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 .
Status of Claims
Claims 1-30 are currently pending and have been examined.
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 08/26/2024 has been considered by the examiner and an initialed copy of the IDS is hereby attached.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claim(s) 1-5,14-20,23-27 and 29-30 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yu et al. (US 20200072963 A1), hereinafter Yu, in view of Hwang (US 20230367005 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Yu discloses [Note: what Yu fails to clearly disclose is strike-through]
A network node for wireless communication (see Fig. 5, further see paragraph 0039, “FIG. 5 is a device control system 500 and in which in some examples may be vehicle computer system including, for instance, a UE.”), comprising:
a memory (see Fig. 5, further see paragraph 0039, “The correlator 512 and the channel estimator 520 may be code (e.g., instructions, logic, etc.) stored in memory of the system 500 and executed by a processor of the system 500.”); and
one or more processors, coupled to the memory (see Fig. 5, further see paragraph 0039, “The correlator 512 and the channel estimator 520 may be code (e.g., instructions, logic, etc.) stored in memory of the system 500 and executed by a processor of the system 500.”), configured to:
transmit a set of radar reference signals using a set of resource elements (see Fig. 5, correlation template 510, further see paragraph 0038, “For active radar sensing, not only may pilot or preamble signals be utilized for the correlation template but also payload data may be similarly employed. An example may pre-store a set of transmission payload in a buffer before transmission, and use this buffer payload as the correlation template for the reflected signal for radar sensing. FIG. 5 shows an implementation example. FIG. 5 depicts active radar sensing using transmitted payload data as correlation templates.”, where the correlation template is indeed “radar reference signals”),
receive a response for the set of radar reference signals (see Fig. 5, reflected channel profile 522 is a response for the set of radar reference signals).
Hwang discloses,
wherein the set of radar reference signals are associated with a phase rotation corresponding to a phase ramp (see Fig. 16, further see paragraph 0176, “FIG. 16 illustrates an example of resource mapping of symbols constituting various chirp signals in a wireless communication system according to an embodiment of the present disclosure. FIG. 16 exemplifies the chirp signal exemplified in FIG. 15 and chirp signals with a different slope.”, where the process of mapping the symbols to each chip with different slope (i.e. ramp) using phase rotation, further see paragraph 0234 for support, “The resource mappers 350 may map modulation symbols of each antenna port to time-frequency resources. The time-frequency resources may include a plurality of symbols (e.g., a CP-OFDMA symbols and DFT-s-OFDMA symbols) in the time domain and a plurality of subcarriers in the frequency domain. The signal generators 360 may generate radio signals from the mapped modulation symbols and the generated radio signals may be transmitted to other devices through each antenna.”, where OFDMA involves phase rotation), wherein the phase ramp has a set of values for sets of symbols such that a first set of symbols, of the sets of symbols, is associated with a first value, of the set of values, for the phase ramp and a second set of symbols, of the sets of symbols, is associated with a second value, of the set of values, for the phase ramp (see Fig. 16, further see paragraph 0177, “Referring to FIG. 16, chirp signals exemplified herein are as follows: a first chirp signal 1610 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1612, 1613, 1614, 1615 and 1616, a second chirp signal 1620 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1622, 1623, 1624, 1625 and 1626, a third chirp signal 1630 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1632, 1633, 1635 and 1636, and a fourth chirp signal 1640 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1642, 1643, 1644, 1645 and 1646. For each of the chirp signals 1610, 1620, 1630 and 1640, one RE per RB is allocated along the frequency axis. As exemplified in FIG. 16, symbol lines constituting the chirp signals 1610, 1620, 1630 and 1640 respectively include 6 symbols, but 7 or more (e.g., 12) symbols may be included.”);
It would have been obvious to someone with ordinary skill in the art prior to the
effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the features as disclosed by Hwang into the invention of Yu. Both references are considered analogous arts to the claimed invention as they both disclose a wireless communication system utilizing radar. The combination would be obvious with a reasonable expectation of success in order to maximize wireless network efficiency and capacity but running multiple devices simultaneously.
