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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55. All claims have priority date of foreign filing Date 03/30/2021
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 3/16/2026 is being considered by the examiner.
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 3/16/2026 has been entered.
Claims 1, 3-21, and 23-42 are pending, with claims 1, 21, 41, and 42 being independent. Claims 1, 3, 9, 11, 21, 23, 29, 31, 41, and 42 have been amended.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 3/16/2026 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
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.
Claim(s) 1, 3-14, 17-21, and 23-30, 32-34, 37-42 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20230296722 A1 SHRESTHA; Deep et al. in view of US 20230176174 A1 PENNA; Frederico et al.
Claims 1, 21, 41 and 42:
Shrestha (See Figs. 3,5,7,8,9,10,11; ¶34, ¶91, ¶36—¶43) discloses 21. A user equipment (UE) (“wireless communication device (WCD)”, Fig. 14 1410 ¶108)comprising:
a memory (Fig. 14 ¶108 memory within processing circuitry 1420 ¶139);
a communication interface (Fig. 14 ¶140 one or more of RF transceiver circuitry); and
one or more processors communicatively coupled to the memory and the communication interface (Fig. 14 ¶108 memory within processing circuitry 1420 ¶139);), the one or more processors, either alone or in combination (Fig 14 1410 and components), configured to:
transmit, via the communication interface, an uplink reference signal (Figs supra and ¶36 “The one or more uplink transmissions may for example comprise a reference signal, such as for example a sounding reference signal (SRS), a positioning reference signal (PRS), or a reference signal used during a random access channel (RACH) procedure”) towards a first reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) (¶37 “objects in an environment of the WCD”);
receive, via the communication interface, from the first RIS, a reflection of the uplink reference signal (Figs supra ¶37 “the one or more uplink transmissions transmitted at step 302 may be at least partially reflected at objects in an environment of the WCD, and may be received by the WCD”);
determining, based on at least one transmission parameter (“¶38 “a backscattered signal received power”) of the reflection identifies the reflection as the reflection of the uplink reference signal (¶38 “..backscattering measurements obtained at step 303 may for example comprise a backscattered signal received power, which may for example be indicative of which types of objects are present in an environment (or in a vicinity) of the WCD. For example, a signal backscattered from an object with a high reflection coefficient may be received with higher power than a signal backscattered from an object with lower reflection coefficient..”)
and enable a distance between the UE and the first RIS to be calculated based, at least in part, on a transmission-to-reception (Tx-Rx) time difference measurement for the UE (¶37 “ WCD may perform measurements on such received reflected versions of the one or more uplink transmissions, to obtain measurement values. . .” ¶39 ranging information), the Tx-Rx time difference measurement representing a difference between a transmission time from the UE of the uplink reference signal to the first RIS and a reception time at the UE of the reflection of the uplink reference signal from the first RIS (¶39 “backscattering measurements obtained at step 303 may for example comprise ranging information indicative of a distance between the WCD an object in a vicinity (or in an environment) of the WCD. . . A timing of a peak (which may for example be a local maximum or a global maximum) of the cross correlation may be indicative of a distance (or range) between the WCD and an object at which the signal has been reflected. However, ranging (or distance estimation) may be performed in other ways than using cross correlation. ..”).
Shrestha does not explicitly teach receiving assistance data related to a first reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) associated with at least one base station, wherein the assistance data includes at least one transmission parameter applied by the first RIS to reflections from the first RIS; and determining the reflection from the first Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface based on the [received] at least one transmission parameter.
