Enabling transmission and / or reception during measurement gaps

Abstract

Embodiment provide a transceiver [e.g., UE] for a wireless communication network [e.g., 5G / NR], wherein the transceiver is configured to transmit and / or receive data on a serving cell, wherein the transceiver is configured to [e.g., to continue or start to] transmit and / or receive the data during at least a part of at least one scheduled measurement gap of a plurality of scheduled measurement gaps [e.g., RRM measurement gaps, NCSG gaps, MUSIM gaps and / or UL gaps for TX power management] [e.g., instead of performing [e.g., inter-frequency and / or inter-RAT] measurements] in response to - a reception of a control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap, - or detecting that the data comprises a priority higher than or equal to a threshold or higher than or equal to the at least one scheduled measurement gap.

Description

[0001] Enabling Transmission and / or Reception During Measurement Gaps

[0002] Description

[0003] Embodiments of the present application relate to the field of wireless communication, and more specifically, to enabling a transmission, TX, and / or reception, RX, during measurement gaps, such as, for example, during radio resource management, RRM, gaps.

[0004] Fig. 1 is a schematic representation of an example of a terrestrial wireless network 100 including, as is shown in Fig. 1 (a), a core network 102 and one or more radio access networks (RANs) RAN1 , RAN2, ... RANN. Fig. 1 (b) is a schematic representation of an example of a radio access network RANn that may include one or more base stations (BSs) gNB1 to gNB5, each serving a specific area surrounding the base station schematically represented by respective cells 1061 to 1065. The base stations are provided to serve users within a cell. The term base station, BS, refers to a next generation node B (gNB) in 5G networks, an evolved node B (eNB) in UMTS / LTE / LTE-A / LTE-A Pro, or just a BS in other mobile communication standards. A user may be a stationary device or a mobile device. The wireless communication system may also be accessed by mobile or stationary Internet of Things (loT) devices which connect to a base station or to a user. The mobile devices or the loT devices may include physical devices, ground based vehicles, such as robots or cars, aerial vehicles, such as manned or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), the latter also referred to as drones, buildings and other items or devices having embedded therein electronics, software, sensors, actuators, or the like as well as network connectivity that enables these devices to collect and exchange data across an existing network infrastructure. Fig. 1(b) shows an exemplary view of five cells, however, the RANn may include more or less such cells, and RANn may also include only one base station. Fig. 1(b) shows two users UE1 and UE2, also referred to as user equipment, UE, that are in cell 1062 and that are served by base station gNB2. Another user UE3 is shown in cell 1064 which is served by base station gNB4. The arrows 1081 , 1082 and 1083 schematically represent uplink / downlink connections for transmitting data from a user UE1 , UE2 and UE3 to the base stations gNB2, gNB4 or for transmitting data from the base stations gNB2, gNB4 to the users UE1 , UE2, UE3. Further, Fig. 1 (b) shows two loT devices 1101 and 1102 in cell 1064, which may be stationary or mobile devices. The loT device 1101 accesses the wireless communication system via the base station gNB4 to receive and transmit data as schematically represented by arrow 1121. The loT device 1102 accesses the wireless communication system via the user UE3 as is schematically represented by arrow 1122. The respective base station gNB1 to gNB5 may be connected to the core network 102, e.g., via the S1 interface, via respective backhaul links 1141 to 1145, which are schematically represented in Fig. 1(b) by the arrows pointing to “core”. The core network 102 may be connected to one or more external networks. Further, some or all of the respective base station gNB1 to gNB5 may connected, e.g., via the S1 or X2 interface or the XN interface in NR, with each other via respective backhaul links 1161 to 1165, which are schematically represented in Fig. 1(b) by the arrows pointing to “gNBs”.

[0005] For data transmission a physical resource grid may be used. The physical resource grid may comprise a set of resource elements (REs) to which various physical channels and physical signals are mapped. For example, the physical channels may include the physical downlink, uplink and sidelink shared channels (PDSCH, PLISCH, PSSCH) carrying user specific data, also referred to as downlink, uplink and sidelink payload data, the physical broadcast channel (PBCH) carrying for example a master information block (MIB), the physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) carrying for example a system information block (SIB), the physical downlink, uplink and sidelink control channels (PDCCH, PLICCH, PSSCH) carrying for example the downlink control information (DCI), the uplink control information (UCI) and the sidelink control information (SCI). For the uplink, the physical channels, or more precisely the transport channels according to 3GPP, may further include the physical random access channel (PRACH or RACH) used by UEs for accessing the network once a UE is synchronized and has obtained the MIB and SIB. The physical signals may comprise reference signals or symbols (RS), synchronization signals and the like. The resource grid may comprise a frame or radio frame having a certain duration in the time domain and having a given bandwidth in the frequency domain. The frame may have a certain number of subframes of a predefined length, e.g., 1ms. Each subframe may include one or more slots of 12 or 14 orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) symbols depending on the cyclic prefix (CP) length. All OFDM symbols may be used for downlink (DL) or uplink (UL) or only a subset, e.g., when utilizing shortened transmission time intervals (sTTI) or a mini-slot / non-slot-based frame structure comprising just a few OFDM symbols.

[0006] The wireless communication system may be any single-tone or multicarrier system using frequency-division multiplexing, like the OFDM system, the orthogonal frequency-division multiple access (OFDMA) system, or any other IFFT-based signal with or without CP, e.g., DFT-s-OFDM. Other waveforms, like non-orthogonal waveforms for multiple access, e.g., filter-bank multicarrier (FBMC), generalized frequency division multiplexing (GFDM) or universal filtered multi carrier (LIFMC), may be used. The wireless communication system may operate, e.g., in accordance with the LTE-Advanced pro standard or the NR (5G), New Radio, standard.

[0007] The wireless network or communication system depicted in Fig. 1 may by a heterogeneous network having distinct overlaid networks, e.g., a network of macro cells with each macro cell including a macro base station, like base station gNB1 to gNB5, and a network of small cell base stations (not shown in Fig. 1), like femto or pico base stations.

[0008] In addition to the above described terrestrial wireless network also non-terrestrial wireless communication networks exist including spaceborne transceivers, like satellites, and / or airborne transceivers, like unmanned aircraft systems. The non-terrestrial wireless communication network or system may operate in a similar way as the terrestrial system described above with reference to Fig. 1 , for example in accordance with the LTE-Advanced Pro standard or the NR (5G), new radio, standard.

[0009] In mobile communication networks, for example in a network like that described above with reference to Fig. 1 , like an LTE or 5G / NR network, there may be UEs that communicate directly with each other over one or more sidelink (SL) channels, e.g., using the PC5 interface. UEs that communicate directly with each other over the sidelink may include vehicles communicating directly with other vehicles (V2V communication), vehicles communicating with other entities of the wireless communication network (V2X communication), for example roadside entities, like traffic lights, traffic signs, or pedestrians. Other UEs may not be vehicular related UEs and may comprise any of the above-mentioned devices. Such devices may also communicate directly with each other (D2D communication) using the SL channels.

[0010] When considering two UEs directly communicating with each other over the sidelink, both UEs may be served by the same base station so that the base station may provide sidelink resource allocation configuration or assistance for the UEs. For example, both UEs may be within the coverage area of a base station, like one of the base stations depicted in Fig. 1. This is referred to as an “in-coverage” scenario. Another scenario is referred to as an “out-of-coverage” scenario. It is noted that “out-of-coverage” does not mean that the two UEs are not within one of the cells depicted in Fig. 1 , rather, it means that these UEs may not be connected to a base station, for example, they are not in a radio resource control (RRC) connected state, so that the UEs do not receive from the base station any sidelink resource allocation configuration or assistance, and / or may be connected to the base station, but, for one or more reasons, the base station may not provide sidelink resource allocation configuration or assistance for the UEs, and / or may be connected to the base station that may not support NR V2X services, e.g., GSM, UMTS, LTE base stations.

[0011] When considering two UEs directly communicating with each other over the sidelink, e.g., using the PC5 interface, one of the UEs may also be connected with a BS, and may relay information from the BS to the other UE via the sidelink interface. The relaying may be performed in the same frequency band (in-band-relay) or another frequency band (out-of-band relay) may be used. In the first case, communication on the Uu and on the sidelink may be decoupled using different time slots as in time division duplex (TDD) systems.

[0012] Fig. 2 is a schematic representation of an in-coverage scenario in which two UEs directly communicating with each other are both connected to a base station. The base station gNB has a coverage area that is schematically represented by the circle 200 which, basically, corresponds to the cell schematically represented in Fig. 1. The UEs directly communicating with each other include a first vehicle 202 and a second vehicle 204 both in the coverage area 200 of the base station gNB. Both vehicles 202, 204 are connected to the base station gNB and, in addition, they are connected directly with each other over the PC5 interface. The scheduling and / or interference management of the V2V traffic is assisted by the gNB via control signaling over the Uu interface, which is the radio interface between the base station and the UEs. In other words, the gNB provides SL resource allocation configuration or assistance for the UEs, and the gNB assigns the resources to be used for the V2V communication over the sidelink. This configuration is also referred to as a mode 1 configuration in NR V2X or as a mode 3 configuration in LTE V2X.

[0013] Fig. 3 is a schematic representation of an out-of-coverage scenario in which the UEs directly communicating with each other are either not connected to a base station, although they may be physically within a cell of a wireless communication network, or some or all of the UEs directly communicating with each other are to a base station but the base station does not provide for the SL resource allocation configuration or assistance. Three vehicles 206, 208 and 210 are shown directly communicating with each other over a sidelink, e.g., using the PC5 interface. The scheduling and / or interference management of the V2V traffic is based on algorithms implemented between the vehicles. This configuration is also referred to as a mode 2 configuration in NR V2X or as a mode 4 configuration in LTE V2X. As mentioned above, the scenario in Fig. 3 which is the out-of-coverage scenario does not necessarily mean that the respective mode 2 UEs (in NR) or mode 4 UEs (in LTE) are outside of the coverage 200 of a base station, rather, it means that the respective mode 2 UEs (in NR) or mode 4 UEs (in LTE) are not served by a base station, are not connected to the base station of the coverage area, or are connected to the base station but receive no SL resource allocation configuration or assistance from the base station. Thus, there may be situations in which, within the coverage area 200 shown in Fig. 2, in addition to the NR mode 1 or LTE mode 3 UEs 202, 204 also NR mode 2 or LTE mode 4 UEs 206, 208, 210 are present.

