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 .
Continued Examination
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on January 21, 2026 has been entered.
This Office Action is in response to claim amendment filed on January 08, 2026 and wherein claims 1, 19, 27 and 29 being currently amended, claims 16,26,32 and 34 being newly canceled, and claims 35-38 being newly added.
In virtue of this communication, claims 1-8, 11-15, 17-21, 23-25, 27-30, 33 and 35-38 are currently pending in this Office Action.
The Office appreciates the explanation of the amendment and analyses of the prior arts, and however, although the claims are interpreted in light of the specification, limitations from the specification are not read into the claims. See In re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d 1181, 26 USPQ2d 1057 (Fed. Cir. 1993) and MPEP 2145.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see Remarks, Pages 10-12, filed on January 08, 2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1, 27, 35 under 35 USC §103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Lee.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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 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.
Claims 1-8, 11, 13-15, 17-21,24-25, 27-30, 33, 37-38 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kazmi et al. (US 20170054544 A1, hereinafter Kazmi) and in view of Lee et al. (US 20210344558 A1, hereinafter Lee), and further in view of Luo (CN 104052529 B, hereinafter Luo).
Claim 1: Kazmi teaches a method of wireless communication performed by a node, comprising (Abstract, Fig. 2,3,4):
receiving configuration information that indicates a set of radio resources ([0110], “The network node may by default or explicitly configure the UE with the same or different set of resources for estimating and reporting of CSI-FD and CSI-HD”, [0106], “The configuration may further specify whether CSI-FD and CSI-HD should be estimated in the same or different resources and information about resources”) for self- interference measurement (Fig 3, element S12, [0070], “the base station 14, sends a CSI configuration message to the UE 12. This message may indicate whether the UE shall transmit a report indicative of one of: CSI-FD, E-CSI-FD, and both CSI-FD and E-CSI-FD”) associated with a full-duplex communication mode ([0020], “in the following also being referred to as full duplex channel state information or CSI-FD”, [0021], “CSI-FD is generated to be indicative of an estimated, predicted and/or calculated impact of self-interference, SI, at the receiver of the UE due to the UL transmission of the UE”);
transmitting, in the set of radio resources in accordance with the configuration information (Fig.3, elements s13, s14, , [0073], “In a third step S13, the UE 12 determines the SSIR e.g. based on estimates or measurements of the SINR for FD, SINR.sub.FD, and the SINR for HD, SINR.sub.HD, at a defined UL transmit power, e.g. at maximum UL transmit power” , [0077], “In a fourth step S14, the UE 12 sends a CSI report indicative of the SSIR in accordance with the received CSI configuration message back to the base station 14”, [0032], “CQI-FD providing information about (or specifying a range of) DL SINR assuming a (maximum) UL transmit power causing self-interference in the assigned DL resources”, [0106], “The configuration may further specify whether CSI-FD and CSI-HD should be estimated in the same or different resources and information about resources in case of latter, UL physical channel (e.g. UL data or control channels) for transmitting CSI reports etc”, [0109], “UE shall estimate CSI-FD and CSI-HD over a first set of resources and a second set of resources respectively. The first set of resources and second set of resources may have a certain relation or the resources may be pre-defined”).
However, Kazmi does not explicitly teach the configuration information indicating a beamforming direction parameter, the beamforming direction parameter comprising a transmission precoding matrix indicator value corresponding to a precoding codebook;
wherein the configuration information further indicates a transmission sequence for a signal used to obtain a self-interference measurement.