PENNA teaches receiving assistance data related to a first reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) associated with at least one base station, wherein the assistance data includes at least one transmission parameter applied by the first RIS to reflections from the first RIS(Penna Fig. 5A, 540 ¶94 ”the corresponding IRS configuration sent in signaling 530 (and also 540, described below) may include any one or more of IRS switching on/off, phase, group-delay or reflector amplitude as examples..” ¶96 “The serving gNB 170 also sends IRS configuration to the UE 110 in signaling 540. . .”); determining the reflection from the first Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface based on the [received] at least one transmission parameter (Penna Fig. 5A, 540 ¶96 “. . .The UE 110 can prepare based on indications in the signaling 540 to use the corresponding configuration of the IRS system 90 in order to take appropriate measurements. . .” 580 ¶98 and Fig. 6 ¶100--¶110 disclosing various embodiments of determining RIS reflection based on the taught configuration parameters).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the invention of Shrestha to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 3, 23:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 22, wherein the assistance data comprises: an identifier of the first RIS, a location of the first RIS, an operation mode of the first RIS, a mapping between the first RIS and uplink resources on which the uplink reference signal is transmitted, or any combination thereof (See Penna Fig. 5A, 540 ¶94 ”the corresponding IRS configuration sent in signaling 530 (and also 540, described below) may include any one or more of IRS switching on/off, phase, group-delay or reflector amplitude as examples..” ¶96 “The serving gNB 170 also sends IRS configuration to the UE 110 in signaling 540. . .”);
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 4, 24:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 23, wherein the assistance data further comprises: identifiers of all RIS in a cell supported by the at least one base station (See Penna Fig. 5A, 540 ¶94 ”the corresponding IRS configuration . . .include any one or more of IRS switching on/off”);
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 5, 25:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 24, wherein the assistance data further comprises: an index value indicating that the first RIS is capable of performing round-trip- time (RTT) positioning (See Penna Fig. 5A 540 ¶94 IRS configuration which includes ¶98 IRS capability report information such as IRS switching on/off, group-delay which implies capable of performing RTT).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 6, 26:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 23, wherein the uplink resources on which the uplink reference signal is transmitted are mapped to a plurality of RIS, including the first RIS (See SHRESTHA ¶50 “Scheduling may for example be adapted to the environment of the WCD in the sense that a frequency resource and/or a time resource” and ¶57-58 teaching mapping uplink transmission for reflections to high-band frequency ranges; where taught structure meets intended function of plurality of RIS ).
Claims 7, 27:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 26, wherein the assistance data further comprises: identifiers of each of the plurality of RIS, locations of each of each of the plurality of RIS, operation modes of each of the plurality of RIS, a preconfigured time delay for each of the plurality of RIS, or any combination thereof (See Penna Fig. 5A, 540 ¶94 ”the corresponding IRS configuration sent in signaling 530 (and also 540, described below) may include any one or more of IRS switching on/off, phase, group-delay or reflector amplitude as examples..”).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 8, 28:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 27, wherein the preconfigured time delay for each of the plurality of RIS is different from other preconfigured time delays of other RIS of the plurality of RIS (See Penna Fig. 5A, 540 ¶94 ”the corresponding IRS configuration sent in signaling 530 (and also 540, described below) may include any one or more of IRS switching on/off, phase, group-delay or reflector amplitude as examples..” obvious the delay is specific to the IRS 90).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 9, 29:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 22, wherein the assistance data is received from a location server. (See Penna Fig. 5 and ¶90 LMF 70 sends configuration 520 to gNB which sends configuration 540 to UE; and ¶90 “LMF include, as a network node 190, a computer or a server connecting to gNB 170.”)
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 10, 30:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 29, wherein the assistance data is received from the location server in one or more Long-Term Evolution (LTE) positioning protocol (LPP) messages. (See Penna ¶96, ¶208 teaching use of LPP).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 11, 12, 32:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 22, wherein the assistance data is received from the at least one base station. (See Penna Fig. 5 and ¶90 LMF 70 sends configuration 520 to gNB which sends configuration 540 to UE; and ¶90 “LMF include, as a network node 190, a computer or a server connecting to gNB 170.”)
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 13, 33:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 21, wherein the at least one transmission parameter comprises: a preconfigured time delay of the first RIS, one or more reflection weights applied to the reflection, or any combination thereof (See Penna Fig. 5A, 540 ¶94 ”the corresponding IRS configuration sent in signaling 530 (and also 540, described below) may include any one or more of IRS switching on/off, phase, group-delay or reflector amplitude as examples..” obvious the delay is specific to the IRS 90).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Penna in order to perform positioning of the UEs using Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces (IRSs) or other reconfigurable reflecting surfaces (Penna ¶1)
Claims 14, 34:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 21, wherein: the uplink reference signal is transmitted on an uplink transmit beam (Shrestha ¶51 “selecting 404 beamforming based on the estimated environment of the WCD. The direction and/or size and/strength of one or more beams used for the transmission may for example be adapted based on the estimated environment of the WCD”), the reflection of the uplink reference signal is transmitted on a downlink receive beam, and the uplink transmit beam and the downlink receive beam are in the same direction (See Shrestha ¶91 “the UE performs additional measurements during the UL transmission (such as, but not limited to, backscattered signal power, ranging based on backscattered signal, and Doppler shift of the backscattered signal observed during UL transmission).” Emphasis added, during the UL transmission thus in the same direction).