Regarding claim 2, Yu further discloses
The network node of claim 1, wherein the response includes a radar return associated with the set of radar reference signals (see Fig. 5, where the reflected channel profile is associated with the radar returns (i.e. reflected signals 514) and the radar reference signals (i.e. correlation templated 510)).
Regarding claim 3, Yu further discloses
The network node of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
detect one or more targets using the response for the set of radar reference signals (see Fig. 5, where the reflected channel profiled indicates the detection of one or more targets, further see paragraph 0037, “Further, again, for active radar sensing, the reflected data communication signal can be a reflection from another vehicle, or also be from other objects, e.g., a wall.”).
Regarding claim 4, Yu further discloses
The network node of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors, to transmit the set of radar reference signals, are configured to:
transmit the set of radar reference signals when radar sensing is disabled for the network node (see paragraph 0044, “Moreover, passive radar sensing may also be implemented via V2X communication. For example, roadside units (RSUs) can be equipped with sensors to extend the view of the machines or devices (e.g., vehicles) beyond that of sensors of upcoming traffic. Furthermore, the active radar sensing and passive radar sensing can co-exist, as discussed below with respect to FIG. 7”, where in “passive sensing” the radar sensing is disabled and the reference signals are received by the system).
Regarding claim 5, Yu further discloses
The network node of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors, to transmit the set of radar reference signals, are configured to:
transmit the set of radar reference signals when radar sensing is enabled for the network node (see paragraph 0044, “Moreover, passive radar sensing may also be implemented via V2X communication. For example, roadside units (RSUs) can be equipped with sensors to extend the view of the machines or devices (e.g., vehicles) beyond that of sensors of upcoming traffic. Furthermore, the active radar sensing and passive radar sensing can co-exist, as discussed below with respect to FIG. 7”, where in “active sensing” the radar sensing is enabled and the reference signals are received by the system).
Regarding claim 14, Yu further discloses
The network node of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
sense one or more targets within a proximity of the network node based at least in part on the response for the set of radar resource elements (see paragraph 0051, “Moreover, with respect to the radar-sensing results, when a problem (e.g., in vehicle traffic, road conditions, weather, etc.) is detected, the data communication link may prioritize the transmission of messages related to or responsive to the problem and with increased transmission power. Moreover, a device or vehicle may transmit a data communication signal toward an object (not necessarily another device or vehicle), and then perform active radar sensing based on a reflection of the data communication signal received by the vehicle as reflected from the object.”, further see paragraph 0047, “Furthermore, radar sensing results may jointly optimize or improve the higher-level safety message exchange for V2V communications. A variable is that when a potential risk is detected by radar sensing, the communication link of the corresponding UE car may be prioritized higher than others. This can be done by allocating more resource blocks for the corresponding UE car or prioritize the data packet transmission and reception of the corresponding UE car”).
Regarding claim 15, the combination of Yu and Hwang discloses [Note what Yu fails to disclose is strike-through]
The network node of claim 14, wherein the one or more processors, to sense the one or more targets, are configured to:
Hwang discloses,
sense the one or more targets based at least in part on one or more data symbols (see Fig. 16, further see paragraph 0177, “Referring to FIG. 16, chirp signals exemplified herein are as follows: a first chirp signal 1610 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1612, 1613, 1614, 1615 and 1616, a second chirp signal 1620 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1622, 1623, 1624, 1625 and 1626, a third chirp signal 1630 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1632, 1633, 1635 and 1636, and a fourth chirp signal 1640 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1642, 1643, 1644, 1645 and 1646…In case SCS is 240 KHz and each of the chirp signals 1610, 1620, 1630 and 1640 consists of 12 symbols, radar performance may be compared as in Table 8 below.”), wherein the one or more data symbols are subject to an interference cancellation procedure (see paragraph 0187, “Accordingly, an interference cancellation operation may be performed during an object detection process using a chirp signal. In other words, in order to cancel interference caused by an adjacent chirp signal during a process of mixing a Rx chirp signal sequence to be measured, a device may perform an operation of interference cancellation during a process of signal processing. To this end, an example of a receiver structure is as in FIG. 20 below.”).
