Unified Beam Indication to Reduce Multi-Channel Signaling Overhead
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing high-frequency communications systems face significant beam indication signaling overheads due to independent indication of beams for different physical channels or signals, leading to inefficient communication.
Innovation Solution
A unified beam indication method where a terminal device transmits multiple physical channels and signals based on a single beam, reducing the need for separate signaling by using downlink control information (DCI) to indicate the unified beam, allowing the terminal device to determine other beams accordingly.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If the access network device independently performs beam indication on different physical channels or physical signals using separate signaling structures, then each physical channel or signal can have its beam independently configured and optimized, but beam indication signaling overheads become relatively large
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges beam indication for multiple physical channels and physical signals into a unified beam indication mechanism. Instead of independently indicating beams for PDCCH, PDSCH, PUCCH, PUSCH, and other channels separately, the system uses a single beam indication to cover multiple channels, thereby reducing signaling overhead while maintaining necessary beam configuration capabilities
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates a universal beam indication mechanism that can serve multiple physical channels and signals simultaneously. The unified beam indication is designed to be multi-functional, capable of indicating beams for downlink channels, uplink channels, and control channels through a single indication structure, reducing the need for channel-specific beam indications
2Adaptability or versatility
If multiple beam indication signaling structures are used for different physical channels, then each channel can be optimized independently, but the device complexity and signaling processing burden increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines multiple separate beam indication signaling structures into a single unified structure. By merging the indication mechanisms for different physical channels into one unified beam indication, the system reduces device complexity and signaling processing burden while still enabling beam optimization for various channels through the unified mechanism
3Measurement precision
If separate beam indication is performed for each physical channel, then beam alignment can be precisely controlled for each channel, but the time and signaling resources required increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges separate beam indication operations into a unified beam indication process. By combining multiple beam indication operations into a single unified indication, the system reduces the time required for beam indication while maintaining beam alignment precision through the unified mechanism that covers multiple channels simultaneously
Data Source
AI summary
This application discloses a beam indication method and a communications apparatus. The method includes: sending configuration information to a terminal device, wherein the configuration information is used to indicate to determine, based on a unified beam indicator, beams used by the terminal device to transmit a plurality of physical channels and/or physical signals; and sending first information to the terminal device; wherein the first information is used to indicate the unified beam indicator; the unified beam indicator is associated with at least one downlink transmission configuration indicator (TCI) state identifier and at least one uplink TCI state identifier; and the downlink TCI state identifier is used to indicate a receive beam of a downlink physical channel, and the uplink TCI state identifier is used to indicate a transmit beam of an uplink physical channel. It can be learned it is helpful to reduce beam indication signaling overheads.