DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
1. 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.
2. Claims 1, 2, 9, 28 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Haija (US PG Pub. No. 2022/0014935) in view of NPL (Titled: Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface Assisted Device-to-Device Communications, May 05, 2021).
As per claim 1:
Haija teaches a receiving user equipment (UE) for wireless communication (see Figure 3A, electronic device (ED) 110), comprising:
one or more memories (see Figure 3A, memory 208);
and one or more processors, coupled to the one or more memories (see Figure 3A, processing unit 200 coupled to memory 208), configured to:
transmit a first measurement that is based at least in part on a first reference signal, from a base station, that is to be reflected via a passive device (see paragraph [0158], the UE 706 measures 725 the redirected reference signals and then the UE 706 then transmits 730 feedback to the base station 702 and/or toward the RIS 704 so that the RIS would reflect the feedback to the base station. The UE 706 may also send the feedback to the base station 702 via direct link, please see paragraph [0159]);
and transmit a second measurement that is based at least in part on a second reference signal, from a transmitting UE, that is to be reflected via the passive device (see paragraph [0113], in response to receiving UE1’s reference signals reflected by RIS, UE2 performs measurements and feed the measurements back to the base station or the base station and UE1. The base station then determines the AoA at RIS and configures the RIS to perform reflection to increase the gain of the signal from the UE1 to UE2).
Haija does not teach and a third reference signal from the transmitting UE.
NPL teaches and a third reference signal from the transmitting UE (see page 2795, Col 1, lines 16-26, explicitly states: “More precisely, the BS/user ti can send pilot signals to the user ri, and estimate the user-RIS-BS cascaded channel and the user-BS direct channel or the user-RIS-user cascaded channel and the user-user direct channel based on the feedback from the user ri”. In other words, the feedback from user ri to the BS or user ti includes feedback measurements related to user-to-user direct channel, user-RIS-BS cascaded channel and user-BS direct channel as well).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the reporting of feedback measurements between users, BS and RIS (as disclosed in NPL) into Haija as a way of mitigating the interference and improving system performance (please see page 2800, Col 1, lines 9-17 of NPL). Therefore, by configuring the RIS based on the measurement feedback helps to eliminate D2D interference and also fulfill demanding data rates (please see page 2792 of Col 2 under introduction of NPL).
As per claim 2:
Haija in view of NPL teaches the receiving UE of claim 1.
Haija does not teach wherein the third reference signal is not reflected via the passive device.
NPL teaches wherein the third reference signal is not reflected via the passive device (see page 2795, Col 1, lines 16-26, the feedback measurement includes user-user direct channel).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the reporting of feedback measurements between users, BS and RIS (as disclosed in NPL) into Haija as a way of mitigating the interference and improving system performance (please see page 2800, Col 1, lines 9-17 of NPL). Therefore, by configuring the RIS based on the measurement feedback helps to eliminate D2D interference and also fulfill demanding data rates (please see page 2792 of Col 2 under introduction of NPL).
As per claim 9:
Haija teaches a transmitting user equipment (UE) for wireless communication (see Figure 3A, electronic device (ED) 110), comprising:
one or more memories (see Figure 3A, memory 208);
and one or more processors, coupled to the one or more memories (see Figure 3A, processing unit 200 coupled to memory 208), configured to:
transmit a first measurement that is based at least in part on a first reference
signal, from a base station, that is reflected via a passive device (see paragraph [0158], the UE 706 measures 725 the redirected reference signals and then the UE 706 then transmits 730 feedback to the base station 702 and/or toward the RIS 704 so that the RIS would reflect the feedback to the base station. The UE 706 may also send the feedback to the base station 702 via direct link, please see paragraph [0159]);
transmit, in connection with a request from the base station, a second reference signal, to a receiving UE, that is to be reflected via the passive device (see paragraph [0113], the base station configures the RIS to reflect UE1’s reference signals to UE2. Then UE2 performs measurements and feeds the measurements back to the base station or the base station and UE1).
Haija does not teach and transmit, in connection with the request, a third reference signal to the receiving UE.
NPL teaches and transmit, in connection with the request, a third reference signal to the receiving UE (see page 2795, Col 1, lines 16-26, explicitly states: “More precisely, the BS/user ti can send pilot signals to the user ri, and estimate the user-RIS-BS cascaded channel and the user-BS direct channel or the user-RIS-user cascaded channel and the user-user direct channel based on the feedback from the user ri”. In other words, the feedback from user ri to the BS or user ti includes feedback measurements related to user-to-user direct channel, user-RIS-BS cascaded channel and user-BS direct channel as well).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the reporting of feedback measurements between users, BS and RIS (as disclosed in NPL) into Haija as a way of mitigating the interference and improving system performance (please see page 2800, Col 1, lines 9-17 of NPL). Therefore, by configuring the RIS based on the measurement feedback helps to eliminate D2D interference and also fulfill demanding data rates (please see page 2792 of Col 2 under introduction of NPL).