[0014] Naturally, it is also possible that the first vehicle 202 is covered by the gNB, i.e. connected with Uu to the gNB, wherein the second vehicle 204 is not covered by the gNB and only connected via the PC5 interface to the first vehicle 202, or that the second vehicle is connected via the PC5 interface to the first vehicle 202 but via Uu to another gNB, as will become clear from the discussion of Figs. 4 and 5.

[0015] Fig. 4 is a schematic representation of a scenario in which two UEs directly communicating with each, wherein only one of the two UEs is connected to a base station. The base station gNB has a coverage area that is schematically represented by the circle 200 which, basically, corresponds to the cell schematically represented in Fig. 1. The UEs directly communicating with each other include a first vehicle 202 and a second vehicle 204, wherein only the first vehicle 202 is in the coverage area 200 of the base station gNB. Both vehicles 202, 204 are connected directly with each other over the PC5 interface.

[0016] Fig. 5 is a schematic representation of a scenario in which two UEs directly communicating with each, wherein the two UEs are connected to different base stations. The first base station gNB1 has a coverage area that is schematically represented by the first circle 2001 , wherein the second station gNB2 has a coverage area that is schematically represented by the second circle 2002. The UEs directly communicating with each other include a first vehicle 202 and a second vehicle 204, wherein the first vehicle 202 is in the coverage area 2001 of the first base station gNB1 and connected to the first base station gNB1 via the Uu interface, wherein the second vehicle 204 is in the coverage area 2002 of the second base station gNB2 and connected to the second base station gNB2 via the Uu interface.

[0017] 5G NR aims at providing high-speed, low-latency and high-reliability wireless connectivity. One expected application is to enable immersive VR, AR, and XR multimedia and cloud computing services. These applications may have strict system requirements, i.e., high data rate, low latency, or low power devices (e.g., AR glasses, VR head-mounted displays). Measurement gaps (MG) are durations of time during which a UE temporarily suspends data traffic with the serving cell in order to perform radio resource management, RRM, measurements. MGs are primarily used by the network for mobility-related procedures, e.g., inter-frequency handover (i.e., FR1 / FR2), inter-RAT handover, beam management or the addition of new cells.

[0018] However, such disruptions can result in the degradation of the QoS of AR / VR / XR data traffic, in terms of higher latency and reduction of the data throughput. To illustrate this point, the two following extreme cases are considered by way of example:

[0019] When the UE is located at the edge of its serving cell, it may likely experience poor SNR and / or poor CQI. In that case, it is not recommendable to skip many consecutive measurement gaps as it may result in the non-detection of radio link failure events between the UE and the serving cell, and thus in the non-decision by the network to perform handover,

[0020] Conversely, when the UE is static and near the center of its serving cell, it may likely experience very good SNR and / or very good CQI. In that case, several consecutive measurement gaps can be skipped for higher capacity and lower latency purposes without compromising some important decisions to be made by the network.

[0021] Different Types of Measurement Gaps: Definition in Rel-18

[0022] For mobility-related procedures, the RRM measurements are performed on the synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) of neighbor cells over the SSB measurement timing configuration (SMTC). The MG and SMTC durations are configured such that the UE can identify and measure the SSBs within the SMTC window. The timing of neighbor cell SSBs is provided to the UE by the network. The SMTC window is contained within a MG and its duration must be sufficient to accommodate all the SSBs that are being transmitted. The legacy MGs are configured with:

[0023] A length {1.5, 3, 3.5, 4, 5.5, 6, 10, 20} ms which includes the time necessary for RF tuning (e.g., 0.5 ms for FR1 and 0.25 ms for FR2) and for measurements of a SSB burst within the SMTC window, in which an additional scheduling restriction of one data symbol applies between two consecutive SSBs. This guarantees that the UE has enough time to switch to the target non-serving cell, to perform the measurements, and to return back after the measurements.

[0024] A periodicity {20, 40, 80, 160} ms, which is a multiple of the SSB burst periodicity. The proper configuration of the MG length and periodicity depend on multiple factors. For example, measurements in FR2 may require long MGs due to beamforming, whereas operations in FR1 (without beamforming) can benefit from a shorter MG length.

[0025] By specification, the UE shall support the list of MG patterns provided in Table 9.1.2-1 in [1], The MGs and SMTC are configured by the gNB through RRC signaling according to Section 5.5.2.9 and Section 5.5.2.10 in [2], respectively.

[0026] Besides SSBs, the MGs can be associated with other measurement objectives (e.g., PRS or CSI-RS). The UE is only required to perform the measurement associated to the MG during that MG occasion, so that the measurement behavior of the UE is always well-defined.

[0027] Other types of gaps are used in 5G NR, such as the following gaps:

[0028] Network controlled small gaps (NCSG), with two visible interruption lengths (VI L1 and VI L2, which are 1 ms for FR1 and 0.75 ms for FR2) before and after the measurement length (ML), during which the UE is not expected to transmit and receive any data. During the ML, which is {1 , 2, 3, 5} ms, the UE is expected to continue downlink (DL) reception or uplink (UL) transmission with the serving cells. The visible interruption repetition period (VI RP) is {20, 40, 80, 160} ms.

[0029] Multi-universal subscriber identity module (MUSIM) gaps, which are used for cell identification and measurement, paging monitoring, SIB acquisition, and / or on- demand SI request of the target cell in the target network. The MUSIM gap repetition period (MGRP) is {20, 40, 80, 160, 320, 640, 1280, 2560, 5120} ms, and the MUSIM gap length (MGL) is {3, 4, 6, 10, 20} ms.

[0030] UL gaps for TX power management, applicable only in FR2. The UL gap repetition periodicity (UGRP) is {5, 20, 40, 160} ms, and the UL gap length (UGL) is {0.125, 0.25, 0.5, 1.0} ms.

[0031] Different Types of Measurement Gaps: Impact on Latency Sensitive Traffic

[0032] The gaps described above induce scheduling restrictions. Indeed, the UE has only one RF chain and does thus not have the capability to perform any transmissions or receptions of other signals / channels in UL / DL. In other words, MGs are typically given automatic priority over data traffic (PxCCH, PxSCH, HARQ-ACK, CSI-RS, SRS) in 5G NR systems, except during the initial attach procedure (e.g., for Msg2 / Msg3 / Msg4 in a 4-step RACH procedure and / or MsgA / MsgB in a 2-step RACH procedure). Because the configured MGs have a higher priority than the normal data traffic, the UE may be unable to transmit and receive any traffic during MGs. For this reason, they can have a significant (negative) impact on the performance of bursty data traffic, e.g., XR, in terms of the ability to meet packet delay budget (PDB) requirements, since: the MG duration consumes a large portion of the PDB, the MG periodicity determines how often the data traffic will be interrupted or affected.

[0033] For example, for a MG occasion with a length of 6 ms, the remaining time for scheduling data with PDB of 10 ms is only 4 ms, assuming that the traffic data arrives at the start of MG. One consequence of interrupting the data traffic and delaying data transmission until after the MG duration is that the quality of service (QoS) requirements may not be met, especially in terms of latency (or, equivalently, PDB), and the data may potentially be discarded. This issue is illustrated in Fig. 6. This situation happens because the integer-valued (with respect to slots or subframes) MG periodicity cannot be aligned with the typically non-integer-valued periodicities of data traffic (e.g., 60 or 120 Hz for video streams, 30 Hz for audio streams, etc.).

[0034] Specifically, Fig. 6 shows in a diagram a schematic representation of an impact of measurement gaps when colliding with latency-sensitive data traffic. Thereby, in Fig. 6 the abscissa denotes the time. In Fig. 6, it is exemplarily assumed that latency sensitive data traffic, such as XR traffic, arrives as PDSCH transmissions 160_1-160_7 with a periodicity of 16.67 ms (60 frames per second), the respective packet delay bounds 162_1-162_7 are 10ms and measurement gaps 164_1-164 have a length of 6 ms and a periodicity of 40ms.

[0035] This means that overlaps between the data traffic and the MG occasions are unavoidable. In addition, when a MG is configured, the maximum UE throughput may be reduced according to the MG duration.

[0036] Discontinuous Reception (DRX): Definition in Rel-18

[0037] A UE may be configured for connected discontinuous reception (C-DRX) operations in order to reduce its power consumption. Each long DRX cycle consists of an active duration (“ON”) and an inactive duration (“OFF”), which are defined by various timers configurable by RRC: ‘drx-onDurationTimer’, which indicates how long the UE should remain active in every long DRX cycle to monitor PDCCH. It can be {1 , 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 80, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 600, 800, 1000, 1200, 1600} ms.

[0038] ‘drx-lnactivityTimer’, which indicates how long the UE should remain active after having successfully decoded a PDCCH indicating a new UL / DL transmission. It is restarted every time a PDCCH is successfully decoded. It can be {0, 1 , 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 80, 100, 200, 300, 500, 750, 1280, 1920, 2560} ms. The UE goes to DRX mode (“OFF”) upon the expiry of either of these two timers until the start of next “ON” duration in the next long DRX cycle. In addition, short DRX cycles can also be optionally configured, with the following timers (configured by RRC):

[0039] ‘shortDRX-Cycle’, which indicates the duration of the short DRX cycle. The duration of the long DRX cycle shall be an integer multiple of the ‘shortDRX-Cycle’, which can be {2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 14, 16, 20, 30, 32, 35, 40, 64, 80, 128, 160, 256, 320, 512, 640} ms.

[0040] ‘drxShortCycleTimer’, which indicates the number of consecutive short DRX cycles the UE should follow after the ‘drx-lnactivityTimer’ has expired and before entering the long DRX cycle. It can be {1 , 2, ... , 16}.

[0041] The same ‘drx-onDurationTimer’ value is applied for both long and short DRX cycles. For both long and short DRX cycles, the start of “ON” duration is determined the parameters ‘Startoffset’ and ‘drx-SlotOffet’.

[0042] Discontinuous Reception (DRX): Impact on Latency Sensitive Traffic

[0043] As described for the MGs above, there is a mismatch between the typically non-integer-valued periodicities of data traffic and the integer-valued periodicities of both the long and short DRX cycles. This would similarly lead to throughput loss due to larger latency and / or larger UE power consumption to keep the same latency performance.

