As illustrated in FIG. 1, Cell#1 may be operated at frequency#1, and Cell#1 may broadcast an SSB and a SIB1. Cell#2 and Cell#4 may be operated at frequency#2 which may be different from frequency#1, and both may broadcast the SSB only. The Cell#2’s coverage and the Cell#4’s coverage may be fully overlapped with Cell#1’s coverage. Cell#3 may be operated at frequency#3 which may be different from frequency#1 and frequency#2. Cell#3 may only broadcast SSB(s) and the coverage of Cell#3 may be fully overlapped with the Cell#1’s coverage.In FIG. 1, UE#1 may not be capable of implementing an “on-demand SIB1 request” or a “(Rel-19) Network Energy Saving” feature / function which may mean that UE#1 may not request a SIB1 when UE#1 identifies a cell not broadcasting the SIB1 during the idle / inactive state of UE#1 (e.g., an RRC_IDLE state or an RRC_INACTIVE state). Under scenario 1, UE#1 may detect Cell#1 (within the coverage of Cell#1) and may only camp on Cell#1. If Cell#1 is not suitable, UE#1 may perform a cell (re)selection followed by the 3GPP specifications. On the other hand, UE#2 may be capable of implementing the “on-demand SIB1 request” feature / function which may mean that UE#2 may request the cell to perform SIB1 transmissions when UE#2 is in the RRC_IDLE / RRC_INACTIVE state and identifies a cell not broadcasting the SIB1. Under scenario 1, UE#2 may detect Cell#1 and Cell#2 and may either try to camp on Cell#1 or try to request the SIB1 associated with the Cell#2.There may be certain criteria on why UE#2 camps on a cell other rather than Cell#1. For instance, UE#2 may be configured to camp on a specific frequency or UE#2 may be barred by Cell#1 since Cell#1 is overloaded. UE#2 may be able to trigger the “on-demand SIB1 request (procedure)” regarding at least one SSB or at least one cell or at least one frequency via one or more number of requests. After receiving the on-demand SIB1 request, the cell(s) (e.g., Cell#1, Cell#2) may provide the SIB1 for fulfilling the needs of UE#2. The mechanism to provide the SIB1 may include a broadcast or a multicast or a unicast transmission approach. When the broadcast or the multicast transmission is used, the cell may stop broadcasting the SIB1 when the demand is fulfilled. Moreover, the “on-demand SIB1 (OD-SIB1) request” behavior may not be guaranteed successfully, and UE#2 may repeat the request or try to camp on other cells or be kept in the idle / inactivate state.Scenario 2:FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram illustrating a network configuration of Scenario 2, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. As illustrated in FIG. 2, Cell#1 may be operated at frequency#1, and Cell#1 may broadcast an SSB and a SIB1. Cell#2 and Cell#4 may be operated at frequency#2 which may be different from frequency#1, and both may broadcast the SSB only. The coverage of Cell#2 and Cell#4 may be partially overlapped with the coverage of Cell#1. Cell#3 may be operated at frequency#3 which may be different from frequency#1 and frequency#2. Cell#3 may only broadcast the SSB and the coverage of Cell#3 may be partially overlapped with the coverage of Cell#1.In this scenario, UE#1 may not be capable of implementing an on-demand SIB1 request (or a (Rel-19) Network Energy Saving) feature / function which may mean that UE#1 may not request the SIB1 when UE#1 is in an RRC_IDLE / RRC_INACTIVE state and identifies a cell not broadcasting the SIB1. Under scenario 2, UE#1 may detect Cell#1 and Cell#3. Only Cell#1 may be accessible. If Cell#1 is not suitable, UE#1 may perform a cell (re)selection followed by the 3GPP specifications even though the quality of Cell#3 may be sufficient (e.g., the SSB-RSRP between Cell#3 and UE#1 may be higher than a threshold but no SIB1 may be acquired, so UE#1 may try to search cells other than Cell#1 and Cell#3). On the other hand, UE#2 may be capable of implementing the “on-demand SIB1 request” feature / function which may mean that UE#2 may request the SIB1 when UE#2 is in the RRC_IDLE / RRC_INACTIVE state and identifies a cell not broadcasting the SIB1. Under scenario 2, UE#2 may detect Cell#2 and may try to request the SIB1 associated with Cell#2. Otherwise, UE#2 may perform the cell (re)selection or may be forced to be out of services. In addition, UE#2 may not get other assistance from Cell#1 since UE#2 may not be in the coverage of Cell#1. On the contrary, UE#3 may be capable of implementing the “on-demand SIB1 request” feature which may mean that UE#3 may detect Cell#1 and Cell#4 and may decide whether to camp on Cell#1 or try to request the SIB1 associated with Cell#4. In some implementations, UE#3 may get certain assistance from Cell#1 and then may camp on Cell#4.If UE#2 fails to camp on Cell#2 even though UE#2 performed the on-demand SIB1 request procedure, UE#2 may record such condition to reflect there may be a coverage hole (since there may be no suitable / acceptable cells for the UE to camp on). When UE#2 is entering an RRC_CONNECTED state, UE#2 may perform the reporting and a network vendor may try to have optimization. Otherwise, it may be a waste for a cell to broadcast the SSB without the SIB1.There may be certain criteria on why UE#3 camps on Cell#4 rather than Cell#1. For instance, when UE#3 may be configured to camp on a specific frequency or when Cell#1 may be overloaded. UE#3 may be able to trigger the on-demand SIB1 request procedure subject to at least one cell or at least one frequency upon one request. After receiving the demand request, the cell(s) may provide the SIB1 for fulfilling the needs of UE#3. The mechanism to provide the SIB1 may include a broadcast or a multicast or a unicast transmission approach. When the broadcast transmission may be used, the cell may stop broadcasting the SIB1 when the demand of UE#3 may be fulfilled. In some implementations, the “on-demand SIB1 request” procedure / behavior may not be guaranteed successfully, and UE#3 may repeat the same request or try to camp on other cells or may be kept in the idle / inactivate state.Scenario 3:FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram illustrating a network configuration of Scenario 3, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. As illustrated in FIG. 3, Cell#1 may be operated at frequency#1, and Cell#1 may broadcast an SSB and a SIB1. Cell#2 and Cell#4 may be operated at frequency#2 which may be different from the frequency#1, and both may broadcast the SSB only. The coverage of Cell#2 and Cell#4 may not be overlapped with the coverage of Cell#1. Cell#3 may be operated at frequency#3 which may be different from frequency#1 and frequency#2. Cell#3 may only broadcast the SSB and the coverage of Cell#3 may not be overlapped with the coverage of Cell#1.UE#1 may not be capable of implementing an on-demand SIB1 request feature / function which may mean that UE#1 may not request the SIB1 when UE#1 is in an RRC_IDLE / RRC_INACTIVE state and identifies a cell not broadcasting the SIB1. Under scenario 3, UE#1 may detect Cell#1 and may perform the legacy operation. UE#2 may be capable of implementing the on-demand SIB1 request feature / function which may mean that UE#2 may request the SIB1 when UE#2 is in the RRC_IDLE / RRC_INACTIVE state and identifies a cell not broadcasting the SIB1. Under scenario 3, UE#2 may detect Cell#2 and may try to request the SIB1 associated with Cell#2. Otherwise, UE#2 may perform the cell (re)selection or may be forced to be out of services. In addition, UE#2 may not get other assistance from Cell#1 since UE#2 may not be in the coverage of Cell#1. On the contrary, UE#3 as a non-capable of the “on-demand SIB1 request” feature / function may detect Cell#3 but may have no means to request the SIB1 transmission from Cell#3. As a result, UE#3 may be recognized as it is out of services.If UE#2 fails to camp on Cell#2 even though UE#2 performed the on-demand SIB1 request procedure, UE#2 may record that condition to reflect there may be a coverage hole (since there may be no available / suitable / acceptable cells). When UE#2 is entering an RRC_CONNECTED state, UE#2 may do the reporting and the network vendor may try to have optimization. Otherwise, it may be a waste for a cell to broadcast the SSB without the SIB1.In some implementations, to resolve the issues for different scenarios, the system may try to reuse the existing system frame structure and channel to support the “on-demand SIB1 request” feature / procedure / behavior and the original limitation may be kept as well, like the size budget of the DCI and the blind decoding. Additionally or alternatively, the system may try to eliminate the unnecessary behaviors under the cell side to keep the cell saving the network energy. Additionally or alternatively, the system may try not to impact legacy UEs and cells. For example, the on-demand SIB1 sequence may not confuse them or result in error cases.FIG. 4 is a flowchart illustrating a method 400 for an on-demand SIB1 request procedure performed by a UE capable of implementing the on-demand SIB1 request feature, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. In action 401, a UE may determine whether a SIB1 is broadcasted. The UE may try to synchronize with an SSB of a cell. By decoding the SSB, the UE may have the PSS and the SSS information to derive a PCI for the corresponding cell (e.g., the cell where the UE receives the SSB) and may be able to identify a symbol boundary. With further decoding the PBCH on the SSB, the UE may synchronize with the frame and may get associated time and frequency resources to acquire the SIB1 broadcast by the corresponding cell. Under the legacy behavior, the UE may select an appropriate SSB (e.g., a beam) to get the SIB1. If all information may be provided but the UE fails to get the SIB1, the UE may try to synchronize other SSBs or may perform a cell search again. This may mean the UE may waste a lot of efforts to confirm whether the SIB1 may be received, or the channel quality between the UE and the corresponding cell may not be sufficiently good. Hereafter, the functional block of action 401 may be designed to guide the UE's process to check the availability / validity of the SIB1 and / or may apply an earlier determination method to improve the efficiency. The availability may include whether the SIB1 may be present or may be broadcast by demand. The UE may get other assistance information and may be able to determine the availability of the SIB1 wherein the assistance information may be given from another cell, a core network, Operations, Administration and Maintenance (OAM) etc.In action 402, the UE may determine whether to camp on a cell not broadcasting a SIB1. For example, after confirming there may be no available SIB1 for the corresponding cell, the UE may try a cell search upon another cell with the same / different frequency. Alternatively, the UE may try to request a SIB1 on the cell. In some implementations, action 402 may be determined before action 401 function that the UE may be configured to skip the cell without the SIB1 broadcasting or may skip a particular frequency even though the UE may be capable of the "on-demand SIB1 request" feature. If the UE decides to camp on a cell not the SIB1 broadcasting, then the UE may execute action 403; otherwise, the UE may perform the cell search. In practice, it may be the UE implementation to execute action 402, but a NW or a gNB may override the decisions. For example, an access control may be used to prohibit the UE from accessing a cell without the SIB1 broadcasting. The control approach may work together with a Access Control Barring (ACB) / a Unified Access Control (UAC) or may work independently.Once the UE decides the availability of the SIB1 request and would like to camp on the cell accordingly, the UE may be provided with relative configuration(s) to enable the request. If no configuration may be applied, the UE may go back to action 402 to determine the target cell to camp on again or the UE may apply a default or a stored configuration. The acquisition of the SIB1 configuration may be executed on the same cell (the one that does not broadcast the SIB1) or a different cell. The configuration for the on-demand SIB1 request may facilitate the generation of the request sequence, the appropriate setting for the request behavior, the associated resource(s) and channel and the relative control mechanisms. In action 403, the UE may also check the validity of the configuration. Moreover, the UE may acquire at least one configuration so that it may be feasible to get multiple configurations subject to respective cells.In action 403, the UE may acquire an on-demand SIB1 request configuration. In action 404, the UE may perform an on-demand SIB1 request procedure. In action 405, the UE may determine whether the on-demand SIB1 request procedure is completed. In action 406, the UE may camp on a target cell.In some implementations, the UE may follow the configuration or may follow certain procedures to execute action 404. The UE may send a request signaling to a cell (e.g., the cell without broadcasting the SIB1, the cell where the UE receives the SSB(s) in action 401, or another cell). The signaling may be coded with a specific format and it may be transmitted in a contention based approach (e.g., other UEs may transmit the same sequence at the same resource) or in a contention free based approach (e.g., the sequence may be transmitted at a reserved resource whereas only the UE may be used). To guarantee the reliability and the success of the request, the UE may transmit the sequence in a diversity approach wherein the repetition / retransmission of the sequence with the same and / or different transmitting power may be adopted. The content of the request sequence may include a simple ON / OFF request or may request specific portions of the SIB1 or may indicate an identification of the UE.Upon completion of action 404, the UE may try to perform the cell search again to check whether the SIB1 may be broadcast by the cell (e.g., the cell where the UE receives the SSB(s) in action 401). The broadcast of the SIB1 may be an implicit acknowledgement that the UE may recognize the request may be successfully completed if the SIB1 may be broadcast. It may be noted that a gNB (or the cell where the UE receives the SSB(s) in action 401) may successfully receive the request but still may decide not to broadcast the SIB1. With this regard, the UE may still recognize the failure of the request. Another different option may be the gNB (or the cell where the UE receives the SSB(s) in action 401) may provide an explicit acknowledgement in case the gNB (or the cell where the UE receives the SSB(s) in action 401) receives the request. When the UE receives the acknowledgement from the gNB (or the cell where the UE receives the SSB(s) in action 401) but still fails to receive the SIB1, the UE may identify itself to be barred from the cell. The barring may take place for a long while and the UE may not try to request the SIB1. The barring duration may be configured by barring parameters provided in the SIB1. In some implementations, the UE may by default bar itself from requesting the SIB1 for a default value, e.g., 300s. One specific case may be when the UE may be barred, but the cell broadcasts the SIB1 (e.g., requested by another UE), the UE may still be prohibited from camping on the cell, or the barring may be expired / terminated implicitly (if the SIB1 may be broadcasted, or if the UE receives the SIB1 from the barred cell).In action 406, if the UE can receive the SIB1 after the request behavior, the UE may try to camp on the target cell. The UE may store the corresponding SIB1 information and may associate the corresponding SIB1 information with the PCI of the cell. The UE may perform paging monitoring on the cell and may stay in an RRC_IDLE / RRC_INACTIVE state. The UE may perform an RRC resume operation to transit from an inactive state to a connected state. The UE may perform an RRC connection establishment (or an RRC connection setup) and may enter an RRC_CONNECTED state. It may be noted the steps from action 401 to action 406 may not be order dependent. For example, action 403 may be performed first then action 402 if there may be a pre-configured approach on determining the camp priority.FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating a method 500 for processing an on-demand SIB1 request at a cell / BS side, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.To enable power / energy saving, a network in action 501 may determine not to broadcast a SIB1 and the behavior may be applied for all SSBs (all beams) or at least one of the SSBs. The network may perform an analysis on the loading of each direction and may turn on / off the SIB1 transmission on corresponding directions. The broadcasting periodicity may be adaptive with a longer periodicity