Lee, from the same or similar field of endeavor, teaches the configuration information indicating a beamforming direction parameter (Fig. 5, [0085], “One CSI-RS port can then correspond to one sub-array which produces a narrow analog beam through analog beamforming by analogy BF 510 … A digital BF 515 performs a linear combination across NCSI-PORT analog beams to further increase precoding gain”, [0146], “For a UE to be configured with different TDD slot/symbol patterns each of which is associated with a configured beam ID, measuring self-interference at the UE … for UE to measure self-interference across different panels with different beams, the UE can be configured to transmit UL RS (e.g., SRS) at a panel(s) with a UL beam(s) and to measure the UL RS (i.e., self-interference) at another panel(s) with a DL beam(s), e.g., at a same time-and-frequency resource, and can also be configured to report the corresponding interference quantity”, wherein beam index is reading as beamforming direction parameter, which associated with corresponding panel(s));
wherein the configuration information further indicates a transmission sequence for a signal used to obtain a self-interference measurement ([0147], “a gNB 102 can configure UE 116 to send UL RS at a panel with a UL beam (i.e., corresponding to a beam ID) and to measure the UL RS (self-interference) at another panel with a DL beam (i.e., corresponding to another beam ID), and configure the UE 116 to report the corresponding self-interference in a subsequent UL transmission. The interval for subsequent UL transmission can be configured or fixed”, [0148], “the gNB 102 can configure UE 116 to periodically send UL RS at a panel with a UL beam (i.e., corresponding to a beam ID) for a time period and to measure the UL RS (self-interference) by sweeping all (or part) of DL beams at the other panels one-by-one, and configure UE 116 to report all or part of the corresponding self-interferences in subsequent UL transmissions”).
Kazmi and Lee are both considered to be analogous to the claimed invention because they are in the same field of wireless communication. Therefore, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the configuration information, disclosed by Kazmi, to add a beamforming direction parameter for self-interference measurement and a transmission sequence, as taught by Lee, for the benefit of allowing UE to measure self-interference across different panels with different beams ([0146]).
Luo, from the same or similar field of endeavor, teaches the beamforming direction parameter comprising a transmission precoding matrix indicator value corresponding to a precoding codebook (page 5, paragraph 4-5, disclose transmission scheme comprising precoding matrix associated with self-interference estimation, and using more specific precoding transmission will suppress self-interference, wherein self-interference is associated with precoding matrix. Page 15, paragraph 4-8, disclose base station transmit downlink information using transmission scheme, wherein the transmission scheme is a precoding matrix WFD);
Kazmi and Luo are both considered to be analogous to the claimed invention because they are in the same field of wireless communication. Therefore, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the configuration information, disclosed by Kazmi, to add the beamforming direction parameter comprising a transmission precoding matrix indicator as taught by Luo, wherein it is well known that self-interference is corresponding to specific precoding matrix in a full-duplex MIMO beamforming system (page 5, paragraph 5).
Claim 19 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 1 and Kazmi further teaches a method of wireless communication performed by a base station, comprising (Fig.1, element 14, [0054], “the wireless communication devices 12 and 13 are being referred to as UEs and the radio access node 14 will be referred to as eNodeB or base station, BS 14”).
Claim 27 is an apparatus of Claim 1, it is analyzed and rejected according to claim 1 and Kazmi further teaches a memory (Fig.5, element 1202, [0140]); and one or more processors coupled to the memory, the one or more processors (Fig.5, element 1201, [0140], “some or all of the functionality described above as being provided by UEs, MTC or M2M devices, and/or any other types of wireless communication devices may be provided by the device processor 1201 executing instructions stored on a computer-readable medium, such as the device memory 1202”).
Claim 29 is an apparatus of Claim 19, it is analyzed and rejected according to claim 19 and Kazmi further teaches a memory (Fig.7, element 142, [0146]); and one or more processors operatively coupled to the memory, the memory and the one or more processors (Fig.7 element 141, [0146], “The node processor 141 is coupled to the node memory 142, to the network interface 145 and the node transceiver 143 that is coupled to the one or the plurality of node antennas 144”).
Claim 2: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 1, wherein, based at least in part on the self-interference measurement being associated with a non-zero-power channel state information reference signal NZP-CSI-RS reception, the set of radio resources includes one or more resource elements of an NZP-CSI-RS resource ([0076], “The SINR values may be measured on reference signals RS such as common or dedicated reference signals. Examples of common RS are cell specific RS CRS, discovery RS DRS, channel state indicator RS CSI-RS”).
Claim 20 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 19 and claim 2.
Claim 28 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 27 and claim 2.