[0044] As it can be observed, there is a drift resulting from the misalignment between the data traffic and the C-DRX cycles. This issue was addressed during Rel-18 and solved by “adopting the rational number in DRX cycle and adding the floor operations in DRX formulas” [3], Hence, “DRX cycles could be adjusted to address the mismatch between DL traffic arrival times and DRX on-duration start times”.

[0045] Discontinuous Reception (DRX): Impact on Dynamic Signaling for Measurement Gaps

[0046] When the UE is configured with C-DRX, any dynamic signaling for the MGs cannot be received by the UE during the C-DRX non-active (“OFF”) periods or when the DRX timers expire. Since the UE does not monitor the PDCCH during the C-DRX non-active period, the UE is not aware of the change in the MG configuration. As a consequence, if the corresponding MG occasion overlaps with the C-DRX non-active period, the UE will still delay the transmission of UL data traffic to until after the MG (as it would have done if there had been no dynamic signaling), hence resulting in further latency and QoS degradation during UL data traffic transmission.

[0047] Multi-Modality Traffic Flow

[0048] In AR / VR / XR applications, there are requirements to support the coordinated transmission of multi-modality traffic flows. The different modalities can include video / audio media, haptic (e.g., pressure, texture, vibration, temperature, etc.) data, or sensor (e.g., brightness, temperature, humidity, etc.) data, as illustrated in Fig. 7.

[0049] Each modality has different characteristics, which are described in the following [5],

[0050] Video has the following characteristics: The frame rate for XR video varies from 15 frames per second (fps) up to 90 or even 120 fps, with a typical minimum of 60 fps for VR. The motion-to- photon latency should be less than 20 ms, with 10 ms being given as a goal. Regarding the bit rates, between 10 and 200 Mbps can be expected for XR depending on frame rate, resolution, and codec efficiency. For the dual eye buffer model (i.e. , when the left and right eye frames arrive separately with a time offset), the packet size distribution parameters are given in Table 1 :

[0051] Table 1 : Statistical parameter values for dual eye buffer packet size [6],

[0052] Audio has the following characteristics: It is recommended to have an accuracy of between 15 ms (audio delayed) and 5 ms (audio advanced) for the synchronization with the video component, with recommended absolute limits of 60 ms (audio delayed) and 40 ms (audio advanced) for broadcast video. Exemplary parameters for UL audio traffic are provided in Table 2:

[0053] Table 2: Statistical parameters for the UL audio traffic [6],

[0054] Pose Information has the following characteristics: XR applications require highly accurate, low-latency tracking of the device at about 1 kHz sampling frequency. The size of a packet is typically in the range of 30-100 bytes, i.e., the generated data is around several hundred kbit / s if delivered over the network with latency requirements in the range of 10-20 ms. However, it can be assumed that sending one pose packet aligned with the frame rate of the rendered video may be sufficient, e.g., at 60 Hz. Exemplary parameters for UL pose traffic are provided in Table 3:

[0055] Table 3: Statistical parameters for the UL pose / control traffic [6], Note that the PDB is defined as “the latency requirement of XR traffic in RAN side (i.e., air interface)” [6], “The PDB is a limited time budget for a packet to be transmitted over the air from a gNB to a UE. For a given packet, the delay of the packet incurred in air interface is measured from the time that the packet arrives at the gNB to the time that it is successfully transferred to the UE. If the delay is larger than a given PDB for the packet, then, the packet is said to violate PDB, otherwise the packet is said to be successfully delivered. The value of PDB may vary for different applications and traffic types”.

[0056] The above discussion shows that disruptions caused by measurements gaps, MGs, can result in the degradation of the QoS of AR / VR / XR data traffic, in terms of higher latency and reduction of the data throughput.

[0057] Therefore, there is the need for improvements or enhancements with respect to reducing data transfer disruptions caused by measurements gaps.

[0058] It is noted that the information in the above section is only for enhancing the understanding of the background of the invention and therefore it may contain information that does not form prior art and is already known to a person of ordinary skill in the art.

[0059] Embodiments of the present invention are described herein making reference to the appended drawings.

[0060] Fig. 1 shows a schematic representation of an example of a wireless communication system;

[0061] Fig. 2 is a schematic representation of an in-coverage scenario in which UEs directly communicating with each other are connected to a base station;

[0062] Fig. 3 is a schematic representation of an out-of-coverage scenario in which UEs directly communicating with each other receive no SL resource allocation configuration or assistance from a base station;

[0063] Fig. 4 is a schematic representation of a partial out-of-coverage scenario in which some of the UEs directly communicating with each other receive no SL resource allocation configuration or assistance from a base station;

[0064] Fig. 5 is a schematic representation of an in-coverage scenario in which UEs directly communicating with each other are connected to different base stations;

[0065] Fig. 6 shows a schematic representation of an impact of measurement gaps when colliding with latency sensitive data traffic; Fig. 7 shows a schematic representation of a multi-modal interactive system [4];

[0066] Fig. 8 is a schematic representation of a wireless communication system comprising a transceiver, like a base station or a relay, and a plurality of communication devices, like UEs, according to an embodiment;

[0067] Fig. 9 illustrates an example of a computer system on which units or modules as well as the steps of the methods described in accordance with the inventive approach may execute.

[0068] Equal or equivalent elements or elements with equal or equivalent functionality are denoted in the following description by equal or equivalent reference numerals.

[0069] In the following description, a plurality of details are set forth to provide a more thorough explanation of embodiments of the present invention. However, it will be apparent to one skilled in the art that embodiments of the present invention may be practiced without these specific details. In other instances, well-known structures and devices are shown in block diagram form rather than in detail in order to avoid obscuring embodiments of the present invention. In addition, features of the different embodiments described hereinafter may be combined with each other, unless specifically noted otherwise.

[0070] As indicated above, measurement gaps, MGs, are durations of time during which the data traffic between a UE and its serving cell is temporarily interrupted so as to perform measurements. MGs are primarily used by the network for mobility-related procedures, e.g., inter-frequency handover (i.e., FR1 / FR2), inter-RAT handover, beam management or the addition of new cells. However, such disruptions can result in higher latency and reduction of the data throughput. Hence, there is a need to avoid as much as possible such disruptions.

[0071] Therefore, in accordance with embodiments, data transmission is enabled during one or more MG occasions, to improve the performance of data traffic, such as of latency sensitive traffic.

[0072] Embodiments of the present invention may be implemented in a wireless communication system or network as depicted in Figs. 1 to 5 including a transceiver, like a base station, gNB, or relay, and a plurality of communication devices, like user equipment’s, UEs. Fig. 8 is a schematic representation of a wireless communication system comprising a transceiver 200, like a base station, and a plurality of communication devices 202i to 202n, like UEs. The UEs might communicated directly with each other via a wireless communication link or channel 203, like a radio link (e.g., using the PC5 interface (sidelink)). Further, the transceiver and the UEs 202 might communicate via a wireless communication link or channel 204, like a radio link (e.g., using the ull interface). The transceiver 200 might include one or more antennas ANT or an antenna array having a plurality of antenna elements, a signal processor 200a and a transceiver unit 200b. The UEs 202 might include one or more antennas ANT or an antenna array having a plurality of antennas, a processor 202ai to 202an, and a transceiver (e.g., receiver and / or transmitter) unit 202bi to 202bn. The base station 200 and / or the one or more UEs 202 may operate in accordance with the inventive teachings described herein.

[0073] Embodiments provide a transceiver [e.g., UE] for a wireless communication network [e.g., 5G I NR], wherein the transceiver is configured to transmit and / or receive data on a serving cell, wherein the transceiver is configured to [e.g., to continue or start to] transmit and / or receive the data during at least a part of at least one scheduled measurement gap of a plurality of scheduled measurement gaps [e.g., RRM measurement gaps [e.g., inter-frequency and / or inter-RAT], NCSG gaps, MUSIM gaps and / or UL gaps for TX power management] [e.g., instead of performing measurements] in response to a reception of a control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap [e.g., indicating to use the at least one measurement gap for data transmission and / or reception], or detecting that the data comprises a priority higher than or equal to a threshold or higher than or equal to the at least one scheduled measurement gap.

[0074] In embodiments, during other scheduled measurement gaps of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps the transmission and / or reception of data on the serving cell is interrupted or suspended.

[0075] For example, in embodiments there a first group of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps is used for data traffic, where a second group (e.g., different from the first group) of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps is used for measurements so that data traffic is interrupted. Thereby, the first group of the scheduled measurement gaps is referred to herein as the at least one scheduled measurement gaps, where the second group of scheduled measurement gaps is referred to herein as to other scheduled measurement gaps.

[0076] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to perform during other scheduled measurement gaps of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps [e.g., inter-frequency and / or inter-RAT] measurements [e.g., for mobility-related procedures, such as inter-frequency handover [i.e. , FR1 / FR2], inter-RAT handover, beam management and / or the addition of new cells]. In embodiments, the plurality of measurement gaps is part of a measurement gap configuration [e.g., scheduling the plurality of measurement gaps].

[0077] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured, in case that no control information is received that indicates to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap and / or in case that the priority of the data is lower than the threshold or lower than a priority of the measurement gap, to perform measurements in the at least one scheduled measurement gap.

[0078] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to transmit and / or receive the data during the at least one scheduled measurement gap of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps in response to the reception of the control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap, wherein the control information is one out of a medium access control control element, MAC-CE, [e.g., semi-persistently deactivating the at least one scheduled measurement gap] a bitmask indicating the at least one [e.g., two] scheduled measurement gaps to be deactivated.

[0079] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to transmit and / or receive the data during the at least one scheduled measurement gap of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps in response to the reception of the control information indicating to skip or deactivate or reactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap, wherein the control information is a dynamic signaling.

[0080] In embodiments, the dynamic signaling is performed via a medium access control control element, MAC-CE, or a downlink control information, DCI.

[0081] In embodiments, the medium access control control element, MAC-CE, or the downlink control information, DCI, indicates to skip the at least one scheduled measurement gap implicitly by means of a scheduling information [e.g., if the resource indicated by the scheduling information overlap the at least one scheduled measurement gap], explicitly by means of a new separate field in the MAC-CE or the DCI.