if the network would like to achieve more power / energy saving gain. In some implementations, a cell may broadcast a "compact" SIB1 that only specific information may be provided in comparison with a conventional SIB1 in the 3GPP technical specifications. In addition, it may be typical for the network to decide not to broadcast the SIB1 on a higher frequency band (e.g., because of the smaller coverage).When a gNB / NW decides not to broadcast the SIB1 on the associated cell, the cell may require negotiating such changes with other cells. The other cells may include the neighboring cell (whose coverage may be fully / partial / non overlapped) with the cell not broadcasting the SIB1. The negotiation may further include the frequency, the SSB (SSB index) of not broadcasting the SIB1, the periodicity of broadcast SIB1, the configuration to support the "on-demand SIB1 request", and the other information of the cell loading and the cell barring control. In action 502, the negotiated cell may provide the corresponding assistance information or configuration for the serving UE of the negotiated cell or a requested UE. The cell may provide assistance information by itself rather than negotiating with a neighbor cell. The assistance information may be appended by the special design in the PSS / SSS / PBCH or may be provided via an OAM or a pre-configuration.In action 503, the cell may monitor SIB1 request signaling. For example, the cell may monitor a specific resource or a configured resource to identify whether any UE transmits an on-demand SIB1 request signaling. The monitoring can take place at any SSB or any frequency or at least one SSB or at least one frequency. If multiple requests are detected in respective SSBs and / or frequencies, the cell may recognize the request may be aimed for associating SSB / frequency. On the contrary, the request may be agnostic to the SSB / frequency and the cell may recognize the request may be to enable the broadcasting of the SIB1 on any SSB / frequency. The cell may adopt an "energy-efficient monitoring" that the monitoring may only be triggered while some conditions meet; otherwise the cell may not monitor a request sequence. In addition, the cell may only monitor a request on a specific SSB, resource, and / or frequency to avoid power / energy consumption.The cell may detect multiple requests from different sources (even though the requests may be transmitted on the same resource). In action 504, the cell may determine whether an SIB1 request is received. Action 504 may or may not be required to distinguish the requests from different sources. The distinguishment may be accomplished by checking the sequence or checking the received power on the associated UL physical resource or a Received Signal Strength Indicator or checking the received resources that different UEs may generate different sequence (with the same request content). The cell may treat the request sequence be successfully received while the received strength may be sufficiently large or while the received sequence may be decoded. The cell may adapt the configuration for transmitting the request sequence based on the reception results / performance of the request.After getting the on-demand SIB1 request, the cell may, in action 505, determine whether to broadcast the SIB1. For example, the cell may respond the request wherein the cell may transmit an ACK / NAK to the UE in action 505. The cell may further start the broadcasting of the SIB1. The broadcast can be performed by all the SSBs or particular SSBs on all frequencies or particular frequencies.In the present disclosure, Cell A may be defined as a normal cell, e.g., a cell that may periodically transmit at least the own SIB1 of the cell (e.g., Cell#1 in scenarios 1 to 3). A Network Energy Saving (NES) Cell (e.g., Cell#2, Cell#3, and Cell#4 in scenarios 1 to 3) may be a cell that does not transmit any SIB1 without a UE’s request but may perform SIB1 transmissions in response to an UL WUS (e.g., on-demand SIB1 request) received from a UE.A UE may obtain the UL WUS configuration from either the NES Cell or the Cell A. The UE may transmit the UL WUS to either the NES Cell or Cell A as a target cell of the UL WUS transmission, and a Physical Random Access Channel (PRACH) may be a starting point for the UL WUS signaling. The conditions to trigger the UL WUS may include that the UE would like to setup an RRC connection with a particular cell or the UE would like to camp on a particular cell for the RRC Idle / Inactive mode operation of the UE, such as receiving / monitoring paging. In the following, cases (e.g., Cases 1 to 8) for a UE trying to perform an RRC connection establishment and cases involving UE operations in the RRC_IDLE / RRC_INACTIVE state are provided.Case 1:An RRC Idle / Inactive UE (e.g., a UE operated in an RRC_IDLE / RRC_INACTIVE state) may want to perform an RRC establishment and may detect Cell A during an initial cell search. It may be specified the provision of the WUS configuration and the transmission of the WUS may take place in Cell A as well.FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. In action 601, a UE may try to detect the Cell A’s SSB and may identify Cell A may not be barred from MIB information (e.g., a CellBarred IE may not be set to be 'barred', the CellBarred IE may be set to be 'notBarred') and may be able to acquire the SIB1 of Cell A. With the SIB1, the UE may identify whether Cell A is reserved for other use (a flag ‘cellReservedForOperatorUse’ may be broadcast with a value of 'reserved' or 'not Reserved'). If a cell status may be indicated as ‘not barred’ and ‘reserved’ for operator use for any PLMN / SNPN and not ‘true’ for other use and not “true” for future use. A UE with an Access Identity of 11 (e.g., PLMN Use) or an Access Identity of 15 (e.g., PLMN Staff) may be allowed to use the cell for camping on (e.g., the UE may treat the cell as a candidate during a cell (re)selection procedure). If a cell may be reserved, a UE with an Access Identity 0, 1, 2, 12, 13 or 14 may treat the cell as ‘barred’ and may not be allowed to camp on. Another flag in the SIB1, cellReservedForOtherUse, may be broadcasted with a value of 'true' or may be absent. When this flag may be broadcasted by the SIB1 and either the cell may not broadcast any CAG-IDs or NIDs or may not broadcast any CAG-IDs and the UE may not be operating in an SNPN Access Mode, then all UEs may treat the cell as ‘barred’.More specifically, the uac-Barringlnfo IE within the SIB1 may provide the parameters to determine when a Unified Access Barring check may be required. A unified access barring check may involve the UE generating a uniformly distributed random number between 0 and 1. If the random number may be less than the value of a uac-BarringFactor, then the access attempt may be permitted. Otherwise, the access attempt may be barred. If an access attempt may be barred, the UE may wait for a time period and may try to access attempt again. The UE may check which access category and / or access identity the UE belongs to and may apply corresponding parameters to verify whether the UE can try the access attempt or not.Upon action 602, even while the UE may be barred due to either the reserved setting or the UE may fail to attempt subject to a UAC control or the UE considers the Cell A is ‘barred’ after the UAC check (e.g., by referring to 3GPP TS 38.331 & TS 38.304 specification), the UE may still consequently further check whether a SIBx is broadcasted or not. The SIBx may be the system information to provision a WUS configuration. The SIBx may be a new system information other than an existing one or the SIBx may be incorporated with other existing ones. If the state of the SIBx may be "broadcasting", the UE may receive the SIBx followed by configurations upon the SIB1 reception and no UE demand request may be needed. On the contrary, if the state of the SIBx may be "notBroadcasting", the UE may be able to trigger an on-demand SI request. In some implementations, if Cell A is specified to provide the WUS configuration, the UE may trigger the on-demand SI request regardless of a UAC checking results. In some other implementations, the UE may be disabled to try to monitor / receive the SIBx (e.g., the system information block which includes a WUS configuration for the UE to request SIB1 of a NES cell) from the cell A. An NES cell may refer to a cell which is operating in the