DETAILED ACTION
This communication is responsive to Application #18/404,909 filed 1/5/2024. Claims 1-20 are subject to examination.
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 Objections
Claims 1, 3-7, 10, 13, are objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 1 recites the acronyms “PDCCH”, “RS”, “PCI”, “RRC”, and “RNTI”
Claim 3 recites the acronym “C-RNTI”
Claim 4 recites the acronym “CORESET”
Claim 5 recites the acronyms “TCI”, “CSI-RS”, and “SSB”
Claim 6 recites the acronym “MAC CE”
Claim 7 recites the abbreviation “TCI State ID”
Claim 10 recites the acronym “USS”
Claim 13 recites the acronym “TAG”
In each instance, the abbreviation or acronym needs to be defined at least where mentioned for the first time. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 1 is further objected to because of the following informalities:
The fourth limitation of the claim recites “discarding monitoring the first PDCCH”. For the sake of clarity, the Examiner suggests amending this limitation to read “discarding monitoring of the first PDCCH”.
The final limitation of the claim recites “the source identity and the target identity are respectively an RNTI”. However, the previous limitation states “the source identity and the target identity are different”. For the sake of clarity, the Examiner suggests amending this limitation to read “the source identity and the target identity are Radio Network Temporary Identifiers (RNTIs)”.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 19 is objected to because of the following informalities:
The final limitation of the claim recites “the source identity and the target identity are respectively an RNTI”. However, the previous limitation states “the source identity and the target identity are different”. For the sake of clarity, the Examiner suggests amending this limitation to read “the source identity and the target identity are RNTIs”.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 20 is objected to because of the following informalities:
The fourth limitation of the claim recites “the first PDCCH is discarded to be monitored”. For the sake of clarity, the Examiner suggests amending this limitation to read “monitoring of the first PDCCH is discarded”.
The final limitation of the claim recites “the source identity and the target identity are respectively an RNTI”. However, the previous limitation states “the source identity and the target identity are different”. For the sake of clarity, the Examiner suggests amending this limitation to read “the source identity and the target identity are RNTIs”.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 3, 6, 12, 14, and 16-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Regarding Claim 3, claim 3 recites the limitation “the first signaling comprises a timer T304.” This limitation renders the claim indefinite as it is unclear whether “a timer T304” refers to the RRC timer T304 for managing handover that is specified in an RRC Connection Reconfiguration message, or merely a generic timer identified in the spec as “a timer T304”. For the purposes of examination, it is assumed that “T304” is intended to mean the RRC-specific handover timer.
Regarding Claim 6, claim 6 recites the limitation “the second signaling is generated at the MAC layer”. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Regarding Claims 12, 14, 16, and 18, the claims each recite the limitation “as a response to the behavior of receiving a second signaling ...” This limitation renders the claim indefinite as it is unclear whether “a second signaling” refers to “the second signaling” previously mentioned in claim 1.
Regarding Claim 16, claim 16 recites the limitation “the first counter being maintained at the MAC layer”. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Regarding Claim 17, claim 17 recites the limitation “the first counter” in the first paragraph. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. For the purposes of examination, it is assumed that claim 17 is intended to depend on claim 16, which recites “a first counter”.
Regarding Claim 18, claim 18 recites the limitation “the first timer is maintained at the MAC layer”. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Regarding Claim 19, claim 19 recites the limitation “wherein as a response to the second signaling being received, a second PDCCH is monitored and the first PDCCH is discarded to be monitored”. However, the claim previously only mentions “transmitting a second signaling” and “transmitting a first PDCCH”, not receiving a second signaling or monitoring a first PDCCH. The recited functions of “the second signaling being received, a second PDCCH is monitored and the first PDCCH is discarded to be monitored” do not follow from the structure recited in the claim, i.e., a second transmitter, so it is unclear whether the functions require some other structure.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
Claims 1-8, 11, 14-15, and 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kung et al. (US 2022/0030480 A1, hereinafter “Kung”) in view of Zhu et al. (US 2022/0360314 A1, hereinafter “Zhu”) and Wang et al. (US 2015/0334747 A1, hereinafter “Wang”).