[0082] In embodiments, the at least one scheduled measurement gap to be skipped or deactivated is an upcoming measurement gap [e.g., upcoming measurement gap occasion], a set of upcoming measurement gaps, all upcoming measurement gaps of the plurality of measurement gaps [e.g., of a measurement gap configuration].

[0083] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to transmit and / or receive the data during the at least one scheduled measurement gap of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps in response to detecting that the data comprises a priority, e.g., higher than or equal to the threshold or higher than or equal to the priority of the at least one scheduled measurement gap, wherein the priority is, a PDU session identity, PSI.

[0084] In embodiments, the decision to prioritize the data traffic over the MG occasions can be taken based on (1) the UE assistance information sent to the RAN and / or (2) application layer measurements, QoE measurements, or application performance measurements, e.g., based on specific KPIs (e.g., frame rates, audio delay, video resolution, etc.), or a combination of these.

[0085] In embodiments, in case that the transceiver finalizes a transmission and / or reception of data during a first part of a scheduled measurement gap, the transceiver is configured to utilize a remaining part of the scheduled measurement gap to perform measurements.

[0086] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to detect that the reception of data is finalized in case that no data is received during a predefined time span [e.g., no scheduling grant has been received or pre-allocated DL slot has not been used].

[0087] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to utilize the remaining part of the scheduled measurement gap only in case that the remaining part of the measurement gap is equal to or larger than a smallest configurable measurement gap.

[0088] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to utilize the remaining part of the measurement gap in response to a reception of at least one reconfiguration information [e.g., indicating a duration of the remaining part and / or a new length of the measurement gap] reconfiguring the measurement gap.

[0089] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to receive a second reconfiguration information indicating to restore the previous measurement gap configuration [e.g., the measurement gap was temporarily reconfigured to be partial]. In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to utilize the remaining part of the measurement gap in response to a reception of one reconfiguration information [e.g., indicating in a new field [e.g., of the MAC-CE or DCI] the duration of the remaining part and / or the new length of the measurement gap] reconfiguring the measurement gap.

[0090] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to utilize the remaining part of the measurement gap in response to a reception of at least one reconfiguration information [e.g., one indicating a duration of the remaining part and / or a new length of the measurement gap, another one restoring the previous measurement gap configuration [e.g., the measurement gap was temporarily reconfigured to be partial]] reconfiguring the measurement gap.

[0091] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to transmit an assistance information to a central transceiver that is serving the cell, wherein the assistance information describes at least one out of radio resource measurement results [e.g., RSRP, RSRQ, SINR] obtained in at least one preceding measurement gap, channel state information, CSI, information describing an uplink traffic [e.g., BSR, DSR, SR, or UTO-UCI].

[0092] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to transmit [e.g., via UE capability information to the RAN] an assistance information [e.g., or signaling information], wherein the assistance information describes one out of a minimum DCI processing time, a MAC-CE capability time.

[0093] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to receive the control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap at least a predefined timespan before the at least one scheduled measurement gap, wherein the predefined time span is equal to or greater than a processing time [e.g., T = TDCI + X, where TDCI is the DCI processing time and X is a jitter buffer; or a MAC-CE applicability time, or a RRC reconfiguration delay] required for processing the control information.

[0094] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to receive the data using a discontinuous reception, DRX, wherein the transceiver is configured to transmit an assistance information to a central transceiver that is serving the cell, wherein the assistance information describes at least one parameter of a configuration of the discontinuous reception, DRX. In embodiments, the transmission and / or reception of data is a multi-modal data flow.

[0095] In embodiments, the detecting that the data comprises a priority higher than or equal to a threshold or higher than or equal to the at least one scheduled measurement gap is performed for each flow of the multi-modal data flow.

[0096] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured for each flow of the multi-modal data flow, in case that the transceiver finalizes a reception of a respective data flow during a first part of a scheduled measurement gap, to utilize the remaining part of the scheduled measurement gap not used by all data flows to perform measurements in case that the remaining part of the measurement gap not used by all data flows is equal to or larger than a smallest configurable measurement gap.

[0097] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to transmit an assistance information to a central transceiver that is serving the cell, wherein the assistance information describes at least one out of radio resource measurement results [e.g., RSRP, RSRQ, SINR] obtained in at least one preceding measurement gap, channel state information, CSI, information describing an uplink traffic [e.g., BSR, DSR, SR, or UTO-UCI], for each flow of the multi-modal data flow.

[0098] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to receive the multi-modal data flow using at least one discontinuous reception, DRX, wherein the transceiver is configured to transmit an assistance information to a central transceiver that is serving the cell, wherein the assistance information describes at least one parameter of each of the at least one discontinuous reception, DRX.

[0099] In embodiments, a number of scheduled measurement gaps that are used for transmitting and / or receiving data depends on a state of the transceiver.

[0100] In embodiments, the state of the transceiver is a distance to a central transceiver that is serving the cell and / or a velocity of the transceiver, and / or the serving cell quality, and / or the traffic information (BSR, DSR, etc.).

[0101] In embodiments, the data is at least one out of high-speed data, low-latency data and high- reliability data. In embodiments, the data is, but is not limited to, immersive virtual reality, VR, data, augmented reality, AR, data, extended reality, XR, multimedia data or cloud computing data.

[0102] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to predict [e.g., via extrapolation or AI / ML] at least one measurement value of at least one measurement gap, to obtain at least one predicted measurement value, wherein the transceiver is configured to report the at least one predicted measurement value to a base station of the wireless communication network.

[0103] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to predict [e.g., via extrapolation or AI / ML] at least one measurement value of the at least one measurement gap that is deactivated or skipped according to the received control information [e.g., wherein the transceiver is configured to predict at least one measurement value in the at least one deactivated MG in response at least one measurement value of at least one MG indicated by the base station].

[0104] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to predict the at least one measurement value based on one or more previous measurement values.

[0105] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to report the at least one predicted measurement value via an assistance information or a medium access control control element, MAC-CE.

[0106] In embodiments, the transceiver is configured to report the at least one predicted measurement value in response to a fulfillment of a defined condition.

[0107] In embodiments, the defined condition is fulfilled in case that a change of the at least one measurement value crosses a defined threshold [e.g., deteriorates by at least 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 or 90%].

[0108] Further embodiments provide a base station [e.g., gNB] for a wireless communication network [e.g., 5G I NR], wherein the base station is configured to serve a cell of the wireless communication network, wherein the base station is configured to transmit a control information to a transceiver of the wireless communication network, the control information signaling to skip or deactivate at least one scheduled measurement gap of a plurality of scheduled measurement gaps [e.g., indicating to use the at least one measurement gap for data transmission and / or reception],. In embodiments, the base station is configured to transmit data to the transceiver or receive data from the transceiver during the at least one scheduled measurement gap.

[0109] In embodiments, the base station is configured to determine a configuration of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps, wherein the base station is configured to transmit a control information to the transceiver, the control information describing the configuration of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps.

[0110] In embodiments, the base station is configured to select the one scheduled measurement gap out of the plurality of measurement gaps in dependence on radio resource conditions and / or requirements of one or more transceivers of the cell.

[0111] In embodiments, the control information is one out of a medium access control control element, MAC-CE, [e.g., semi-persistently deactivating the at least one scheduled measurement gap] a bitmask indicating the at least one [e.g., two] scheduled measurement gaps to be deactivated.

[0112] In embodiments, the control information includes a bitmask indicating the scheduled measurement gaps to be deactivated, wherein the same bitmask is used for at least two different measurement configurations [e.g., with no consideration for the type of the MG occasions] or wherein different bitmasks are used for different measurement configurations [e.g., allowing a differentiated handling of the different types of MG occasions].

[0113] In embodiments, the bitmask indicates a pattern of scheduled measurement gaps to be deactivated. For example, the bitmask can indicate that a number of scheduled measurement gaps out of the scheduled measurement gaps are deactivated or that a number of consecutive scheduled measurement gaps out of the scheduled measurement gaps are deactivated.

[0114] In embodiments, the control information is a dynamic signaling.

[0115] In embodiments, the base station is configured to perform the dynamic signaling using a medium access control control element, MAC-CE, or a downlink control information, DCI.

[0116] In embodiments, the medium access control control element, MAC-CE, or the downlink control information, DCI, indicates to skip the at least one scheduled measurement gap implicitly by means of a scheduling information [e.g., if the resource indicated by the scheduling information overlap the at least one scheduled measurement gap], explicitly by means of a new separate field in the MAC-CE or the DCI.

[0117] In embodiments, the at least one scheduled measurement gap to be skipped or deactivated is an upcoming measurement gap [e.g., upcoming measurement gap occasion], a set of upcoming measurement gaps, all upcoming measurement gaps of the plurality of measurement gaps [e.g., of a measurement gap configuration].

[0118] In embodiments, the base station is configured to receive an assistance information from the transceiver, wherein the assistance information describes at least one out of radio resource measurement results [e.g., RSRP, RSRQ, SINR] obtained in at least one preceding measurement gap, channel state information, CSI, information describing an uplink traffic [e.g., BSR, DSR, SR, or UTO-UCI], wherein the base station is configured to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap and / or a number of the at least one scheduled measurement gaps based on the assistance information.

[0119] In embodiments, the base station is configured to receive application measurement reports for specific service types and to prioritize downlink and / or uplink data traffic.

[0120] For example, additional information can be made available to the gNB / CN via application measurement reports for specific service types, e.g., streaming data, VR data, etc. These measurements are not RF-based and can thus continue even if the MG occasions are skipped. The measurements gathered from the UE can be used by the gNB / core network to prioritize DL or UL data traffic using the application ID from the measConfigAppLayerld from the RRC configuration. Besides, the associated data can be prioritized via a Bearer ID, PDCP Session ID, QoS Flow ID, or another ID used to identify data streams within the protocol layers of the wireless communication system or within the UE.

[0121] In embodiments, the base station is configured to receive downlink assistance information [e.g., information from the core network to the base station for downlink transmission], the downlink assistance information describing downlink data traffic [e.g., how much needs to be transmitted, how urgent it is, etc.] made available [e.g., to the RAN by the CN], In embodiments, the base station is configured to transmit the control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap at least a predefined timespan before the at least one scheduled measurement gap, wherein the predefined time span is equal to or greater than a processing time [e.g., T = TDCI + X, where TDCI is the DCI processing time and X is a jitter buffer; or a MAC-CE applicability time, or a RRC reconfiguration delay] required for processing the control information.