NES mode. In addition, a cell which is not operating in the NES cell mode may work as an anchor cell (e.g., Cell A) to support the OD-SIB1 request procedure of the neighbor NES cells or the cell itself (after the cell switches to the NES mode). In other words, a cell may broadcast the WUS configuration (e.g., via broadcasting the SIBx) of its own self while the cell is operating as an anchor cell. Then, if there is a UE receives and stores the broadcasted SIBx, then after the cell switches to NES mode, the UE would be able to request the SIB1 of the cell based on the stored WUS configuration.The UE may use either a Msg1 / Msg3 based approach to request the SIBx and Cell A may broadcast the SIBx (no dedicated signaling may be applied under case 1) afterwards. The WUS configuration in the SIBx may include one or more of the following items (1) to (4):(1) WUS signaling configuration: a dedicated preamble or a dedicated PRACH resource may be provided. Cell A may also configure the RA type and associating RA parameters (e.g., may be separated from a SI-RequestConfig, a RACH-ConfigCommon). For instance, the RA parameter may include the maximum attempt number of the WUS signaling, the transmission power setting (an initial power value and a power ramping value), the RAR window, etc.In some implementations, the WUS configuration may be common for all NES Cells (supported by the serving RAN / PLMN / SNPN) that when a UE may use this configuration to send a WUS, and Cell A may notify all the neighboring NES Cells of Cell A to resume the SIB1 transmission(s) of the neighboring NES Cells.In some implementations, the WUS configuration may be cell-specific for different NES Cells that an association between the WUS configuration and a NES Cell may be needed. The association may be supported by using a PCI or a partial PCI wherein Cell A may configure multiple preambles and / or multiple RO, and a different preamble / RO may be mapped to a specific NES cell. When the UE sends the WUS, Cell A may know the demand and may notify the corresponding NES Cells (e.g., via an Xn interface, via XnAP messages, via inter-node RRC messages).In some implementations, the RA configuration of the WUS signaling configuration may be provided within a RACH-ConfigCommon or a SI-RequestConfig in the SIB1 of Cell A. If it may be the case, the WUS configuration upon the SIBx may contain other configurations (as discussed below). Another special case may be no SIBx for the WUS configuration and Cell A may only provide the WUS configuration via an existing SIB1.(2) NES Cell’s SIB1 validity information and / or other system information’s ID: the validity information such as one or more value tag (associated with different SIBs) that may be presented with the configuration of the SIB1, an area ID (e.g., systeminformationAreaID) may be provided to let the UE know whether the stored SIB1 of the NES Cell and the configuration of the stored SIB1 can be reused or a new SIB1 acquisition may be needed. If the stored SIB1 and / or other SIBs may be valid, the UE may skip the transmission of the WUS and may perform an RRC connection establishment or may camp on the associated NES Cell directly; otherwise the UE may trigger the WUS transmission. Moreover, the tracking area ID, an RNA ID (e.g., RAN Notification Area ID) may be appended together that the information can facilitate the UE to determine whether the UE may stay in Cell A for an RRC Idle / Inactive mode operation (if the ID (e.g., the tracking area ID, the RNA ID) may be the same as what Cell A broadcasts). In some implementations, the information areaScope may be applied. When the areaScope (e.g., the areaScope may be associated with the SIBx) may be set to be "false" or may not be present or may be absent, then the NES Cell's SIB1 may be cell specific, and the UE may be unable to use any stored SIB1 information which may lead to the request of the NES cell's SIB1 may be mandated. When the areaScope (e.g., the areaScope may be associated with the SIBx) may be set to be "true" or may be present, then the NES Cell's SIB1 may be area specific. The UE may be able to use the stored SIB1 information and / or SIBx information associated with the areaScope to acquire the NES cell's SIB1 (e.g., by determining whether the valueTag associated with the stored SIB1 information and / or SIBx information associated with the areaScope may be the same as the received valueTag). In one implementation, a Boolean indication, e.g. NESspecific, may be associated with each NES Cell that Cell A may provide the corresponding configurations for the UE to acquire the corresponding NES Cell's SIB1 information. It may be noted that Cell A may provide the separate configurations for the respective NES Cell. For example, if the NESspecific may be set to be "true" or may be present, the SIBx may be associated with the configuration for a particular NES Cell. If the NESspecific may be set to be "false" or may be absent, the SIBx may be cell specific.(3) WUS trigger condition: Cell A may configure the UE with the specific conditions to send the WUS. The conditions may include one or more of the following conditions (i) to (iv):(i) The NES Cell's SSB RSRP may exceed a threshold (e.g., the threshold here may be different from a SIB2's configuration). The threshold may be a fixed value, may be preconfigured, or may be provided to the UE in the WUS configuration or in the SIB1 of Cell A.(ii) Allowed Access Categories, which may be the only limited ACs (high priority service) that can trigger the SIB1's transmission of the NES Cell.(iii) Allowed NASSI, which may indicate the only specific (network) slice that may be allowed to wake up the NES Cell for an (RRC) connection purpose.(iv) A SIB1 transmission check flag: If the flag may be set to be ‘true’, the UE may be required to perform a cell search on a NES Cell and may determine whether the SIB1 may be transmitted or not. The determination may rely on the MIB information of the NES Cell. The UE may be permitted to send the WUS while the UE may determine there may be no SIB1 transmission on the detected NES Cell. If the flag may be set to be "false", the UE may trigger the WUS regardless of check results. If the flag may not be present (or may be absent), the UE by default may assume the check on the NES Cell's SIB1 state may be always needed before sending the WUS.(4) SIB1 transmission pattern: Cell A may indicate the transmission pattern (e.g., time / frequency pattern) of the SIB1 of the NES cell once the NES Cell decides to transmit the SIB1. The pattern may include aperiodic, semi-periodic (with a configured duration and periodicity), and periodic (with a periodicity). More specifically, the SubCarrierSpacingCommon IE, the PDCCH-ConfigSIB1 IE and the relative information, etc., that may be present in the MIB of the NES Cell may be provided together with the transmission pattern to enable the UE to acquire the SIB1 without detecting the MIB of the NES Cell. On the other hand, if the transmission pattern may not be present in the WUS configuration, it may imply the UE should follow the legacy operation to acquire the SIB1 of the NES Cell.Cell A may update the WUS configuration (SIBx) and the update may follow the modification period specifications. In addition, the validity of the WUS configuration may be checked by Cell A's value tag.In action 603 the UE may transmit an SI request to Cell A via Msg1 or Msg3. In action 604, Cell A may broadcast at least one SIBx including the WUS configuration. In the present disclosure, dashed arrows shown in the figures (e.g., actions 603 and 604 in FIG. 6) may represent optional operations that may be omitted in certain scenarios.In action 605, while receiving the WUS configuration and satisfying the trigger conditions, the UE may send the WUS to Cell A by following the configuration. Cell A may have an acknowledgement and the acknowledgement may be a RAR scrambled by a corresponding RA-RNTI and the RAR content may be without appending a TA value or a Grant. In action 606, Cell A may notify a corresponding NES Cell (followed by receiving the associating WUS) to transmit the SIB1 via a backhaul, an Xn interface or an S1 interface. The NES Cell may also send a confirmation message back to Cell A. It may be noted that Cell A may send the RAR after receiving the confirmation message from the NES Cell. The UE may repeat the WUS transmission if the UE may not receive the acknowledgement