DETAILED ACTION
The following is a final office action in response to amendment filed on 5/14/2026 for response of the
office action mailed on 2/20/2026. Claims 1, 4, 19, and 21 have been amended. Claim 6 has been canceled. Claims 1-5, 8-19, and 21-22 remain pending in the application.
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 .
Response to Amendment
The Amendment filed on 5/14/2026 has been entered.
Applicant’s amendments to the Claims have overcome each and every objection previously set forth in the Non-Final Office Action mailed on 2/20/2026.
Applicant’s amendments to the Drawing have overcome each and every objection previously set forth in the Non-Final Office Action mailed on 2/20/2026.
Applicant’s amendments to claim 1 have overcome each and every rejection based on 35 USC § 112(a) and 35 USC § 112(b) to the claims previously set forth in the Non-Final Office Action mailed on 2/20/2026.
Response to Remarks/Arguments
Applicant’s remarks/arguments (page 7-12), filed on 5/14/2026, with respect to the amended
independent claims 1 and 21 have been fully considered but are not persuasive.
Regarding remarks in page 9 for dependent claim 1 and 21, applicant asserts that "Wanuga does not teach or suggest this amended limitation. The portions of Wanuga relied upon in the rejection relate to resource configuration and reporting of measured values in a RAN-controlled framework, not to a coding rule whereby the sensing measurement result is coded as an index according to a code book.".
Examiner respectfully disagrees with the applicant. Huang et al. (US 2021/0168762 Al) discloses (UE shall determine the set of resources to be reported to higher layers in sensing measurement. Sidelink Control information (SCI) decoding applied during sensing procedure provides at least information on sidelink resources indicated by the UE transmitting the SCI. TX data processor formats, codes, and interleaves the traffic data for each data stream based on a particular coding scheme selected for that data stream to provide coded data. The data rate, coding, and/or modulation for each data stream may be determined by instructions performed by processor. sidelink HARQ-ACK codebook is determined based upon slot index and/or pool index, with respect to FIG. 6, resource pool 1 is associated with a first sidelink assignment index and resource pool 2 is associated with a second sidelink assignment index. Huang: Fig. 6, [0025]-[0026], [0050], [0259], [0570]-[0573]).
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 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 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.
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.
Claims 1-5, 8-19, and 21-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wanuga et
al. (US 2022/0225121 Al, hereinafter “Wanuga”) in view of Stauffer et al. (US 2020/0107249 Al, hereinafter “Stauffer”) and in further view of Huang et al. (US 2021/0168762 Al, hereinafter “Huang”).
Regarding claim 1, Wanuga discloses:
A control unit for a wireless device, the wireless device comprising a first and a second set of transceiver units being connectable to the control unit, the control unit comprising one or more processors. the control unit being configured to control the first set of transceiver units to perform communication, utilizing a communication channel, with a network (NW) node and configured to control the second set of transceiver units to sense and/or localize a surrounding object, the control unit further being configured to (WTRU may have multi-mode capabilities. the transceiver may include multiple transceivers for enabling the WTRU to communicate via multiple RATs. WTRU may include a processor, a transceiver, a transmit/receive element. The RF sensing and radar capabilities may be built on an enhanced communication framework (e.g., antenna/processor/ memory/systems in infrastructure devices, base stations, UEs, WTRUs, stations, access points, or the like). WTRU may perform a JCS/radar-like measurement by transmitting a reference signal (e.g., SRS, DMRS, PTRS, similar signal) and estimating the associated backscatter channel, Wanuga: [0032]-[0033], [0037]-[0038], [0101], [0163]):
receive a sensing configuration from the NW node, the sensing configuration comprising a sensing measurement report configuration (WTRU may receive a measurement and reporting resource configuration from a gNB. the measurement and reporting configuration may include multiple sets of RS configurations for backscatter measurements along with multiple sets of reporting configurations, Wanuga: [0133]);
obtain a measurement result based on the sensing operation (WTRU may commence the backscatter measurement and blockage reporting following a time offset (e.g., 02) from receipt of the indication, Wanuga: [0133]-[0135]); and
transmit the measurement result to the NW node utilizing the sensing measurement report configuration (WTRU may send a measured value to the network. a measurement report containing the current measured value may be reported to the network (e.g., gNB/eNB/BS), Wanuga: [0142]).
Wanuga does not explicitly disclose:
cause the second set of transceiver units to perform a sensing operation for sensing and/or localizing the surrounding object in accordance with the received sensing configuration;
However, in the same field of endeavor, Stauffer teaches:
cause the second set of transceiver units to perform a sensing operation for sensing and/or localizing the surrounding object in accordance with the received sensing configuration (the radar system can transmit a radar signal using at least a portion of a licensed frequency band. By analyzing reflections from the radar signal, the radar system can detect and track an object, such as a user, a portion of the user (e.g., an appendage or body part), an animal, an inanimate object (e.g., a vehicle or an obstacle). The radar data can also be used by the radar system to improve probability of detection, improve location accuracy, improve object tracking, improve object orientation and shape estimation, Stauffer: [0026], [0061]);
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wanuga in view of Stauffer in order to further modify causing the second set of transceiver units to perform a sensing operation for sensing and/or localizing the surrounding object in accordance with the received sensing configuration from the teachings of Stauffer.
