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 .
Drawings
New corrected drawings in compliance with 37 CFR 1.121(d) are required in this application because in figure 7 step 715, it is the UE that receives indication to activate full duplex configuration (see specification para. 715), i.e. the arrow in step 715 is incorrectly showing network node receiving the indication.
Applicant is advised to employ the services of a competent patent draftsperson outside the Office, as the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office no longer prepares new drawings. The corrected drawings are required in reply to the Office action to avoid abandonment of the application. The requirement for corrected drawings will not be held in abeyance.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1, 7-8 and 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Mahama (US 2024/0107541).
Regarding claims 1 and 22, Mahama describes a user equipment (UE) for wireless communication (fig. 1, UE 102), comprising:
one or more memories; and one or more processors, coupled to the one or more memories (fig. 12, UE apparatus 1200 with processing circuitry 1210 & memory 1220), configured to cause the UE to:
receive a full duplex configuration for using one or more downlink ports and one or more uplink ports simultaneously (fig. 11 & para. 181, UE receives SRS configuration from base station for its SRS transmission in SBFD (full duplex – downlink (DL) & uplink (UL)) slots. Transmission of the SRS sequence in the SBFD (UL & DL) is mapped to resource elements in slots for antenna ports (= DL & UP ports), para. 122); and
transmit, via the one or more downlink ports, a sounding reference signal (SRS) for downlink channel sounding in a downlink band of a sub-band full duplex (SBFD) slot in accordance with the full duplex configuration (fig. 11 & para. 183, UE transmits using SBFD slots, which is its UL slots but overlaps with the DL subband, hence equivalent to transmitting in a downlink band. Transmission of the SRS sequence in the SBFD (UL & DL) is mapped to resource elements in slots for antenna ports (= DL & UL ports), para. 122).
Regarding claim 7, Mahama describes:
wherein the one or more downlink ports includes a first downlink port and a second downlink port (para. 122, antenna ports comprising DL ports = first and second DL ports).
Regarding claim 8, Mahama describes:
wherein the one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to receive a downlink communication via the second downlink port while transmitting the SRS via the first downlink port (para. 122, transmission of the SRS sequence in the SBFD (UL & DL) is mapped to resource elements in slots for antenna ports (with DL & UL ports)).
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 2-6, 12-13, 23-25 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Mahama as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Ko (EP 4598104).
Regarding claims 2 and 23, Mahama fails to further explicitly describe:
wherein the one or more processors, to cause the UE to transmit the SRS, are configured to cause the UE to transmit the SRS in accordance with a priority rule that prioritizes transmission of the SRS via the one or more downlink ports in the downlink band of the SBFD slot over reception of one or more downlink signals.
Ko also describes UE operations of SRS transmission using SBFD (abstract), further describing:
wherein the one or more processors, to cause the UE to transmit the SRS, are configured to cause the UE to transmit the SRS in accordance with a priority rule that prioritizes transmission of the SRS via the one or more downlink ports in the downlink band of the SBFD slot over reception of one or more downlink signals (para. 206, configuration information (priority rule from configuration) made UE to set its transceiving priority of SRS over downlink signal that is of lower priority that of the SRS).
It would have been obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art before the effective date of the claimed invention to specify that the transmission of SRS by UE in Mahama to transmit the SRS as prioritized transmission using a priority rule as in Ko.
The motivation for combining the teachings is that this scheme overcomes limitation in frequency resource utilization for the DL/UL direction (Ko, para. 3).
Regarding claims 3, Mahama and Ko combined describe:
wherein the one or more downlink signals includes a semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) signal (Ko, para. 154, SPS in downlink (DL) reception).
Regarding claims 4 and 24, Mahama fails to further explicitly describe:
wherein the one or more processors, to cause the UE to transmit the SRS, are configured to cause the UE to transmit the SRS in accordance with a priority rule that prioritizes reception of one or more downlink signals via the one or more downlink ports in the downlink band of the SBFD slot over transmission of the SRS.
Ko also describes UE operations of SRS transmission using SBFD (abstract), further describing:
wherein the one or more processors, to cause the UE to transmit the SRS, are configured to cause the UE to transmit the SRS in accordance with a priority rule that prioritizes reception of one or more downlink signals via the one or more downlink ports in the downlink band of the SBFD slot over transmission of the SRS (Ko, para. 206, configuration information (priority rule from configuration) made UE to set its transceiving priority of receiving a downlink signal a higher priority than the SRS).
It would have been obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art before the effective date of the claimed invention to specify that the transmission of SRS by UE in Mahama to have a priority rule of receiving downlink signals as prioritized transmission over SRS as in Ko.
The motivation for combining the teachings is that this scheme overcomes limitation in frequency resource utilization for the DL/UL direction (Ko, para. 3).
Regarding claim 5, Mahama and Ko combined describe:
wherein the one or more downlink signals includes a synchronization signal block (SSB) signal (Ko, para. 72, gNB’s downlink transmission in a time resource that includes a SSB).
Regarding claims 6, 12 and 25, Mahama fails to further explicitly describe:
wherein the one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to apply a guard band between the downlink band and an uplink band of the SBFD slot in accordance with the full duplex configuration.
Ko also describes UE operations of SRS transmission using SBFD (abstract), further describing:
wherein the one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to apply a guard band between the downlink band and an uplink band of the SBFD slot in accordance with the full duplex configuration (para. 43, mixed UL-DL configuration comprises: DL region + Guard Period (GP) + UL control region).