and the UE may identify the WUS transmission may be an access failure if the repeating may exceed the configured maximum number. The configuration of the maximum number may take place together with the WUS configuration or may be given by a default value.After receiving the acknowledgement, the UE may either follow the legacy operation to acquire the MIB / SIB1 of the NES cell or may monitor the configured CORESET#0 and SS#0 to receive the SIB1 by corresponding configurations given by the WUS configuration. The NES Cell may terminate the SIB1 transmission based on the implementation of the NES Cell or the configured SIB1 transmission pattern in the WUS configuration. More specifically, if the WUS configurations may already contain a part of the NES SIB1 information, the NES Cell may not append / include that part of information into the SIB1, or the NES Cell may not transmit that part of information. The UE may send an acknowledgement (e.g., may transmit another WUS by different dedicated preambles) to notify Cell A of the successful reception of the SIB1 from the NES Cell.Case 2:In some implementations, an RRC Idle / Inactive UE may want to perform an RRC (connection) establishment and may detect Cell A during an initial cell search. In case 2, the provision of a WUS configuration may occur in Cell A but a transmission of a WUS may take place for a NES Cell, as illustrated in FIG. 7.FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. Actions 701, 702, 703, and 704 in FIG. 7 may be almost identical to actions 601, 602, 603, and 604 in FIG. 6, except that the WUS configuration may further include additional RA settings for a UE to enable the transmission of a WUS to a NES Cell and the monitoring of a SIB1 under the NES Cell and may optionally transmit a particular acknowledgement if the SIB1 may be acquired after the WUS transmission. For instance, the WUS configuration may include a RACH configuration of the NES cell (e.g., a RACH-ConfigCommon of the NES Cell).In action 705, the UE may try to perform an SSB / DL synchronization with the NES Cell and then may send the WUS to the NES Cell. Since there may be no valid SIB1 yet, it may be problematic to proceed the RAR (or other acknowledgement) reception. In some implementations, the WUS configuration may indicate the corresponding acknowledgement monitoring configuration. In some implementations, the UE in case 2 may wait for the acknowledgement (e.g., a RAR from Cell A even though the corresponding preamble may be sent to the NES Cell) of the WUS transmission followed by a SIBx of Cell A and the acknowledgement may come from the NES Cell. Another alternative may be no explicit acknowledgement may be exercised.In action 706, the UE may receive the SSB / SIB1 from the NES Cell. The UE may recognize the successful reception of the SIB1 of the NES Cell as a positive acknowledgment. On the other hand, if the UE may not receive the SIB1 within the configured duration (as signaling in the WUS configuration) or a default time, the UE may treat the WUS transmission as a failure case and may repeat the WUS transmission until reaching the maximum attempt number which may be either configured in the WUS configuration or a default value.The NES Cell may notify Cell A of stopping broadcasting the SIBx if the NES Cell transmits the SIB1 of the NES Cell after receiving the WUS. The NES Cell may also report the loading of the WUS reception (e.g., how many preambles received within a duration) to Cell A and may suggest the preferred WUS configuration setting to Cell A. Afterwards, Cell A may adjust the WUS configuration and may perform a SIBx modification accordingly. In case 2, the UE may not send any acknowledgements to Cell A once the UE may be able to acquire the SIB1 of the NES Cell.Case 3:In Case 3, an RRC Idle / Inactive UE may perform an RRC (connection) establishment and may detect a Cell A during an initial cell search. The provision of a WUS configuration may occur in a NES Cell but the transmission of the WUS may take place in the Cell A. In some implementations, the NES Cell may provide a minimum WUS configuration and the Cell A may additionally provide other WUS configuration(s). The minimum WUS configuration may be used to indicate that the NES Cell supports the WUS transmission / reception to trigger the SIB1 transmission and may further provide a validity check. The other WUS configuration(s) may be used to configure other parameters as illustrated in previous cases. An example signaling process of Case 3 may be illustrated in FIG. 8.FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. In action 801, the UE may receive a SIB1 from Cell A. The SIB1 may include a SI request, UAC information, etc.While the UE may be barred by Cell A in action 802, the UE may not try to request other SIB(s) toward Cell A regardless of whether the state of other SIB(s) is broadcasting or not broadcasting. In other words, the UE would request other SIB(s) from the cell A (only) if the UE considers the Cell A is ‘not barred’ to the UE. The UE may perform a cell search to identify whether other cells may be detected. If no cells are identified, the UE may follow legacy barring mechanisms and may try again for camping on Cell A after a time period. If the UE may detect another Cell A (e.g., the SIB1 is broadcasting by another Cell A) and / or the NES Cell, this another Cell A may still be prioritized for the camp unless 1) no other Cell A is available for camping on, or 2) the NES Cell’s SSB RSRP value measured by the UE is better than Cell A with a configured threshold. The configuration may take place together with the WUS configuration or the UE may acquire the configuration via a SIB2 (cell reselection criteria and parameters). In some implementations, the UE may not need to implement the UAC mechanism for the WUS configuration request (e.g., by monitoring and receiving a broadcasted SIBX directly) and so UE may pass the UAC mechanism automatically for the WUS configuration reception.In action 803, the UE may receive and decode the SSB and a corresponding MIB from the NES cell. The MIB may indicate there is no SIB1 transmission (e.g., by setting the parameter kSSBto 30 in FR1), the UE may re-interpret the MIB information to acquire the minimum WUS configuration. The minimum WUS configuration may contain at least one of the following items (1) to (3):(1) WUS transmission flag: to indicate whether the WUS may be transmitted by Cell A or the NES Cell (i.e., set to "0" refers the WUS may be transmitted to the Cell A; otherwise the WUS may be transmitted to the NES Cell).(2) SIB1’s validity information and other system information's ID: the validity information such as a value tag and an area ID (e.g., a systeminformationArea ID) may be provided in the SIB1 to let the UE know whether the stored SIB1 of the NES Cell may be reused or a new SBI1 acquisition may be needed. If the stored SIB1 is valid, the UE may skip the transmission of the WUS and may perform the RRC connection establishment or may camp on the associated NES Cell directly; otherwise the UE may trigger the WUS transmission. Moreover, the tracking area ID and / or the RNA ID may be appended together so that the information may facilitate the UE to determine whether the UE stays in Cell A for the RRC Idle / Inactive mode operation (if the tracking area ID is the same as the Cell A’s tracking area ID, and / or if the RNA ID is the same as the Cell A's RNA ID).(3) Basic RA configuration: An entry in the pre-defined RA configuration may be used together with the detected PCI to identify the applied preamble and resource. For example, the minimum WUS configuration may provide a parameter K and the UE may perform a Modulo (MOD) function with the detected PCI by the parameter K and may know the corresponding entry of the WUS signaling configuration. This configuration may only be present if the WUS transmission flag is set to be “1” (e.g., configured to transmit the WUS to the NES Cell).In some implementations, while receiving the minimum WUS configuration and the UE is configured to transmit the WUS to Cell A, the UE may try to acquire a SIBx to have other WUS configuration through action 804 and action 805. The other WUS configuration may be a full configuration of all WUS-relative configurations or a delta configuration other than the minimum configuration. In some implementations, one or more of the information items described in paragraphs