As per claim 28:
Haija teaches a method of wireless communication performed by a transmitting user
equipment (UE) (see abstract), comprising:
transmitting a first measurement that is based at least in part on a first reference signal, from a base station, that is reflected via a passive device (see paragraph [0158], the UE 706 measures 725 the redirected reference signals and then the UE 706 then transmits 730 feedback to the base station 702 and/or toward the RIS 704 so that the RIS would reflect the feedback to the base station. The UE 706 may also send the feedback to the base station 702 via direct link, please see paragraph [0159]);
transmitting, in connection with a request from the base station, a second reference
signal, to a receiving UE, that is to be reflected via the passive device (see paragraph [0113], in response to receiving UE1’s reference signals reflected by RIS, UE2 performs measurements and feed the measurements back to the base station or the base station and UE1. The base station then determines the AoA at RIS and configures the RIS to perform reflection to increase the gain of the signal from the UE1 to UE2).
Haija does not teach and transmitting, in connection with the request, a third reference signal to the receiving UE.
NPL teaches and transmitting, in connection with the request, a third reference signal to the receiving UE (see page 2795, Col 1, lines 16-26, explicitly states: “More precisely, the BS/user ti can send pilot signals to the user ri, and estimate the user-RIS-BS cascaded channel and the user-BS direct channel or the user-RIS-user cascaded channel and the user-user direct channel based on the feedback from the user ri”. In other words, the feedback from user ri to the BS or user ti includes feedback measurements related to user-to-user direct channel, user-RIS-BS cascaded channel and user-BS direct channel as well).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the reporting of feedback measurements between users, BS and RIS (as disclosed in NPL) into Haija as a way of mitigating the interference and improving system performance (please see page 2800, Col 1, lines 9-17 of NPL). Therefore, by configuring the RIS based on the measurement feedback helps to eliminate D2D interference and also fulfill demanding data rates (please see page 2792 of Col 2 under introduction of NPL).
3. Claim 14 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Haija in view of NPL and further in view of Saily (US PG Pub. No. 2024/0340942).
As per claim 14:
Haija teaches a base station for wireless communication (see Figure 3B, paragraph [0075], base station 170), comprising:
one or more memories (see Figure 3B, memory 258);
and one or more processors, coupled to the one or more memories (see Figure 3B, memory 258 coupled to processing unit 250), configured to:
transmit, to a transmitting user equipment (UE), a first reference signal that is to
be reflected via a passive device (see paragraph [0158], the UE 706 measures 725 the redirected reference signals and then the UE 706 then transmits 730 feedback to the base station 702 and/or toward the RIS 704 so that the RIS would reflect the feedback to the base station. The UE 706 may also send the feedback to the base station 702 via direct link, please see paragraph [0159]) and a request for the transmitting UE to transmit, to a receiving UE, a second reference signal that is to be reflected via the passive device (see paragraph [0113], in response to receiving UE1’s reference signals reflected by RIS, UE2 performs measurements and feed the measurements back to the base station or the base station and UE1. The base station then determines the AoA at RIS and configures the RIS to perform reflection to increase the gain of the signal from the UE1 to UE2).
Haija does not teach transmit, to the receiving UE, a third reference signal that is to be reflected via the passive device;
receive a first measurement from the transmitting UE for the first reference signal,
a second measurement from the receiving UE for the second reference signal.
NPL teaches transmit, to the receiving UE, a third reference signal that is to be reflected via the passive device (see page 2795 Col 1, lines 6-26, the base station sends pilot signals to users with transceiver capability via the BS-RIS-user channel and thus first and third reference signals. Each respective user also sends pilot signals to a peer/receiving user using the user-RIS-user channel and thus a second reference signal);
receive a first measurement from the transmitting UE for the first reference signal,
a second measurement from the receiving UE for the second reference signal (see page 2795, Col 1, lines 6-26, each user feeds back all measurements on the BS-RIS-user channel to the BS. The respective users also feedback measurements on the user-user channel back to the BS) .
