DETAILED ACTION
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 .
Claim Status
This office action is in response to the communication(s) filed on 12/23/2025.
Claim(s) 1-30 is/are currently presenting for examination.
Claim(s) 1, 15-16, and 30 is/are independent claim(s).
Claim(s) 1-30 is/are rejected.
This action has been made FINAL.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed on 12/23/2025 have been considered but are moot in view of the new ground(s) of rejection.
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.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claim(s) 1,2, 5-7, 15-17, 20-22, and 30 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US_20230345460_A1_Molavianjazi in view of US_20250039899_A1_Huang.
Regarding claim 1, Molavianjazi discloses a method of wireless communication performed by a user equipment (UE), comprising: receiving, from a network node, a multi-cell downlink control information (MC-DCI) that indicates scheduling information for shared channel communication in co-scheduled component carriers (CCs) (Molavianjazi figure 4, steps 410-430. Also see figures 5-9), wherein the MC-DCI indicates an antenna port(s) field and a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) field to be commonly applied to one or more of the co- scheduled CCs (Molavianjazi paragraph 354, “A DCI field with multi-cell mapping can be, for example, one or more of: MCS, antenna ports (APs), TCI state, SRI, TPMI, FDRA, or TDRA, and so on”, paragraph 389, “…for a UE configured with a set of co-scheduled cells… The UE can receive a configuration of such states to be commonly applied to multiple scheduling parameters or DCI fields”); and transmitting an uplink shared channel communication in each of the co-scheduled CCs based at least in part on the scheduling information indicated by the MC- DCI, or receiving a downlink shared channel communication in each of the co-scheduled CCs based at least in part on the scheduling information indicated by the MC-DCI (Molavianjazi figure 4, step 440).
Huang discloses transmitting an uplink shared channel communication in each of the co-scheduled CCs based at least in part on the scheduling information indicated by the MC- DCI (Huang figure 5, steps 501 and 502, and paragraph 33, “…The first DCI is DCI that supports multi-carrier co-scheduling…”, paragraph 79-80), or receiving a downlink shared channel communication in each of the co-scheduled CCs based at least in part on the scheduling information (Huang figure 5, steps 501 and 502, and paragraph 33, “…The first DCI is DCI that supports multi-carrier co-scheduling…”, paragraph 79-80).
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Huang’s the UE receives PDSCHs or sends PUSCHs on the plurality of CCs based on scheduling of the first DCI in Molavianjazi’s system to enable a UE to increase spectral efficiency, reduce latency, and minimize control channel overhead (Huang paragraphs 3, 78). This method for improving the system of Molavianjazi was within the ordinary ability of one of ordinary skill in the art based on the teachings of Huang. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Molavianjazi and Huang to obtain the invention as specified in claim 1.
Regarding claim 2, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, and Molavianjazi further discloses wherein the co-scheduled CCs are associated with one or more of: a same number of codewords, a same demodulation reference signal type, a same maximum length, and a same number of transmission configuration indication (TCI) states per TCI codepoint (Molavianjazi paragraph 91, “If a UE is configured with enable TwoDefaultTCI-States, and at least one TCI codepoint indicates two TCI states…”), and wherein the antenna port(s) field for the co-scheduled CCs is a common lookup table for the co-scheduled CCs.
Regarding claim 5, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, wherein the MC-DCI indicates one or more of the antenna port(s) field or the MCS field for a first sub-group and a second sub-group (Molavianjazi paragraph 354, “A DCI field with multi-cell mapping can be, for example, one or more of: MCS, antenna ports (APs), TCI state, SRI, TPMI, FDRA, or TDRA, and so on”, paragraph 323, “…the first and second subsets are subsets of the set of co-scheduled cells….”), wherein the first sub-group is associated with a first subset of CCs of the co-scheduled CCs and the second sub-group is associated with a second subset of CCs of the co-scheduled CCs (Molavianjazi paragraph 195, “…a first DCI format in a first PDCCH MO indicates scheduling on a first subset of cells, while a second DCI format in a second PDCCH MO indicates scheduling on a second subset of cells…”).