[0103] to

[0113] of the present disclosure may be appended in other WUS configurations.With getting other WUS configurations, the UE and Cell A may perform action 806, action 807, and action 808 which may be the same as action 605, action 606, and action 607 in FIG. 6, respectively. The NES Cell may terminate the SIB1 transmission based on an implementation of the NES Cell or the configured pattern. In some implementations, the NES Cell may use a dedicated signaling to indicate the SIB1 change and a transmission pattern of the SIB1 for the connected UEs.Case 4:In Case 4, an RRC Idle / Inactive UE may perform an RRC (connection) establishment and may detect a Cell A during an initial cell search. The provision of a WUS configuration and a WUS transmission may occur in a NES Cell. The provision of the WUS configuration in the NES Cell may further include two operations: (a) the NES Cell may provide a minimum WUS configuration only, and (b) the NES Cell may provide a minimum WUS configuration and the Cell A may optionally provide other WUS configurations. The signaling processes may be illustrated in FIG. 9 and FIG. 10 respectively.FIG. 9 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for the operation where the NES Cell provides a minimum WUS configuration, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. FIG. 10 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for the operation the NES Cell provides a minimum WUS configuration and Cell A optionally provides other WUS configurations, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure.Actions 901 to 903 in FIG. 9 and actions 1001 to 1003 in FIG. 10 may be substantially identical to actions 801 to 803 in FIG.8, except that the minimum WUS configuration may indicate the necessity to acquire other WUS configurations. In some implementations, a 1-bit indication may be used. When the bit is set to be “1”, it may mean that Cell A may assist the other WUS configuration provision and then the UE may perform actions 904 and 905 accordingly. When the bit is set to be “0”, it may mean that no other WUS configuration is provided from other Cell A(s) and the UE may require to transmit a WUS to the NES Cell via the available information in the minimum WUS configuration. Afterwards, in action 906, the UE may send the WUS directly to the NES Cell. In action 907, the NES cell may transmit at least one SSB / SIB to the UE in response to the WUS from the UE. Actions 1004 and 1005 in FIG. 10 may be substantially the same as actions 906 and 907 in FIG. 9.In some implementations, another embodiment rather than the 1-bit indication may be a default behavior which may be applied directly (e.g., no need to signaling the 1-bit indication). For example, by a default setting, the UE may assume the UE should transmit the WUS to the NES Cell directly followed by the information broadcasted by the NES Cell and the UE may fall back to Cell A to acquire other WUS configurations via a SIBx-request procedure as illustrated in action 904 and action 905 if the NES Cell does not provide the SIB1 transmission even though the WUS has been transmitted. After acquiring the other WUS configuration, the UE may try the WUS transmission again based on the other WUS configuration.Case 5:In Case 5, an RRC Idle / Inactive UE may perform an RRC (connection) establishment and may detect a NES Cell during an initial cell search. Cell A may provide the WUS configuration to the UE and the UE may transmit the WUS to Cell A. An example signaling process for Case 5 is illustrated in FIG. 11.FIG. 11 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. In action 1101, the UE may recognize that the SIB1 is not broadcasted based on the information appended in the MIB and the UE may fail to camp on the NES Cell for the RRC connection establishment. The UE may perform a cell search and then find Cell A in action 1102. In action 1103, the UE may be barred by Cell A subject to the cell being reserved for other uses or the UAC barring control. Even so, the UE may still be enabled to implement the following actions 1104 to 1108 for the SIB1 request and reception. In some other implementations, the UE may not be enabled to implement action 1104 (and so actions after 1104 may also be disabled) if the UE considered that cell A is ‘barred’ to the UE. In other words, action 1204 / 1205 may be enabled to, or performed by, the UE only while Cell A is ‘not barred’ to the UE (as a result of UAC check by referring to 3GPP technical specifications).In action 1104, the UE may trigger an SI request procedure (e.g., by sending an SI request to Cell A via Msg 1 / Msg 3). In action 1105, the UE may acquire a WUS configuration via SIBx from Cell A. In action 1106, the UE may transmit WUS signaling to Cell A based on the received WUS configuration. Cell A then triggers the on-demand SIB1 transmission of the NES Cell in response to the WUS from the UE. Afterwards, the UE may be back to accessing the NES Cell and may perform a SIB1 acquisition in action 1108. Actions 1104 to 1108 in FIG. 11 may be substantially the same as actions 603 to 607 in FIG. 6.Case 6:In Case 6, an RRC Idle / Inactive UE may perform an RRC (connection) establishment and may detect a NES Cell during an initial cell search. The WUS configuration may be provided by Cell A and the WUS may be transmitted to the NES Cell. The signaling process for Case 6 may be illustrated in FIG. 12.FIG. 12 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. Actions 1201 to 1205 may be substantially the same as actions 1101 to action 1105, except that the WUS configuration may include additional RA settings for the UE to enable the monitoring of the NES Cell and transmit a particular acknowledgement. For instance, the WUS configuration may include a RACH configuration (e.g., a RACH-ConfigCommon IE) of the NES Cell. If the UE is not barred by Cell A, the UE may try to camp on Cell A rather than triggering the on-demand SIB1 request procedure tor camp on the NES Cell. If the UE is barred by Cell A, the UE may proceed to perform actions 1206 and action 1207, which are substantially the same as actions 705 and 706 in FIG. 7, respectively.Case 7:In Case 7, an RRC Idle / Inactive UE may perform an RRC (connection) establishment and may detect a NES Cell during an initial cell search. The UE may receive a minimum WUS configuration from the NES Cell. Based on the minimum WUS configuration, the UE may transmit a WUS to Cell A to trigger the NES Cell’ SIB1 transmission. The minimum WUS configuration may indicate the support of an on-demand SIB1 request function / procedure and may instruct the UE to send the WUS to Cell A (if Cell A is detected by the UE) to trigger the UE to transmit the WUS to Cell A. If Cell A is not detected, the UE may either treat this attempt on the NES Cell as a failure of entry (e.g., unable to get the SIB1) or the UE may fall back to transmit the WUS to the NES Cell directly. An example signaling process for Case 7 is illustrated in FIG. 13.FIG. 13 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. In action 1301, the UE may receive a minimum WUS configuration from the NES Cell. With the minimum WUS configuration, the UE may know the WUS should be transmitted to Cell A. Therefore, the UE may perform a cell search procedure to find Cell A accordingly. After detecting Cell A, the UE may skip the UAC barring check (e.g., the UE does not want to camp on Cell A but is required to acquire the SIB1 information to know the potential resource allocation for the WUS transmission). In action 1302, the UE may receive the SIB1 information from Cell A. With the SIB1 information, the UE may be able to transmit the WUS and may skip the SI request procedure even though the SIBx is indicated as “not broadcasting”. The NES Cell may provide a parameter K for a basic RA configuration (e.g., the configurations described in action 703) in the minimum WUS configuration of the NES Cell and such an RA configuration may be associated with Cell A. The UE may use that information and the received SIB1 information to identify the WUS occasion and may transmit the WUS in action 1306.In some implementations, Cell A may provide other / remaining WUS configurations (e.g., the NES Cell does not require to provide all WUS details in the minimum WUS configuration) to the UE. For example, if Cell A indicates, in action 1302, that the SIBx is not provided / broadcasted, then in action 1303, the UE may know that the SIBx is not broadcasted by Cell A. The UE may then perform an SI request procedure in action 1304 to request the other / remaining WUS configurations from Cell A. In action 1305, Cell A may transmit the SIBx containing the other / remaining WUS configurations to the UE. With the full WUS configuration (e.g., by referring to both the minimum WUS configuration and the other WUS configurations), the UE may transmit the WUS to Cell A in action 1306. Cell A may then trigger the NES Cell’ SIB1 transmission in action 1307. The UE may then acquire the SIB1 from the NES Cell based on the full WUS configuration in action 1308. In some implementations, the minimum WUS configuration may indicate (e.g., by using a 1-bit flag) whether other WUS configurations from Cell A are needed and indicate (e.g., by using a 1-bit flag) whether the other WUS configurations are broadcasted. With these indications, the UE may speed up (e.g., by skipping one or mroe actions in the process) the WUS transmission. In actionCase 8:In Case 8, an RRC Idle / Inactive UE may perform an RRC (connection) establishment and may detect a NES Cell during an initial cell search. The UE may receive the WUS configuration from the NES Cell. Consequently, the UE may transmit a WUS to the NES Cell directly to trigger the NES Cell’s SIB1 transmission. It may be observed that all signaling are exchanged between the UE and the NES Cell in Case 8. Therefore, Case 8 may be applied to standalone NES Cell deployment scenarios. An example signaling process for Case 8 is illustrated in FIG. 14.FIG. 14 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling process for a UE to acquire a SIB1 from a NES cell, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. In action 1401, the UE may receive a minimum WUS configuration (e.g., via the SSB) form the NES Cell. In action 1402, the UE may apply the minimum WUS configuration to transmit a WUS to the NES Cell. In action 1403, the NES Cell may transmit at least one SIB1 to the UE in response to receiving the WUS from the UE.In some implementations, depending on the available space of the MIB, the minimum WUS configuration may include at least one of: a) a flag to support the WUS and optionally an indication of the target cell, b) a validity information of the SIB1, or c) a basic RA configuration such as a parameter K. The UE may transmit the WUS based on the minimum WUS configuration after determining a trigger condition is fulfilled. The trigger condition may include at least one of the following: a WUS support checking, a validity checking, and / or a SSB quality check. After transmitting the WUS, the UE may monitor the SSB and the relative MIB information after a time offset. The time offset may be a default value and the UE may identify the successful of the WUS transmission if the MIB indicates the presence of the SIB1. The UE may treat the NES Cell as a barred Cell if the UE does not acquire the SIB1 after the UE has transmitted the WUS and no response is received from the NES Cell until a duration expires, where the duration may be a default value. The UE may then perform a cell search based on a legacy operation.In some implementations, to support the access control of determining whether to camp on a NES cell and triggering an on-demand SIB1 request procedure accordingly among different scenarios, the UAC may be used if the UE is barred by a cell subject to the UAC. The UE may consider camping on the NES Cell alternatively. If the UE cannot attempt / access the NES Cell successfully (e.g., unable to acquire SIB1 information), the UE may then perform a cell selection. On the contrary, if the UE successfully identifies a NES Cell, the UE may not try to acquire the SIB1 unless the UE may be barred by other cells.FIG. 15 is a flowchart illustrating method / process 1500 for NES cell access, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. Although actions 1502, 1504, and 1506 are illustrated, as separate actions, represented as independent blocks in FIG. 15, these separately illustrated actions should not be construed as to be