It would have been obvious to someone with ordinary skill in the art prior to the
effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the features as disclosed by Hwang into the invention of Yu. Both references are considered analogous arts to the claimed invention as they both disclose a wireless communication system utilizing radar. The combination would be obvious with a reasonable expectation of success in order to reduce noise in the system and thereby lead to more accurate radar data.
Regarding claim 16, the combination of Yu and Hwang discloses [Note what Yu fails to disclose is strike-through]
The network node of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
Hwang discloses,
determine the phase ramp based at least in part on at least one of:
a random selection procedure, a pseudo-random selection procedure (see paragraph 0184, “In the case of a chirp signal that is not based on an OFDM waveform, there is no method of distinguishing overlapped chirp signals. However, in the case of a chirp signal based on an OFDM waveform according to various embodiments, a pseudo-random sequence with good cross-correlation may be used as a sequence constituting the chirp signal. In this case, chirp signals have orthogonality that enables them to be distinguished from each other”), a configured pattern, or a codebook of configured patterns.
It would have been obvious to someone with ordinary skill in the art prior to the
effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the features as disclosed by Hwang into the invention of Yu. Both references are considered analogous arts to the claimed invention as they both disclose a wireless communication system utilizing radar. The combination would be obvious with a reasonable expectation of success in order to increase system security.
Regarding claim 17, the combination of Yu and Hwang discloses [Note what Yu fails to disclose is strike-through]
The network node of claim 1,
Hwang discloses,
wherein the phase ramp is associated with a first one or more values and another phase ramp associated with another network node is associated with a second one or more values (see Fig. 16, further see paragraph 0177, “Referring to FIG. 16, chirp signals exemplified herein are as follows: a first chirp signal 1610 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1612, 1613, 1614, 1615 and 1616, a second chirp signal 1620 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1622, 1623, 1624, 1625 and 1626, a third chirp signal 1630 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1632, 1633, 1635 and 1636, and a fourth chirp signal 1640 consisting of a symbol line including symbols 1601, 1642, 1643, 1644, 1645 and 1646. For each of the chirp signals 1610, 1620, 1630 and 1640, one RE per RB is allocated along the frequency axis. As exemplified in FIG. 16, symbol lines constituting the chirp signals 1610, 1620, 1630 and 1640 respectively include 6 symbols, but 7 or more (e.g., 12) symbols may be included.”);
It would have been obvious to someone with ordinary skill in the art prior to the
effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the features as disclosed by Hwang into the invention of Yu. Both references are considered analogous arts to the claimed invention as they both disclose a wireless communication system utilizing radar. The combination would be obvious with a reasonable expectation of success in order to maximize wireless network efficiency and capacity but running multiple devices simultaneously.
Regarding claim 18, the combination of Yu and Hwang discloses [Note what Yu fails to disclose is strike-through]
The network node of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
Hwang discloses,
determine a phase ramp duration for the phase ramp based at least in part on at least one of: a coherent processing interval, a network node specific configuration (see paragraph 0149, “Referring to FIG. 9B, in the LTE transmission mode 2, the LTE transmission mode 4, or the NR resource allocation mode 2, the UE may determine an SL transmission resource within an SL resource configured by a BS/network or a pre-configured SL resource. For example, the configured SL resource or the pre-configured SL resource may be a resource pool. For example, the UE may autonomously select or schedule a resource for SL transmission. For example, the UE may perform SL communication by autonomously selecting a resource within a configured resource pool. For example, the UE may autonomously select a resource within a selective window by performing a sensing and resource (re)selection procedure. For example, the sensing may be performed in unit of subchannel(s). For example, subsequently, a first UE which has selected resource(s) from a resource pool by itself may transmit a PSCCH (e.g., sidelink control information (SCI) or 1.sup.st-stage SCI) to a second UE by using the resource(s). After then, the first UE may transmit a PSSCH (e.g., 2.sup.nd-stage SCI, MAC PDU, data, etc.) related to the PSCCH to the second UE. In step S8030, the first UE may receive a PSFCH related to the PSCCH/PSSCH from the second UE.”), a range of permissible phase ramp durations, or a static configuration common to a plurality of network nodes.