Regarding claim 6, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, and Molavianjazi further discloses wherein the MC-DCI indicates a common indication field that applies to a subset of co-scheduled CCs, of the co-scheduled CCs, associated with a sub-group (Molavianjazi paragraph 257, “…when the UE is configured with FH for PUSCH transmissions for at least a first cell from a set of co-scheduled cells, and is not configured with FH for PUSCH transmissions for at least a second cell from the set of co-scheduled cells…”), and wherein different bits in the MC-DCI are used for subsets of co-scheduled CCs in different sub-groups (Molavianjazi paragraph 260, “…the DCI format can use 2 bits from the FDRA field for FH indication, wherein the MSB (or LSB) of those 2 bits is used for the FH indication of the first cell, and both of the 2 bits are used for the FH indication of the second cell…”).
Regarding claim 7, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, and Molavianjazi further discloses wherein a subset of co-scheduled CCs, of the co-scheduled CCs, in a sub-group are associated with same radio resource control parameters (Molavianjazi paragraph 278, “In one example, the UE is provided a joint TDRA table across serving cells from a set of co-scheduled cells. Herein, a joint TDRA table can refer to a TDRA table that includes multiple parameter sets…”).
Regarding claim 15, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 1.
Regarding claim 16, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 1, and an apparatus for wireless communication at a user equipment (UE), comprising: a memory; and one or more processors, coupled to the memory (Molavianjazi figure 3).
Regarding claim 17, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 2.
Regarding claim 20, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 5.
Regarding claim 21, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 6.
Regarding claim 22, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 7.
Regarding claim 30, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 1, and an apparatus for wireless communication at a network node, comprising: a memory; and one or more processors, coupled to the memory (Molavianjazi figure 2).
Claim(s) 3, 4, 9, 18, 19, and 24 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US_20230345460_A1_Molavianjazi in view of US_20250039899_A1_Huang and US_20230275683_A1_Ersbo.
Regarding claim 3, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, but do not disclose wherein: an MCS table downlink control information (DCI) radio resource control (RRC) parameter is set to quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) 1024, QAM 256, or QAM 64 low spectral efficiency for the co-scheduled CCs; or the MCS table DCI RRC parameter is not configured for any of the co-scheduled CCs.
Ersbo discloses wherein: an MCS table downlink control information (DCI) radio resource control (RRC) parameter is set to quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) 1024, QAM 256, or QAM 64 low spectral efficiency for the co-scheduled CCs (Ersbo paragraph 101, “An example is shown in TABLE 1, where the MCS of TB2 is determined using the Delta-MCS and MCS indicated for TB1. Thus, for example, if MCS of TB1 is MCS 29 (corresponding to rate 948/1024, 64QAM—quadrature amplitude modulation), and delta MCS is given/indicated by 11, the MCS of TB2 is 29−1=28 (corresponding to rate 910/1024, 64QAM). This is assuming MCS index table 1 for PDSCH”); or the MCS table DCI RRC parameter is not configured for any of the co-scheduled CCs.
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Ersbo’s 64QAM-quadrature amplitude modulation in Molavianjazi and Huang’s system to enable a UE to maximize data throughput within a limited spectrum. This method for improving the system of Molavianjazi and Huang was within the ordinary ability of one of ordinary skill in the art based on the teachings of Ersbo. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Molavianjazi, Huang and Ersbo to obtain the invention as specified in claim 3.
Regarding claim 4, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, but do not disclose wherein an MCS table downlink control information (DCI) radio resource control (RRC) parameter is defined as a per-CC parameter, and a same MCS table DCI RRC parameter is associated with each of the co-scheduled CCs.
