CTNF 18/787,815 CTNF 76798 Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status 07-03-aia AIA 15-10-aia 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 07-06 AIA 15-10-15 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. 07-07-aia AIA 07-07 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 – 07-12-aia AIA (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. 07-15-03-aia AIA 2. Claim s 12-15 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a) (2) as being anticipated by Haija et (US 2024/0405807) . Regarding claim 12, Haija discloses an apparatus configured for wireless communications, comprising: one or more memories; and one or more processors coupled to the one or more memories (Paragraphs 0024, 0041, 0047: there is provided a device including a processor and a computer readable medium having stored thereon, computer executable instructions, that when executed cause the processor to perform the method described above.) , the one or more processors being configured to cause the apparatus to: receive a first configuration of a plurality of time-frequency resources for receiving a plurality of signals via a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) comprising a plurality of RIS elements (Paragraph 0178: at step 1045, signaling between the BS 1010 and UE 1020 occurs to notify the UE 1020 about configuration information pertaining to reference signals that may be sent by the BS 1010 and that may be received and measured by the UE 1020.) ; receive, via one or more of the plurality of time-frequency resources, one or more signals of the plurality of signals via the RIS determine observation information associated with the one or more signals received at the apparatus, wherein the observation information comprises at least one of: one or more in-phase and quadrature (IQ) samples; one or more reference signal received power (RSRP) measurements; or one or more phase estimations (Paragraph 0179: at step 1050, the UE 1020 while beam sweeping, performs measurements (e.g., reference signal received power (RSRP), SNR, received signal strength indicator (RSSI), etc.) of the received reference signals that were identified by the BS 1010 in the configuration information in step 1045.) ; and send the observation information to a first network entity (paragraph 0179: the UE 1020 also feeds back information to the BS 1010 regarding measure signals in step 1050.) . Regarding claim 13, Haija discloses wherein: the apparatus comprises a user equipment; and to receive the one or more signals, the one or more processors are configured to cause the apparatus to receive the one or more signals from the first network entity or a second network entity (Paragraph 0179: at step 1050, the UE 1020 while beam sweeping, performs measurements (e.g., reference signal received power (RSRP), SNR, received signal strength indicator (RSSI), etc.) of the received reference signals that were identified by the BS 1010 in the configuration information in step 1045.) . Regarding claim 14, Haija discloses wherein: the apparatus comprises a second network entity; and to receive the one or more signals, the one or more processors are configured to cause the apparatus to receive the one or more signals from one or more user equipments (Figure 11C. Paragraph 0208: UE1 1120 is considered to be the transmit UE and UE2 1130 is considered to be the receive UE. Paragraph 0209: In the first method the BS determines the beam spot of each UE separately in a similar manner as would be performed for the UE3 1140, which involves the UEs 1120 and 1130 sending feedback information to the BS 1110 so the BS can determine beamforming configuration information.) . Regarding claim 15, Haija discloses wherein the one or more processors are configured to cause the apparatus to receive a second configuration of a plurality of signal attributes for receiving the plurality of signals, the plurality of signal attributes comprising at least a plurality of receive beams for receiving the plurality of signals (Paragraph 0182: The BS sends, at step 1060, updated beamforming configuration information to the UE 1020 and to beamform the beam, which is used in conjunction with the beamforming information to beamform the BS beam, aligns the beam spot of the BS beam and UE beam at the RIS 1030.) . Regarding claim 20, Haija discloses a method of wireless communications by an apparatus, comprising: receiving a first configuration of a plurality of time-frequency resources for receiving a plurality of signals via a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) comprising a plurality of RIS elements (Paragraph 0178: at step 1045, signaling between the BS 1010 and UE 1020 occurs to notify the UE 1020 about configuration information pertaining to reference signals that may be sent by the BS 1010 and that may be received and measured by the UE 1020.) ;; receiving, via one or more of the plurality of time-frequency resources, one or more signals of the plurality of signals via the RIS; determining observation information associated with the one or more signals received at the apparatus, wherein the observation information comprises at least one of: one or more in-phase and quadrature (IQ) samples; one or more reference signal received power (RSRP) measurements; or one or more phase estimations (Paragraph 0179: at step 1050, the UE 1020 while beam sweeping, performs measurements (e.g., reference signal received power (RSRP), SNR, received signal strength indicator (RSSI), etc.) of the received reference signals that were identified by the BS 1010 in the configuration information in step 1045.) ; and sending the observation information to a first network entity (paragraph 0179: the UE 1020 also feeds back information to the BS 1010 regarding measure signals in step 1050.) .. Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 07-20-aia AIA 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. 