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 Rejections - 35 USC § 103
1. 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 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.
2. 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 of this title, 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.
Claims 1, 3-9 and 22-25 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. Pre-Grant Publication US 2023/0300891 to Su et al. (hereinafter Su) in view of U.S. Publication No, US 2023/0093016 to Shi et al. (hereinafter Shi)
As to claims 1 and 22, Su discloses a method of wireless communication performed by a user equipment (UE), comprising:
determining a configuration that indicates an antenna switching point associated with an uplink communication configured for multiple repetitions (Su; Fig.20:2010; [0239]; [0241]-[0242]; [0052]; [0286] discloses Msg3 with 8 repetitions, the network node can configure the UE with 2 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 4 consecutive repetitions, and the UE with 4 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 2 consecutive repetitions . Here after 4 consecutive repetitions or after 2 consecutive repetitions corresponding to antenna switching point);
transmitting, to a network node, one or more repetitions of the uplink communication using a first transmit antenna prior to the antenna switching point (Su; Fig.20:2012;0020[0239]; [0241]-[0242]; [0052]; [0286] discloses the PUSCH is transmitted over N PUSCH repetitions, M consecutive PUSCH repetitions of N PUSCH repetitions are transmitted using a first precoder of the sequence of precoders and at least one PUSCH repetition following the M consecutive PUSCH repetitions of the N PUSCH repetitions is transmitted using a second precoder of the sequence of precoders. [0242] discloses Msg3 with 8 repetitions, the network node can configure the UE with 2 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 4 consecutive repetitions, and the UE with 4 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 2 consecutive repetitions); and
transmitting, to the network node, one or more repetitions of the uplink communication using a second transmit antenna after the antenna switching point (Su; [0239]; [0241]-[0242]; [0052]; [0286] discloses the PUSCH is transmitted over N PUSCH repetitions, M consecutive PUSCH repetitions of N PUSCH repetitions are transmitted using a first precoder of the sequence of precoders and at least one PUSCH repetition following the M consecutive PUSCH repetitions of the N PUSCH repetitions is transmitted using a second precoder of the sequence of precoders. [0242] discloses Msg3 with 8 repetitions, the network node can configure the UE with 2 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 4 consecutive repetitions, and the UE with 4 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 2 consecutive repetitions).
Su discloses antenna switching point, but fails to discloses wherein the antenna switching point corresponds to a time to switch a first transmit antenna to a second transmit antenna. However, Shi discloses
wherein the antenna switching point corresponds to a time to switch a first transmit antenna to a second transmit antenna (Shi; [0647] discloses the first device switches from the first antenna to the second antenna, and then performs the remaining provisioning procedure by using the second antenna. [0648] discloses a time at which the first device switches from the first antenna to the second antenna)
It is obvious for a person of ordinary skilled in the art to combine the teachings before the effective filing date of the invention. One would be motivated to combine the teachings so that a terminal can switch from one antenna to another antenna at a particular time and thus use the limited resources in an effective way
As to claims 3 and 23, the rejection of claim 1 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi discloses further comprising:
receiving the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point in a random access response (RAR) message associated with a random access channel procedure, wherein the uplink communication associated with the antenna switching point is a msg3 communication transmitted after receiving the RAR message (Su; [0005] discloses The base station such as next generation NodeB (gNodeB or gNB) can reply with a NR Random Access Response (NR-RAR, msg2). The RAR may carry information such as temporary C-RNTI (cell radio network temporary identity); Timing Advance Value; and Uplink Grant Resource. The UE transmits NR PUSCH (message 3) after receiving a timing advance command in the RAR and after adjusting the timing of the PUSCH transmission, allowing PUSCH to be received at gNB with a timing accuracy within the cyclic prefix)
As to claims 4 and 24, the rejection of claim 1 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi discloses further comprising:
receiving the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point in a system information block (Su; [0387]; discloses the precoder for PUSCH is configured in System Information Block Type 1 (SIB1) or predefined. [0272]-[0274] discloses wherein precoder is used to switch antenna and send msg3)
As to claim 5, the rejection of claim 1 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi discloses wherein the configuration is specified in a wireless communication standard (Su; [0003]-[0005] discloses a wireless communication system such as NR (new radio))
As to claim 6, the rejection of claim 1 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi discloses further comprising:
receiving the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point in a radio resource control message, a medium access control element, or downlink control information based at least in part on the uplink communication including a physical uplink shared channel or a physical uplink control channel (Su; [0073]; [0305] discloses Msg3/MsgA PUSCH repetition in spatial domain is indicated to UE by MAC (medium access control) signaling. Here Su is applied for the 2nd alternative).