Ersbo discloses wherein an MCS table downlink control information (DCI) radio resource control (RRC) parameter is defined as a per-CC parameter, and a same MCS table DCI RRC parameter is associated with each of the co-scheduled CCs (Ersbo paragraph 98, “In some embodiments, the same MCS value is used for both TBs on the same carrier, and a delta-MCS field used to indicate the MCS for both TBs of the other carrier…”).
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Ersbo’s 64QAM-quadrature amplitude modulation in Molavianjazi and Huang’s system to enable a UE to maximize data throughput within a limited spectrum. This method for improving the system of Molavianjazi and Huang was within the ordinary ability of one of ordinary skill in the art based on the teachings of Ersbo. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Molavianjazi, Huang and Ersbo to obtain the invention as specified in claim 4.
Regarding claim 9, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, but do not disclose wherein a sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs is based at least in part on whether the co-scheduled CCs are associated with a same antenna port(s) field or MCS field.
Ersbo discloses wherein a sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs is based at least in part on whether the co-scheduled CCs are associated with a same antenna port(s) field or MCS field (Ersbo abstract , “The network node includes processing circuitry configured to indicate, in downlink control information, DCI, a first modulation and coding scheme, MCS, associated with first transport block, TB, indicate, in the DCI, a second MCS associated with a second TB where the first MCS is indicated by a first MCS field size and the second MCS is indicated by a second MCS field size less than the first MCS field size, and communicate with the wireless device based on the first MCS and the second MCS”, and paragraph 98, “In some embodiments, the same MCS value is used for both TBs on the same carrier, and a delta-MCS field used to indicate the MCS for both TBs of the other carrier…”).
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Ersbo’s 64QAM-quadrature amplitude modulation in Molavianjazi and Huang’s system to enable a UE to maximize data throughput within a limited spectrum. This method for improving the system of Molavianjazi and Huang was within the ordinary ability of one of ordinary skill in the art based on the teachings of Ersbo. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Molavianjazi, Huang and Ersbo to obtain the invention as specified in claim 9.
Regarding claim 18, Molavianjazi, Huang and Ersbo disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 3.
Regarding claim 19, Molavianjazi, Huang and Ersbo disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 4.
Regarding claim 24, Molavianjazi, Huang and Ersbo disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 9.
Claim(s) 8, 10-12, 23, 25-27 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US_20230345460_A1_Molavianjazi in view of US_20250039899_A1_Huang and US_20230309093_A1_Wei.
Regarding claim 8, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, but do not disclose wherein a sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs is based at least in part on dedicated radio resource control (RRC) parameters, and wherein the UE is configured with an association between each of the co-scheduled CCs and each sub-group using the dedicated RRC parameters.
Wei discloses wherein a sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs is based at least in part on dedicated radio resource control (RRC) parameters, and wherein the UE is configured with an association between each of the co-scheduled CCs and each sub-group using the dedicated RRC parameters (Wei paragraph 113, “In some implementations, a subset of entries of the TDRA table of each cell may be pre-configured or pre-defined by the gNB. The subset of entries per serving cell may be pre-configured by the gNB via dedicated downlink RRC signaling”; paragraph 121, “The UE may be configured with multiple TDRA tables for each cell”; paragraph 122, “(I) TDRA (TimeDomainResourceAl/ocation) cell group: the UE may be configured with a TDRA cell group by DL RRC signaling. That is, one or more cells may be indicated by the gNB to be treated as a TDRA group ... For example, if DCI schedules multiple PDSCHs/PUSCHs on Pcell, Scell 1, Scell 2, and Scell 3, and if Scell 1 and Scell2 are configured with TDRA tables, there may be 3 TDRA groups. That is, Scell 3 may be in the same TDRA group (e.g., first TDRA group) as the Pcell, since Scell 3 is not configured with a TDRA table. Scell 1 may be in the second TDRA group, and Scell 2 may be in the third TDRA group.)”).