Regarding Claims 1 and 20, Kung teaches a first node for wireless communications, comprising: a first receiver, receiving a first signaling, the first signaling indicating a target identity (Kung: The first information may indicate C-RNTI for the UE. The C-RNTI may be used (by the UE, for example) for the second cell (e.g., the C-RNTI may be used for communication with the second cell), see paragraph [0311]; the RNTI value may be provided (to the UE 902, for example) by the Source Cell 906 ... via the RRC message (transmitted at 908), see paragraph [0347]);
monitoring a first PDCCH (Kung: At 918, the Source Cell 906 may trigger and/or initiate a procedure ... via transmitting a signaling to the UE 902 ... The signaling may be transmitted via PDCCH, see paragraph [0345]);
receiving a second signaling, the second signaling being used to indicate a second PCI (Kung: At 918, the Source Cell 906 may trigger and/or initiate a procedure ... via transmitting a signaling to the UE 902 ... The signaling may indicate a cell identity of the Target Cell 904 (e.g., a serving cell index and/or a physical cell identity, such as PhysCellId and/or PCI), see paragraph [0345]);
as a response to the behavior of receiving the second signaling, monitoring a second PDCCH and discarding monitoring the first PDCCH, the second PDCCH being associated with a second downlink RS resource, and the second downlink RS resource being associated with the second PCI (Kung: the signaling may comprise an indicator ... indicating that the UE 902 may perform ... mobility procedure on the Target Cell 904 in response to receiving the signaling. At 920, in response to receiving the signaling, the UE 902 may monitor one or more downlink channels (e.g., PDCCH and/or PDSCH) for downlink reception from the Target Cell 904, see paragraph [0346]; the second information may indicate one or more TCI state IDs and/or one or more reference signal indexes associated with downlink reception (e.g., PDSCH reception and/or PDCCH reception) from the second cell for the UE, see paragraph [0296]); *Examiner’s Note: the UE performing a mobility procedure to the target cell constitutes “discarding monitoring [of] the first PDCCH”.
wherein the first signaling comprises an RRC message (Kung: At 908, the Source Cell 906 transmits a RRC message comprising one or more configurations associated with a Target Cell 904, see paragraph [0340]);
the second signaling comprises a signaling below the RRC layer (Kung: At 918, the Source Cell 906 may trigger and/or initiate a procedure (e.g., a Layer-1 (L1) and/or Layer-2 (L2) handover (HO) procedure and/or a mobility procedure) via transmitting a signaling to the UE 902 ... the signaling may be a MAC CE, see paragraph [0345]);
and the target identity is an RNTI (Kung: The first information may indicate C-RNTI for the UE. The C-RNTI may be used (by the UE, for example) for the second cell (e.g., the C-RNTI may be used for communication with the second cell), see paragraph [0311]).
Kung does not explicitly teach the first PDCCH being associated with a first downlink RS resource, the first downlink RS resource being associated with a first PCI;
the first PDCCH uses a source identity for scrambling;
the second PDCCH uses the target identity for scrambling;
the source identity and the target identity are different; and
and the source identity is an RNTI.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Zhu teaches the first PDCCH being associated with a first downlink RS resource, the first downlink RS resource being associated with a first PCI (Zhu: the BFD RS resources in each BFD RS beam ... could correspond to periodic 1-port CSI-RS resources/CSI-RS resource configuration indexes ... with same values as the QCL-TypeD source RS indexes indicated in active TCI states for PDCCH reception in respective CORESETs that the UE uses for monitoring the PDCCH(s), wherein one or more of the active TCI states for PDCCH reception or one or more of the respective CORESETs could be associated with/linked to a PCI (e.g., corresponding to either the serving cell PCI or a non-serving cell PCI), see paragraph [0323]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung to include the features as taught by Zhu above in order to configure the UE for inter-cell operation (Zhu: see paragraph [0123]).