necessarily order-dependent. The order in which the actions are performed in FIG. 15 is not intended to be construed as a limitation, and any number of the disclosed blocks may be combined in any order to implement the method, or an alternative method. Each of actions 1502, 1504, and 1506 may be performed independent of the other actions, and may be omitted in some implementations of the present disclosure. Moreover, method / process 1500 may be combined with other procedures / methods described in the present disclosure. Process 1500 may be performed by a UE, with each action of process 1500 corresponding to an operation executed by the UE.In action 1502, process 1500 may start by receiving a WUS configuration from a serving cell, where the WUS configuration may be associated with at least one NES cell configured perform a SIB1 transmission upon request (e.g., an on-demand SIB1 transmission). The serving cell may correspond to the Cell A described in the present disclosure.In action 1504, process 1500 may transmit a WUS to the at least one NES cell based on the WUS configuration.In action 1506, process 1500 may monitor for a SIB1 from the at least one NES cell in response to transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell.In some implementations, the UE may transmit a System Information (SI) request to the serving cell and monitor for the WUS configuration in a SIB from the serving cell in response to transmitting the system information request to the serving cell.In some implementations, the at least one NES cell may include multiple NES cells. The WUS configuration may include Physical Cell Identities (PCIs) of the multiple NES cells to establish an association between the WUS configuration and the multiple NES cells.In some implementations, the UE may determine that the WUS configuration is common for the multiple NES cells in response to determining that the WUS configuration includes the PCIs of the multiple NES cells.In some implementations, the at least one NES cell may include multiple NES cells. The WUS configuration may include first area identifier information and second area identifier information. The first area identifier information may be associated with a first NES cell of multiple NES cells and the second area identifier information may be associated with a second NES cell of the multiple NES cells. The UE may receive and store the SIB1 from the first NES cell, and determine whether the stored SIB1 is reusable for accessing the second NES cell by determining whether the first area identifier information is the same as the second area identifier information.In some implementations, the UE may determine that the stored SIB1 is reusable for accessing the second NES cell in response to determining that the first area identifier information is the same as the second area identifier information.In some implementations, the UE may determine whether a Reference Signal Receiving Power (RSRP) value of the at least one NES cell exceeds an RSRP threshold. The UE may transmit the WUS to the at least one NES cell in response to determining that the RSRP value of the at least one NES cell exceeds the RSRP threshold.In some implementations, the WUS configuration may include a SIB1 transmission pattern indicating time and frequency resources for the SIB1 transmission from the at least one NES cell.In some implementations, the UE may receive a Random Access Response (RAR) after transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell, where the RAR serves as an acknowledgement for the WUS.Process 1500 may enable on-demand acquisition of a SIB1 from a NES cell through a WUS mechanism, which may allow a UE to access a NES cell in an efficient manner. Process 1500 may provide a solution for the UE to trigger the SIB1 transmission from the NES cell when the SIB1 may not be continuously broadcasted, thereby conserving network resources and reducing power consumption. By transmitting the WUS based on the received configuration and monitoring for the SIB1 in response to the WUS transmission, process 1500 may establish a signaling exchange mechanism among the UE, the Cell A, and the NES cell that may optimize network resource utilization while maintaining service availability. Additionally, process 1500 may enable the UE to make camp decisions efficiently by determining whether to camp on the NES cell based on the successful acquisition of the SIB1, thereby enhancing the overall cell selection and access procedure in wireless communication networks.It should also be noted that the BS may perform methods / actions corresponding to those performed by the UE. For example, the receiving actions performed by the UE may correspond to the transmitting / configuring actions of the BS; the transmitting actions performed by the UE may correspond to the receiving actions of the BS. That is, the BS and the UE may have reciprocally aligned roles in transmission and reception, as illustrated in FIG. 16.FIG. 16 is a flowchart illustrating method / process 1600 for supporting NES cell access, according to an example implementation of the present disclosure. Although actions 1602, 1604, and 1608 are illustrated, as separate actions, represented as independent blocks in FIG. 16, these separately illustrated actions should not be construed as to be necessarily order-dependent. The order in which the actions are performed in FIG. 16 is not intended to be construed as a limitation, and any number of the disclosed blocks may be combined in any order to implement the method, or an alternative method. Each of actions 1602, 1604, and 1608 may be performed independent of the other actions, and may be omitted in some implementations of the present disclosure. Moreover, method / process 1600 may be combined with other procedures / methods described in the present disclosure. Process 1600 may be performed by a BS, with each action of process 1600 corresponding to an operation executed by the BS.In action 1602, process 1600 may start by transmitting, via a serving cell (e.g., Cell A) of a UE, a WUS configuration to the UE, where the WUS configuration is associated with at least one NES cell configured to perform a SIB1 transmission upon request.In action 1604, process 1600 may receive, via the at least one NES cell, a WUS from the UE. In action 1606, process 1600 may initiate, via the at least one NES cell, the SIB1 transmission in response to receiving the WUS.In some implementations, the BS may receive, via the serving cell, a system information request from the UE, and transmit, via the serving cell, the WUS configuration in a System Information Block (SIB) in response to receiving the system information request.In some implementations, the at least one NES cell may include multiple NES cells. The WUS configuration may include PCIs of the multiple NES cells to establish an association between the WUS configuration and the multiple NES cells.In some implementations, the WUS configuration may include a SIB1 transmission pattern indicating time and frequency resources for the SIB1 transmission.In some implementations, the BS may transmit a RAR to the UE after receiving the WUS from the UE, where the RAR serves as an acknowledgement for the WUS.FIG. 17 is a block diagram illustrating node 1700 for wireless communications, in accordance with various aspects of the present disclosure. As illustrated in FIG. 17, node 1700 may include transceiver 1720, processor 1728, memory 1734, one or more presentation components 1738, and at least one antenna 1736. Node 1700 may also include a radio frequency (RF) spectrum band module, a BS communications module, a network communications module, and a system communications management module, Input / Output (I / O) ports, I / O components, and a power supply (not illustrated in FIG. 17).Each of the components may directly or indirectly communicate with each other over one or more buses 1740. Node 1700 may be a UE or a BS that performs various functions disclosed with reference to FIG. 1 and FIG. 16.Transceiver 1720 has transmitter 1722 (e.g., transmitting / transmission circuitry) and receiver 1724 (e.g., receiving / reception circuitry) and may be configured to transmit and / or receive time and / or frequency resource partitioning information. Transceiver 1720 may be configured to transmit in different types of subframes and slots including, but not limited to, usable, non-usable, and flexibly usable subframes and slot formats. Transceiver 1720 may be configured to receive data and control channels.Node 1700 may include a variety of computer-readable media. Computer-readable media may be any available media that may be accessed by node 1700 and include volatile (and / or non-volatile) media and removable (and / or non-removable) media.The computer-readable media may include computer-storage media and communication media. Computer-storage media may include both volatile (and / or non-volatile media), and removable (and / or non-removable) media implemented in any method or technology for storage of information such as computer-readable instructions, data structures, program modules, or data.Computer-storage media may include RAM, ROM, EPROM, EEPROM, flash memory (or other memory technology), CD-ROM, Digital Versatile Disks (DVD) (or other optical disk storage), magnetic cassettes, magnetic tape, magnetic disk storage (or other magnetic storage devices), etc. Computer-storage media may not include a propagated data signal. Communication media may typically embody computer-readable instructions, data structures, program modules, or other data in a modulated data signal, such as a carrier wave, or other transport mechanisms and include any information delivery media.The term “modulated data signal” may mean a signal that has one or more of its characteristics set or changed in such a manner as to encode information in the signal. Communication media may include wired media, such as a wired network or direct-wired connection, and wireless media, such as acoustic, RF, infrared, and other wireless media. Combinations of any of the aforementioned listed components should also be included within the scope of computer-readable media.Memory 1734 may include computer-storage media in the form of volatile and / or non-volatile memory. Memory 1734 may be removable, non-removable, or a combination thereof. Example memory may include solid-state memory, hard drives, optical-disc drives, etc. As illustrated in FIG. 17, memory 1734 may store a computer-readable and / or computer-executable instructions 1732 (e.g., software codes) that are configured to, when executed, cause processor 1728 to perform various functions disclosed herein, for example, with reference to FIG. 1 and FIG. 2. Alternatively, instructions 1732 may not be directly executable by processor 1728 but may be configured to cause node 1700 (e.g., when compiled and executed) to perform various functions disclosed herein.Processor 1728 (e.g., having processing circuitry) may include an intelligent hardware device, e.g., a Central Processing Unit (CPU), a microcontroller, an ASIC, etc. Processor 1728 may include memory. Processor 1728 may process data 1730 and instructions 1732 received from memory 1734, and information transmitted and received via transceiver 1720, the baseband communications module, and / or the network communications module. Processor 1728 may also process information to send to transceiver 1720 for transmission via antenna 1736 to the network communications module for transmission to a CN.One or more presentation components 1738 may present data indications to a person or another device. Examples of presentation components 1738 may include a display device, a speaker, a printing component, a vibrating component, etc.In view of the present disclosure, it is obvious that various techniques may be used for implementing the disclosed concepts without departing from the scope of those concepts. Moreover, while the concepts have been disclosed with specific reference to certain implementations, a person of ordinary skill in the art may recognize that changes may be made in form and detail without departing from the scope of those concepts. As such, the disclosed implementations are to be considered in all respects as illustrative and not restrictive. It should also be understood that the present disclosure is not limited to the particular implementations disclosed and many rearrangements, modifications, and substitutions are possible without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