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Wei’s the subset of entries per serving cell may be pre-configured by the gNB via dedicated downlink RRC signaling in Molavianjazi and Huang’s system to enable a UE to facilitate efficient scheduling of co-scheduled CCs via RRC signaling. This method for improving the system of Molavianjazi and Huang was within the ordinary ability of one of ordinary skill in the art based on the teachings of Wei. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Molavianjazi, Huang and Wei to obtain the invention as specified in claim 8.
Regarding claim 10, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, but do not disclose wherein a sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs is a cell-level sub-grouping, wherein a plurality of bandwidth part configurations for a given cell are associated with a sub-group, and wherein a BWP is switchable on each CC without changing the sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs.
Wei discloses wherein a sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs is a cell-level sub-grouping (Wei paragraph 113, “In some implementations, a subset of entries of the TDRA table of each cell may be pre-configured or pre-defined by the gNB. The subset of entries per serving cell may be pre-configured by the gNB via dedicated downlink RRC signaling”; paragraph 121, “The UE may be configured with multiple TDRA tables for each cell”; paragraph 122, “(I) TDRA (TimeDomainResourceAl/ocation) cell group: the UE may be configured with a TDRA cell group by DL RRC signaling. That is, one or more cells may be indicated by the gNB to be treated as a TDRA group”), wherein a plurality of bandwidth part configurations for a given cell are associated with a sub-group (Wei paragraph 45, “Bandwidth Adaptation (BA) may be achieved by configuring the UE with BWP(s) and informing the UE which of the configured BWPs is currently active. To enable BA on the Pcell, the gNB may configure the UE with UL and DL BWP(s). In the case of CA, to enable BA on Scells, the gNB may configure the UE with at least DL BWP(s) (e.g., there may be none in the UL). For the Pcell, the initial BWP may be the BWP used for initial access. For the Scell(s), the initial BWP may be the BWP configured for the UE to operate first upon Scell activation.), and wherein a BWP is switchable on each CC without changing the sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs (Wei 137, “In NR, a dormant BWP that does not include PDCCH may be configured, such that when the UE switches to a dormant BWP, there may be no power consumption resulting from PDCCH monitoring. When CA is configured, the Scells may be divided into groups, and an Scell dormancy indication field may be used to indicate whether the cells in the S cell groups should be switched to dormant BWPs. The Scell dormancy indication field may also be included in DCI scheduling multiple PDSCHs/PUSCHs on multiple cells”).
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Wei’s configuring a plurality of bandwidth parts for a given cell associated with a sub-group in Molavianjazi and Huang’s system to enable switching between active BWP and dormant BWP for power conservation or as required by channel conditions without changing the sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs. This method for improving the system of Molavianjazi and Huang was within the ordinary ability of one of ordinary skill in the art based on the teachings of Wei. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Molavianjazi, Huang and Wei to obtain the invention as specified in claim 10.
Regarding claim 11, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, but do not disclose wherein a sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs is a bandwidth part (BWP)-level sub-grouping, wherein each BWP configuration for a given cell is associated with a sub-group, and wherein a BWP switching on a certain CC changes the sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs.
Wei discloses wherein a sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs is a bandwidth part (BWP)-level sub-grouping, wherein each BWP configuration for a given cell is associated with a sub-group, and wherein a BWP switching on a certain CC changes the sub-grouping of the co-scheduled CCs (Wei paragraph 45, “Bandwidth Adaptation (BA) may be achieved by configuring the UE with BWP(s) and informing the UE which of the configured BWPs is currently active. To enable BA on the Pcell, the gNB may configure the UE with UL and DL BWP(s). In the case of CA, to enable BA on Scells, the gNB may configure the UE with at least DL BWP(s) (e.g., there may be none in the UL). For the Pcell, the initial BWP may be the BWP used for initial access. For the Scell(s), the initial BWP may be the BWP configured for the UE to operate first upon Scell activation”).