Kung-Zhu does not explicitly teach the first PDCCH uses a source identity for scrambling;
the second PDCCH uses the target identity for scrambling;
the source identity and the target identity are different; and
and the source identity is an RNTI.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Wang teaches the first PDCCH uses a source identity for scrambling (Wang: the request message includes a first cell radio network temporary identifier C-RNTI used in the first wireless communication node by the UE ... the method further includes: scrambling ... the PDCCH message by using the first C-RNTI and a first physical cell identifier PCI of the first wireless communication node, see paragraph [0010]);
the second PDCCH uses the target identity for scrambling (Wang: the request response includes a second C-RNTI that is allocated by the second wireless communication node to the UE ... the method further includes: scrambling ... the PDCCH message by using the second C-RNTI and a second PCI of the second wireless communication node, see paragraph [0013]);
the source identity and the target identity are different (Wang: receiving, by the second wireless communication node, a C-RNTI set ... that is to be allocated by the second wireless communication node to the UE for use, where the C-RNTI set does not include the first C-RNTI, see paragraph [0012]); and
and the source identity is an RNTI (Wang; the request message includes a first cell radio network temporary identifier C-RNTI used in the first wireless communication node by the UE, see paragraph [0010]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung-Zhu to include the features as taught by Wang above in order to avoid addressing messages to the wrong UE (Wang: see paragraph [0143]).
Regarding Claim 2, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, wherein the first signaling is used to configure a candidate cell (Kung: The first information may indicate cell information of one or more cells (comprising the second cell, for example) ... The one or more cells may be (and/or may comprise) one or more candidate cells of one or more mobility procedures for the UE. The cell information (of the one or more cells comprising the second cell) may be indicative of one or more cell configurations of the one or more cells, see paragraph [0307]);
the first signaling comprises an RRCReconfiguration message (Kung: At 908, the Source Cell 906 transmits a RRC message comprising one or more configurations associated with a Target Cell 904 ... The RRC message may be a RRCReconfiguration message, see paragraph [0340]).
Regarding Claim 3, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, wherein the second PCI is used to identify a second cell (Kung: The signaling may indicate a cell identity of the Target Cell 904 (e.g., a serving cell index and/or a physical cell identity, such as PhysCellId and/or PCI), see paragraph [0345]);
the first signaling comprises a C-RNTI of the first node in the second cell, the C-RNTI is the target identity (Kung: The first information may indicate C-RNTI for the UE. The C-RNTI may be used (by the UE, for example) for the second cell (e.g., the C-RNTI may be used for communication with the second cell), see paragraph [0311]).
Zhu further teaches the first PCI is different from the second PCI (Zhu: In the present disclosure, the non-serving cell(s) or the non-serving cell TRP(s) could have/broadcast different physical cell IDs (PCIs) ... from that of the serving cell or the serving cell TRP (i.e., the serving cell PCI), see paragraph [0106]).
The rationale and motivation for adding the teaching of Zhu is the same as the rationale and motivation for Claim 1.
Regarding Claim 4, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1.
Zhu further teaches the first PDCCH being associated with a first downlink RS resource comprises: the first PDCCH is associated with a CORESET, and the CORESET comprises the first downlink RS resource (Zhu: the BFD RS resources in each BFD RS beam ... could correspond to periodic 1-port CSI-RS resources/CSI-RS resource configuration indexes ... with same values as the QCL-TypeD source RS indexes indicated in active TCI states for PDCCH reception in respective CORESETs that the UE uses for monitoring the PDCCH(s), see paragraph [0323]);
the second PDCCH is associated with a second downlink RS resource comprises: the second PDCCH is associated with a CORESET, and the CORESET comprises the second downlink RS resource (Zhu: the BFD RS resources in each BFD RS beam ... could correspond to periodic 1-port CSI-RS resources/CSI-RS resource configuration indexes ... with same values as the QCL-TypeD source RS indexes indicated in active TCI states for PDCCH reception in respective CORESETs that the UE uses for monitoring the PDCCH(s), see paragraph [0323]).
The rationale and motivation for adding the teaching of Zhu is the same as the rationale and motivation for Claim 1.
Regarding Claim 5, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, wherein the second downlink RS resource corresponds to a TCI state identity (Kung: the second information may indicate one or more TCI state IDs and/or one or more reference signal indexes associated with downlink reception (e.g., PDSCH reception and/or PDCCH reception) from the second cell for the UE, see paragraph [0296]);
the second downlink RS resource comprises an SSB indexed by SSB-Index (Kung: the second information may comprise one or more reference signal indexes (e.g., Synchronization Signal Block (SSB)-Index and/or CSI-RS-Index) associated with the second cell, see paragraph [0313]).