As to claim 7, the rejection of claim 1 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi discloses wherein the configuration indicates that the antenna switching point is at a midpoint of the multiple repetitions that is defined using a floor or ceiling function according to a number of the multiple repetitions (Su; [0242] discloses Msg3 with 8 repetitions, the network node can configure the UE with 2 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 4 consecutive repetitions corresponding to midpoint of the multiple repetitions)
As to claims 8 and 25, the rejection of claim 1 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi discloses further comprising:
receiving, from the network node, random access configuration information that partitions random access channel (RACH) occasions (ROs) or preambles into a first subset for UEs having an antenna switching capability and a second subset for UEs lacking the antenna switching capability (Su; [0269]-[0274] discloses RAR toward the UE contains a RAPID corresponding to a particular PRACH preamble sent out by the UE and also discloses If precoder is absent in RAR, it indicates the network node wants UE to send Msg3 from only one antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding preamble. [0273] discloses If precoder is included in RAR, the antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding PRACH preamble, is AP#0. For UE with two antenna ports, the other antenna port is AP#1. Note: Precoder in this option is only for UE with 2 antenna ports. Here Su is applied for the 2nd alternative)
selecting an RO or a preamble in the first subset based at least in part on the UE having the antenna switching capability (Su; [0269]-[0274] discloses RAR toward the UE contains a RAPID corresponding to a particular PRACH preamble sent out by the UE and also discloses If precoder is absent in RAR, it indicates the network node wants UE to send Msg3 from only one antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding preamble. [0273] discloses If precoder is included in RAR, the antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding PRACH preamble. Here Su is applied for the 2nd alternative); and
transmitting, to the network node, a physical RACH (PRACH) using the RO or the preamble selected from the first subset to initiate a four-step RACH procedure (Su; [0269]-[0274] discloses RAR toward the UE contains a RAPID corresponding to a particular PRACH preamble sent out by the UE and also discloses If precoder is absent in RAR, it indicates the network node wants UE to send Msg3 from only one antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding preamble. [0273] discloses If precoder is included in RAR, the antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding PRACH preamble. Here Su is applied for the 2nd alternative).
As to claim 9, the rejection of claim 8 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi discloses further comprising:
receiving, from the network node, the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point for msg3 of the four-step RACH procedure based at least in part on transmitting the PRACH using the RO or the preamble selected from the first subset for UEs having the antenna switching capability (Su; [0004]-[0006]; Fig.11; [0251] discloses different preambles from one UE are transmitted on different time instances, the UE transmits Msg1 (the entire preamble set, i.e., multiple preambles in beam sweeping) before attempting to receive Msg2. The network node receives the multiple preambles, selects one with the best performance, and responds to the best performance preamble with a Msg2 (RAR) containing the RAPID (random access preamble identifier) for that preamble. The UE transmits a Msg3 using the spatial domain transmission filter it used for the selected preamble identified by the RAPID. The UE may continue to use the spatial domain transmission filter until it is configured otherwise, for example by being configured with a spatialRelationInfo field in an SRS resource configuration. The network node sends Msg4 to the UE. In this way the improved beam found during the RACH procedure can be used for PUSCH transmission, avoiding the need for a separate beam refinement procedure).