Claim 30 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 29 and claim 2.
Claim 3: The combination of Kazmi, Lee and Luo teach the method of claim 2, Lee additionally teaches wherein the configuration information explicitly indicates a location of the set of resources ([0146], “For a UE to be configured with different TDD slot/symbol patterns each of which is associated with a configured beam ID, measuring self-interference at the UE … gNB 102 can collect the interference quantity with respect to the relationship between DL and UL panels with DL and UL beams, and can allocate multiple DL and UL slot/symbol configurations each of which is associated with a different beam ID, in a manner that self-interference can be minimized”).
The motivation for combining Kazmi and Lee regarding to the claim 1 is also applied to claim 3.
Claim 4: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 2, wherein the configuration information indicates that the set of radio resources includes the one or more resource elements of the NZP-CSI-RS resource ([0106], “The configuration may further specify whether CSI-FD and CSI-HD should be estimated in the same or different resources and information about resources in case of latter, UL physical channel e.g. UL data or control channels for transmitting CSI reports etc”).
Claim 5: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the configuration information indicates a transmit power parameter for the signal, and wherein transmission of the signal is based at least in part on the transmit power parameter ([0095], “this may also include an indication on the assumed, predicted and/or recommended UL transmit power levels associated with the predicted SI-to-N and/or SI-to-I levels”).
Claim 6: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 5, wherein the transmit power parameter indicates a maximum transmit power for the signal ([0138], “From the power scaling factors, the base station 14 and the UE 12 can derive the proper transmission power in the DL and UL, respectively, based on the maximum DL and UL transmit power values known to them”), and wherein a transmit power for the signal is determined to be lower than the maximum transmit power ([0131], “the network may determine UL and DL power scaling factors, α.sub.UL(f) and α.sub.DL(f), to scale down the maximum UL and DL transmit power values in resource blocks at each frequency f to maximize an overall spectral efficiency”).
Claim 7: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 5, wherein the transmit power parameter indicates an allowable reception power level ([0133], “a maximum UL transmit power that the UE shall use in FD mode in certain time resource e.g. next subframe”), and wherein the method further comprises:
determining a transmit power for the signal based at least in part on the allowable reception power level and based at least in part on a pathloss value ([0093], “the uplink power that the UE uses for upcoming UL transmissions, SI cancelling capabilities, and/or on a current path loss estimate e.g. based on DL RS measurements”).
Claim 8: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 5, wherein the transmit power parameter indicates a maximum transmit power for the signal ([0128] “maximum UL transmit power that the UE shall use in FD mode in certain time resource e.g. next subframe”) and an allowable reception power level ([0129], “maximum DL transmit power with which the UE shall be served in FD mode in certain time resource e.g. next subframe”).
Claim 11: The combination of Kazmi, Lee and Luo teach the method of claim 1, Lee additionally wherein the beamforming direction parameter is indicated relative to an uplink reference signal or a downlink reference signal ([0146], “the UE can be configured to transmit UL RS (e.g., SRS) at a panel(s) with a UL beam(s) and to measure the UL RS (i.e., self-interference) at another panel(s) with a DL beam(s), e.g., at a same time-and-frequency resource, and can also be configured to report the corresponding interference quantity”, [0147], “a gNB 102 can configure UE 116 to send UL RS at a panel with a UL beam (i.e., corresponding to a beam ID) and to measure the UL RS (self-interference) at another panel with a DL beam”).
The motivation for combining Kazmi and Lee regarding to the claim 1 is also applied to claim 11.
Claim 13: The combination of Kazmi, Lee and Luo teach the method of claim 1, Lee additionally teaches wherein the configuration information is received via at least one of: downlink control information, medium access control information, radio resource control information, or a combination thereof ([0098], “A beam indication procedure can include, for example, a procedure wherein the gNB 102 can indicate to the UE 116 to transmit an uplink channel (and/or a second uplink signal) with a same spatial filter that was used to receive a (first) reference signal ... indication can be, e.g., a DCI and/or MAC-CE, and/or RRC signaling”).