Zhu further teaches the first downlink RS resource corresponds to a TCI state identity (Zhu: a SSB resource/SSB resource index could be configured as a QCL source RS in a TCI state, and the corresponding TCI state ID/index could be indicated in the parameter ... configuring a periodic 1-port CSI-RS resource, see paragraph [0215]);
the first downlink RS resource comprises an SSB indexed by SSB-Index (Zhu: a SSB resource/SSB resource index could be configured as a QCL source RS in a TCI state, and the corresponding TCI state ID/index could be indicated in the parameter ... configuring a periodic 1-port CSI-RS resource, see paragraph [0215]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung to include the features as taught by Zhu above in order to control activation and RS resources (Zhu: see paragraph [0122]).
Regarding Claim 6, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, wherein the second signaling comprises a MAC CE (Kung: At 918, the Source Cell 906 may trigger and/or initiate a procedure (e.g., a Layer-1 (L1) and/or Layer-2 (L2) handover (HO) procedure and/or a mobility procedure) via transmitting a signaling to the UE 902. ... the signaling may be a MAC CE, see paragraph [0345]);
the phrase that the second signaling comprises a signaling below the RRC layer comprises: the second signaling is generated at the MAC layer (Kung: the signaling may be a MAC CE, see paragraph [0345]).
Regarding Claim 7, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, wherein the second signaling comprises a TCI State ID field, the TCI State ID field is used to indicate a TCI state, and the TCI state is associated with the second downlink RS resource (Kung: the second information may indicate one or more TCI state IDs and/or one or more reference signal indexes associated with downlink reception (e.g., PDSCH reception and/or PDCCH reception) from the second cell for the UE. In response to receiving the second information, the UE may monitor and/or listen to downlink transmission, from the second cell, associated with one or more TCI states indicated by the second information ... and/or associated with one or more reference signals indicated by the second information, see paragraph [0296]);
wherein the second downlink RS resource is associated with the second PCI (Kung: The second information may indicate an identity of the second cell ... The identity may be a physical cell identity (e.g., PhysCellId and/or PCI) and/or a serving cell index of the second cell ... the second information may comprise one or more reference signal indexes (e.g., Synchronization Signal Block (SSB)-Index and/or CSI-RS-Index) associated with the second cell, see paragraphs [0312]-[0313]).
Regarding Claim 8, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, wherein the second signaling comprises a first field, the first field indicates the second PCI, the first field is set as a first configuration index, the first configuration index corresponds to a cell identified by the second PCI, and the first configuration index is a non-negative integer (Kung: The second information may indicate an identity of the second cell ... The identity may be a physical cell identity (e.g., PhysCellId and/or PCI) ... of the second cell, see paragraph [0312]; the first information may comprise and/or indicate a set of one or more SR configurations associated with the second cell. The second information may comprise and/or indicate a SR configuration (e.g., the second information may indicate the SR configuration via indicating a SR index), of the set of one or more SR configurations (indicated by the first information, for example), to the UE, see paragraph [0285]; the SR may be triggered according to the SR configuration based on a determination that an index associated with the SR configuration is index 0, see paragraph [0289]).
Regarding Claim 11, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, wherein when the first signaling is received, a configuration in the first signaling is not applied, and when the second signaling is received, a configuration in the first signaling is applied (Kung: the first information may comprise and/or indicate a set of one or more SR configurations associated with the second cell. The second information may comprise and/or indicate a SR configuration ... of the set of one or more SR configurations (indicated by the first information, for example), to the UE. The UE may trigger a SR based on the SR configuration indicated by the second information, see paragraph [0285]).
Regarding Claim 14, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, comprising: the first receiver, as a response to the behavior of receiving a second signaling, setting a C-RNTI as the target identity (Kung: At 910, the Source Cell 906 may transmit a message, to the Target Cell 904, providing information (e.g., UE information) of the UE 902 (e.g., the information may comprise a C-RNTI for the UE 902 ... for the Target Cell 904) ... At 918, the Source Cell 906 may trigger and/or initiate a procedure (e.g., a Layer-1 (L1) and/or Layer-2 (L2) handover (HO) procedure and/or a mobility procedure) via transmitting a signaling to the UE 902 ... At 920, in response to receiving the signaling, the UE 902 may monitor one or more downlink channels (e.g., PDCCH and/or PDSCH) for downlink reception from the Target Cell 904, see paragraphs [0341]-[0346]).