[0122] In embodiments, the base station is configured to receive an assistance information from the transceiver, the assistance information describing at least one parameter of a configuration of a discontinuous reception, DRX, used by the transceiver, wherein the base station is configured to transmit the control information based on the assistance information and / or to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap based on the assistance information.

[0123] In embodiments, the transmission and / or reception of data is a multi-modal data flow.

[0124] In embodiments, the base station is configured to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap or a number of the at least one scheduled measurement gap based on a state of the transceiver.

[0125] In embodiments, the state of the transceiver is a distance to a central transceiver that is serving the cell and / or a velocity of the transceiver.

[0126] In embodiments, the base station is configured to receive a report of at least one predicted measurement value of one or more scheduled measurement gaps of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps, wherein the base station is configured to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap out of the plurality of measurement gaps to be skipped or deactivated in dependence on the at least one predicted measurement value.

[0127] In embodiments, the base station is configured to receive a report of at least one measurement value of one or more previous measurement gaps, wherein the base station is configured to predict at least one measurement value of at least one scheduled measurement gap of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps, in order to obtain at least one predicted measurement value, wherein the base station is configured to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap out of the plurality of measurement gaps to be skipped or deactivated in dependence on the at least one predicted measurement value. In embodiments, the base station is configured to receive the report from a transceiver of the wireless communication network or from another base station of the wireless communication network.

[0128] In embodiments, the base station is configured to receive the report via an assistance information or via a medium access control control element.

[0129] Further embodiments provide a method for operating a transceiver [e.g., UE] for a wireless communication network [e.g., 5G I NR], The method comprises a step of performing a data transmission and / or reception on a serving cell, wherein the data transmission and / or reception is performed during at least a part of at least one measurement gap of a plurality of measurement gaps [e.g., instead of performing [e.g., inter-frequency and / or inter-RAT] measurements] in response to a reception of a control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one measurement gap [e.g., indicating to use the at least one measurement gap for data transmission and / or reception], or detecting that the data comprises a priority higher than or equal to a threshold or higher than or equal to the at least one measurement gap.

[0130] Further embodiments provide a method for operating a base station [e.g., gNB] for a wireless communication network [e.g., 5G I NR], The method comprises a step of serving a cell of the wireless communication network. The method comprises a step of transmitting a control information to a transceiver of the wireless communication network, the control information signaling to skip or deactivate at least one scheduled measurement gap of a plurality of scheduled measurement gaps [e.g., indicating to use the at least one measurement gap for data transmission and / or reception].

[0131] Embodiments provide a trade-off in order not to harm the fundamental functionalities that MGs are primarily intended for.

[0132] In embodiments, the term measurement gap, MG, is used to refer indiscriminately to one or more out of

[0133] RRM measurement gaps,

[0134] NCSG gaps,

[0135] MllSIM gaps,

[0136] UL gaps for TX power management, which are described in further detail above in the introductory portion. In this regard, it is noted that embodiments are agnostic with respect to which type of MG is considered.

[0137] Embodiments described herein may apply to any type of application providing high-speed, low- latency and high-reliability wireless connectivity. This includes, but is not limited to, immersive VR, AR, and XR multimedia and cloud computing services.

[0138] Note that in 3GPP Rel-18, MG occasions are given automatic priority over data traffic, except during the RACH procedure. Because the configured MGs have a higher priority than the normal data traffic, the UE may be unable to transmit or receive any traffic during MG occasions. This is the legacy behavior. Therefore, in some embodiments, this is assumed to be the default behavior, which may also be used as a fallback solution if nothing is indicated.

[0139] Subsequently, embodiments are described in further detail.

[0140] 1. Network-Controlled Solution

[0141] In embodiments, to optimize data transmission during MGs, additional control may be required.

[0142] In embodiments, only the network can decide whether data transmission / reception should occur over a MG assigned to a UE. The reason for this is that the network has a better knowledge of the radio conditions and of the requirements for all the UEs in the network. Moreover, it is the network responsibility to ensure that measurements are performed regularly enough and with sufficient accuracy in order to not have any detrimental impact on procedures such as mobility or link adaptation.

[0143] In embodiments, MGs may be enabled, e.g., by default or (pre-)configured. In case of default, a combination of (i): semi-persistent or semi-static signaling, and (ii): dynamic signaling can be used to deactivate or reactivate a MG occasion. As the baseline solution, in embodiments: the network can deactivate semi-persistently the MG occasions by means of MAC-CE signaling until a new RRC reconfiguration configures a new MG configuration, with possibly different MG length and / or periodicity, or the network can deactivate semi-statically the MG occasions indicated by RRC signaling using a bitmask hence allowing an aperiodic pattern of valid MG occasions, which are such that they do not fully, or even partially, overlap with data transmission. Consequently, in embodiments, this bitmask can be used: • for all the different MG configurations, with no consideration for the type of the MG occasions, or

[0144] • for each MG configuration, allowing therefore a differentiated handling of the different types of MG occasions.

[0145] As an example, the semi-persistent and / or semi-static periodic pattern can be chosen such that:

[0146] X occasions of gaps out of Y are cancelled, or

[0147] T consecutive gaps out of Y (with Y greater than T) are cancelled, such that the pattern is independent of the traffic, channel conditions, and / or UE mobility. The signaling can consist then of two numbers, namely “X” (or “T”) and “Y”, and there is in that case no need to provide the complete bitmask to the UE in the RRC signaling. The ratio X / Y (or T / Y) corresponds to the minimum ratio of occasions of gaps that can be cancelled to guarantee a certain level of RRM performance. The values of X (or T) and Y, which can be (pre-)configured by the network and provided to the UE by means of RRC Reconfiguration.

[0148] On top of it, in embodiments, a dynamic signaling can be used, e.g., in order to quickly activate (resp. deactivate) when the channel conditions become suddenly better (resp. worse) than they were when the baseline solution was implemented: the upcoming MG occasion, a set of upcoming MG occasions, and / or all the MG occasions of the MG configuration.

[0149] For that purpose, in embodiments, either DCI or MAC-CE signaling can be used: DCI signaling provides lower latency and higher flexibility, whereas MAC-CE signaling is more reliable. The dynamic signaling can be performed either: implicitly, i.e., if the UE receives a scheduling DCI or MAC-CE before the start of a MG occasion and the time domain resources indicated overlap with the MG occasion, it indicates that the upcoming MG occasion is cancelled and that data transmission / reception will be instead performed, or explicitly, i.e., by introducing a new field in the DCI format or in a MAC-CE that indicates MG occasion activation (resp. deactivation), where it is up to the UE to determine if the signaling concerns only the upcoming MG occasion or more.

[0150] In embodiments, the semi-persistent / semi-static signaling aims at taking care of the long-term behavior of the channel conditions and / or in the data traffic conditions. Hence, it does not need to be updated and to be provided to the UE very often. On the other hand, the dynamic signaling is able to adapt on-the-fly to the shorter-term fluctuations that may occur in the channel conditions and / or in the data traffic conditions.

[0151] 2. Solution Based on Data Traffic Prioritization

[0152] As an alternative to the network-based solution described in Section 1 , another solution consists in prioritizing the traffic over MG occasions to ensure that the data traffic is not interrupted even a MG occasion is starting.

[0153] In embodiments, this can be performed by setting the PSI of a PDU Set in the data traffic. For example, when the data traffic overlaps a MG occasion, the UE can check the PSI to decide if the data is important enough to skip the MG. This can be performed, for example, by comparing the respective priorities of the data traffic and of the MG occasions: if the PSI of the data traffic has been set above the priority of the MG occasions, then the MG occasion is cancelled in favor of the data traffic, otherwise, the data traffic is interrupted during the MG occasion to carry the measurements.

[0154] In embodiments, this mechanism allows the RAN to decide whether the traffic data is important enough to skip MG occasions by dynamically adjusting the PSI of the data traffic, and at the same time to control the measurement performance. The decision to prioritize the data traffic over the MG occasions can be taken based on: the UE assistance information sent to the RAN, which is described in Section 4, and / or application layer measurements, QoE measurements, or application performance measurements based on specific KPIs (e.g., frame rates, audio delay, video resolution, etc.), or a combination of these.

[0155] Note that regarding QoE measurements, the RAN visible QoE measurements are supported for the DASH streaming and VR services. The gNB configures the RAN visible QoE measurement to collect all or some of the available RAN visible QoE metrics, where the indication of metric availability is received from the QAM or the 5GC. The set of available RAN visible QoE metrics is a subset of the metrics which are already configured as part of QoE measurement configuration encapsulated in the application layer container. The PDU session ID(s) corresponding to the service that is subject to QoE measurements can also be reported by the UE along with the RAN visible QoE measurement results.

[0156] 3. Partial Cancellation of Measurement Gaps In embodiments, the case may also happen that a MG interrupts the ongoing data traffic, which cannot be delayed until after the MG for latency reasons, or because only a small amount of data remains to be transmitted or received. In that case, it should be possible to partially cancel a MG occasion: the first part of the MG can be used to continue the data transmission or reception while the remaining part of the MG can be used to perform measurements. For example, in the DL, the data transmission / reception continues until all the data have been transmitted / received. In particular, the UE may consider that the MG occasion is available for measurements if: no new data is received during a certain amount of time, e.g., no scheduling grant has been received or pre-allocated DL slot has not been used, and / or the remaining MG duration is larger than the smallest configurable MG duration (i.e. , 5 ms).

[0157] The latter condition is needed to ensure that sufficient time is effectively allocated to perform accurate measurements.

[0158] In embodiments, the network-controlled solutions (described in Section 1) may require that either: a new field in the RRC Reconfiguration message indicates the duration of the remaining part of the partially-skipped MG during which the measurements will be performed, two RRC Reconfiguration messages are needed to reconfigure the MG occasion, i.e., o a first one to indicate the duration of the remaining part of the partially-skipped MG during which the measurements will be performed, o another one to set the length of the MG to its previously configured value.

[0159] Note that it is also possible to not use an RRC message, but, e.g., to implicitly add an indicator on the length in the data transmission or another option to one RRC message only.

