Highly Overlapping Beam Layouts for Wireless Beam-Edge RSRP
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional non-terrestrial communication systems face issues with inefficient resource utilization due to inter-beam interference and varying reference-signal received power (RSRP), particularly at cell/beam-edges, leading to low availability and throughput.
Innovation Solution
Implement a highly overlapping beam-layout with multiple beam layers, allowing UEs to select synchronization signals (SSBs) based on RSRP for initial-access, and use position information to facilitate focused data transmission with reduced interference.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of manufacture
If a regular beam-layout pattern is used for both reference signal and data transmission, then the system structure is simple and easy to implement, but the RSRP varies significantly across beam coverage resulting in low availability and throughput at cell/beam-edge regions
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the beam transmission into two distinct parts: reference signal transmission using a regular beam-layout pattern, and data transmission using a highly overlapping beam-layout pattern. This segmentation allows each part to be optimized independently - the reference signal uses simple regular patterns for ease of implementation, while the data transmission uses overlapping patterns to ensure high RSRP and availability at beam edges.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies different beam-layout qualities to different transmission purposes. For reference signals, a regular uniform pattern is used which is sufficient for coverage indication. For data transmission, a highly overlapping pattern is used locally at beam-edge regions to ensure high RSRP and reliability, while beam-center regions can use less overlapping patterns to save resources.
2Reliability
If partial overlaps between adjacent beams are allowed to avoid coverage holes and enhance availability, then the RSRP uniformity is improved, but inter-beam interference occurs resulting in inefficient resource utilization
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements dynamic beam management where the degree of beam overlap and the set of active beams are adjusted based on UE position and traffic demands. The network can dynamically switch between different beam-layout patterns (regular vs. highly overlapping) depending on whether the UE is at beam-center or beam-edge regions, and whether reference signal or data transmission is being performed.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes key parameters of the beam-layout including the overlap factor, beam width, and spacing between adjacent beams. By adjusting these parameters, the system can achieve the desired balance between RSRP uniformity (requiring higher overlap) and inter-beam interference reduction (requiring lower overlap). Different parameter sets are used for different transmission types and UE locations.
3Reliability
If the number of deployed beams is increased to improve capacity and coverage, then the coverage area and availability are enhanced, but the resource consumption (number of antennas, RF chains, processing power) increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies partial overlapping between adjacent beams rather than full overlapping. This means that beams overlap to the extent necessary to eliminate coverage holes and ensure beam-edge availability, but not beyond what is needed. This partial action approach achieves the minimum necessary beam count for reliable coverage without the excessive resource consumption that would result from full overlapping of all beams.
Data Source
AI summary
A communication system, a radio access network (RAN), a user equipment (UE), and/or one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage devices are configured for performing a method leveraging a highly overlapping beam layout for communication between the RAN and UE. The method may include: receiving a plurality of synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) of a plurality of beams of a plurality of different beam layers, each SSB associated with a respective beam, and each beam associated with a respective beam layer; determining reference-signal received powers (RSRPs) of the SSBs; and selecting one or more of the SSBs based on the measured RSRPs for performing an initial-access procedure to a serving cell. Based on the received position information, the RAN may transmit a narrow-width beam towards the UE for performing an initial-access procedure to a serving cell.