Regarding Claim 15, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, wherein the target identity is a C-RNTI of the first node in the cell identified by the second PCI (Kung: The first information may indicate C-RNTI for the UE. The C-RNTI may be used (by the UE, for example) for the second cell (e.g., the C-RNTI may be used for communication with the second cell), see paragraph [0311]).
Wang further teaches the source identity is a C-RNTI of the first node in the cell identified by the first PCI (Wang: the request message includes a first cell radio network temporary identifier C-RNTI used in the first wireless communication node by the UE ... the method further includes: scrambling ... the PDCCH message by using the first C-RNTI and a first physical cell identifier PCI of the first wireless communication node, see paragraph [0010]).
The rationale and motivation for adding the teaching of Zhu is the same as the rationale and motivation for Claim 1.
Regarding Claim 19, Kung teaches a second node for wireless communications, comprising: a second transmitter, transmitting a first signaling, the first signaling indicating a target identity (Kung: The first information may indicate C-RNTI for the UE. The C-RNTI may be used (by the UE, for example) for the second cell (e.g., the C-RNTI may be used for communication with the second cell), see paragraph [0311]; the RNTI value may be provided (to the UE 902, for example) by the Source Cell 906 ... via the RRC message (transmitted at 908), see paragraph [0347]);
transmitting a first PDCCH (Kung: At 918, the Source Cell 906 may trigger and/or initiate a procedure ... via transmitting a signaling to the UE 902 ... The signaling may be transmitted via PDCCH, see paragraph [0345]);
transmitting a second signaling, the second signaling being used to indicate a second PCI (Kung: At 918, the Source Cell 906 may trigger and/or initiate a procedure ... via transmitting a signaling to the UE 902 ... The signaling may indicate a cell identity of the Target Cell 904 (e.g., a serving cell index and/or a physical cell identity, such as PhysCellId and/or PCI), see paragraph [0345]);
wherein as a response to the second signaling being received, a second PDCCH is monitored and the first PDCCH is discarded to be monitored, the second PDCCH is associated with a second downlink RS resource, and the second downlink RS resource is associated with the second PCI (Kung: the signaling may comprise an indicator ... indicating that the UE 902 may perform ... mobility procedure on the Target Cell 904 in response to receiving the signaling. At 920, in response to receiving the signaling, the UE 902 may monitor one or more downlink channels (e.g., PDCCH and/or PDSCH) for downlink reception from the Target Cell 904, see paragraph [0346]; the second information may indicate one or more TCI state IDs and/or one or more reference signal indexes associated with downlink reception (e.g., PDSCH reception and/or PDCCH reception) from the second cell for the UE, see paragraph [0296]); *Examiner’s Note: the UE performing a mobility procedure to the target cell constitutes “discarding monitoring [of] the first PDCCH”.
the first signaling comprises an RRC message (Kung: At 908, the Source Cell 906 transmits a RRC message comprising one or more configurations associated with a Target Cell 904, see paragraph [0340]);
the second signaling comprises a signaling below the RRC layer (Kung: At 918, the Source Cell 906 may trigger and/or initiate a procedure (e.g., a Layer-1 (L1) and/or Layer-2 (L2) handover (HO) procedure and/or a mobility procedure) via transmitting a signaling to the UE 902 ... the signaling may be a MAC CE, see paragraph [0345]);
and the target identity is an RNTI (Kung: The first information may indicate C-RNTI for the UE. The C-RNTI may be used (by the UE, for example) for the second cell (e.g., the C-RNTI may be used for communication with the second cell), see paragraph [0311]).