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the reporting of feedback measurements between users, BS and RIS (as disclosed in NPL) into Haija as a way of mitigating the interference and improving system performance (please see page 2800, Col 1, lines 9-17 of NPL). Therefore, by configuring the RIS based on the measurement feedback helps to eliminate D2D interference and also fulfill demanding data rates (please see page 2792 of Col 2 under introduction of NPL).
The combination of Haija and NPL do not clearly teach transmit a scheduling message to the transmitting UE or the receiving UE that is based at least in part on the first measurement, the second measurement, and the third measurement.
Saily teaches transmit a scheduling message to the transmitting UE or the receiving UE that is based at least in part on the first measurement, the second measurement, and the third measurement (see paragraphs [0034], [0038], the UE reports SL signal measurements regarding SL signals passively reflected off an object as well as report on the UE-gNB link. The gNB, in turn, sends message to the UE supporting SL communication to perform corrective action, e.g., to improve the radio network performance of the UE. Example of such corrective action includes: scheduling resources for uplink or downlink, handover to a different network node and a change in a modulation node).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to incorporate the reporting of SL and gNB-UE link measurements to the network node (as disclosed in Saily) into both Haija and NPL as a way of improving the radio performance for the UE (please see paragraph [00338] of Saily).
4. Claims 3, 6, 11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Haija in view of NPL and further in view of Wu (US PG Pub. No. 2022/0248418).
As per claim 3:
Haija in view of NPL teaches the receiving UE of claim 1 with the exception of:
wherein the one or more processors are configured to determine the second measurement based at least in part on subtracting the third reference signal from the second reference signal.
Wu teaches wherein the one or more processors are configured to determine the second measurement based at least in part on subtracting the third reference signal from the second reference signal (see paragraph [0378], the first pathloss is a difference value obtained by subtracting a transmitting power of the first reference signal from a receiving power of the first reference signal and a second pathloss is a difference value obtained by subtracting a transmitting power of the first reference signal from a receiving power of the first reference signal).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to incorporate the first and second pathloss obtained from the respective reference signals (as disclosed in Wu) into both Haija and NPL as a way of determining the transmitting power of the given resource block (please see paragraph [0357] of Wu).
As per claim 6:
Haija in view of NPL teaches the receiving UE of claim 1 with the exception of:
wherein the first measurement is a first path loss measurement and the second measurement is a second path loss measurement.
Wu teaches wherein the first measurement is a first path loss measurement and the second measurement is a second path loss measurement (see paragraph [0378], the first pathloss is a difference value obtained by subtracting a transmitting power of the first reference signal from a receiving power of the first reference signal and a second pathloss is a difference value obtained by subtracting a transmitting power of the first reference signal from a receiving power of the first reference signal).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to incorporate the first and second pathloss obtained from the respective reference signals (as disclosed in Wu) into both Haija and NPL as a way of determining the transmitting power of the given resource block (please see paragraph [0357] of Wu).
As per claim 11:
Haija in view of NPL teaches the transmitting UE of claim 9 with the exception of:
wherein the first measurement is a first path loss measurement.
Wu teaches wherein the first measurement is a first path loss measurement (see paragraph [0378], the first pathloss is a difference value obtained by subtracting a transmitting power of the first reference signal from a receiving power of the first reference signal and a second pathloss is a difference value obtained by subtracting a transmitting power of the first reference signal from a receiving power of the first reference signal).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to incorporate the first and second pathloss obtained from the respective reference signals (as disclosed in Wu) into both Haija and NPL as a way of determining the transmitting power of the given resource block (please see paragraph [0357] of Wu).
5. Claims 4, 5, 10 and 29 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Haija in view of NPL and further in view of Wang (US Patent No. 8,929,353).
As per claim 4:
Haija in view of NPL teaches the receiving UE of claim 1 with the exception of:
wherein the third reference signal is received in a different slot or symbol than the second reference signal.
Wang teaches wherein the third reference signal is received in a different slot or symbol than the second reference signal (see Col 1, lines 55-64, the base station may send the first, second and third TDM pilots in the first, second and third time intervals respectively in a preamble that is transmitted periodically).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the sending of pilot signals at different time intervals (as disclosed in Wang) into both Haija and NPL as a way of enabling the terminal to reduce acquisition complexity and improve detection performance for the terminal (please see Col 4, lines 53-63 of Wang).
As per claim 5:
Haija in view of NPL teaches the receiving UE of claim 1 with the exception of:
wherein the one or more processors are configured to identify the third reference signal based at least in part on the second reference signal being marked differently than the third reference signal.
