DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claims 1-20 are pending in Instant Application.
Priority
Examiner acknowledges Applicant’s claim to priority benefits of U.S. Provisional Application Serial No. 63/486,536 filed 02/23/2023.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement(s) (IDS) submitted on 2/22/2024 is/are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement(s) is/are being considered if signed and initialed by the Examiner.
Claim Objections
Claims 5 and 14 are objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 5 recites, “wherein the one or more first SSBs include at least two first SSBs; and/or wherein the one or more second SSBs include at least two second SSBs, in lines 1-2. For clarity it is suggested to replace the operator "/" with words.
Claim 14 us also objected for the same reason as set fort above for claim 5.
Appropriate correction is required.
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 of this title, 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, 4-5, 7-10, 13-14 and 16-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rao et al. (US Pub. No.: 2023/0189343), in view of Schwab et al. (US Patent No.: 10,742,305) and further in view of Xue et al. (US Pub. No.: 2021/0112603).
As per claim 1, Rao disclose A system (see Fig.4, Fig.5, a cellular communications system 400), comprising:
a first base station (see Fig.5, Base Station 402) including at least one baseband unit (BBU) entity (see Fig.5, a baseband unit 506) and a radio unit (see Fig.5, a radio unit 504) communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity (see Fig.5, interface/ communicatively coupled between the radio unit and the baseband unit), wherein the first base station is configured to provide service to user equipment (see Fig.4, UE 412) in a cell (see Fig.4, para. 0049, the RAN includes base station 402-1, which in 5G NR are referred to as gNBs, controlling corresponding (macro) cell 404-1) using a Time-Division Duplexing (TDD) configuration (see para. 0006, FIGS. 3A through 3C illustrate a scheduling example with Time Division Duplexing (TDD), see also para. 0058, Using the TDD 4:1 scheduling example illustrated in FIGS. 3A through 3C); and
wherein the at least one BBU entity is configured to:
configure one or more first Synchronization Signal Blocks (SSBs) and one or more second SSBs for a cell (see Fig.1, para. 0004, 0012, 0017, 0021, the gNB transmits a first SSB in a first beam direction during a first time period, a second SSB in a second beam direction during a second time period);
map the one or more first SSBs to one or more first Random-Access Channel (RACH) occasions and the one or more second SSBs to one or more second RACH occasions (see para. 0012, 0017, the one or more RACH occasions comprise a first RACH occasion and a second RACH occasion, and the plurality of SSBs comprise a first set of SSBs mapped to the first RACH occasion and a second set of SSBs mapped to the second RACH occasion); and
transmit only the one or more first SSBs (see para. 0017, the first set of SSBs and the second set of SSBs are mutually exclusive. In one embodiment, the first set of SSBs is a first subset of the plurality of SSBs that are transmitted on a first subset of the plurality of transmit beams having beam directions that are spatially adjacent to one another, see also para. 0021, the baseband unit is configured to transmit, via the wideband transmitter of the radio unit, a plurality of SSBs on a respective plurality of transmit beams in accordance with a beam sweeping scheme, wherein the plurality of SSBs are mapped to one or more RACH occasions in accordance with an N-to-1 mapping scheme where N is greater than 1 / transmit only the one or more first SSBs).
Although Rao disclose an interface between the radio unit and the baseband unit;
Rao however does not explicitly disclose a distributed antenna system including a master unit communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit;
Schwab however disclose a distributed antenna system (see Fig5, Fig.6, para. 107, the repeater system 100 is implemented as a distributed antenna system (DAS)) including a master unit (see Fig.6, para. 108, the DAS 600 comprises one or more master units 602) communicatively coupled to at least one BBU entity (see para. 109, 110, each master unit 604 is communicatively coupled to one or more base stations 102, at least one BBU entity) and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit (see Fig.6, para. 108, the DAS 600 comprises one or more master units 602 that are communicatively coupled to one or more remote antenna units 604 via one or more cables 606. Each remote antenna unit 604 can be communicatively coupled directly to one or more of the master units 602 or indirectly via one or more other remote antenna units 604 and/or via one or more expansion (or other intermediary) unit 608);
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide the functionality of a distributed antenna system including a master unit communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit, as taught by Schwab, in the system of Rao, so as to improve the wireless coverage provided by the base stations, see Schwab, paragraphs 9-14.
Although Rao disclose wherein the at least one BBU entity is configured to: configure one or more first Synchronization Signal Blocks (SSBs) and one or more second SSBs for a cell;
Rao however does not explicitly disclose not to transmit the one or more second SSBs.
