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
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 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Salah et al (US 2024/0187129 A1) in view of Zheng et al (US 2025/0056403 A1).
Regarding claim 1, 19, Salah teaches an apparatus/method for wireless communication, comprising:
one or more memories; and one or more processors coupled to the one or more memories, the one or more processors individually or collectively configured to (Fig. 10, memory and processor):
obtain an indication to adjust a quantity of physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) blind decoding operations for a first component carrier (Figs 2, 3; [0026], “the CCE/BD budges may be re-scaled, whether equally/evenly or unevenly, between the carriers as needed. For instance, with bad channel conditions on one or more specific DL carriers, those specific DL carriers are not used for DL control and, rather, the CCE/BD budgets may be re-allocated to other carriers”)
Salah triggers the adjustment when a carrier is not carrying downlink control (Salah, Fig 2, 3; [0026]). However, Salah does not expressly disclose that the indication is in accordance with a cell discontinuous transmission (DTX) state of the first component carrier or a cell DTX state of a second component carrier.
Zheng teaches a per-serving-cell DTX state that is signalled to the UE (e.g., by a DTX DCI format carrying a per-cell field), wherein a serving cell in the DTX non-active state does not transmit PDCCH/EPDCCH and a serving cell in the DTX active state does, and wherein the UE monitors the cells in the DTX active state without monitoring the cells in the DTX non-active state ([0057], “A periodic cell DTX/DRX configuration is explicitly signalled to the UEs. A periodic cell DTX/DRX pattern is configured by UE specific RRC signalling. The cell DTX/DRX configuration contains at least: periodicity, start slot/offset, on duration. As a baseline cell DTX/DRX is activated/deactivated implicitly by RRC signalling, i.e., activated immediately once configured by RRC and deactivated once the RRC configuration is released. There is a benefit with L1 signalling for cell DTX/DRX activation/deactivation, and the design details are needed. The understanding for the gNB scheduling behaviour for new transmissions during a cell DTX non-active period is that the gNB does not schedule UE-specific dynamic grants/assignments, even if the UE is in Cell DRX Active Time. UE may not monitor PDCCH for dynamic grants/assignments for new transmissions during a cell DTX non-active period, even if the UE is in Cell DRX Active time”).
Before the effective filing date of the invention, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to adjust the per-carrier BD quantity of Salah in accordance with the cell DTX state taught by Zheng, because a cell in a DTX non-active state does not transmit PDCCH and therefore need not be monitored — the same condition (a carrier not carrying downlink control) that Salah uses to trigger reallocation of the BD budget to the remaining carriers. The combination merely applies Salah's known BD-budget reallocation to a known trigger (cell DTX state), yielding the predictable result of reallocating monitoring resources away from a non-transmitting cell.
Regarding claim 14, Salah teaches an apparatus for wireless communication at a network node, comprising: one or more memories; and one or more processors coupled to the one or more memories, the one or more processors individually or collectively configured to:
obtain an indication that a user equipment (UE) is to perform a quantity of physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) blind decoding operations for a first component carrier ( Figs, 2-3, 10; [0027], “additionally, re-scaling of the CCE/BD budgets may be semi-statically (e.g., via radio resource control (RRC)) or dynamically (e.g., via DCI) enabled and/or disabled by network 120”); and
transmit an indication to adjust the quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations for the first component carrier
Salah discloses triggering the adjustment when a carrier is not carrying downlink control, but does not explicitly teach transmitting the adjustment indication in accordance with a cell DTX state of the first or second component carrier.
Zheng teaches a per-serving-cell DTX state that is signalled to the UE (e.g., by a DTX DCI format carrying a per-cell field), wherein a serving cell in the DTX non-active state does not transmit PDCCH/EPDCCH and a serving cell in the DTX active state does, and wherein the UE monitors the cells in the DTX active state without monitoring the cells in the DTX non-active state ([0057], “A periodic cell DTX/DRX configuration is explicitly signalled to the UEs. A periodic cell DTX/DRX pattern is configured by UE specific RRC signalling. The cell DTX/DRX configuration contains at least: periodicity, start slot/offset, on duration. As a baseline cell DTX/DRX is activated/deactivated implicitly by RRC signalling, i.e., activated immediately once configured by RRC and deactivated once the RRC configuration is released. There is a benefit with L1 signalling for cell DTX/DRX activation/deactivation, and the design details are needed. The understanding for the gNB scheduling behaviour for new transmissions during a cell DTX non-active period is that the gNB does not schedule UE-specific dynamic grants/assignments, even if the UE is in Cell DRX Active Time. UE may not monitor PDCCH for dynamic grants/assignments for new transmissions during a cell DTX non-active period, even if the UE is in Cell DRX Active time”).
Before the effective filing date of the invention, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to adjust the per-carrier BD quantity of Salah in accordance with the cell DTX state taught by Zheng, because a cell in a DTX non-active state does not transmit PDCCH and therefore need not be monitored — the same condition (a carrier not carrying downlink control) that Salah uses to trigger reallocation of the BD budget to the remaining carriers. The combination merely applies Salah's known BD-budget reallocation to a known trigger (cell DTX state), yielding the predictable result of reallocating monitoring resources away from a non-transmitting cell.
