CTNF 18/279,185 CTNF 99147 DETAILED ACTION Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status 07-03-aia AIA 15-10-aia The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA. Response to Arguments 07-38-02 Applicant’s arguments, filed 2/3/2026, with respect to the rejection of claims 1-20 under 35 USC § 102 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new grounds of rejection is made in view of 35 USC § 103. Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 07-20-aia AIA 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. 07-23-aia AIA 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. 07-21-aia AIA Claims 1- 9, 12-20 are re jected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ha o et al. (US 20230254086 A1) in view of Babaei et al. (US 20240275567 A1). Re garding claim 1, Hao et al. teaches an apparatus for a 5 th generation NodeB (gNB), the apparatus comprising: processing circuitry to configure the gNB to: transmit, to a user equipment (UE), demodulation reference signals (DM-RS) and downlink control information (DCI) of a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) during a downlink (DL) period of a time domain duplexing (TDD) period, the DCI requesting channel state information (CSI) reporting (Paragraph 89, 92, 93, 117, 157, These passages teach a gNB transmitting DM-RS and DCI on PDCCH in a TDD downlink slot, where the DCI may request CSI reporting) ; and a memory configured to store the CQI (Paragraph 103, 168, These passages teach a base station memory associated with its controller/processor that stores received data such as CQI for subsequent scheduling use) . Hao et al. does not explicitly teach in response to transmission of the DM-RS and DCI, receive, from the UE, uplink control information (UCI) of a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) or physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), the UCI containing a channel quality indicator (CQI) calculated using the DM-RS. However, Babaei et al. teaches in response to transmission of the DM-RS and DCI, receive, from the UE, uplink control information (UCI) of a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) or physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), the UCI containing a channel quality indicator (CQI) calculated using the DM-RS (Paragraph 393, 408, 414, 424, 428, 443, These passages teach that, in response to DCI-triggered CSI request and DL reference signals, the UE transmits CSI as UCI via PUCCH/PUSCH including CQI computed from reference signals used for channel estimation) . Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide in response to transmission of the DM-RS and DCI, receive, from the UE, uplink control information (UCI) of a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) or physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), the UCI containing a channel quality indicator (CQI) calculated using the DM-RS as taught by Babaei et al. in the system of Hao et al., so that it would enable the gNB of Hao et al. to obtain accurate channel quality feedback derived from the transmitted reference signals for improved link adaptation, scheduling, and downlink transmission performance in a TDD wireless communication system. Regarding claim 2, Hao et al. teaches the DCI transmitted on the PDCCH comprises one of a DL DCI, an uplink (UL) DCI, or a joint DL and UL DCI (Paragraph 93, 110, 131, PDCCH carries DCI; the DCI may be uplink or downlink; and DL DCI can jointly indicate both UL and DL control resources) . Regarding claim 3, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is to configure the gNB to transmit, to the UE, radio resource control (RRC) signaling that indicates an offset and a periodicity of the DM-RS of the PDCCH (Paragraph 96, 129, 131, The passages show that the gNB’s processing circuitry executes RRC layer functions that configure signaling to the UE, where RRC messages indicate DM-RS-related parameters such as offset and periodicity) . Regarding claim 4, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is to configure the gNB to indicate, to the UE, a power offset to be used for calculation of the CQI, the power offset indicates a power ratio between the DM-RS of the PDCCH and a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH)for which the CQI is calculated, and the power offset is one of explicitly included in the DCI, able to be implicitly derived from the DCI, or provided to the UE in radio resource control (RRC) signaling (Paragraph 93, 141, 131, 127, The gNB configures the UE to calculate CQI using the DMRS of the PDCCH/PDSCH, with offset or related parameters indicated through DCI fields or RRC signaling, thus teaching indication of a power offset for CQI calculation as recited) . Regarding claim 5, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is to configure the gNB to indicate, in at least one of the DCI or radio resource control (RRC) signaling, timing of transmission of the UCl (Paragraph 89, 131, 132, 170, 171, teaches a gNB whose processing circuitry configures and transmits control signaling—via DCI or RRC—that specifies slot formats and slot offsets, thereby indicating timing for uplink control transmissions such as CSI or feedback reports). Regarding claim 6, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is to configure the gNB to indicate, to the UE, to transmit the UCI in a soonest discrete Fourier transform spread orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (DFT-s-OFDM) symbol that satisfies a minimum time between a last symbol of the PDCCH and a first symbol of the UCI (Paragraph 94, 129, 144, These paragraphs show the gNB configures the UE to send UCI on PUCCH using DFT-s- OFDM symbols after a defined minimum symbol gap, thereby ensuring UCI is transmitted in the earliest symbol satisfying the timing constraint from the PDCCH) . Regarding claim 7, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is to configure the gNB to transmit, to the