Claims 2, 11-21 and 26-30 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. Pre-Grant Publication US 2023/0300891 to Su et al. (hereinafter Su) in view of U.S. Publication No, US 2023/0093016 to Shi et al. (hereinafter Shi) in view of U.S. Publication No, US 2023/0216632 to Go et al. (hereinafter Go)
As to claim 2, Su-Shi discloses of antenna switching, but fails to explicitly disclose of antenna switching based on DMRS bundle configuration. However, Go discloses
wherein the antenna switching point is based at least in part on a boundary of a demodulation reference signal (DMRS) bundle in a DMRS bundling configuration associated with the uplink communication (Go; [0225]-[0226] discloses a base station may perform a SRS time domain bundling configuration/indication so that a terminal transmits an SRS and an UL DMRS adjacent in a time domain. Through a corresponding configuration/indication, when performing UL channel estimation through SRS reception, a base station may use a channel measure result value through UL DMRS reception with a channel estimation result value through SRS reception for UL channel estimation (or, reciprocity-based DL CSI acquisition, i.e., antenna switching).
It is obvious for a person of ordinary skilled in the art to combine the teachings before the effective filing date of the invention. One would be motivated to combine the teachings so that a terminal may perform a terminal operation related to the following time domain bundling only when frequency domain resource allocation of an SRS and a DMRS is fully or partially overlapped and thus use the limited resources in an effective way.
As to claims 11 and 26, Su discloses a method of wireless communication performed by a network node, comprising:
determining a configuration that indicates an antenna switching point associated with an uplink communication configured for multiple repetitions (Su; [0239]; [0241]-[0242]; [0052]; [0286] discloses Msg3 with 8 repetitions, the network node can configure the UE with 2 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 4 consecutive repetitions, and the UE with 4 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 2 consecutive repetitions . Here after 4 consecutive repetitions or after 2 consecutive repetitions corresponding to antenna switching point);
receiving, from a user equipment (UE), one or more repetitions of the uplink communication prior to the antenna switching point and one or more repetitions of the uplink communication after the antenna switching point (Su; [0239]; [0241]-[0242]; [0052]; [0286] discloses the PUSCH is transmitted over N PUSCH repetitions, M consecutive PUSCH repetitions of N PUSCH repetitions are transmitted using a first precoder of the sequence of precoders and at least one PUSCH repetition following the M consecutive PUSCH repetitions of the N PUSCH repetitions is transmitted using a second precoder of the sequence of precoders. [0242] discloses Msg3 with 8 repetitions, the network node can configure the UE with 2 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 4 consecutive repetitions, and the UE with 4 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 2 consecutive repetitions. Prior to switching of antenna 4 repetitions are received and after switching to another antenna, another 4 repetitions are received);
Su discloses antenna switching point, but fails to discloses wherein the antenna switching point corresponds to a time to switch a first transmit antenna to a second transmit antenna. However, Shi discloses
wherein the antenna switching point corresponds to a time to switch a first transmit antenna to a second transmit antenna (Shi; [0647] discloses of switches from the first antenna to the second antenna, and then performs the remaining provisioning procedure by using the second antenna. [0648] discloses a time at which the first device switches from the first antenna to the second antenna)
It is obvious for a person of ordinary skilled in the art to combine the teachings before the effective filing date of the invention. One would be motivated to combine the teachings so that a terminal can switch from one antenna to another antenna at a particular time and thus use the limited resources in an effective way
Su-Shi discloses of antenna switching, but fails to disclose performing channel estimation for the uplink communication based at least in part on the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point. However, Go discloses
performing channel estimation for the uplink communication based at least in part on the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point (Go; [0226]; [0159]-[0161] discloses when performing UL channel estimation through SRS reception, a base station may use a channel measure result value through UL DMRS reception with a channel estimation result value through SRS reception for UL channel estimation (or, reciprocity-based DL CSI acquisition, i.e., antenna switching).
It is obvious for a person of ordinary skilled in the art to combine the teachings before the effective filing date of the invention. One would be motivated to combine the teachings so that a terminal may perform a terminal operation related to the following time domain bundling only when frequency domain resource allocation of an SRS and a DMRS is fully or partially overlapped and thus use the limited resources in an effective way.