The motivation for combining Kazmi and Lee regarding to the claim 1 is also applied to claim 11.
Claim 14: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the configuration information is received in a channel state information report configuration message (Fig.3, element S12, [0070], “the base station 14, sends a CSI configuration message to the UE 12. This message may indicate whether the UE shall transmit a report indicative of one of: CSI-FD, E-CSI-FD, and both CSI-FD and E-CSI-FD”).
Claim 24 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 19 and claim 14.
Claim 15: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the information indicating the self-interference measurement indicates at least one of a self-interference strength value or a channel state information value that is based at least in part on the self-interference strength value ([0027], “the CSI-FD comprises information about a DL Signal-to-SI Ratio, SSIR. The SSIR may be determined based on measurements and/or estimations of the UE”).
Claim 25 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 19 and claim 15.
Claim 17: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the configuration information is received from a central unit associated with the node (Fig.1, element 14, [0054-0056], it indicates BS 14 can be any suitable eNodeB, which including central unit).
Claim 18: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the configuration information is received from a parent node of the node ([0054-0056], it indicates that the node can be any compatible radio access nodes, wireless device, which including parent node).
Claim 21: Kazmi teaches the method of claim 19, wherein the configuration information indicates a transmit power parameter for a signal associated with the self-interference measurement ([0095], “this may also include an indication on the assumed, predicted and/or recommended UL transmit power levels associated with the predicted SI-to-N and/or SI-to-I levels”,[0123-0129], disclosing configuring UE radio operations by the base station 14 are given: maximum DL transmit power with which the UE shall be served in FD mode in certain time resource, maximum DL transmit power is properly interpreted as an allowable reception power level, [0094], “a measured or estimated SINR on previous DL transmissions; the SINR may be defined with respect to the received DL signal-to-interference-plus-noise-ratio, SSIR, wherein interference may include both an external interference and the self-interference, SI).
Claim 33: Kazmi teaches the base station of claim 29, wherein the allowable reception power level for the signal indicates a threshold for an expected received power per resource block (RB) at a recipient of the signal ([0134], “a maximum DL transmit power with which the UE shall be served in FD mode in certain time resource e.g. next subframe”).
Claim 37: The combination of Kazmi, Lee and Luo teaches the method of claim 19, Kazmi additionally wherein the information indicating the self- interference measurement indicates at least one of a self-interference strength value or a channel state information value that is based at least in part on the self-interference strength value ([0095], “this may also include an indication on the assumed, predicted and/or recommended UL transmit power levels associated with the predicted SI-to-N and/or SI-to-I levels”, [0123-0129], disclosing configuring UE radio operations by the base station 14 are given: maximum UL transmit power that the UE shall use in FD mode in certain time resource, maximum DL transmit power with which the UE shall be served in FD mode in certain time resource, wherein channel state information is measured base on maximum UL transmit power , maximum DL transmit power. [0094], “a measured or estimated SINR on previous DL transmissions; the SINR may be defined with respect to the received DL signal-to-interference-plus-noise-ratio, SSIR, wherein interference may include both an external interference and the self-interference, SI”).
Claim 38: The combination of Kazmi, Lee and Luo teach the method of claim 19, Lee additionally teaches wherein the configuration information is received via medium access control information ([0098], “A beam indication procedure can include, for example, a procedure wherein the gNB 102 can indicate to the UE 116 to transmit an uplink channel (and/or a second uplink signal) with a same spatial filter that was used to receive a (first) reference signal ... indication can be, e.g., a DCI and/or MAC-CE, and/or RRC signaling”).
The motivation for combining Kazmi and Lee regarding to the claim 1 is also applied to claim 38.
Claims 12, 23 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kazmi et al. (US 20170054544 A1, hereinafter Kazmi) and in view of Lee et al. (US 20210344558 A1, hereinafter Lee), and in view of Luo (CN 104052529 B, hereinafter Luo), and further in view of Stirling et al. (US 20170033916 A1, hereinafter Stirling).