[0160] On the other hand, the partial cancellation of MG occasions is intrinsically supported in embodiments based on the prioritization of traffic over MG occasions (described in section 2). Assistance Information

[0161] In embodiments, in order to decide whether a MG occasion can be deactivated or not, the network can receive timely information about the measurements and data scheduling. For that purpose, in embodiments, the UE may report information related to the channel conditions, e.g., based on CSI reports and / or on measurements (RSRP, RSRQ, SINR) from configured measurement objects associated with previous MG occasions. For good channel conditions with the current serving cell (i.e., when the UE’s measurements on the current serving cell are greater than a certain threshold), MGs may not be needed for performing measurements on non-serving cells and MG occasions may be skipped temporarily to instead enable data traffic transmission / reception.

[0162] Further, in embodiments, information about the DL data traffic (e.g., how much needs to be transmitted, how urgent it is, etc.) is made available to the RAN by the CN.

[0163] In embodiments, the UE can indicate information about the UL data traffic with, e.g., BSR, DSR, SR, or UTO-UCI. For example, if the amount of data to be transmitted reported in the BSR (and / or if the delay reported in the DSR) is greater than a (pre-)configured threshold, then the UE may decide to prioritize the transmission of UL data over MG occasions.

[0164] In embodiments, additional information can be made available to the gNB / CN via application measurement reports for specific service types, e.g., streaming data, VR data, etc. These measurements are not RF-based and can thus continue even if the MG occasions are skipped. The measurements gathered from the UE can be used by the gNB / core network to prioritize DL or UL data traffic using the application ID from the measConfigAppLayerld from the RRC configuration. Besides, the associated data can be prioritized via a Bearer ID, PDCP Session ID, QoS Flow ID, or another ID used to identify data streams within the protocol layers of the wireless communication system or within the UE.

[0165] 5. Timeline

[0166] In embodiments, dynamic signaling, e.g., via DCI or MAC-CE, was proposed in Section 1 to deactivate / reactivate a MG occasion on-the-fly. When the UE receives it, the signaling should concern only the upcoming MG occasion and no other one. Therefore, In embodiments, an adequate timeline can be adopted, such as, for example:

[0167] For DCI-based signaling, the DCI processing time is the minimum time interval between the end of the PDCCH containing the scheduling DCI and the start of the MG occasion. An additional margin may also be considered to account for the jitter. For that reason, DCI-based signaling is sent T ms before the start of the associated MG occasion, i.e., T = TDCI + X, where TDCI is the DCI processing time and X is the jitter buffer, respectively, For MAC-CE-based signaling, the usual MAC-CE applicability time (i.e., 3 ms) is the minimum time interval between the time when the MAC-CE is acknowledged and the start of the MG occasion. Note that this also applies to the semi-persistent signaling.

[0168] In embodiments, as for the semi-static signaling, the minimum time interval between the reception of the DL RRC reconfiguration command and the start of the MG occasion is the RRC reconfiguration delay.

[0169] In embodiments, a UE may signal the minimum DCI processing time (e.g., in terms of slots) or MAC-CE applicability time via the UE capability information to the RAN.

[0170] In embodiments, no specific timeline may be necessary when considering the prioritization of the data traffic over the MG occasions. As explained above in Section 2, the prioritization of the traffic data over the MG occasions is done by setting the PSI of a PDU Set in the data traffic, either based on information received from the CN (in the DL) or based on UE assistance information (in the UL), such that no additional signaling latency occurs.

[0171] 6. Interaction with DRX

[0172] When a UE is configured with C-DRX, MGs can overlap with a DRX active time (long or short) during which data are being transmitted or received (from the UE perspective). In case the DRX inactivity timer expires during a MG, the UE will enter the inactive state for the remainder of the DRX cycle. As a result, the delivery of the data traffic is further delayed until the start of the next DRX cycle, such that the QoS requirements may not be satisfied and the PDUs delivered outside the PDB to be discarded.

[0173] Another case occurs because any dynamic signaling for adapting MGs cannot be received outside of the C-DRX active period or when the DRX timers expire. Since the UE does not monitor the PDCCH during the non-active C-DRX period, the UE will behave as if it had not received the associated signaling (i.e., still skipping the MG occasion if the signaling indicated its activation, or still performing the measurements if the signaling indicated its deactivation). The associated MG occasion can either partly overlap the C-DRX non-active period or it can occur later. Hence, the UE will delay the transmission (resp. reception) of any UL (resp. DL) data until after the end of the MG occasion.

[0174] To address these issues, in embodiments, the UE assistance information can be used to inform the RAN of the UE’s C-DRX parameters. With this information being available, the RAN can avoid sending any dynamic signaling of MG (de)activation when the UE is in a C-DRX nonactive period.

[0175] 7. Extension to Multi-Flow Solution

[0176] When MG occasions occur, they interrupt all the data flows simultaneously.

[0177] Therefore, in the case of a multi-modal traffic flow (see definition in Section 2.2.3), in embodiments, each flow can be treated as an independent flow. In that case, this means that the solutions presented in Sections 1 and 2 (which assume only a single-mode traffic flow) can be applied without loss of generality to each of the multi-modal traffic flow:

[0178] The assistance information (which was described in Section 4) needs to be provided for each flow separately, either by the CN (for DL data traffic) or by the UE (for UL data traffic).

[0179] The prioritization of the traffic over MG occasions (described in Section 2) should be performed individually for each flow of the multi-modal traffic flow based on the corresponding assistance information.

[0180] Each flow having a distinct C-DRX, the solution proposed in Section 6 for a singlemode traffic flow needs to be adapted accordingly. In particular, the condition for sending dynamic signaling of MG (de)activation should be updated as follows:

[0181] “[...] the RAN can avoid sending any dynamic signaling of MG (de)activation when the UE is in a C-DRX non-active period in each flow of the multi-modal traffic flow simultaneously.”

[0182] The solution in Section 3 for the partial cancellation of a MG occasion was proposed for a single-mode traffic flow. It also applies to multi-modal traffic flow as follows:

[0183] “[...] the UE can consider that the MG occasion is available for measurements if, in each flow of the multi-modal traffic flow:

[0184] • No new data is received during a certain amount of time,

[0185] • The remaining MG duration is larger than the smallest configurable MG duration (i.e. , 5 ms).”

[0186] 8. Conditions for Cancelling Measurement Gaps

[0187] How many and which MG occasions can be cancelled are questions that depend on the UE state. This includes, e.g., the UE mobility information (speed, location in the serving cell, etc.), the serving cell quality, the traffic information (BSR, DSR, etc.) For that purpose, in embodiments, two different modes of operations can be considered: A large proportion of MG occasions can be cancelled. This will typically occur when the UE is static and near the center of its serving cell, such that higher capacity and lower latency data traffic can be achieved without compromising some important decisions to be made by the RAN.

[0188] Little to no MG occasions can be cancelled. This will typically occur when the UE is located at the edge of its serving cell and / or is moving with high velocity. In that case, the decision to cancel MG occasions may result in, e.g., the non-detection of RLF events between the UE and the serving cell, hence harming the RAN performance.

[0189] 9, Measurement Gap Prediction

[0190] In embodiments, it is possible to replace measurements on some MG occasions by instead predicting the corresponding measured quantities. This allows to further increase the number of MGs which can be deactivated while minimizing the impact on the performance requirements.

[0191] On the other hand, it is also possible to predict the channel conditions over upcoming MG occasions. The upcoming MG occasions over which the predicted channel conditions are good can therefore be first identified, then deactivated. They can instead be used instead for data traffic transmission. In that case, the prediction can be performed based on the history of previous measurements using different types of approach, including (but not necessarily limited to), e.g., extrapolation, AI / ML, etc. It may also take into account the UE mobility (e.g., UE location, speed, etc.) The prediction can either be performed on the network side or on the UE side.

[0192] The prediction model configuration can have the following embodiments:

[0193] • For a UE-sided model, the UE can report the predicted measurements to the network, for example, as part of the UE assistance information or in an UL MAC-CE. To keep the signaling overhead reduced or even minimal, the measurement prediction should not be reported too frequently. For example, the UE can report the measurement prediction only in certain conditions, e.g., when the channel conditions predicted over future MG occasions change significantly. For example, this may typically happen when the UE is approaching a cell edge and the channel conditions are expected to deteriorate compared to a location nearer the cell center where channel conditions are expected to remain good. Therefore, the network can provide a configuration (e.g., by RRC) to the UE for the control of the report of the predicted measurement quantities. • For a network-sided model, the UE or neighboring network nodes (base stations) can report the measurements and assistance information (if any) to the network as model input, where the network-sided model then uses for its prediction.

[0194] Note that the prediction can be performed for each type of MG occasion (as defined in the introductory portion in section “Different Types of Measurement Gaps”) separately, assuming that the corresponding prediction model exists.

[0195] 10. Further embodiments

[0196] Embodiments described herein can be applied for high-speed, low-latency and / or high- reliability wireless connectivity. For example, one expected application is to enable immersive AR / VR / XR multimedia and cloud computing services. These applications may have strict system requirements, i.e. , high data rate, low latency, or low power devices (e.g., AR glasses, VR head-mounted displays)

[0197] In embodiments, measurement gaps (MGs) are durations of time during which a UE suspends data traffic with the serving cell to perform radio resource management (RRM) measurements. MGs are primarily used by the network for mobility-related procedures, e.g., inter-frequency handover (i.e., FR1 / FR2), inter-RAT handover, beam management or the addition of new cells.

[0198] Embodiments allow counteracting QoS degradation (in terms of higher latency and reduction of the data throughput).

[0199] Embodiments enable data transmission during MG occasions to improve the performance of data traffic, such as, latency sensitive traffic. In embodiments, a trade-off can be considered not to harm the fundamental functionalities that MGs are primarily intended for one or more out of

[0200] Network-controlled solution

[0201] Dynamic (de)activation of the MGs

[0202] Interactions with DRX

[0203] Prioritization rules of the data traffic over MGs

[0204] Specification of the assistance information required from the UE

[0205] General design considerations (timeline, signals / channels allowed to transmit over MGs, etc.). Embodiments improve performance for data traffic, e.g., in terms of latency reduction and increase of data throughput compared to the case when transmission can cannot be performed over MGs.

[0206] Embodiments provide more flexibility, such as, to allow skipping MG occasions if they are not necessary (e.g., when the UE is located near the center of the serving cell, has low mobility, experiences high SNR, etc.).

[0207] In embodiments, MGs are still needed for the good operation of the network, i.e., the fundamental functionalities that MGs are primarily intended for must not be harmed.