Kung does not explicitly teach the first PDCCH being associated with a first downlink RS resource, the first downlink RS resource being associated with a first PCI;
the first PDCCH uses a source identity for scrambling;
the second PDCCH uses the target identity for scrambling;
the source identity and the target identity are different; and
and the source identity is an RNTI.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Zhu teaches the first PDCCH being associated with a first downlink RS resource, the first downlink RS resource being associated with a first PCI (Zhu: the BFD RS resources in each BFD RS beam ... could correspond to periodic 1-port CSI-RS resources/CSI-RS resource configuration indexes ... with same values as the QCL-TypeD source RS indexes indicated in active TCI states for PDCCH reception in respective CORESETs that the UE uses for monitoring the PDCCH(s), wherein one or more of the active TCI states for PDCCH reception or one or more of the respective CORESETs could be associated with/linked to a PCI (e.g., corresponding to either the serving cell PCI or a non-serving cell PCI), see paragraph [0323]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung to include the features as taught by Zhu above in order to configure the UE for inter-cell operation (Zhu: see paragraph [0123]).
Kung-Zhu does not explicitly teach the first PDCCH uses a source identity for scrambling;
the second PDCCH uses the target identity for scrambling;
the source identity and the target identity are different; and
and the source identity is an RNTI.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Wang teaches the first PDCCH uses a source identity for scrambling (Wang: the request message includes a first cell radio network temporary identifier C-RNTI used in the first wireless communication node by the UE ... the method further includes: scrambling ... the PDCCH message by using the first C-RNTI and a first physical cell identifier PCI of the first wireless communication node, see paragraph [0010]);
the second PDCCH uses the target identity for scrambling (Wang: the request response includes a second C-RNTI that is allocated by the second wireless communication node to the UE ... the method further includes: scrambling ... the PDCCH message by using the second C-RNTI and a second PCI of the second wireless communication node, see paragraph [0013]);
the source identity and the target identity are different (Wang: receiving, by the second wireless communication node, a C-RNTI set ... that is to be allocated by the second wireless communication node to the UE for use, where the C-RNTI set does not include the first C-RNTI, see paragraph [0012]); and
and the source identity is an RNTI (Wang; the request message includes a first cell radio network temporary identifier C-RNTI used in the first wireless communication node by the UE, see paragraph [0010]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung-Zhu to include the features as taught by Wang above in order to avoid addressing messages to the wrong UE (Wang: see paragraph [0143]).
Claim 9 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kung-Zhu-Wang in view of Fong et al. (US 2021/0044395 A1, hereinafter “Fong”).
Regarding Claim 9, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, and the second signaling is PDSCH (Kung: The second information may be transmitted in a PDSCH signaling, see paragraph [0324]).
Kung-Zhu-Wang does not explicitly teach the first PDCCH indicates scheduling information of the PDSCH.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Fong teaches the first PDCCH indicates scheduling information of the PDSCH (Fong: the PDCCH is used to transmit scheduling assignment and control data packets ... to the UE to indicate scheduling information to be used by the UE to receive downlink communication traffic packets on a Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH), see paragraph [0006]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung-Zhu-Wang to include the features as taught by Fong above in order to facilitate communications between a base station and a UE (Fong: see paragraph [0006]).
Claim 10 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kung-Zhu-Wang in view of Awoniyi-Oteri et al. (US 2021/0076276 A1, hereinafter “AO”).
Regarding Claim 10, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, but does not explicitly teach, wherein the second PDCCH comprises a USS set.
However, in the same field of endeavor, AO teaches wherein the second PDCCH comprises a USS set (AO: the notification can include a notification of search space configuration(s) ... over which the target cell can transmit downlink communications to the UE 104 (over a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH)). For example, such notifications may include resources configured for a ... UE-specific search space, see paragraph [0065]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung-Zhu-Wang to include the features as taught by AO above in order to avoid overlapping downlink resources with the source cell (AO: see paragraph [0065]).
Claim 12 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kung-Zhu-Wang in view of Kim et al. (US 2023/0102937 A1, hereinafter “Kim”).
Regarding Claim 12, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, but does not explicitly teach, the first receiver, as a response to the behavior of receiving a second signaling, regarding a first secondary cell to be deactivated;
wherein the first secondary cell and a cell identified by the first PCI belong to a same cell group.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Kim teaches the first receiver, as a response to the behavior of receiving a second signaling, regarding a first secondary cell to be deactivated (Kim: Based on receiving the RRC resume message ... the UE may configure SCells of MCG and/or SCG by configuring lower layers to consider the restored MCG and/or SCG SCells to be in deactivated state, see paragraph [0259]);
wherein the first secondary cell and a cell identified by the first PCI belong to a same cell group (Kim: Based on initiating the transmission of the RRC resume request message, the UE may restore the stored configuration parameters ... The configuration parameter may comprise ... the physical cell identity of the source PCell, see paragraph [0223]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung-Zhu-Wang to include the features as taught by Kim above in order to resume a suspended RRC connection (Kim: see paragraph [0222]).
Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kung-Zhu-Wang-Kim in view of Dinan (US 10,499,300 B2).
Regarding Claim 13, Kung-Zhu-Wang-Kim teaches the first node according to claim 12, that the first secondary cell is associated with the serving cell (Kim: Based on initiating the transmission of the RRC resume request message, the UE may restore the stored configuration parameters ... The configuration parameter may comprise ... the physical cell identity of the source PCell, see paragraph [0223]) and that the cell identified by the second PCI is a target cell (Kung: The signaling may indicate a cell identity of the Target Cell 904 (e.g., a serving cell index and/or a physical cell identity, such as PhysCellId and/or PCI), see paragraph [0345]).
Kung-Zhu-Wang-Kim does not explicitly teach that the serving cell and the target cell belong to different TAGs.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Dinan teaches that the serving cell and the target cell belong to different TAGs (Dinan: A UE may be configured with a first TAG configuration with a serving eNB ... The target eNB may have a different cell configuration and may require a different TAG configuration, see col. 11 lines 1-6).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung-Zhu-Wang-Kim to include the features as taught by Dinan above in order to enable operation of multiple timing advance groups (Dinan: see col. 5 lines 10-11).
Claims 16-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kung-Zhu-Wang in view of Li (US 2022/0394535 A1).
Regarding Claim 16, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, but does not explicitly teach, the first receiver, as a response to the behavior of receiving a second signaling, clearing a first counter to zero;
the behavior of clearing a first counter to zero comprises: setting the first counter to 0;
the first counter being maintained at the MAC layer.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Li teaches the first receiver, as a response to the behavior of receiving a second signaling, clearing a first counter to zero (Li: the terminal device may determine to configure a value of a BFI_COUNTER to be zero according to second indication information sent by the network device, see paragraph [0076]);
the behavior of clearing a first counter to zero comprises: setting the first counter to 0 (Li: the terminal device configures the value of the BFI_COUNTER to be zero, see paragraph [0076]);
the first counter being maintained at the MAC layer (Li: the MAC layer of the terminal device maintains a counter BFI_COUNTER, see paragraph [0038]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Kung-Zhu-Wang to include the features as taught by Li above in order to implement beam management and beam failure recovery (Li: see paragraph [0038]).
Regarding Claim 17, Kung-Zhu-Wang-Li teaches the first node according to claim 16.
Li further teaches the first counter is BFI_COUNTER (Li: the terminal device may determine to configure a value of a BFI_COUNTER to be zero according to second indication information sent by the network device, see paragraph [0076]).
The rationale and motivation for adding the teaching of Li is the same as the rationale and motivation for Claim 16.
Regarding Claim 18, Kung-Zhu-Wang teaches the first node according to claim 1, but does not explicitly teach, wherein as a response to the behavior of receiving a second signaling, stop a first timer, the first timer is maintained at the MAC layer;
the first timer is beamFailureDetectionTimer.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Li teaches as a response to the behavior of receiving a second signaling, stop a first timer, the first timer is maintained at the MAC layer (Li: the terminal device may determine to configure a value of a BFI_COUNTER to be zero according to second indication information sent by the network device, and/or stop running the BeamFailureDetectionTimer, see paragraph [0076]; every time the MAC layer receives a beam failure indication from the physical layer, ... a BeamFailureDetectionTimer is started or restarted, see paragraph [0038]);
the first timer is beamFailureDetectionTimer (Li: If the second indication information indicates to stop running the BeamFailureDetectionTimer, the terminal device stops running the BeamFailureDetectionTimer, see paragraph [0076]).
The rationale and motivation for adding the teaching of Li is the same as the rationale and motivation for Claim 16.
Conclusion
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/P.K./Examiner, Art Unit 2416
/SHARMIN CHOWDHURY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2416