Claim 12: Kazimi does not explicitly teach the method of claim 1, wherein the configuration information indicates a set of allowable beamforming directions and a set of respective transmission power parameters associated with the set of allowable beamforming directions.
Stirling, from the same or similar field of endeavor, teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the configuration information indicates a set of allowable beamforming directions ( Fig.12A, elements 1214,1232,1226,1228,1234, [0024], “reported UE position or angular UE beam index, base station position”, [0058], “UEs have beamforming capability and multi-dimensional position information, the UE's relative distance to the base station can be taken into account during scheduling users to avoid interference”, [0076], “In block 1214, the base station determines the beam index and transmit and receive (TX/RX) coupling loss for each served UE … the beam index identifies a particular beam and, thus, the particular antenna elements used to form that beam, to the base station”) and a set of respective transmission power parameters associated with the set of allowable beamforming directions (Fig. 12A, element 1218, [0024], “the base station's assigned beam index for each user, fed back reference signal received power (RSRP) for each communication device”, [0084], “in block 1218, may then construct a list of served UE … the UE's power control status”).
Kazmi and Stirling are both considered to be analogous to the claimed invention because they are in the same field of wireless communication. Therefore, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the configuration information, disclosed by Kazmi, to add transmission power parameters associating with a beamforming direction, as taught by Stirling, it is well known self-interference is associated with transmission power, and increasing when the transmission power is substantially greater than the received power ([0023], [0039]).
Claim 23 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 19 and claim 12.
Claims 35-36 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kazmi et al. (US 20170054544 A1, hereinafter Kazmi) and in view of Lee et al. (US 20210344558 A1, hereinafter Lee), and further in view of Luo (CN 104052529 B, hereinafter Luo), and further in view of Zhang et al. (US 20220216976 A1, hereinafter Zhang).
Claim 35: Kazimi does not explicitly teach the method of claim 19, wherein the configuration information indicates that the set of radio resources includes one or more resource elements of a non-zero-power channel state information reference signal resource.
However, Zhang, from the same or similar field of endeavor, teaches wherein the configuration information indicates that the set of radio resources includes one or more resource elements of a non-zero-power channel state information reference signal resource (Fig. 3, [0306], “The base station can configure some downlink reference signals for channel measurement or interference (co-channel interference and/or self-interference) measurement, and these downlink reference signals may be a synchronization signal block (SSB), a channel state information-reference signal (CSI-RS, which may further include none zero power CSI-RS (NZP-CSI-RS) and zero power CSI-RS (ZP-CSI-RS)) … A time frequency resource location of the downlink reference signal may be notified to the user equipment by the base station through control information”).
Kazmi and Zhang are both considered to be analogous to the claimed invention because they are in the same field of wireless communication. Therefore, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the configuration information, disclosed by Kazmi, adding a non-zero-power channel state information reference signal resource, as taught by Zhang, for the benefit of allowing UE performing accurate measurement, since the measurement is determined based on the specific reference signal type of the downlink reference signal. ([0273-0274]).
Claim 36: The combination of Kazimi and Lee does not explicitly teach the method of claim 19, wherein the transmission sequence comprises at least one non-zero-power channel state information reference signal.
However, Zhang, from the same or similar field of endeavor, teaches wherein the transmission sequence comprises at least one non-zero-power channel state information reference signal (Fig. 3, [0306], “The base station can configure some downlink reference signals for channel measurement or interference (co-channel interference and/or self-interference) measurement, and these downlink reference signals may be a synchronization signal block (SSB), a channel state information-reference signal (CSI-RS, which may further include none zero power CSI-RS (NZP-CSI-RS) and zero power CSI-RS (ZP-CSI-RS)) … A time frequency resource location of the downlink reference signal may be notified to the user equipment by the base station through control information”).
The motivation for combining Kazmi and Zhang regarding to the claim 35 is also applied to claim 36.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to YONGHONG ZHAO whose telephone number is (571)272-4089. The examiner can normally be reached Monday -Friday 9:00 am - 5:00pm.
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/Y.Z./
Examiner, Art Unit 2472
/NICHOLAS A JENSEN/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2472