[0208] Various elements and features of the present invention may be implemented in hardware using analog and / or digital circuits, in software, through the execution of instructions by one or more general purpose or special-purpose processors, or as a combination of hardware and software. For example, embodiments of the present invention may be implemented in the environment of a computer system or another processing system. Fig. 9 illustrates an example of a computer system 500. The units or modules as well as the steps of the methods performed by these units may execute on one or more computer systems 500. The computer system 500 includes one or more processors 502, like a special purpose or a general-purpose digital signal processor. The processor 502 is connected to a communication infrastructure 504, like a bus or a network. The computer system 500 includes a main memory 506, e.g., a random-access memory (RAM), and a secondary memory 508, e.g., a hard disk drive and / or a removable storage drive. The secondary memory 508 may allow computer programs or other instructions to be loaded into the computer system 500. The computer system 500 may further include a communications interface 510 to allow software and data to be transferred between computer system 500 and external devices. The communication may be in the from electronic, electromagnetic, optical, or other signals capable of being handled by a communications interface. The communication may use a wire or a cable, fiber optics, a phone line, a cellular phone link, an RF link and other communications channels 512.

[0209] The terms “computer program medium” and “computer readable medium” are used to generally refer to tangible storage media such as removable storage units or a hard disk installed in a hard disk drive. These computer program products are means for providing software to the computer system 500. The computer programs, also referred to as computer control logic, are stored in main memory 506 and / or secondary memory 508. Computer programs may also be received via the communications interface 510. The computer program, when executed, enables the computer system 500 to implement the present invention. In particular, the computer program, when executed, enables processor 502 to implement the processes of the present invention, such as any of the methods described herein. Accordingly, such a computer program may represent a controller of the computer system 500. Where the disclosure is implemented using software, the software may be stored in a computer program product and loaded into computer system 500 using a removable storage drive, an interface, like communications interface 510.

[0210] The implementation in hardware or in software may be performed using a digital storage medium, for example cloud storage, a floppy disk, a DVD, a Blue-Ray, a CD, a ROM, a PROM, an EPROM, an EEPROM or a FLASH memory, having electronically readable control signals stored thereon, which cooperate (or are capable of cooperating) with a programmable computer system such that the respective method is performed. Therefore, the digital storage medium may be computer readable.

[0211] Some embodiments according to the invention comprise a data carrier having electronically readable control signals, which are capable of cooperating with a programmable computer system, such that one of the methods described herein is performed.

[0212] Generally, embodiments of the present invention may be implemented as a computer program product with a program code, the program code being operative for performing one of the methods when the computer program product runs on a computer. The program code may for example be stored on a machine-readable carrier.

[0213] Other embodiments comprise the computer program for performing one of the methods described herein, stored on a machine-readable carrier. In other words, an embodiment of the inventive method is, therefore, a computer program having a program code for performing one of the methods described herein, when the computer program runs on a computer.

[0214] A further embodiment of the inventive methods is, therefore, a data carrier (or a digital storage medium, or a computer-readable medium) comprising, recorded thereon, the computer program for performing one of the methods described herein. A further embodiment of the inventive method is, therefore, a data stream or a sequence of signals representing the computer program for performing one of the methods described herein. The data stream or the sequence of signals may for example be configured to be transferred via a data communication connection, for example via the Internet. A further embodiment comprises a processing means, for example a computer, or a programmable logic device, configured to or adapted to perform one of the methods described herein. A further embodiment comprises a computer having installed thereon the computer program for performing one of the methods described herein.

[0215] In some embodiments, a programmable logic device (for example a field programmable gate array) may be used to perform some or all of the functionalities of the methods described herein. In some embodiments, a field programmable gate array may cooperate with a microprocessor in order to perform one of the methods described herein. Generally, the methods are preferably performed by any hardware apparatus. The above described embodiments are merely illustrative for the principles of the present invention. It is understood that modifications and variations of the arrangements and the details described herein are apparent to others skilled in the art. It is the intent, therefore, to be limited only by the scope of the impending patent claims and not by the specific details presented by way of description and explanation of the embodiments herein.

[0216] List of References

[0217] [1] 3GPP TS 38 133 v18.4.0, “5G; NR; Requirements for support of radio resource management,” Dec. 2023.

[0218] [2] 3GPP TS 38.331 v18.0.0, “5G; NR; Radio resource control (RRC); Protocol specification,” Dec. 2023.

[0219] [3] R1-2210002, Qualcomm

[0220] [4] 3GPP TS 22 261 v19.5.0, “Service requirements for the 5G system,” Dec. 2023.

[0221] [5] 3GPP TR 38 835 v18.0.1 , “Study on XR enhancements for NR,” Apr. 2023.

[0222] [6] 3GPP TR 38 838 v17.0.0, “Study on XR (Extended Reality) evaluations for NR,” Dec.

[0223] 2021.

[0224] Abbreviations

[0225] 3GPP Third Generation Partnership Project

[0226] Al Artificial Intelligence

[0227] ACK Acknowledgement

[0228] AR Augmented Reality

[0229] BS Base Station

[0230] BSR Buffer Status Report

[0231] C-DRX Connected-mode Discontinuous Reception

[0232] CN Core Network

[0233] CQI Channel Quality Information

[0234] CSI Channel State Information

[0235] CSI-RS Channel State Information - Reference Signal

[0236] D2D Device- to- Device

[0237] DCI Downlink Control Information

[0238] DL Downlink

[0239] DRX Discontinuous Reception

[0240] DSR Delay Status Report eNB evolved node B

[0241] FR Frequency Range

[0242] FR1 Frequency Range one

[0243] FR2 Frequency Range two gNB next generation node B

[0244] HARQ Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request

[0245] ID identity

[0246] IFFT inverse fast Fourier transform loT Internet of Things KPI Key Performance Indicator LTE Long-Term Evolution

[0247] MAC Medium Access Control

[0248] MAC-CE Medium Access Control - Control Element

[0249] MG Measurement Gap

[0250] MIB Master Information Block

[0251] ML Machine Learning

[0252] MUSIM Multi-Universal Subscriber Identity Module NCSG Network Controlled Small Gaps

[0253] NR New Radio

[0254] OFDM Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiplexing

[0255] OFDMA Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access

[0256] PBCH Physical Broadcast Channel

[0257] PC5 interface using the sidelink channel for D2D communication

[0258] PDB Packet Delay Budget

[0259] PDCCH Physical Downlink Control Channel

[0260] PDCP Packet Data Convergence Protocol

[0261] PDSCH Physical Downlink Shared Channel

[0262] PDU Packet Data Unit

[0263] PRACH Physical Random Access Channel

[0264] PRS Positioning Reference Signal

[0265] PSI PDU Set Importance

[0266] PSSCH Physical Sidelink Shared Channel

[0267] PUCCH Physical Uplink Control Channel

[0268] PUSCH Physical Uplink Shared Channel

[0269] QoE Quality of Experience

[0270] QoS Quality of Service

[0271] RACH Random Access Channel

[0272] RAN Radio Access network

[0273] RAT Radio Access Technology

[0274] RE Resource Element

[0275] RF Radio Frequency

[0276] RLF Radio Link Failure

[0277] RRC Radio Resource Control

[0278] RRM Radio Resource Management

[0279] RSRP Reference Signal Received Power

[0280] RSRQ Reference Signal Received Quality

[0281] RX Receive

[0282] SCI Sidelink Control Information

[0283] SI System Information

[0284] SIB System Information Block

[0285] SI NR Signal to Interference plus Noise Ratio

[0286] SMTC SSB Measurement Timing Configuration

[0287] SL Sidelink

[0288] SR Scheduling Request SRS Sounding Reference Signal

[0289] SSB Synchronization Signal Block sTTI short Transmission Time Interval

[0290] TDD Time Division Duplex TX Transmit

[0291] UCI Uplink Control Information

[0292] UE User Equipment, e.g., a smartphone or loT node

[0293] UL Uplink

[0294] UMTS Universal Mobile Telecommunication System UTO-UCI Unused Transmission Occasion(s) indicated by UCI

[0295] V2X Vehicle-to-Everything

[0296] V2V Vehicle-to-Vehicle

[0297] VR Virtual Reality

[0298] XR Extended Reality

Claims

Claims1. Transceiver (202i) for a wireless communication network, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit and / or receive data on a serving cell, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit and / or receive the data during at least a part of at least one scheduled measurement gap of a plurality of scheduled measurement gaps in response to a reception of a control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap, or detecting that the data comprises a priority higher than or equal to a threshold or higher than or equal to the at least one scheduled measurement gap.

2. Transceiver (202i) according to claim 1 , wherein during other scheduled measurement gaps of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps the transmission and / or reception of data on the serving cell is interrupted or suspended.

3. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 1 to 2, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to perform during other scheduled measurement gaps of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps measurements.

4. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 1 to 3, wherein the plurality of measurement gaps is part of a measurement gap configuration.

5. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 1 to 4, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured, in case that no control information is received that indicates to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap and / or in case that the priority of the data is lower than the threshold or lower thana priority of the measurement gap, to perform measurements in the at least one scheduled measurement gap.

6. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 1 to 5, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit and / or receive the data during the at least one scheduled measurement gap of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps in response to the reception of the control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap, wherein the control information is one out of a medium access control control element, MAC-CE, a bitmask indicating the at least one scheduled measurement gaps to be deactivated.

7. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 1 to 5, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit and / or receive the data during the at least one scheduled measurement gap of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps in response to the reception of the control information indicating to skip or deactivate or reactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap, wherein the control information is a dynamic signaling.

8. Transceiver (202i) according to claim 7, wherein the dynamic signaling is performed via a medium access control control element, MAC-CE, or a downlink control information, DCI.

9. Transceiver (202i) according to claim 8, wherein the medium access control control element, MAC-CE, or the downlink control information, DCI, indicates to skip the at least one scheduled measurement gap implicitly by means of a scheduling information, explicitly by means of a new separate field in the MAC-CE or the DCI.

10. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 7 to 9,wherein the at least one scheduled measurement gap to be skipped or deactivated is an upcoming measurement gap, a set of upcoming measurement gaps, all upcoming measurement gaps of the plurality of measurement gaps.