UE, a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) table to derive the CQI, the CQI derived from a CQI index that corresponds to an MCS index of the MCS table (Paragraph 114, 171, teaches that the gNB’s scheduling component configures MCS information for transmission, where the UE derives a CQI from a CQI index corresponding to an MCS index defined in an MCS table) . Regarding claim 8, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is to configure the gNB to: transmit, to the UE, CSI reference signals (CSI-RS) on at least one of a plurality of multiple input multiple output (MIMO) beams during a beam management procedure, and receive, from the UE, an additional CQI report together with a CSI-RS resource index (CRI) report, a CQI in the CQI report is derived using the CSI-RS, the CRI report indicating preferred beamforming for at least one of DL or uplink (UL) transmissions (Paragraph 84, 92, 116, 124, These passages collectively teach that the gNB (base station) transmits CSI-RS on MIMO beams for beam management, the UE measures the CSI-RS to generate a CQI and CRI report, and the gNB receives the report indicating preferred beamforming for DL or UL transmissions) . Regarding claim 9, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is to configure the gNB to transmit, to the UE, a set of power offsets to apply to measurements of the DM-RS for evaluation of a block error rate (BLER) based on a set of CQIs, each power offset based on a modulation order corresponding to a different CQI in the set of CQIs, and calculation of each CQI by the UE accounts for reduction in transmission power by applying scaling to measurements of the DM-RS based on a corresponding power offset from the set of power offsets (Paragraph 141, 169, 171, The gNB’s processing circuitry configures CSI and DM-RS measurement parameters, uses CQI-based modulation orders that imply different power levels, and accounts for transmission-power conditions when generating CQI) . Regarding claim 12, Hao et al. teaches calculation of the CQI is not based on channel state information (CSI) reference signals (CSI-RS) (Paragraph 69, 70, 141, repeatedly describes embodiments where CQI is derived from PDSCH/DMRS measurements rather than CSI-RS, expressly teaching that CQI calculation is not based on CSI-RS) . Regarding claim 13, Hao et al. teaches an apparatus for a user equipment (UE), the apparatus comprising: processing circuitry to configure the UE to: receive, from a 5 th generation NodeB (gNB) during a downlink (DL) period of a time domain duplexing (TDD) period, demodulation reference signals (DM-RS) associated with a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH), downlink control information (DCI) of the PDCCH, and a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) (Paragraph 77, 89, 92, 93, 113, These passages teach a UE receiving, in a 5G NR TDD downlink period, PDCCH carrying DCI, PDSCH, and associated DM-RS scheduled by the DCI) ; calculate a channel quality indicator (CQI) based on the DM-RS (Paragraph 113, 141, 178, 187, These passages teach calculating a CQI at the UE based on DM-RS (as part of the DMRS/PDSCH measurement resource)) ; and a memory configured to store the CQI (Paragraph 103, 168, These passages teach a base station memory associated with its controller/processor that stores received data such as CQI for subsequent scheduling use) . Hao et al. does not explicitly teach transmit, to the gNB, uplink control information (UCI) of a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) or physical uplink shred channel (PUSCH), the UCI containing the CQI. However, Babaei et al. teaches transmit, to the gNB, uplink control information (UCI) of a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) or physical uplink shred channel (PUSCH), the UCI containing the CQI (Paragraph 414, 439, 443, 450, These passages teach that the UE transmits CSI reports containing CQI via uplink channels including PUCCH or PUSCH) . Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide transmit, to the gNB, uplink control information (UCI) of a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) or physical uplink shred channel (PUSCH), the UCI containing the CQI as taught by Babaei et al. in the system of Hao et al., so that the UE could report the CQI calculated from the DM-RS associated with the PDCCH/PDSCH to the gNB using standardized uplink feedback signaling mechanisms, thereby enabling the gNB to efficiently perform adaptive modulation and coding, link adaptation, and scheduling decisions based on current channel conditions in a 5G NR TDD communication system. Regarding claim 14, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is further configured to calculate the CQI based on a power offset, the power offset indicates a power ratio between the DM-RS of the PDCCH and a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) for which the CQI is calculated, and the power offset is one of explicitly included in the DCI, able to be implicitly derived from the DCI, or provided to the UE in radio resource control (RRC) signaling (Paragraph 93, 106, 131, 141, [0141] shows CQI is calculated from DM-RS/PDSCH power characteristics, effectively a power offset; [0093] links this DM-RS to PDCCH/PDSCH; [0106] and [0131] show that the offset or its parameters can be explicitly or implicitly signaled via DCI or configured via RRC) . Regarding claim 15, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is configured to determine timing of transmission of the UCI from at least one of the DCI or radio resource control (RRC) signaling (Paragraph 127, 131, The UE determines when to transmit UCI based on timing indicated in DCI or time configuration provided via RRC signaling) . Regarding claim 16, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is to configure the UE to transmit the UCI in a soonest discrete Fourier transform spread orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (DFT-s-OFDM) symbol that satisfies