One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated because the radar system is integrated within the UE and the radar system can transmit a radar signal. The radar data can also be used by the radar system to improve probability of detection, improve location accuracy, improve object tracking, improve object
orientation and shape estimation (Stauffer: [0026], [0061).
Yet, Wanuga in view of Stauffer does not explicitly disclose:
wherein the sensing measurement report configuration comprises information about a coding rule to apply to the measurement result for transmission, and wherein the coding rule specifies that the measurement result is coded as an index according to a code book;
However, in the same field of endeavor, Huang teaches:
wherein the sensing measurement report configuration comprises information about a coding rule to apply to the measurement result for transmission, and wherein the coding rule specifies that the measurement result is coded as an index according to a code book (UE shall determine the set of resources to be reported to higher layers in sensing measurement. Sidelink Control information (SCI) decoding applied during sensing procedure provides at least information on sidelink resources indicated by the UE transmitting the SCI. TX data processor formats, codes, and interleaves the traffic data for each data stream based on a particular coding scheme selected for that data stream to provide coded data. The data rate, coding, and/or modulation for each data stream may be determined by instructions performed by processor. sidelink HARQ-ACK codebook is determined based upon slot index and/or pool index, with respect to FIG. 6, resource pool 1 is associated with a first sidelink assignment index and resource pool 2 is associated with a second sidelink assignment index. Huang: Fig. 6, [0025]-[0026], [0050], [0259], [0570]-[0573]);
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wanuga and Stauffer in view of Huang and in order to further modify the sensing measurement report configuration which comprises information about a coding rule to apply to the measurement result for transmission, and wherein the coding rule specifies that the measurement result is coded as an index according to a code book from the teachings of Huang.
One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated because the information of the sidelink HARQ-ACK codebook is arranged based upon the first sidelink assignment index and the second sidelink assignment index. The first UE determines (and/or derives) the order by ordering the plurality of occasions based upon slot indexes (Huang: [0577], [0636]).
Regarding claim 2, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the sensing measurement report configuration comprises information about radio resources, such as time resources, frequency resources and/or channel resources, to utilize for transmitting the measurement result to the NW node (The reference signal (RS) configuration may include a periodicity and offset, a repetition (the number of symbols or beams on which the RS may be transmitted repeatedly), a starting symbol and symbol offset (in case of non-contiguous symbols are allocated), a starting physical resource block (PRB), a number of PRBs, a PRB offset, an RE offset and RE density (number of REs per RB per port), a number of ports, power control parameters, and parameters to derive a unique WTRU RS sequence (e.g., sequence ID, cyclic prefix, etc.), Wanuga: [0107]).
Regarding claim 3, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the sensing measurement report configuration comprises information about which layer to utilize for transmitting the measurement result to the NW node (The gNB may signal the preferred/selected WTRU Tx beam using an appropriate downlink channel configuration (e.g., DCI) in the downlink common channel transmission (e.g., PDCCH), Wanuga: [0158]).
Regarding claim 4, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 3 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 3, wherein the sensing measurement report configuration specifies that the layer to utilize for transmitting the measurement result to the NW node is one or more of (reporting configuration may be communicated to the WTRU, for example, in RRC signaling (e.g., via an RRC configuration message) or system information, Wanuga: [0154]):
a radio resource control (RRC) layer (WTRU may send the measurement report using an uplink L3 message, for example, an RRC message, Wanuga: [0144]);
Regarding claim 5, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 4 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 4, wherein the sensing measurement report configuration specifies that the layer to utilize for transmitting the measurement result to the NW node is the RRC layer (The reporting configuration may be communicated to the WTRU (e.g., in an RRC configuration or system information). WTRU may send the measurement report using an uplink L3 message, for example, an RRC message, Wanuga: [0115], [0144]).
Regarding claim 8, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the measurement result is transmitted to the NW node in a control message (RS configuration may be communicated to the WTRU in RRC signaling (e.g., in an RRC configuration message), Wanuga: [0108]).
Regarding claim 9, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the sensing operation is a radar operation and the obtained measurement result is based on reception of a response signal, such as a radar signal reflection (target's bearing, or angular position relative to the radar, may be obtained from directional transmission of radar signals to isolate reflections from a limited direction of arrival, Wanuga: [0083]-[0084]).