Regarding claim 2, 15, 20, the aforementioned references further teach that the apparatus is configured to perform a first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations for the first component carrier and to perform a second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations for the second component carrier, and wherein the indication to adjust the quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations for the first component carrier is an indication to apply a splitting factor to the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations and the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations (Salah, Fig. 2, re-scaling the per-carrier budget so the freed budge of one carrier is distributed to the others; Fig. 3; and [0026]).
Regarding claim 3, 16, the aforementioned references further teach that the indication to apply the splitting factor to the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations and the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations is an indication to increase the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations and to decrease the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations in accordance (Salah, Fig. 2, re-scaling the per-carrier budget so the freed budge of one carrier is distributed to the others; Fig. 3; and [0026]) with the first component carrier and the second component carrier being in a cell DTX active state (Zheng, [0057]).
Regarding claim 4, the aforementioned references further teach that the indication to increase the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations is an indication to add a third quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations to the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations, and the indication to decrease the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations is an indication to subtract the third quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations from the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations (Salah, Fig. 2, re-scaling the per-carrier budget so the freed budge of one carrier is distributed to the others; Fig. 3; and [0026]).
Regarding claim 5, 17, the aforementioned references further teach that the indication to apply the splitting factor to the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations and the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations is an indication to increase the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations in accordance (Salah, Fig. 2, re-scaling the per-carrier budget so the freed budge of one carrier is distributed to the others; Fig. 3; and [0026]) with the first component carrier being in a cell DTX active state and to decrease the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations in accordance with the second component carrier being in a cell DTX non-active state (Zheng, [0057]).
Regarding claim 6, the aforementioned references further teach that the indication to increase the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations is an indication to perform a combined quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations for the first component carrier that is equal to the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations and the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations, and the indication to decrease the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations is an indication to perform zero PDCCH blind decoding operations for the second component carrier (Salah, Fig. 4, Fig. 5, [0030]-[0031]).
Regarding claim 7, the aforementioned references further teach that the indication to apply the splitting factor to the first quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations and the second quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations (Salah, [0026]) is an indication to perform zero PDCCH blind decoding operations for the first component carrier and the second component carrier in accordance with the first component carrier and the second component carrier being in a cell DTX non-active state (Zheng, [0057]).
Regarding claim 9, the aforementioned references further teach that the one or more processors, to obtain the indication to adjust the quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations for the first component carrier (Salah, [0026]), are configured to receive downlink control information (DCI) that includes the indication to adjust the quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations for the first component carrier (Zheng, [0057]).
Regarding claim 10, the aforementioned references further teach that the DCI has DCI format 2_9 (Zheng, [0092], “DCI format 2_x”, it’s noted that DCI format 2_x include DCI format 2_9).
Regarding claim 11, the aforementioned references further teach that the one or more processors are further configured to apply a scaling factor to the quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations (Salah, [0026]) based at least in part on receiving the DCI and until the apparatus applies the cell DTX state for the first component carrier (Zheng, [0057]).
Regarding claim 12, 18, the aforementioned references further teach that the indication to adjust the quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations for the first component carrier in accordance with the cell DTX state of the first component carrier or the cell DTX state of the second component carrier is an indication to decrease the quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations for the first component carrier (Salah, [0026]) in accordance with the cell DTX state of the first component carrier (Zheng, [0057]).
Regarding claim 13, the aforementioned references further teach that the one or more processors, to perform the PDCCH blind decoding in accordance with the indication, are configured to perform a default quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations (Salah, [0026]) in accordance with the first component carrier being in a cell DTX active state or performing a reduced quantity of PDCCH blind decoding operations in accordance with the first component carrier being in a cell DTX non-active state (Zheng, [0057]).
Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Salah et al (US 2024/0187129 A1), in view of Zheng, further in view of Cirik et al (2025/0106848 A1).
Regarding claim 8, Salah in view of Zheng discloses that each component carrier is associated with a respective serving cell and that the BD/CCE budgets are partitioned across carriers in corresponding/overlapping slots, including budgets used for scheduling on a given cell across carriers (Salah, Fig. 4-9, cross-carrier search space sets and budgets associated with scheduling on a cell; []).
Salah in view of Zheng does not expressly recite two cells whose cell DTX active states at least partially overlap.
Cirik disclose behavior keyed to the timing relationship between two DTXs; where a PDCCH monitoring occasion/CORESET overlaps the non-active period of a first DTX and the active period of a second DTX, the device’s monitoring is determined accordingly, and the device monitors during active period of both DTXs (Cirik, [0218]-[0222]).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to associated Salah’s first and second carriers with respective first nad second cells, each having a cell DTX state, with the cell DTX active states at least partially overlapping as taught by Cirik, and to associate the first and second BD quantities with a scheduling operation for the first cell (Salah’s cross-carrier scheduling budget). Salah already partitions the BD budget across carriers in corresponding/overlapping per-entity DTX active/non-active periods; the combination predictably manages the BUD budget for scheduling the first cell across both carriers during the common active interval.
Conclusion
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/SIMING LIU/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2411
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