Claims 17, 37:
The combination teaches he UE of claim 21, wherein the at least one processor being configured to enable the distance between the UE and the first RIS to be calculated comprises the at least one processor being configured to calculate the distance between the UE and the first RIS. (See SHRESTHA ¶42 “The reporting of the backscattering measurements may for example include transmission of the backscattering measurements themselves, or transmission of values derived from the backscattering measurements, such as a distance to an object and/or a velocity of an object and/or a type of an object”)
Claims 18, 38:
The combination teaches The UE of claim 21, wherein the at least one processor being configured to enable the distance between the UE and the first RIS to be calculated comprises the at least one processor being configured to transmit the Tx-Rx time difference measurement to a location server. (See SHRESTHA ¶42 “The reporting of the backscattering measurements may for example include transmission of the backscattering measurements themselves, or transmission of values derived from the backscattering measurements, such as a distance to an object and/or a velocity of an object and/or a type of an object”)
Claims 19, 39:
The UE of claim 21, wherein the uplink reference signal comprises a sounding reference signal (SRS). (See Shrestha ¶36 “the one or more uplink transmissions may for example comprise a reference signal, such as for example a sounding reference signal (SRS), a positioning reference signal (PRS), or a reference signal used during a random access channel (RACH) procedure”).
Claims 20, 40:
The UE of claim 21, wherein the at least one base station is a neighboring base station of the UE. (See Shrestha ¶96 TRP selected based on environment information).
Claim(s) 15 and 35 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20230296722 A1 SHRESTHA; Deep et al. in view of US 20230176174 A1 PENNA; Frederico et al. in further view of US 20150215793 A1 Siomina; Iana et al.
Claims 15, 35:
The combination further including Siomina teaches The UE of claim 21, wherein the uplink reference signal is transmitted omni- directionally (Siomina [0149] A transmit antenna configuration may comprise, e.g.: [0150] a transmit antenna type (e.g., omni or directional or narrow-beam directional), [0151] an antenna pattern, [0152] a number of transmit antennas or transmit antenna ports, [0153] a set of transmit antennas to be used for uplink radio signal transmissions for positioning measurements,)
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of Siomina in order to intelligently use these reconfigurable reflective surfaces, the network node is equipped to improving uplink positioning techniques( Siomina Abstract)
Claim(s) 31 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20230296722 A1 SHRESTHA; Deep et al. in view of US 20230176174 A1 PENNA; Frederico et al. in further view of US 20230246674 A1 ÅSTRÖM; Magnus et al.
Claim 31
The combination further including ÅSTRÖM teaches The UE of claim 31, wherein the assistance data is received from the at least one base station in system information broadcasted by the at least one base station in one or more system information blocks (SIBs). See ÅSTRÖM Fig. 8, ¶77 “”..similar to what is usually performed by a WD in a cellular network, i.e., time and frequency synchronization, determining cell ID of the network node 18, reading master information block (MIB)/system information block (SIB) information, etc. The associating step may also involve informing the network node 18 of the identity and existence of the rIS 20, e.g., through a random access (RA). In some embodiments, the rIS 20 may also provide its capabilities and current configuration state through the same interface or a different interface, e.g., a wired Ethernet connection, as the interface used by the rIS 20 for informing the network node 18 of its identity and existence (Block S124). . .”)
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, to modify the combination to include the noted teachings of ÅSTRÖM in order to intelligently use these reconfigurable reflective surfaces, the network node is equipped to identify a particular configuration (Astrom ¶13).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 16 and 36 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.
Claims 16, 36:
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The prior art of record does not teach or render obvious The UE of claim 21, wherein the distance between the UE and the RIS is calculated as: 1d=cxTTx-DELTA_t, where c is the speed of light, is the Tx-Rx time difference measurement, and DELTA_t is a preconfigured time delay of the first RIS.
Related Prior Art
Prior art pertinent to invention but not relied upon in the rejection:
HENK WYMEERSCH ET AL: "Radio Localization and Mapping with Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces", ARXIV.ORG, CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY, 201 OLIN LIBRARY CORNELL UNIVERSITY ITHACA, NY 14853, 19 December 2019 (2019-12-19)
US 20180262868 A1 Edge; Stephen William METHOD AND/OR SYSTEM FOR POSITIONING OF A MOBILE DEVICE
US 20150215793 A1 Siomina; Iana et al. Enhancing Uplink Measurements for Positioning by Adaptively Using Multi-Antenna Systems
CN 111912409 A SONG, Ling-yang et al. Locating method and device of multi-mobile device assisted by programmable intelligent reflecting surface
Conclusion
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/UMAIR AHSAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2647