Regarding claim 10, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the sensing operation is a backscatter operation and the obtained measurement result is based on a response signal received from a backscatter device (WTRU may measure received power of the backscatter; measure phase of the backscatter; estimate the channel impulse response of the backscatter and/or relevant parameters of channel impulse response, Wanuga: [0110]-[0112]).
Regarding claim 11, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the measurement result comprises a radio channel impulse response signal/message (WTRU may estimate the channel impulse response (h(t)) using an estimation algorithm, Wanuga: [0110], [0163]).
Regarding claim 12, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the measurement result comprises a response signal time spread and amplitude variation measure (WTRU may measure received power of the backscatter; measure phase of the backscatter; estimate the channel impulse response of the backscatter and/or relevant parameters of channel impulse response (e.g., round-trip time, delay spread, path-loss, etc.), Wanuga: [0110], [0163]).
Regarding claim 13, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the measurement result comprises a spatial direction of the response signal, such as a spatial direction of the radar signal reflection, preferably a spatial radio channel impulse response (beamforming may be used to transmit and/or receive signals in desired spatial directions, the sensing information including information indicating one or more blockage statistics associated with at least a portion of the plurality of spatial directions, Wanuga: [0022], Claim 21).
Regarding claim 14, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the measurement result comprises doppler, velocity or direction information associated with the surrounding object (the ability to determine bearing, or angular position of a target with respect to the transmitter, has been made available through directional transmission of radar signals. the estimation of a target's velocity from the target's Doppler frequency has become a fundamental function of radar systems, Wanuga: [0079]).
Regarding claim 15, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the measurement result comprises an object identifier, the object identifier determined based on a received response signal, such as a radar signal reflection (radar's ranging capability may refer to the radar system's ability to estimate the distance of the target to the radar receiver. WTRU may be configured to transmit reference signals (RSs) for the purpose of sensing (e.g., detection of objects in proximity). The measurements may indicate the detection of an object on beam, Wanuga: [0082], [0107], [0166]).
Regarding claim 16, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 1 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 1, wherein the measurement result comprises information related to a difference between a measurement from a previous radar operation and a corresponding measurement of the present radar operation (The measurement value change may refer to the absolute difference between the current measurement value (e.g., blockage rate or number of blocked beams measured based on the current measurement period) and the previously reported measurement value. WTRU may perform a JCS/radar-like measurement by transmitting a reference signal, Wanuga: [0128], [0163]).
Regarding claim 17, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 10 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 10, wherein the measurement result comprises one or more of an identifier for the backscatter device and a sensor value received from the backscatter device (WTRU may measure received power of the backscatter; measure phase of the backscatter; estimate the channel impulse response of the backscatter and/or relevant parameters of channel impulse response (e.g., round-trip time, delay spread, path-loss, etc.); and/or perform cross-correlation between the received backscatter and the sequence used to transmit the RSs, WTRU may be configured with an uplink RS configuration ( e.g., for the purpose of sensing only, or for the purpose of joint communication and sensing) for backscatter measurements corresponding to each of the Tx beams ( or SSB identifiers or indices), Wanuga: [0110], [0152] ).
Regarding claim 18, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 9 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 9, wherein the control unit is further configured to classify the object by comparing the received response signal with previously received response signals having assigned object identifiers to find a best match and wherein the object identifier corresponding to the best match is included in the measurement result (The underlying sensing modulation and waveform may be based on Frequency Modulated Continuous Wave (FMCW) technology, which may be used to separate RF reflections based on the distance of the reflecting objects. The micro-doppler and phase variation characteristics of the received signals may be detected by machine learning-based filtering methods, which may then be used to distinguish or detect the features of the objects, Wanuga: [0095]).
Regarding claim 19, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 8 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
The control unit of claim 8, wherein the control message is transmitted on one or more of a radio resource control (RRC) layer; a media access control, (MAC) layer; a physical (PHY) layer; and an Application layer (reporting configuration may be communicated to the WTRU (e.g., in an RRC configuration or system information). initial or default selection of one set of resources for RS transmission and one set of resources for blockage reporting may be communicated to the WTRU, for example in an RRC configuration, via a downlink MAC-CE message, or via downlink control information (DCI) transmitted over a downlink control channel, Wanuga: [0115], [0126], [0144]).