Xue however disclose not to transmit one or more second SSBs (see Fig.5, 7, 9, 11, para. 0102-0107, the processor, BBU, of the Base Station 500, transmits an invalid SSB {dummy}, by not transmitting one or more second SSBs, at step 1108, when neither the PUSCH nor the RACH occasion is invalid, method 1100 proceeds to step 1113, at which the PUSCH-RACH occasion pair is associated with a SSB (transmit only the one or more first SSBs)).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide the functionality of not to transmit one or more second SSBs, as taught by Xue, in the system of Rao and Schwab, so as to enable a UE to validate the PUSCH occasion with SSB and downlink pattern in TDD, the UE validate the PUSCH occasion for 2-step RACH with SSB or downlink pattern in TDD according to Section 8.1 of TS38.213 (dummy = invalid), see Xue, paragraphs 87-90.
As per claim 4, the combination of Rao, Schwab and Xue disclose the system of claim 1.
Rao further disclose wherein the at least one BBU entity is configured to configure only one first SSB and only one second SSB (see Fig.1, para. 0004, the gNB transmits a first SSB in a first beam direction during a first time period, a second SSB in a second beam direction during a second time period).
As per claim 5, the combination of Rao, Schwab and Xue disclose the system of claim 1.
Rao further disclose wherein the one or more first SSBs include at least two first SSBs; and/or wherein the one or more second SSBs include at least two second SSBs (see para. 0012, the plurality of SSBs comprise a first set of SSBs mapped to the first RACH occasion and a second set of SSBs mapped to the second RACH occasion).
As per claim 7, the combination of Rao, Schwab and Xue disclose the system of claim 1.
Rao further disclose wherein the at least one BBU entity includes one or more central units communicatively coupled to one or more distributed units, wherein the one or more distributed units are communicatively coupled to the radio unit (see Fig.5, para. 0054, the baseband unit 506 includes PRACH processing and detection circuitry 520 that operates to process the outputs of the narrowband receivers 516, the accumulators 518 and perform PRACH detection based on the results of the processing. In addition, the baseband unit 506 includes functions 522 including a scheduler, link adaptation function, coding and modulation function, the narrowband receivers 516 process the received signals from only a subset of the antenna elements 502-1 through 502-N.sub.A of the antenna array 500, at the limited bandwidth, to provide corresponding narrowband receive signals for that subset of the antenna elements 502-1 through 502-N.sub.A of the antenna array 500).
As per claim 8, the combination of Rao, Schwab and Xue disclose the system of claim 1.
Schab further disclose wherein the master unit is communicatively coupled to at least one second base station different than the first base station (see para. 109, 110, each master unit 604 is communicatively coupled to one or more base stations 102).
As per claim 9, the combination of Rao, Schwab and Xue disclose the system of claim 1.
Schwab further disclose wherein the master unit is communicatively coupled to an antenna port of the radio unit (see Fig.6, para. 0109, the DAS 600 comprises one or more master units 602 that are communicatively coupled to one or more remote antenna units 604 via one or more cables 606).
As per claim 10, claim 10 is rejected the same way as claim 1.
As per claim 13, claim 13 is rejected the same way as claim 4.
As per claim 14, claim 14 is rejected the same way as claim 5.
As per claim 16, claim 16 is rejected the same way as claim 7.
As per claim 17, claim 17 is rejected the same way as claim 1.
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Second Rejection:
Claims 1, 10 and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rao et al. (US Pub. No.: 2023/0189343), in view of Schwab et al. (US Patent No.: 10,742,305), and further in view of Jung et al. (US Pub. No.: 2019/0159261).
As per claim 1, Rao disclose A system (see Fig.4, Fig.5, a cellular communications system 400), comprising:
a first base station (see Fig.5, Base Station 402) including at least one baseband unit (BBU) entity (see Fig.5, a baseband unit 506) and a radio unit (see Fig.5, a radio unit 504) communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity (see Fig.5, interface/ communicatively coupled between the radio unit and the baseband unit), wherein the first base station is configured to provide service to user equipment (see Fig.4, UE 412) in a cell (see Fig.4, para. 0049, the RAN includes base station 402-1, which in 5G NR are referred to as gNBs, controlling corresponding (macro) cell 404-1) using a Time-Division Duplexing (TDD) configuration (see para. 0006, FIGS. 3A through 3C illustrate a scheduling example with Time Division Duplexing (TDD), see also para. 0058, Using the TDD 4:1 scheduling example illustrated in FIGS. 3A through 3C); and
a distributed antenna system including a master unit (see Fig.5, Wideband receiver/transmitter with UL/DL Beamforming, the BF function 517 is between the NBRs 516 and the antenna 502-N.sub.A,) communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit (see Fig.5, Ant. Array 500);
wherein the at least one BBU entity is configured to:
configure one or more first Synchronization Signal Blocks (SSBs) and one or more second SSBs for a cell (see Fig.1, para. 0004, 0012, 0017, 0021, the gNB transmits a first SSB in a first beam direction during a first time period, a second SSB in a second beam direction during a second time period);
map the one or more first SSBs to one or more first Random-Access Channel (RACH) occasions and the one or more second SSBs to one or more second RACH occasions (see para. 0012, 0017, the one or more RACH occasions comprise a first RACH occasion and a second RACH occasion, and the plurality of SSBs comprise a first set of SSBs mapped to the first RACH occasion and a second set of SSBs mapped to the second RACH occasion); and
transmit only the one or more first SSBs (see para. 0017, the first set of SSBs and the second set of SSBs are mutually exclusive. In one embodiment, the first set of SSBs is a first subset of the plurality of SSBs that are transmitted on a first subset of the plurality of transmit beams having beam directions that are spatially adjacent to one another, see also para. 0021, the baseband unit is configured to transmit, via the wideband transmitter of the radio unit, a plurality of SSBs on a respective plurality of transmit beams in accordance with a beam sweeping scheme, wherein the plurality of SSBs are mapped to one or more RACH occasions in accordance with an N-to-1 mapping scheme where N is greater than 1 / transmit only the one or more first SSBs).