07-21-aia AIA 2. Claim s 16 and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Haija et (US 2024/0405807) in view of Ye et al (US 2025/0080254) . Regarding claim 16, Haija discloses the apparatus stated above. Haija does not disclose wherein the one or more processors are configured to cause the apparatus to obtain at least one of: a codebook pattern; or a channel estimate for a channel associated with each of the one or more signals. Ye discloses the communication system comprising the base station, the UEs and the reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS) as shown in figure 1. Ye discloses the codebook switching interference suppression method shown in figure 3. Paragraph 0173 discloses a base station performs interference RIS pairing according to a multi-RIS interference correlation table, determines an RIS panel which needs to change a codebook and determines an adjustable codebook scanning set. Paragraph 0174 discloses the base station issues codebook scanning set signaling to an RIS controller including a codebook set which can be adjusted by RISs under the RIS controller. The base station issues interference measurement signaling to a UE including start time, a duration, measurement times, end time for interference measurement. The UE may perform interference detection and reporting in cooperation with the base station and the RISs and may feedback to the base station in a manner of separately reporting for each codebook in batches. This feedback will be used to reconfigure the RIS. Paragraph 0003 discloses the RIS is an artificial electromagnetic material having programmability electromagnetic characteristics. By controlling the phase of each array, the emergent beam can be controlled to be focused to a desired detection or point. Therefore, Ye discloses the apparatus obtaining at least a codebook pattern. It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Ye into the apparatus of Haija. Ye will overcome the interference generated by controlling a RIS as described in paragraphs 0003-0004. By overcoming this interference, the communication conveyed in the communication system will be improved. Regarding claim 17, the combination discloses wherein: to determine the observation information, the one or more processors are configured to cause the apparatus to determine the observation information associated with the one or more signals received at the apparatus based at least in part on the codebook pattern or the channel estimate for the channel associated with each of the one or more signals (Ye: Paragraph 0173 discloses a base station preforms interference RIS pairing according to a multi-RIS interference correlation table, determines an RIS panel which needs to change a codebook and determines an adjustable codebook scanning set. Paragraph 0174 discloses the base station issues codebook scanning set signaling to an RIS controller including a codebook set which can be adjusted by RISs under the RIS controller. The base station issues interference measurement signaling to a UE including start time, a duration, measurement times, end time for interference measurement, The UE may perform interference detection and reporting in cooperation with the base station and the RISs and may feedback to the base station in a manner of separately reporting for each codebook in batches. This feedback will be used to reconfigure the RIS.) , and the observation information comprises the one or more phase estimations (Paragraph 0003 discloses the RIS is an artificial electromagnetic material having programmability electromagnetic characteristics. By controlling the phase of each array, the emergent beam can be controlled to be focused to a desired detection or point.) . Allowable Subject Matter 12-151-07 AIA 07-97 12-51-07 3. Claim s 1-11 and 18-19 are allowed. 13-03 AIA The following is an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance: Wang et al (US 2024/0171239) discloses the communication system shown in figures 1, 4 and 5 comprising a base station, mobile stations and an adaptive phase changing device comprising an reconfigurable intelligent surface as stated in the abstract. Paragraph 0070 discloses the base station re-groups the UEs based on various changes in an operating environment such as UE location changes, signal quality measurements and/or link quality measurements changes among the group of UEs. Paragraph 0071 discloses the base station directs the APD to apply one or more multi-UE communication surface configurations. In a configuration that spatially widens the reflection of an incident wireless signal, a base station will select a surface configuration that turns off some of the configurable surface elements. Wang discloses determining RIS element issues in that the previous RIS configuration is not operating as desired and a new configuration will improve the communication to the desired receivers. Wang will selects desired configuration from the stored possible configurations. The instant specification discloses a technical challenge of deploying RISs involves their susceptibility to deformation in paragraph 0038. Paragraph 0038 discloses RIS deformation may include changes in location and/or orientation of individual RIS elements or groups of RIS elements, of the RIS. One location deformation may include a translation of a RIS element or a group of RIS elements to a location on a surface of the RIS different from an intended location. Therefore, the deformation in location or orientation of RIS elements is when the RIS element or elements on the surface are at a location and/or orientation different than the intended location and/or orientation. Wang does not disclose the determine an RIS element deformation step as recited in claims 1-11 and 18-19 . Any comments considered necessary by applicant must be submitted no later than the payment of the issue fee and, to avoid processing delays, should preferably accompany the issue fee. Such submissions should be clearly labeled “Comments on Statement of Reasons for Allowance.” Conclusion Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to KEVIN M. BURD whose telephone number is (571)272-3008. The examiner can normally be reached 9:30 - 5:00. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Chieh Fan can be reached at 571-272-3042. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. /KEVIN M BURD/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2632 6/16/2026 Application/Control Number: 18/787,815 Page 2 Art Unit: 2632 Application/Control Number: 18/787,815 Page 3 Art Unit: 2632 Application/Control Number: 18/787,815 Page 4 Art Unit: 2632 Application/Control Number: 18/787,815 Page 5 Art Unit: 2632 Application/Control Number: 18/787,815 Page 6 Art Unit: 2632 Application/Control Number: 18/787,815 Page 7 Art Unit: 2632 Application/Control Number: 18/787,815 Page 8 Art Unit: 2632 Application/Control Number: 18/787,815 Page 9 Art Unit: 2632 Application/Control Number: 18/787,815 Page 10 Art Unit: 2632
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