Claims

1. A User Equipment (UE) for Network Energy Saving (NES) cell access, the UE comprising: 　　　　at least one processor; and 　　　　at least one non-transitory computer-readable medium coupled to the at least one processor and storing one or more computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the UE to: 　　　　receive a Wake-Up Signal (WUS) configuration from a serving cell, wherein the WUS configuration is associated with at least one NES cell configured perform a System Information Block 1 (SIB1) transmission upon request; 　　　　transmit a WUS to the at least one NES cell based on the WUS configuration; and 　　　　monitor for a SIB1 from the at least one NES cell in response to transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell.

2. The UE of claim 1, wherein the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to: 　　　　transmit a system information request to the serving cell; and 　　　　monitor for the WUS configuration in a System Information Block (SIB) from the serving cell in response to transmitting the system information request to the serving cell.

3. The UE of claim 1, wherein: 　　　　the at least one NES cell comprises a plurality of NES cells, and 　　　　the WUS configuration comprises Physical Cell Identities (PCIs) of the plurality of NES cells to establish an association between the WUS configuration and the plurality of NES cells.

4. The UE of claim 3, wherein the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to: 　　　　determine that the WUS configuration is common for the plurality of NES cells in response to determining that the WUS configuration comprises the PCIs of the plurality of NES cells.

5. The UE of claim 1, wherein: 　　　　the at least one NES cell comprises a plurality of NES cells, 　　　　the WUS configuration comprises first area identifier information and second area identifier information, 　　　　the first area identifier information is associated with a first NES cell of plurality of NES cells and the second area identifier information is associated with a second NES cell of the plurality of NES cells, and 　　　　the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to: 　　　　receive and store the SIB1 from the first NES cell; and 　　　　determine whether the stored SIB1 is reusable for accessing the second NES cell by determining whether the first area identifier information is the same as the second area identifier information.

6. The UE of claim 5, wherein the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to: 　　　　determine that the stored SIB1 is reusable for accessing the second NES cell in response to determining that the first area identifier information is the same as the second area identifier information.

7. The UE of claim 1, wherein transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell comprises: 　　　　determining whether a Reference Signal Receiving Power (RSRP) value of the at least one NES cell exceeds an RSRP threshold; and 　　　　transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell in response to determining that the RSRP value of the at least one NES cell exceeds the RSRP threshold.

8. The UE of claim 1, wherein the WUS configuration comprises a SIB1 transmission pattern indicating time and frequency resources for the SIB1 transmission from the at least one NES cell.

9. The UE of claim 1, wherein the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the UE to: 　　　　receive a Random Access Response (RAR) after transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell, wherein the RAR serves as an acknowledgement for the WUS.

10. A method performed by a User Equipment (UE) for Network Energy Saving (NES) cell access, the method comprising: 　　　　receiving a Wake-Up Signal (WUS) configuration from a serving cell, wherein the WUS configuration is associated with at least one NES cell configured perform a System Information Block 1 (SIB1) transmission upon request; 　　　　transmitting a WUS to the at least one NES cell based on the WUS configuration; and 　　　　monitoring for a SIB1 from the at least one NES cell in response to transmitting the WUS to the at least one NES cell.

11. A base station (BS) for supporting Network Energy Saving (NES) cell access, the BS comprising: 　　　　at least one processor; and 　　　　at least one non-transitory computer-readable medium coupled to the at least one processor and storing one or more computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the BS to: 　　　　transmit, via a serving cell of a User Equipment (UE), a Wake-Up Signal (WUS) configuration to the UE, wherein the WUS configuration is associated with at least one NES cell configured to perform a System Information Block 1 (SIB1) transmission upon request; 　　　　receive, via the at least one NES cell, a WUS from the UE; and 　　　　initiate, via the at least one NES cell, the SIB1 transmission in response to receiving the WUS.

12. The BS of claim 11, wherein the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the BS to: 　　　　receive, via the serving cell, a system information request from the UE; and 　　　　transmit, via the serving cell, the WUS configuration in a System Information Block (SIB) in response to receiving the system information request.

13. The BS of claim 11, wherein: 　　　　the at least one NES cell comprises a plurality of NES cells, and 　　　　the WUS configuration comprises Physical Cell Identities (PCIs) of the plurality of NES cells to establish an association between the WUS configuration and the plurality of NES cells.

14. The BS of claim 11, wherein the WUS configuration comprises a SIB1 transmission pattern indicating time and frequency resources for the SIB1 transmission.

15. The BS of claim 11, wherein the one or more computer-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the BS to: 　　　　transmit a Random Access Response (RAR) to the UE after receiving the WUS from the UE, wherein the RAR serves as an acknowledgement for the WUS.

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