Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 08/20/2025. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Response to Amendment
Applicant’s amendment filed on 11/07/2025 has been entered. Independent claims 1, 5, and 9 have been amended. No claims have been canceled in this amendment. No new claim has been added in this amendment. Claims 1, 3-5, 7-9, 11, and 12 are still pending in this application, with claims 1, 5, and 9 being independent.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 11/07/2025 on pages 5 to 12, with respect to the rejection of Claims 1, 5, and 9 under 35 USC § 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection of Claims 1, 5, and 9 has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Oh in view of Oizumi, further in view of Yuan.
Applicant’s arguments filed on 11/07/2025 on pages 10-11 of applicant’s remark regarding Claims 1, 5, and 9. The applicant argues that Oizumi fails to teach slots acting as a slot group. However, the wording for the claim is “one or more slots” not “one or more slot groups”, which can be interpreted as bits in a message, this interpretation is further justified by the element later in the claim “the number of slots in the slot group”, which suggests that slots and slot groups are different. Thus, the applicant here fails to patentably distinguish the claimed invention of teaching slots acting as a slot group from the teachings of Oizumi. The applicant’s arguments have been fully considered, but are not persuasive.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claim(s) 1, 3-5, 7-9, 11, and 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor, or for pre-AIA the applicant regards as the invention. The claims are not clearly written to define metes and bounds of the claimed invention.
Regarding Claim 1, Claim 5, and Claim 9
The claims recite “start at the same time location relative to a beginning”. The claim is not clear as to what a time location is, as it is not a term of art. Location is different from time. For the purposes of examining, Examiner has assumed that the start time is consistent between the two transmissions.
Claims 3-4, 7-8, and 11-12 are rejected are rejected based upon claim dependency to claims 1, 5, and 9.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim(s) 1, 3-5, 7-9, 11, and 12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Oh (Pub. No.: US 20210168770 A1, hereafter “Oh”) in view of Oizumi (Pub. No.: US 20130114563 A1, hereafter “Oizumi”) further in view of Yuan (Pub. No.: US 20230403715 A1, hereafter “Yuan”).
Regarding Claim 1, Claim 5, and Claim 9
Oh teaches a Method and Apparatus Comprising
A method of wireless communication of a user equipment (UE) (Oh ¶0180: UE), comprising: receiving a first indication (Oh ¶0180: PDCCH regions) of a number of slots (Oh ¶0180: two slots) that form a period of a downlink control channel monitoring pattern (Oh ¶0180: DCI; Oh teaches a UE receiving a PDCCH that includes multiple slots in a DCI); receiving a second indication of a number of slots (Oh ¶0180: how many slots) in a slot group (Oh ¶0180: slots in the DCI; Oh teaches the UE receiving configuration information about the number of slots in the DCI); receiving a configuration (Oh ¶0181: UE obtains information) associated with a duration (Oh ¶0181: SFI information, e.g. slot formation information) indicating two or more slot groups (Oh ¶0181: slot n and slot n+1, e.g. Fig. 9A 900, 901, 902, …) in which downlink control channels (Oh ¶0180: UE may detect the DCI) are to be monitored (Oh ¶0180: UE is requested to detect) by the UE, wherein the duration is in each period (Oh ¶0180: UE is requested to detect SFI information from PDCCH regions; Oh teaches the UE receiving slot information for multiple slots for the UE to detect in each region);
Oh does not explicitly teach
receiving a third indication indicating one or more slots, in which search spaces are located for detecting the downlink control channels, the one or more slots being less than or equal to the number of slots in the slot group;
However, Oizumi teaches
receiving a third indication (Oizumi ¶0209: coding rates) indicating one or more slots (Oizumi ¶0209: slot 0 and slot 1), in which search spaces (Oizumi ¶0209: search space configuration) are located for detecting the downlink control channels (Oizumi ¶0209: DCI), the one or more slots (Oizumi ¶0209: slot 0 and slot 1) being less than or equal to (Oizumi ¶0209: slot 0 is less than slot 1) the number of slots in the slot group (Oizumi ¶0209: slots are in RB’s width; Oizumi teaches a received coding rate in an RB with multiple slots, of a differing size, for the purpose of a DCI);
It would have been obvious for one skilled in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Oh by way of Oizumi, to include an element that teaches a received coding rate in an RB with multiple slots, of a differing size, for the purpose of a DCI, as taught by Oizumi in ¶0209, to improve communication between a UE and BS with a search space configuration rule corresponding to a slot to be configured.