As to claims 12 and 27, the rejection of claim 11 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses wherein performing the channel estimation includes:
attempting channel estimation according to a first assumption that the UE performed an antenna switch at the antenna switching point and according to a second assumption that the UE did not perform an antenna switch at the antenna switching point based at least in part on the uplink communication including a msg3 communication associated with a random access channel procedure (Su; [0269]-[0274] discloses RAR toward the UE contains a RAPID corresponding to a particular PRACH preamble sent out by the UE and also discloses If precoder is absent in RAR, it indicates the network node wants UE to send Msg3 from only one antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding preamble. [0273] discloses If precoder is included in RAR, the antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding PRACH preamble, is AP#0. For UE with two antenna ports, the other antenna port is AP#1. Note: Precoder in this option is only for UE with 2 antenna ports. If precoder is absent, only one antenna port is used and not switching to another antenna port. If precoder is included, the antenna port is switched to another antenna port).
As to claim 13, the rejection of claim 12 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses further comprising:
decoding the msg3 communication based at least in part on a channel estimation result associated with the first assumption or the second assumption (Su; Fig.11; [0251] shows and discloses the base station receiving msg3 from the UE. The UE transmits a Msg3 using the spatial domain transmission filter it used for the selected preamble identified by the RAPID. The UE may continue to use the spatial domain transmission filter until it is configured otherwise, for example by being configured with a spatialRelationInfo field in an SRS resource configuration).
As to claim 14, the rejection of claim 11 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses wherein the antenna switching point is based at least in part on a boundary of a demodulation reference signal (DMRS) bundle in a DMRS bundling configuration associated with the uplink communication (Go; [0226] discloses a base station may perform a SRS time domain bundling configuration/indication so that a terminal transmits an SRS and an UL DMRS adjacent in a time domain. Through a corresponding configuration/indication, when performing UL channel estimation through SRS reception, a base station may use a channel measure result value through UL DMRS reception with a channel estimation result value through SRS reception for UL channel estimation).
As to claims 15 and 28, the rejection of claim 11 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses further comprising:
transmitting the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point in a random access response (RAR) message associated with a random access channel procedure, wherein the uplink communication associated with the antenna switching point is a msg3 communication subsequent to the RAR message (Su; [0005] discloses The base station such as next generation NodeB (gNodeB or gNB) can reply with a NR Random Access Response (NR-RAR, msg2). The RAR may carry information such as temporary C-RNTI (cell radio network temporary identity); Timing Advance Value; and Uplink Grant Resource. The UE transmits NR PUSCH (message 3) after receiving a timing advance command in the RAR and after adjusting the timing of the PUSCH transmission, allowing PUSCH to be received at gNB with a timing accuracy within the cyclic prefix).
As to claims 16 and 29, the rejection of claim 11 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses further comprising:
transmitting the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point in a system information block (Su; [0387]; discloses the precoder for PUSCH is configured in System Information Block Type 1 (SIB1) or predefined. [0272]-[0274] discloses wherein precoder is used to switch antenna and send msg3).
As to claim 17, the rejection of claim 11 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses wherein the configuration is specified in a wireless communication standard (Su; [0003]-[0005] discloses a wireless communication system such as NR (new radio))
As to claim 18, the rejection of claim 11 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses further comprising:
transmitting the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point in a radio resource control message, a medium access control control element, or downlink control information based at least in part on the uplink communication including a physical uplink shared channel or a physical uplink control channel (Su; [0073]; [0305] discloses Msg3/MsgA PUSCH repetition in spatial domain is indicated to UE by MAC (medium access control) signaling. Here Su is applied for the 2nd alternative).
As to claim 19, the rejection of claim 11 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses wherein the configuration indicates that the antenna switching point is at a midpoint of the multiple repetitions that is defined using a floor or ceiling function according to a number of the multiple repetitions (Su; [0242] discloses Msg3 with 8 repetitions, the network node can configure the UE with 2 Tx antennas to switch precoder/transmit antenna after 4 consecutive repetitions corresponding to midpoint of the multiple repetitions).