Regarding claim 21, Wanuga discloses:
A method of a control unit for a wireless device, the wireless device comprising a first and a second set of transceiver units being connectable to the control unit, the method comprising (WTRU may have multi-mode capabilities. the transceiver may include multiple transceivers for enabling the WTRU to communicate via multiple RATs. WTRU may include a processor, a transceiver, a transmit/receive element, Wanuga: [0032]-[0033], [0037]-[0038]):
controlling the first set of transceiver units to perform communication, utilizing a communication channel, with a network (NW) node (the transceiver may include multiple transceivers for enabling the WTRU to communicate via multiple RATs, such as NR and IEEE 802.11, Wanuga: [0037]);
receiving a sensing configuration from the NW node, the sensing configuration comprising a sensing measurement report configuration (WTRU may receive a measurement and reporting resource configuration from a gNB. the measurement and reporting configuration may include multiple sets of RS configurations for backscatter measurements along with multiple sets of reporting configurations, Wanuga: [0133]);
obtaining a measurement result based on the sensing operation (WTRU may commence the backscatter measurement and blockage reporting following a time offset (e.g., 02) from receipt of the indication, Wanuga: [0133]-[0135]); and
transmitting the measurement result to the NW node utilizing the sensing measurement report configuration (WTRU may send a measured value to the network. a measurement report containing the current measured value may be reported to the network (e.g., gNB/eNB/BS), Wanuga: [0142]).
Wanuga does not explicitly disclose:
controlling the second set of transceivers to perform a sensing operation for sensing and/or localizing a surrounding object in accordance with the received sensing configuration;
However, in the same field of endeavor, Stauffer teaches:
controlling the second set of transceivers to perform a sensing operation for sensing and/or localizing a surrounding object in accordance with the received sensing configuration (the radar system can transmit a radar signal using at least a portion of a licensed frequency band. By analyzing reflections from the radar signal, the radar system can detect and track an object, such as a user, a portion of the user (e.g., an appendage or body part), an animal, an inanimate object (e.g., a vehicle or an obstacle). The radar data can also be used by the radar system to improve probability of detection, improve location accuracy, improve object tracking, improve object orientation and shape estimation, Stauffer: [0026], [0061]);
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wanuga in view of Stauffer in order to further modify controlling the second set of transceivers to perform a sensing operation for sensing and/or localizing a surrounding object in accordance with the received sensing configuration from the teachings of Stauffer.
One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated because the radar system is integrated within the UE and the radar system can transmit a radar signal. The radar data can also be used by the radar system to improve probability of detection, improve location accuracy, improve object tracking, improve object orientation and shape estimation (Stauffer: [0026], [0061).
Yet, Wanuga in view of Stauffer does not explicitly disclose:
wherein the sensing measurement report configuration comprises information about a coding rule to apply to the measurement result for transmission, and wherein the coding rule specifies that the measurement result is coded as an index according to a code book;
However, in the same field of endeavor, Huang teaches:
wherein the sensing measurement report configuration comprises information about a coding rule to apply to the measurement result for transmission, and wherein the coding rule specifies that the measurement result is coded as an index according to a code book (UE shall determine the set of resources to be reported to higher layers in sensing measurement. Sidelink Control information (SCI) decoding applied during sensing procedure provides at least information on sidelink resources indicated by the UE transmitting the SCI. TX data processor formats, codes, and interleaves the traffic data for each data stream based on a particular coding scheme selected for that data stream to provide coded data. The data rate, coding, and/or modulation for each data stream may be determined by instructions performed by processor. sidelink HARQ-ACK codebook is determined based upon slot index and/or pool index, with respect to FIG. 6, resource pool 1 is associated with a first sidelink assignment index and resource pool 2 is associated with a second sidelink assignment index. Huang: Fig. 6, [0025]-[0026], [0050], [0259], [0570]-[0573]);
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wanuga and Stauffer in view of Huang and in order to further modify the sensing measurement report configuration which comprises information about a coding rule to apply to the measurement result for transmission, and wherein the coding rule specifies that the measurement result is coded as an index according to a code book from the teachings of Huang.
One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated because the information of the sidelink HARQ-ACK codebook is arranged based upon the first sidelink assignment index and the second sidelink assignment index. The first UE determines (and/or derives) the order by ordering the plurality of occasions based upon slot indexes (Huang: [0577], [0636]).
Regarding claim 22, Wanuga-Stauffe-Huang teaches all the claimed limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim 21 above.
Wanuga further discloses:
A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer readable medium , having thereon a computer program comprising program instructions, the computer program being loadable into a data processing unit configured to cause execution of the method of claim 21 when the computer program is run by the data processing unit (the methods described herein may be implemented in a computer program, software, or firmware incorporated in a computer-readable medium for execution by a computer or processor. Examples of computer-readable media include electronic signals (transmitted over wired or wireless connections) and computer-readable storage media, Wanuga: [0175]).
Conclusion
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 extension fee 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.
In the case of amendments, applicant is respectfully requested to indicate the portion(s) of the specification which dictate(s) the structure relied on for proper interpretation and support, for ascertaining the metes and bounds of the claimed invention.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should
be directed to SANG C LEE whose telephone number is (703)756-1461. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 9:00AM-5:00PM ET.
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, HASSAN PHILLIPS can be reached on (571)272-3940. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/S.C.L./Examiner, Art Unit 2467
/HASSAN A PHILLIPS/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2467
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