11. T ransceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 1 to 5, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit and / or receive the data during the at least one scheduled measurement gap of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps in response to detecting that the data comprises a priority, e.g., higher than or equal to the threshold or higher than or equal to the priority of the at least one scheduled measurement gap, wherein the priority is, a PDU session identity, PSI.

12. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the preceding claims 1 to 11 , wherein in case that the transceiver (202i) finalizes a transmission and / or reception of data during a first part of a scheduled measurement gap, the transceiver (202i) is configured to utilize a remaining part of the scheduled measurement gap to perform measurements.

13. Transceiver (202i) according to claim 12, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to detect that the reception of data is finalized in case that no data is received during a predefined time span.

14. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 12 to 13, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to utilize the remaining part of the scheduled measurement gap only in case that the remaining part of the measurement gap is equal to or larger than a smallest configurable measurement gap.

15. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 12 to 14,wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to utilize the remaining part of the measurement gap in response to a reception of at least one reconfiguration information reconfiguring the measurement gap, or wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to receive a second reconfiguration information indicating to restore the previous measurement gap configuration, or wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to utilize the remaining part of the measurement gap in response to a reception of one reconfiguration information reconfiguring the measurement gap, or wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to utilize the remaining part of the measurement gap in response to a reception of at least one reconfiguration information reconfiguring the measurement gap.

16. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the preceding claims 1 to 15, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit an assistance information to a central transceiver (200) that is serving the cell, wherein the assistance information describes at least one out of radio resource measurement results obtained in at least one preceding measurement gap, channel state information, CSI, information describing an uplink traffic, and / or wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit an assistance information, wherein the assistance information describes one out of a minimum DCI processing time, a MAC-CE capability time.

17. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the preceding claims 1 to 16, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to receive the control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap at least a predefined timespan before the at least one scheduled measurement gap,wherein the predefined time span is equal to or greater than a processing time required for processing the control information.

18. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the preceding claims 1 to 17, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to receive the data using a discontinuous reception, DRX, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit an assistance information to a central transceiver (200) that is serving the cell, wherein the assistance information describes at least one parameter of a configuration of the discontinuous reception, DRX.

19. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the preceding claims 1 to 18, wherein the transmission and / or reception of data is a multi-modal data flow.

20. Transceiver (202i) according to claim 19, wherein the detecting that the data comprises a priority higher than or equal to a threshold or higher than or equal to the at least one scheduled measurement gap is performed for each flow of the multi-modal data flow.21 . T ransceiver (202i) according to claim 19 or 20, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured for each flow of the multi-modal data flow, in case that the transceiver (202i) finalizes a reception of a respective data flow during a first part of a scheduled measurement gap, to utilize the remaining part of the scheduled measurement gap not used by all data flows to perform measurements in case that the remaining part of the measurement gap not used by all data flows is equal to or larger than a smallest configurable measurement gap.

22. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 19 to 21 , wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit an assistance information to a central transceiver that is serving the cell,wherein the assistance information describes at least one out of radio resource measurement results obtained in at least one preceding measurement gap, channel state information, CSI, information describing an uplink traffic, for each flow of the multi-modal data flow.

23. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 19 to 22, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to receive the multi-modal data flow using at least one discontinuous reception, DRX, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to transmit an assistance information to a central transceiver (200) that is serving the cell, wherein the assistance information describes at least one parameter of each of the at least one discontinuous reception, DRX.

24. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the preceding claims 1 to 23, wherein a number of scheduled measurement gaps that are used for transmitting and / or receiving data depends on a state of the transceiver (202i).

25. Transceiver (202i) according to claim 24, wherein the state of the transceiver (202i) is a distance to a central transceiver (200) that is serving the cell and / or a velocity of the transceiver (202i), and / or the serving cell quality, and / or the traffic information (BSR, DSR, etc.).

26. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 1 to 25, wherein the data is at least one out of high-speed data, low-latency data and high- reliability data,and / or wherein the data is, but is not limited to, immersive virtual reality, VR, data, augmented reality, AR, data, extended reality, XR, multimedia data or cloud computing data.

27. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claim 1 to 25, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to predict at least one measurement value of at least one measurement gap, to obtain at least one predicted measurement value, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to report the at least one predicted measurement value to a base station of the wireless communication network, or wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to predict at least one measurement value of the at least one measurement gap that is deactivated or skipped according to the received control information.

28. Transceiver (202i) according to claim 27, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to predict the at least one measurement value based on one or more previous measurement values.

29. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 27 to 28, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to report the at least one predicted measurement value via an assistance information or a medium access control control element, MAC-CE.

30. Transceiver (202i) according to one of the claims 27 to 29, wherein the transceiver (202i) is configured to report the at least one predicted measurement value in response to a fulfillment of a defined condition.

31. T ransceiver (202i) according to claim 30, wherein the defined condition is fulfilled in case that a change of the at least one measurement value crosses a defined threshold.

32. Base station (200) for a wireless communication network,wherein the base station (200) is configured to serve a cell of the wireless communication network, wherein the base station (200) is configured to transmit a control information to a transceiver (202i) of the wireless communication network, the control information signaling to skip or deactivate at least one scheduled measurement gap of a plurality of scheduled measurement gaps.

33. Base station (200) according to claim 32, wherein the base station is configured to transmit data to the transceiver (202i) or receive data from the transceiver during the at least one scheduled measurement gap.

34. Base station (200) according to one of the claims 32 to 33, wherein the base station (200) is configured to determine a configuration of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps, wherein the base station (200) is configured to transmit a control information to the transceiver (202i), the control information describing the configuration of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps.

35. Base station (200) according to one of the claims 32 to 34, wherein the base station (200) is configured to select the one scheduled measurement gap out of the plurality of measurement gaps in dependence on radio resource conditions and / or requirements of one or more transceivers of the cell.

36. Base station (200) according to one of the claims 32 to 35, wherein the control information is one out of a medium access control control element, MAC-CE, a bitmask indicating the at least one scheduled measurement gaps to be deactivated.

37. Base station (200) according to one of the claims 32 to 35,wherein the control information is a dynamic signaling.

38. Base station (200) according to claim 37, wherein the base station (200) is configured to perform the dynamic signaling using a medium access control control element, MAC-CE, or a downlink control information, DCI.

39. Base station (200) according to claim 38, wherein the medium access control control element, MAC-CE, or the downlink control information, DCI, indicates to skip the at least one scheduled measurement gap implicitly by means of a scheduling information, explicitly by means of a new separate field in the MAC-CE or the DCI.

40. Base station (200) according to one of the preceding claims 32 to 39, wherein the at least one scheduled measurement gap to be skipped or deactivated is an upcoming measurement gap, a set of upcoming measurement gaps, all upcoming measurement gaps of the plurality of measurement gaps.

41. Base station (200) according to one of the preceding claims 32 to 40, wherein the base station (200) is configured to receive an assistance information from the transceiver (202i), wherein the assistance information describes at least one out of radio resource measurement results obtained in at least one preceding measurement gap, channel state information, CSI, information describing an uplink traffic, wherein the base station (200) is configured to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap and / or a number of the at least one scheduled measurement gaps based on the assistance information.

42. Base station (200) according to one of the preceding claims 32 to 41 , wherein the base station is configured to receive application measurement reports for specific service types and to prioritize downlink and / or uplink data traffic.

43. Base station (200) according to one of the preceding claims 32 to 42, wherein the base station (200) is configured to receive downlink assistance information, the downlink assistance information describing downlink data traffic made available.

44. Base station (200) according to one of the preceding claims 32 to 43, wherein the base station (200) is configured to transmit the control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one scheduled measurement gap at least a predefined timespan before the at least one scheduled measurement gap, wherein the predefined time span is equal to or greater than a processing time required for processing the control information.

45. Base station (200) according to one of the preceding claims 32 to 44, wherein the base station (200) is configured to receive an assistance information from the transceiver (202i), the assistance information describing at least one parameter of a configuration of a discontinuous reception, DRX, used by the transceiver (202i), wherein the base station (200) is configured to transmit the control information based on the assistance information and / or to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap based on the assistance information.

46. Base station (200) according to one of the preceding claims 32 to 45, wherein the transmission and / or reception of data is a multi-modal data flow.

47. Base station (200) according to one of the preceding claims 32 to 46,wherein the base station (200) is configured to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap or a number of the at least one scheduled measurement gap based on a state of the transceiver (202i).

48. Base station (200) according to claim 47, wherein the state of the transceiver (202i) is a distance to a central transceiver that is serving the cell and / or a velocity of the transceiver (202i).

49. Base station (200) according to one of the claims 32 to 47, wherein the base station (200) is configured to receive a report of at least one predicted measurement value of one or more scheduled measurement gaps of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps, wherein the base station (200) is configured to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap out of the plurality of measurement gaps to be skipped or deactivated in dependence on the at least one predicted measurement value.

50. Base station (200) according to one of the claims 32 to 47, wherein the base station (200) is configured to receive a report of at least one measurement value of one or more previous measurement gaps, wherein the base station (200) is configured to predict at least one measurement value of at least one scheduled measurement gap of the plurality of scheduled measurement gaps, in order to obtain at least one predicted measurement value, wherein the base station (200) is configured to select the at least one scheduled measurement gap out of the plurality of measurement gaps to be skipped or deactivated in dependence on the at least one predicted measurement value.

51. Base station (200) according to one of the claims 49 to 50, wherein the base station (200) is configured to receive the report from a transceiver (202i) of the wireless communication network or from another base station of the wireless communication network.

52. Base station (200) according to one of the claims 49 to 50, wherein the base station (200) is configured to receive the report via an assistance information or via a medium access control control element.

53. Method for operating a transceiver for a wireless communication network, the method comprising: performing a data transmission and / or reception on a serving cell, wherein the data transmission and / or reception is performed during at least a part of at least one measurement gap of a plurality of measurement gaps in response to a reception of a control information indicating to skip or deactivate the at least one measurement gap, or detecting that the data comprises a priority higher than or equal to a threshold or higher than or equal to the at least one measurement gap.

54. Method for operating a base station for a wireless communication network, the method comprising: serving a cell of the wireless communication network, transmitting a control information to a transceiver of the wireless communication network, the control information signaling to skip or deactivate at least one scheduled measurement gap of a plurality of scheduled measurement gaps.

55. Computer program for performing a method according to claim 53 or 54, when the computer program runs on a computer, microprocessor or software defined radio.

Images