As to claims 20 and 30, the rejection of claim 11 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses further comprising:
transmitting random access configuration information that partitions random access channel (RACH) occasions (ROs) or preambles into a first subset for UEs having an antenna switching capability and a second subset for UEs lacking the antenna switching capability (Su; [0269]-[0274] discloses RAR toward the UE contains a RAPID corresponding to a particular PRACH preamble sent out by the UE and also discloses If precoder is absent in RAR, it indicates the network node wants UE to send Msg3 from only one antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding preamble. [0273] discloses If precoder is included in RAR, the antenna port, which has sent out the RAPID-corresponding PRACH preamble, is AP#0. For UE with two antenna ports, the other antenna port is AP#1. Note: Precoder in this option is only for UE with 2 antenna ports. Here Su is applied for the 2nd alternative);
receiving, from the UE, a physical RACH (PRACH) to initiate a four-step RACH procedure using an RO or a preamble selected from the first subset or the second subset (Su; [0251] discloses the UE transmits a Msg3 using the spatial domain transmission filter it used for the selected preamble identified by the RAPID. The UE may continue to use the spatial domain transmission filter until it is configured otherwise, for example by being configured with a spatialRelationInfo field in an SRS resource configuration.; and
determining whether the UE has the antenna switching capability based at least in part on the RO or the preamble associated with the PRACH (Go; [0164] discloses when a terminal is configured with an SRS resource and/or an SRS resource set configured for antenna switching through higher layer signaling, a corresponding terminal may be configured to perform SRS transmission based on UE capability related to antenna switching. In this case, UE capability related to antenna switching may be ‘1T2R’, ‘2T4R’, ‘1T4R’, ‘1T4R/2T4R’, ‘1T1R’, ‘2T2R’, ‘4T4R’, etc. Here, ‘mTnR’ may mean UE capability which supports m transmission and n reception).
As to claim 21, the rejection of claim 10 as listed above is incorporated herein. In addition, Su-Shi-Go discloses further comprising:
transmitting, to the UE, the configuration that indicates the antenna switching point for msg3 of the four-step RACH procedure based at least in part on determining that the UE has the antenna switching capability (Su; [0004]-[0006]; Fig.11; [0251] discloses different preambles from one UE are transmitted on different time instances, the UE transmits Msg1 (the entire preamble set, i.e., multiple preambles in beam sweeping) before attempting to receive Msg2. The network node receives the multiple preambles, selects one with the best performance, and responds to the best performance preamble with a Msg2 (RAR) containing the RAPID (random access preamble identifier) for that preamble. The UE transmits a Msg3 using the spatial domain transmission filter it used for the selected preamble identified by the RAPID. The UE may continue to use the spatial domain transmission filter until it is configured otherwise, for example by being configured with a spatialRelationInfo field in an SRS resource configuration. The network node sends Msg4 to the UE. In this way the improved beam found during the RACH procedure can be used for PUSCH transmission, avoiding the need for a separate beam refinement procedure).
Claims 10 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. Pre-Grant Publication US 2023/0300891 to Su et al. (hereinafter Su) in view of U.S. Publication No, US 2023/0093016 to Shi et al. (hereinafter Shi) in view of U.S. Publication No, US 2024/0031011 to Zhu et al. (hereinafter Zhu)
As to claim 10, Su-Shi discloses a network node that allocate resource for msg3 uplink transmission, but fails to disclose wherein the network node is non-terrestrial network node. However, Zhu discloses
wherein the network node is a non-terrestrial network node (Zhu; [0082]; [0113] discloses wherein resources allocated by the satellite to the terminal for sending the msg3 (message 3) in the random-access process. Here satellite corresponding to non-terrestrial network node)
It is obvious for a person of ordinary skilled in the art to combine the teachings before the effective filing date of the invention. One would be motivated to combine the teachings in order to provide service in non-terrestrial network configuration
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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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/FAISAL CHOUDHURY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2478