Oh in view of Oizumi does not explicitly teach
Searching the search spaces in the one or more slots within each of the two or more slot groups in the duration to detect the downlink control channels, wherein the one or more slots start at the same time location relative to a beginning of each of the two or more slot groups.
However, Yuan teaches
searching (Yuan ¶0049: monitor) the search spaces (Yuan ¶0049: monitor PDCCH in search space) in the one or more slots (Yuan ¶0045-¶0046: slot format) within each of the two or more slot groups (Yuan ¶0045-¶0046: number of slots depends on slot configuration and numerology) in the duration (Yuan ¶0083: corresponding timing condition) to detect the downlink control channels (Yuan ¶0049: DCI), wherein the one or more slots start at the same time location relative to a beginning of each of the two or more slot groups (Yuan ¶0081-¶0082: second PUCCH start at the same slot; Yuan teaches monitoring the PDCCH in a search space with multiple slots for a DCI, and multiple PUCCH occurring at the same time).
It would have been obvious for one skilled in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Oh in view of Oizumi by way of Yuan, to include an element that teaches monitoring the PDCCH in a search space with multiple slots for a DCI, and multiple PUCCH occurring at the same time, as taught by Yuan in ¶0045-¶0049 and ¶0081-¶0082, to better enable 5G communications with improved latency, reliability, security, and scalability by enabling multiplexing with MIMO.
Claim 5 differs by the following limitation, which is also taught by the prior art,
A method of wireless communication of a base station (Oh Fig. 1: 110; Oh teaches a Base Station),
Claim 9 differs by the following limitation, which is also taught by the prior art,
the apparatus being a user equipment (UE) (Oh Fig. 1: 120), comprising: a memory (Oh Fig. 2: 230); and at least one processor coupled to the memory (Oh Fig. 2: 240; Oh teaches a UE with memory coupled to a processor)
Regarding Claim 3, Claim 7, and Claim 11
Oh in view of Oizumi, and further in view of Yuan teaches the method and apparatus as explained above in Claim 1. Oizumi further discloses
an indication (Oizumi ¶0181: PDCCH) specifying a number of consecutive slots (Oizumi ¶0181: CCE aggregation level, e.g. a Consecutive Control Element), and an indication specifying the beginning of the duration (Oizumi ¶0181: CCE aggregation level index) within a period (Oizumi ¶0181: PDCCH region) and the beginning of the number of consecutive slots (Oizumi ¶0181: Slot 0 and Slot 1) in each slot group in the duration within a period (Oizumi ¶0181: PDCCH region; Oizumi teaches a CCE with an indication of an index, and consecutive slots in a period).
It would have been obvious for one skilled in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Oh by way of Oizumi, and further in view of Yuan, to include an element that teaches a CCE with an indication of an index, and consecutive slots in a period, as taught by Oizumi in ¶0181, to improve communication between a UE and BS with a search space configuration rule corresponding to a slot to be configured.
Regarding Claim 4, Claim 8, and Claim 12
Oh in view of Oizumi, and further in view of Yuan teaches the method and apparatus as explained above in Claim 1. Oh further discloses
receiving an indication (Oh ¶0178: UE may receive) indicating one or more symbols (Oh ¶0178: SFI information), in the one or more slots (Oh ¶0178: search space configuration), in which the search spaces are located (Oh ¶0178: search space period; Oh teaches the UE receiving information including a search space configuration, which contains the search space period).
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JUSTIN MICHAEL WHITAKER whose telephone number is (703)756-4763. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Thursday 7:30am - 4:00pm.
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/JUSTIN MICHAEL WHITAKER/Examiner, Art Unit 2415
/Sudesh M. Patidar/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415