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 § 102
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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.
Claim(s) 1 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102 as being by Kim US 20200169318
1. A backscatter communication method, performed by a first terminal, comprising:
receiving a first signal that is sent by a second terminal through backscattering based on a signal transmission parameter (Kim: fig. 2-3 [0026, 0034, 0069, 0079] the ambient backscatter signal is decoded, the IoT devices may perform an information exchange through an ambient backscatter communication and determine whether the information exchange is performed using a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) calculated by using the channel state information); and
sending a second signal to a network side device, wherein the second signal is obtained based on the first signal (Kim: fig. 2-3 [0027, 0034, 0080] transmit the information in the cooperation mode when the IoT devices satisfy).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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) 2-7 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kim US 20200169318 in view of Elshafie US 20230141393
2. The backscatter communication method according to claim 1, further comprising: obtaining the signal transmission parameter, wherein the signal transmission parameter comprises at least one of the following: a time domain resource, [[a frequency domain resource]], a time window, a precoding parameter, a space-time code parameter, an aperiodic transmission mode, periodicity length information, time information of signal transmission within a transmission periodicity, a modulation method, a coding method, a delimiter, preamble sequence synchronization information, a frequency shift parameter, an identifier of the second terminal, an identifier of the first terminal, a transmission identifier, or total transmission duration that is for a modulated signal, wherein: the time window indicates a time window in which the first signal is sent; the synchronization information comprises at least one of the following: starting time of a subframe or a symbol of the first signal, or information about an offset between a timing of the first signal and a timing of the network side device; the delimiter indicates a starting moment of the first signal; the preamble sequence indicates information related to signal frame synchronization of the first signal; the frequency shift parameter indicates parameter information for frequency shifting the first signal; the transmission identifier indicates whether the first signal is transmitted periodically; and the total transmission duration indicates total duration for transmission of the first signal (Kim: [0081] space-time block code).
Kim merely discloses the term a frequency domain resource
Elshafie teaches wherein a frequency domain resource (Elshafie: [0082] time resources, frequency resources).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claim invention to include the above recited limitation into Kim’s invention in order to carry sidelink control information stage 1 (SCI-1) 530, which may indicate various control information used for sidelink communications, as taught by Elshafie.
4. The backscatter communication method according to claim 3, wherein: the first indication information or the second indication information is carried in at least one of the following: Downlink Control Information (DCI); a preamble sequence; Radio Resource Control (RRC) signaling; or a Media Access Control Control Element (MAC CE) (Kim: [0005] energy transfer downlink; Elshafie: [0128] DCI, RRC, MAC CE).
3. The backscatter communication method according to claim 2, wherein the obtaining the signal transmission parameter comprises: obtaining the signal transmission parameter in at least one of the following: receiving first indication information sent by the network side device, wherein the first indication information indicates the signal transmission parameter to the first terminal; receiving second indication information sent by the network side device, wherein the second indication information indicates the signal transmission parameter to the second terminal, and the second indication information is information that both the first terminal and the second terminal are configured to demodulate; receiving third indication information sent by the second terminal, wherein the third indication information indicates the signal transmission parameter to the first terminal; or determining the signal transmission parameter (Kim: [0078] receive both types of signals from the hybrid access point 200; Elshafie: [0128] receive, from the node (e.g., another UE) sidelink control information (SCI), a PC5-MAC-CE, PC5-RRC signaling).
4. The backscatter communication method according to claim 3, wherein: the first indication information or the second indication information is carried in at least one of the following: Downlink Control Information (DCI); a preamble sequence; Radio Resource Control (RRC) signaling; or a Media Access Control Control Element (MAC CE) (Kim: [0005] energy transfer downlink; Elshafie: [0128] DCI, RRC, MAC CE).
5. The backscatter communication method according to claim 3, wherein the third indication information is carried in at least one of the following: two-step Sidelink Control Information (SCI); one-step SCI; a preamble sequence; SideLink Radio Resource Control (SL RRC) signaling; or a SideLink Media Access Control Control Element (SL MAC CE) (Elshafie: [0128] sidelink control information (SCI), a PC5-MAC-CE, PC5-RRC signaling).
6. The backscatter communication method according to claim 1, wherein the sending a second signal to a network side device comprises: demodulating and decoding the first signal based on the signal transmission parameter to obtain a third signal, modulating and encoding the third signal to generate the second signal, and sending the second signal to the network side device; or amplifying the first signal to obtain the second signal, and sending the second signal to the network side device (Kim: fig. 2-3 [0026-0027, 0069-0073] perform an information exchange through an ambient backscatter communication transmit …. the information in the cooperation mode when the IoT devices satisfy).
7. The backscatter communication method according to claim 1, wherein the second terminal is powered in at least one of the following: the second terminal is powered by a radio frequency signal transmitted by the network side device; the second terminal is powered by a radio frequency signal transmitted by another device; the second terminal is powered by a mechanical power supply; the second terminal is powered by a vibration power supply; the second terminal is powered by solar energy; or the second terminal is powered by thermal energy (Kim: [0003, 0009, 0015] receive energy signals from the energy node and harvest the energy; Elshafie: [0068, 0120] solar, vibration, thermal, laser or light, and/or RF).
Regarding claims 8-20, the independent claim and each dependent claim are related to the same limitation set for hereinabove in claims 1-8, where the difference used is a “method” and the wordings of the claims were interchanged within the claim itself or some of the claims were presented as a combination of two or more previously presented limitations. This change does not affect the limitation of the above treated claims. Adding these phrases to the claims arid interchanging the wording did not introduce new limitations to these claims. Therefore, these claims were rejected for similar reasons as stated above.
Remark:
The examiner stresses that the claims are too broad and require detail or specialization of the steps as recited in the claims. Alone and as claimed, the limitations are too open.
Examiner has cited particular portions of the references as applied to each claim limitation for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings of the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested from the applicant in preparing responses, to fully consider the references in entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the Examiner.
In addition, an interview could expedite the prosecution.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Sulaiman Nooristany whose telephone number is (571) 270-1929. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F from 9 to 5. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's supervisor, Jeffrey Rutkowski, can be reached on (571) 270-1215. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PAIR. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free).
/SULAIMAN NOORISTANY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415
Prosecution Insights