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Wei’s bandwidth Adaptation (BA) may be achieved by configuring the UE with BWP(s) and informing the UE which of the configured BWPs is currently active in Molavianjazi and Huang’s system to achieve bandwidth adaptation and to inform the UE which of the configured BWPs is currently active. This method for improving the system of Molavianjazi and Huang was within the ordinary ability of one of ordinary skill in the art based on the teachings of Wei. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Molavianjazi, Huang and Wei to obtain the invention as specified in claim 11.
Regarding claim 12, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, and Molavianjazi further discloses wherein the MC-DCI is with an MCS cell radio network temporary identifier (MCS-C-RNTI) (Molavianjazi paragraph 138, “In the downlink, the gNB can dynamically allocate resources to UEs via the C-RNTI on PDCCH(s). A UE monitors the PDCCH(s) in order to find possible assignments when its downlink reception is enabled (activity governed by DRX when configured). When CA is configured, the same C-RNTI applies to all serving cells”).
But Molavianjazi and Huang do not disclose wherein: the MC-DCI includes a radio resource control (RRC) parameter that indicates for which sub-groups of co-scheduled CCs an MCS index lookup table is used when the MC-DCI is with an MCS cell radio network temporary identifier (MCS-C-RNTI); or the MC-DCI includes an RRC parameter for each CC of the co-scheduled CCs that indicates for which CCs the MCS index lookup table is used when the MCDCI is with the MCS-C-RNTI.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Wei discloses using RRC parameters for indicting different MCS tables and resource allocation tables for co-scheduled CCs (Wei paragraph 72, “The number of PDSCHs/PUSCHs scheduled by the scheduling DCI may be indicated by the scheduling DCI or preconfigured by the gNB via RRC signaling. For example, the UE may be configured with a group of serving cells specific to the multiple PDSCH/PUSCH scheduling”; paragraph 107, “In NR, a time domain relation between PDCCH and PDSCH may be determined by the UE based on a time domain resource allocation (TDRA) table preconfigured by DL RRC signaling and a time domain resource assignment indicator (field) carried by scheduling DCI which schedules the PDSCH reception”; paragraph 228, “A common list may be used to indicate the common parameter among different resources. For example, the common list may include at least one of value of K.sub.0, K.sub.1, maximum MIMO layers, MCS table, PRB, and the number of repetitions.).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the method of Molavianjazi and Huang as applied to claim 1, based on the above teaching from Wei, to derive "the MC-DCI includes an RRC parameter for each CC of the co-scheduled CCs that indicates for which CCs the MCS index lookup table is used when the MC-DCI is with the MCS-C-RNTI", because this is simply a design implementation choice that can be easily selected by a person of ordinary skill in the art based on the above teachings from Molavianjazi, Huang and Wei. The modification uses prior art elements according to their established functions to produce a predictable result that is equivalent to the claimed limitations. This method of improving was well within the ability of one of ordinary skill in the art, who would have been motivated to perform this modification in order to identify the MCS table for co-scheduled CCs.
Regarding claim 23, Molavianjazi, Huang and Wei disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 8.
Regarding claim 25, Molavianjazi, Huang and Wei disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 10.
Regarding claim 26, Molavianjazi, Huang and Wei disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 11.
Regarding claim 27, Molavianjazi, Huang and Wei disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 12.
Claim(s) 13-14, and 28-29 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US_20230345460_A1_Molavianjazi in view of US_20250039899_A1_Huang, US_20210119723_A1_Golitschek and US_20230413289_A1_Lei.
Regarding claim 13, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, but do not disclose wherein: the antenna port(s) field indicates a value of antenna port(s) for two codewords and a value of an MCS index for CCs of the co-scheduled CCs in which both codewords are not disabled; or the antenna port(s) field indicates a value of antenna port(s) for one codeword for CCs of the co-scheduled CCs in which a codeword is disabled.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Golitschek discloses whether a codeword is indicated as disabled in a subframe for CCs co-scheduled by a DCI by using MCS index (Golitschek paragraph 110, “Moreover, if only a single codeword from an earlier multi codeword transmission needs to be retransmitted, it is advantageous to disable the second codeword in order to reduce inter-codeword interference”; paragraph 117, “the combination of largest MCS index with assigning the predefined or preconfigured smallest allocable unit of PRBs determines that one codeword is disabled in each subframe scheduled by this DCI”).