It would have been obvious to someone with ordinary skill in the art prior to the
effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the features as disclosed by Hwang into the invention of Yu. Both references are considered analogous arts to the claimed invention as they both disclose a wireless communication system utilizing radar. The combination would be obvious with a reasonable expectation of success in order to maximize wireless network efficiency and capacity but running multiple devices simultaneously.
Regarding claim 19, the combination of Yu and Hwang discloses [Note what Yu fails to disclose is strike-through]
The network node of claim 18,
Hwang discloses,
wherein the coherent processing interval is common to a plurality of network nodes (see paragraph 0149, “Referring to FIG. 9B, in the LTE transmission mode 2, the LTE transmission mode 4, or the NR resource allocation mode 2, the UE may determine an SL transmission resource within an SL resource configured by a BS/network or a pre-configured SL resource. For example, the configured SL resource or the pre-configured SL resource may be a resource pool.”, where the resource pool is common to a plurality of the UEs).
It would have been obvious to someone with ordinary skill in the art prior to the
effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the features as disclosed by Hwang into the invention of Yu. Both references are considered analogous arts to the claimed invention as they both disclose a wireless communication system utilizing radar. The combination would be obvious with a reasonable expectation of success in order to maximize wireless network efficiency and capacity but running multiple devices simultaneously.
Regarding claim 20, the combination of Yu and Hwang discloses [Note what Yu fails to disclose is strike-through]
The network node of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
Hwang discloses,
transmit an indication of the phase ramp, wherein channel estimation is based at least in part on the phase ramp (see Figs. 16 and 17 where the symbols allocated to the chirp signals with different slopes is indeed “an indication of the phase ramp”, furthermore, see paragraph 0179, “FIG. 17 illustrates another example of resource mapping of symbols constituting various chirp signals in a wireless communication system according to an embodiment of the present disclosure. Referring to FIG. 17, chirp signals with different slopes, that is, a first chirp signal 1710, a second chirp signal 1720, a third chirp signal 1730, a fourth chirp signal 1740, a fifth chirp signal 1750, and a sixth chirp signal 1760 may be defined. Herein, according to slopes, the number of samples constituting the chirp signals 1710, 1720, 1730, 1740, 1750 and 1760, that is, the number of symbols may be different…Accordingly, it is desirable that a structure as in FIG. 17 should be limited to radar only for object detection, not for measurement of velocity of a target object.”).
It would have been obvious to someone with ordinary skill in the art prior to the
effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the features as disclosed by Hwang into the invention of Yu. Both references are considered analogous arts to the claimed invention as they both disclose a wireless communication system utilizing radar. The combination would be obvious with a reasonable expectation of success in order to maximize wireless network efficiency and capacity but running multiple devices simultaneously.