It would have been obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art before the effective date of the claimed invention to specify the DL/UL configuration of Mahama to comprise a guardband in between as in Ko.
The motivation for combining the teachings is that this scheme overcomes limitation in frequency resource utilization for the DL/UL direction (Ko, para. 3).
Regarding claim 12 and 26, Mahama fails to further explicitly describe:
wherein the full duplex configuration includes a rate-matching configuration for rate-matching the SRS and reception of a downlink communication.
Ko also describes UE operations of SRS transmission using SBFD (abstract), further describing:
wherein the full duplex configuration includes a rate-matching configuration for rate-matching the SRS and reception of a downlink communication (para. 7 or abstract, SBFD (full duplex) comprising uplink involves rate-matching resources during SRS).
It would have been obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art before the effective date of the claimed invention to specify the full duplex configuration of Mahama to including rate-matching the SRS and reception of a downlink communication as in Ko.
The motivation for combining the teachings is that this scheme overcomes limitation in frequency resource utilization for the DL/UL direction (Ko, para. 3).
Regarding claim 13, Mahama fails to further explicitly describe:
wherein the full duplex configuration includes a resource overlap configuration associated with a dropping, by a network node, of a transmission of a downlink communication.
Ko also describes UE operations of SRS transmission using SBFD (abstract), further describing:
wherein the full duplex configuration includes a resource overlap configuration associated with a dropping, by a network node, of a transmission of a downlink communication (para. 156, DL/UL channel/signal overlapping with RBs (resource) in the SBFD will be dropped).
It would have been obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art before the effective date of the claimed invention to specify that the full duplex configuration of Mahama to involve dropping downlink communication upon resource overlap as in Ko.
The motivation for combining the teachings is that this scheme overcomes limitation in frequency resource utilization for the DL/UL direction (Ko, para. 3).
Claims 14-15 and 27 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Mahama as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Mohandoss (US).
Regarding claims 14 and 27, Mahama fails to further explicitly describe:
wherein the one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to apply a power control adaptation to transmission of the SRS in accordance with the full duplex configuration.
Mohandoss also describes UE transmission of SRS using SBFD slots after receipt of SRS configuration (abstract), further describing:
wherein the one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to apply a power control adaptation to transmission of the SRS in accordance with the full duplex configuration (para. 8 & abstract, power control for SBFD system per receiving the first & second SRS configurations).
It would have been obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art before the effective date of the claimed invention to specify that the SRS transmission in Mahama to invoke power control adaptation per the full duplex configuration as in Mohandoss.
The motivation for combining the teachings is that this yields improvements and enhancements for UL and DL channel state information for full duplex system (Mohandoss, para. 5).
Regarding claim 15, Mahama already describe:
transmission of SRS in the SBFD slots (downlink) (para. 5 or abstract).
Mahama and Mohandoss combined describe:
wherein the one or more processors, to cause the UE to apply the power control adaptation to the transmission of the SRS, are configured to cause the UE to apply a configured offset to an SRS power control, and wherein the configured offset is associated with the one or more downlink (Mohandoss, applying a power density offset (offset to SRS power control) between the PUSCH and [transmitted] SRS).
Claims 16-21 are network node claims comprising limitation steps that are same or mirroring that of the source UE’s steps in claims 1, 2, 4, 6, 12 and 13 respectively. Hence, they are rejected under the same rationale.
Claims 28-30 are method claims comprising limitations of apparatus claims 16 and 20-21 respectively. Hence, they are rejected under the same rationale.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 9-11 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Regarding claim 9, the prior art fails to further explicitly describe:
wherein the one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to:
select the first downlink port from among a first set of downlink ports; and select the second downlink port from among a second set of downlink ports.
Regarding claim 11, the prior art fails to further explicitly describe:
wherein one or more of the first downlink port or the second downlink port is selected in accordance with one or more of a radio resource control (RRC) configuration, a transmission configuration indicator (TCI) state, a downlink signal or channel, or one or more downlink transmission parameters.
For claims 9 and 11, the closest prior art, Mohandoss (US 2024/0178967) also describing UE using SBFD slots for SRS transmission after receiving SRS configuration, in combination with Mahama, fail to render the above additional features obvious.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure: Khan (WO 2024233755) describing the first WTRU may be configured with first SRS resource(s) within the UL SB and/or second SRS resource(s) outside of the UL SB (e.g., inside a DL SB) (e.g., of an SBFD slot or other time unit) (para. 88), Zhou (WO 2024/207319) describing a schematic diagram of configuring an SRS resource set for an SBFD time slot (fig. 2), Wang (US 2022/0052882) describing configuring sounding reference signal (SRS) transmissions on subband full-duplex (SBFD) slots (abstract), Ibrahim (US 2024/0155591) describing techniques for configuring SBFD resources (title & fig. 7), Mahama (US 2024/0284208) describing SRS transmissions within a GB are only feasible for the SBFD slots 721, 722, and 723 (fig. 1 & para. 81), and Jang (US 2025/0056533) describing UE transmitting, to the base station, a first PUSCH associated with the first SRS resource set and a second PUSCH associated with the second SRS resource set, wherein the slot configuration configured based on the third information includes a slot for uplink transmission of the UE, and a subband non-overlapping full duplex (SBFD) slot including a subband for downlink reception of the UE and a subband for the uplink transmission of the UE.
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WARNER WONG
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2469
/WARNER WONG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2469