Although Rao disclose an interface between the radio unit and the baseband unit;
Rao however does not explicitly disclose a distributed antenna system including a master unit communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit;
Schwab however disclose a distributed antenna system (see Fig5, Fig.6, para. 107, the repeater system 100 is implemented as a distributed antenna system (DAS)) including a master unit (see Fig.6, para. 108, the DAS 600 comprises one or more master units 602) communicatively coupled to at least one BBU entity (see para. 109, 110, each master unit 604 is communicatively coupled to one or more base stations 102, at least one BBU entity) and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit (see Fig.6, para. 108, the DAS 600 comprises one or more master units 602 that are communicatively coupled to one or more remote antenna units 604 via one or more cables 606. Each remote antenna unit 604 can be communicatively coupled directly to one or more of the master units 602 or indirectly via one or more other remote antenna units 604 and/or via one or more expansion (or other intermediary) unit 608);
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide the functionality of a distributed antenna system including a master unit communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit, as taught by Schwab, in the system of Rao, so as to improve the wireless coverage provided by the base stations, see Schwab, paragraphs 9-14.
Although Rao disclose wherein the at least one BBU entity is configured to: configure one or more first Synchronization Signal Blocks (SSBs) and one or more second SSBs for a cell;
Rao however does not explicitly disclose not to transmit the one or more second SSBs.
Jung however disclose not to transmit one or more second SSBs (see Fig.4 para. 0066, Fig.5, para. 0067, the first SSB 502, the second SSB 504, is transmitted in different time periods, clearly transmit only the one or more first SSBs and delaying / not to transmit one or more second SSBs).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide the functionality of not to transmit one or more second SSBs, as taught by Xue, in the system of Rao and Schwab, so that if one or more cell-defining SSBs (e.g., a first SSB, a second SSB, and/or a third SSB) on different synchronization signal frequencies within a wideband carrier are transmitted by one or more cooperating TRPs (e.g., a first TPR, a second TPR, and/or a third TRP) which may be connected to a common central processing unit or base station, a gNB may change a serving cell-defining SSB of a UE among the one or more cell-defining SSBs of the wideband carrier by reconfiguring the default bandwidth part of the UE, see Xue, paragraphs 65-67.
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Third Rejection:
Claims 1, 10 and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rao et al. (US Pub. No.: 2023/0189343), in view of Schwab et al. (US Patent No.: 10,742,305), and further in view of Zewail et al. (US Pub. No.: 2022/0007421).
As per claim 1, Rao disclose A system (see Fig.4, Fig.5, a cellular communications system 400), comprising:
a first base station (see Fig.5, Base Station 402) including at least one baseband unit (BBU) entity (see Fig.5, a baseband unit 506) and a radio unit (see Fig.5, a radio unit 504) communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity (see Fig.5, interface/ communicatively coupled between the radio unit and the baseband unit), wherein the first base station is configured to provide service to user equipment (see Fig.4, UE 412) in a cell (see Fig.4, para. 0049, the RAN includes base station 402-1, which in 5G NR are referred to as gNBs, controlling corresponding (macro) cell 404-1) using a Time-Division Duplexing (TDD) configuration (see para. 0006, FIGS. 3A through 3C illustrate a scheduling example with Time Division Duplexing (TDD), see also para. 0058, Using the TDD 4:1 scheduling example illustrated in FIGS. 3A through 3C); and
a distributed antenna system including a master unit (see Fig.5, Wideband receiver/transmitter with UL/DL Beamforming, the BF function 517 is between the NBRs 516 and the antenna 502-N.sub.A,) communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit (see Fig.5, Ant. Array 500);
wherein the at least one BBU entity is configured to:
configure one or more first Synchronization Signal Blocks (SSBs) and one or more second SSBs for a cell (see Fig.1, para. 0004, 0012, 0017, 0021, the gNB transmits a first SSB in a first beam direction during a first time period, a second SSB in a second beam direction during a second time period);
map the one or more first SSBs to one or more first Random-Access Channel (RACH) occasions and the one or more second SSBs to one or more second RACH occasions (see para. 0012, 0017, the one or more RACH occasions comprise a first RACH occasion and a second RACH occasion, and the plurality of SSBs comprise a first set of SSBs mapped to the first RACH occasion and a second set of SSBs mapped to the second RACH occasion); and
transmit only the one or more first SSBs (see para. 0017, the first set of SSBs and the second set of SSBs are mutually exclusive. In one embodiment, the first set of SSBs is a first subset of the plurality of SSBs that are transmitted on a first subset of the plurality of transmit beams having beam directions that are spatially adjacent to one another, see also para. 0021, the baseband unit is configured to transmit, via the wideband transmitter of the radio unit, a plurality of SSBs on a respective plurality of transmit beams in accordance with a beam sweeping scheme, wherein the plurality of SSBs are mapped to one or more RACH occasions in accordance with an N-to-1 mapping scheme where N is greater than 1 / transmit only the one or more first SSBs).