Furthermore, in the same field of endeavor, Lei discloses wherein the MC-DCI indicates a number of antenna ports for a subset of CCs of the co-scheduled CCs (Lei paragraph 63, “In Table 2, "N" refers to the maximum number of scheduled carriers which can be scheduled by a single DCI format; Table 2 indicates, in the DC!, a number of antenna ports shared among a group of co-scheduled CCs”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the method of Molavianjazi and Huang as applied to claim 1, based on the above teachings from Golitschek and Lei, to derive "wherein: the antenna port(s) field indicates a value of antenna port(s) for one codeword for CCs of the co-scheduled CCs in which a codeword is disabled", because this is simply a design implementation choice that can be easily selected by a person of ordinary skill in the art based on the above teachings from Molavianjazi, Huang, Golitschek, and Lei. The modification uses prior art elements according to their established functions to produce a predictable result that is equivalent to the claimed limitations. This method of improving was well within the ability of one of ordinary skill in the art, who would have been motivated to perform this modification by disabling one out of two codewords in order to reduce inter-codeword interference in the case of co-scheduled CCs.
Regarding claim 14, Molavianjazi and Huang disclose the method of claim 1, but do not disclose wherein an MCS for CCs in which a codeword is disabled and a value of antenna port(s) for CCs in which the codeword is disabled are configured via radio resource control signaling for each value of the antenna port(s) field.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Golitschek discloses wherein an MCS for CCs in which a codeword is disabled is configured via radio resource control signaling for each value of the antenna port(s) field (Golitschek paragraph 110, “Moreover, if only a single codeword from an earlier multi codeword transmission needs to be retransmitted, it is advantageous to disable the second codeword in order to reduce inter-codeword interference”; paragraph 117, “the combination of largest MCS index with assigning the predefined or preconfigured smallest allocable unit of PRBs determines that one codeword is disabled in each subframe scheduled by this DCI”; paragraph 147, “According to a second example, the preceding information for one codeword is configured semi-statically, for instance by radio resource control protocol, RRC ... it would be most efficient to defer the preceding information for one enabled codeword to semi-static RRC signaling, while the preceding information for two enabled codewords is preferably indicated in the DCI and can consequently be adapted relatively fast to changing channel conditions”).
Furthermore, in the same field of endeavor, Lei discloses wherein the MC-DCI indicates a number of antenna ports for a subset of CCs of the co-scheduled CCs via RRC signaling (Lei paragraph 63, “In Table 2, "N" refers to the maximum number of scheduled carriers which can be scheduled by a single DCI format; Table 2 indicates. in the DC/, a number of antenna ports shared among a group of co-scheduled CCs”; paragraph 106, “a BS may notify the UE which DCI field(s) is set as specific or common, for example, via RRC signaling”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the method of Molavianjazi and Huang as applied to claim 1, based on the above teachings from Golitschek and Lei, to derive "wherein an MCS for CCs in which a codeword is disabled and a value of antenna port(s) for CCs in which the codeword is disabled are configured via radio resource control signaling for each value of the antenna port(s) field", because the modification uses prior art elements according to their established functions to produce a predictable result that is equivalent to the claimed limitations. This method of improving was well within the ability of one of ordinary skill in the art, who would have been motivated to perform this modification by semi-statically configuring MCS and antenna ports for a case when a codeword is disabled so that the parameters may be selected more efficiently for co-scheduled CCs.
Regarding claim 28, Molavianjazi and Huang, Golitschek and Lei disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 13.
Regarding claim 29, Molavianjazi and Huang, Golitschek and Lei disclose the limitations as set forth in claim 14.
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.
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/W.H/Examiner, Art Unit 2471
/SUJOY K KUNDU/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2471