Wang teaches wherein the one or more processors are configured to identify the third reference signal based at least in part on the second reference signal being marked differently than the third reference signal (see Col 10, lines 10-24, a detected value V1 for M1 information bits are detected in TDM pilot 1. Detected value V1 and a hypothesized value m for the M2 new bits sent in TDM pilot 2 and different set of values in TDM pilot 3).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the sending of pilot signals at different time intervals (as disclosed in Wang) into both Haija and NPL as a way of enabling the terminal to reduce acquisition complexity and improve detection performance for the terminal (please see Col 4, lines 53-63 of Wang).
Claims 10 and 29 are rejected in the same scope as claim 4.
6. Claims 7, 8, 12, 13, 30, 31 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Haija in view of NPL and further in view of Jang (US PG Pub. No. 2020/0204232).
As per claim 7:
Haija in view of NPL teaches the receiving UE of claim 1 with the exception of:
wherein the first measurement is a first rank determination and the second measurement is a second rank determination.
Jang teaches wherein the first measurement is a first rank determination and the second measurement is a second rank determination (see paragraph [0009] disclose channel capacities for each rank on the basis of the obtained eigen value).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the extraction of the rank of each channel capacity on the basis of the eigen value (as disclosed in Jang) into both Haija and NPL as a way of maximizing the data transmission rate at a low cost (please see paragraph [0008] of Jang).
As per claim 8:
Haija in view of NPL and further in view of Jang teaches the receiving UE of claim 7.
Haija and NPL do not teach wherein the one or more processors are configured to determine the first rank determination or the second rank determination based at
least in part on a threshold ratio of eigenvalues.
Jang teaches wherein the one or more processors are configured to determine the first rank determination or the second rank determination based at
least in part on a threshold ratio of eigenvalues (see paragraph [0035], disclose approximating the channel capacity of each rank so that the eigenvalue is always maintained the same ratio regardless of an AGC operation reference point).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the extraction of the rank of each channel capacity on the basis of the eigen value (as disclosed in Jang) into both Haija and NPL as a way of maximizing the data transmission rate at a low cost (please see paragraph [0008] of Jang).
As per claim 12:
Haija in view of NPL teaches the transmitting UE of claim 9 with the exception of:
wherein the first measurement is a first rank determination.
Jang teaches wherein the first measurement is a first rank determination (see paragraph [0009] disclose channel capacities for each rank on the basis of the obtained eigen value).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the extraction of the rank of each channel capacity on the basis of the eigen value (as disclosed in Jang) into both Haija and NPL as a way of maximizing the data transmission rate at a low cost (please see paragraph [0008] of Jang).
As per claim 13:
Haija in view of NPL and further in view of Jang teaches the transmitting UE of claim 12.
Haija and NPL do not teach wherein the one or more processors are configured to determine the first rank determination based at least in part on a threshold ratio
of eigenvalues.
Jang teaches wherein the one or more processors are configured to determine the first rank determination based at least in part on a threshold ratio
of eigenvalues (see paragraph [0035], disclose approximating the channel capacity of each rank so that the eigenvalue is always maintained a the same ratio regardless of an AGC operation reference point).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the extraction of the rank of each channel capacity on the basis of the eigen value (as disclosed in Jang) into both Haija and NPL as a way of maximizing the data transmission rate at a low cost (please see paragraph [0008] of Jang).
Claim 30 is rejected in the same scope as claim 12.
Claim 31 is rejected in the same scope as claim 13.
7. Claim 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Haija in view of NPL and further in view of Saily and Papasakellariou (US PG Pub. No. 2018/0310257).
As per claim 15:
Haija in view of NPL and further in view of Saily teaches the base station of claim 14 with the exception of:
wherein the first measurement is a first path loss measurement, the second measurement is a second path loss measurement, and the third measurement is a third path loss measurement.
Papasakellariou teaches wherein the first measurement is a first path loss measurement, the second measurement is a second path loss measurement, and the third measurement is a third path loss measurement (see paragraph [0155], discloses obtaining first, second and third pathloss measurements for the respective beam pairs).
Thus, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to implement the first, second and third pathloss measurements (as disclosed in Papasakellariou) into Haija, NPL, and Saily as a way of compensating for transmission/reception not omnidirectional (see paragraph [0154] of Papasakellariou).
Allowable Subject Matter
8. Claims 16-23 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
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PRINCE AKWASI MENSAH whose telephone number is (571)270-7183. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Fri 8:00am-4:00pm.
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, MICHAEL THIER can be reached at 571-272-2832. 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.
PRINCE AKWASI. MENSAH
Examiner
Art Unit 2474
/PRINCE A MENSAH/Examiner, Art Unit 2474
/Michael Thier/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2474
Prosecution Insights