Although Rao disclose an interface between the radio unit and the baseband unit;
Rao however does not explicitly disclose a distributed antenna system including a master unit communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit;
Schwab however disclose a distributed antenna system (see Fig5, Fig.6, para. 107, the repeater system 100 is implemented as a distributed antenna system (DAS)) including a master unit (see Fig.6, para. 108, the DAS 600 comprises one or more master units 602) communicatively coupled to at least one BBU entity (see para. 109, 110, each master unit 604 is communicatively coupled to one or more base stations 102, at least one BBU entity) and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit (see Fig.6, para. 108, the DAS 600 comprises one or more master units 602 that are communicatively coupled to one or more remote antenna units 604 via one or more cables 606. Each remote antenna unit 604 can be communicatively coupled directly to one or more of the master units 602 or indirectly via one or more other remote antenna units 604 and/or via one or more expansion (or other intermediary) unit 608);
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide the functionality of a distributed antenna system including a master unit communicatively coupled to the at least one BBU entity and a plurality of remote antenna units communicatively coupled to the master unit, wherein the plurality of remote antenna units is located remotely from the master unit, as taught by Schwab, in the system of Rao, so as to improve the wireless coverage provided by the base stations, see Schwab, paragraphs 9-14.
Although Rao disclose wherein the at least one BBU entity is configured to: configure one or more first Synchronization Signal Blocks (SSBs) and one or more second SSBs for a cell;
Rao however does not explicitly disclose not to transmit the one or more second SSBs.
Zewail however disclose not to transmit one or more second SSBs (see Fig.6, para. 0088-0090, Fig.7, para. 0092, 0093, the RACH capability of the UE 120 is associated with a full duplex capability (e.g., a capability to receive and transmit at the same time), and a capability of the UE 120 to determine to not receive the SSB (e.g., skip the SSB) / not to transmit one or more second SSBs, not receiving “skipping dummy SSB”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide the functionality of not to transmit one or more second SSBs, as taught by Zewail, in the system of Rao and Schwab, so that the first set of RACH occasions are mapped to one or more SSBs before the second set of RACH occasions are mapped to one or more SSBs, see Zewail, paragraphs 6-11.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-3, 6, 11-12, 15 and 18-20 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
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Xue et al (US Pub. No.:2022/0338275) – see para. 0014, “the method further includes receiving a system information block type 1 SIB 1 corresponding to the first synchronization signal/physical broadcast channel block, where the SIB 1 includes indication information of RACH occasions corresponding to the first frequency domain position, where indication information of the RACH occasions corresponding to the second frequency domain position is included in at least one of the SIB 1 and the second synchronization signal/physical broadcast channel block, and the determining RACH occasions corresponding to the second frequency domain position includes determining, based on the indication information of the RACH occasions corresponding to the second frequency domain position, the RACH occasions corresponding to the second frequency domain position”.
Alfarhan (US 20217/0274555) – see para. 0157, “WTRU 102 may not increment the power ramping counter and/or the preamble transmission counter when an associated PRACH occasion is skipped. The WTRU 102 may skip or further skip RACH occasions associated with the SSB selected with the previous PRACH transmission, for example up to a limited number of retransmissions or while a certain timer is running”.
PAN (US 2020/0053772) – see para. 0102, “mapping associations between SSB & RACH occasions (fig. 3), but corresponding LBT for PRACH transmission may be AVOIDED or SKIPPED”.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to LAKERAM JANGBAHADUR whose telephone number is (571)272-1335. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F 7 am - 4 pm.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Ian Moore can be reached on 571-272-3085. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/LAKERAM JANGBAHADUR/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2469