a minimum time between a last symbol of the PDCCH and a first symbol of the UCI (Paragraph 90, 93, 95, 144, teaches that the UE transmits uplink control information (UCI) on a PUCCH using DFT-s-OFDM symbols and defines that the transmission must occur after a minimum symbol gap (Z or Z′) following downlink control (e.g., PDCCH/DCI)) . Regarding claim 17, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is further configured to derive the CQI based on a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) table, a CQI index of the CQI corresponding to an index of an MCS from the MCS table (Paragraph 114, deriving a channel quality indicator (CQI) from a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) table, where the CQI index directly corresponds to an index of an MCS entry defined in standardized MCS tables) . Regarding claim 18, Hao et al. teaches the processing circuitry is further configured to: derive the CQI based on a set of power offsets to apply to the DM-RS for evaluation of a block error rate (BLER) based on a set of CQIs, each power offset based on a modulation order corresponding to a different CQI in the set of CQIs, and scale measurements of the DM-RS by applying a power offset from the set of power offsets that corresponds to the modulation order associated with a calculated CQI for the BLER (Paragraph 113, 114, 141, The UE derives CQI from DM-RS measurements linked to modulation and coding schemes that target specific BLERs, using DM-RS scaling and modulation-dependent parameters for CQI calculation) . Regarding claim 19, Hao et al. teaches a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium that stores instructions for execution by one or more processors of a 5 th generation NodeB (gNB), the one or more processors to configure the gNB to, when the instructions are executed: transmit, to a user equipment (UE), a channel state information (CSI) reporting configuration, the CSI reporting configuration indicating use of demodulation reference signals (DM-RS) of a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) or physical downlink shared channel ( PDSCH) are to be used by the UE for calculating a CSI and that the calculated CSI is to be transmitted by the UE on a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) or physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) (Paragraph 388, 409, 414, 438, 458, These passages teach that the base station transmits CSI reporting configuration via RRC including CSI-RS/DM-RS-based measurement settings and explicitly configures CSI reporting on PUCCH/PUSCH based on downlink reference signals) ; transmit, to the UE, DM-RS and downlink control information (DCI) of the PDCCH during a downlink (DL) period of a time domain duplexing (TDD) period, the DCI requesting the CSI reporting (Paragraph 142, 203, 429, 438, 457, These passages teach that during a DL portion (including TDD DL slots) the gNB transmits PDCCH carrying DCI with a CSI request field along with DM-RS-bearing downlink channels used for CSI measurement). Hao et al. does not explicitly teach in response to transmission of the DM-RS and DCI, receive, from the UE, uplink control information (UCI) of the PUCCH or PUSCH, the UCI containing a CSI calculated based on the DM-RS of the PDCCH during the DL period. However, Babaei et al. teaches in response to transmission of the DM-RS and DCI, receive, from the UE, uplink control information (UCI) of the PUCCH or PUSCH, the UCI containing a CSI calculated based on the DM-RS of the PDCCH during the DL period (Paragraph 171, 408, 436, 439, 450, These passages teach that, in response to DCI triggering and based on downlink reference resources (including DM-RS/CSI-RS), the UE transmits CSI as uplink control information on PUCCH or PUSCH which is received by the base station) . Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide in response to transmission of the DM-RS and DCI, receive, from the UE, uplink control information (UCI) of the PUCCH or PUSCH, the UCI containing a CSI calculated based on the DM-RS of the PDCCH during the DL period as taught by Babaei et al. in the system of Hao et al., so that it would enable the gNB to obtain CSI feedback generated from DM-RS-associated downlink transmissions in response to DCI-triggered CSI reporting for improved channel state determination, uplink feedback coordination, and adaptive downlink scheduling within a TDD communication framework. Regarding claim 20, Hao et al. teaches the CSI is channel quality information (CQI) (Paragraph 69, 75, 125, 126, These passages show CSI includes or consists of CQI, as the UE calculates CQI and reports it as the CSI) . Allowable Subject Matter 12-151-08 AIA 07-43 12-51-08 Claim s 10-11 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims. Conclusion 07-96 AIA The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Mueck et al. (US 20220132524 A1) Park et al. (US 20200083938 A1) Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ANDREW SHAJI KURIAN whose telephone number is (703)756-1878. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 8am-4pm. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Ricky Ngo can be reached at (571) 272-3139. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. /ANDREW SHAJI KURIAN/Examiner, Art Unit 2464 /IQBAL ZAIDI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 2 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 4 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 5 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 6 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 7 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 8 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 9 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 10 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 11 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 12 Art Unit: 2464 Application/Control Number: 18/279,185 Page 13 Art Unit: 2464
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