Regarding claim 22, the combination of Yu and Hwang discloses [Note what Yu fails to disclose is strike-through]
The network node of claim 20,
Hwang discloses,
wherein the indication of the phase ramp is conveyed in at least one of: uplink control information (see paragraph 0110, “Referring to FIG. 4, in the NR, a radio frame may be used for performing uplink and downlink transmission. A radio frame has a length of 10 ms and may be defined to be configured of two half-frames (HFs). A half-frame may include five 1 ms subframes (SFs). A subframe (SF) may be divided into one or more slots, and the number of slots within a subframe may be determined in accordance with subcarrier spacing (SCS). Each slot may include 12 or 14 OFDM(A) symbols according to a cyclic prefix (CP).”), downlink control information (see paragraph 0108, “The physical channel includes several OFDM symbols in a time domain and several sub-carriers in a frequency domain. One sub-frame includes a plurality of OFDM symbols in the time domain. A resource block is a unit of resource allocation, and consists of a plurality of OFDM symbols and a plurality of sub-carriers. Further, each subframe may use specific sub-carriers of specific OFDM symbols (e.g., a first OFDM symbol) of a corresponding subframe for a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH), i.e., an L1/L2 control channel. A transmission time interval (TTI) is a unit time of subframe transmission.”), or sidelink control information.
It would have been obvious to someone with ordinary skill in the art prior to the
effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the features as disclosed by Hwang into the invention of Yu. Both references are considered analogous arts to the claimed invention as they both disclose a wireless communication system utilizing radar. The combination would be obvious with a reasonable expectation of success in order to maximize wireless network efficiency and capacity but running multiple devices simultaneously.
Regarding claim 23, the same cited section and rationale as claim 1 is applied.
Regarding claim 24, the same cited section and rationale as claim 2 is applied.
Regarding claim 25, the same cited section and rationale as claim 3 is applied.
Regarding claim 26, the same cited section and rationale as claim 4 is applied.
Regarding claim 27, the same cited section and rationale as claim 5 is applied.
Regarding claim 29, the same cited section and rationale as claim 1 is applied.
Regarding claim 30, the same cited section and rationale as claim 1 is applied.
Claim(s) 21 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yu et al. (US 20200072963 A1), hereinafter Yu, in view of Hwang (US 20230367005 A1), further in view of KIM et al. (US 20230254189 A1), hereinafter KIM.
Regarding claim 21, the combination of Yu and Hwang discloses [Note what the combination of Yu and Hwang fails to disclose is strike-through]
The network node of claim 20,
KIM discloses,
wherein the indication of the phase ramp includes an index value identifying a codebook entry corresponding to the phase ramp (see paragraph 0287, “In Table 7, the codebook, which is the basis of the codebook index, may be composed of a code generation matrix or parameters necessary for generation of the code generation matrix. In the case of non-systematic UW-OFDM, the codebook may be composed of code generation matrices according to the arrangement of the zero UW. In the case of systematic UW-OFDM, the codebook may be composed of a combination of the length and position information of the UW. In this way, if the codebook index is transmitted after sharing information in the form of a codebook, signaling overhead can be minimized.”).
It would have been obvious to someone with ordinary skill in the art prior to the
effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the features as disclosed by KIM into the invention of Yu in view of Hwang. All three references are considered analogous arts to the claimed invention as they all disclose resource allocation within a wireless communication system. The combination would be obvious with a reasonable expectation of success in order to minimize signaling overhead.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 6-13 and 28 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
In reference to claims 6-13 and 28, the prior arts made of record individually or in any combination, failed to teach, render obvious, or fairly suggest to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing the combination of the claimed features of claims 6-13 and 28.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
LANG et al. (US 20200052941 A1) is considered close pertinent art to the claimed invention as it discloses OFDM symbol allocation across various subcarriers in a wireless communication system using radar (see Figs. 6 and 8).
HERBERTSSON et al. (US 20240241217 A1) is considered close pertinent art to the claimed invention as it also discloses OFDM symbol allocation across various subcarriers in a wireless communication system using radar (see Figs. 3 and 6).
Kim et al. (US 11929807 B2) is considered close pertinent art to the claimed invention as it also discloses OFDM symbol allocation across various subcarriers in a wireless communication system using radar (see Fig. 4).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to NAZRA N. WAHEED whose telephone number is (571)272-6713. The examiner can normally be reached M-F (8 AM - 4:30 PM).
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Vladimir Magloire can be reached at (571)270-5144. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/NAZRA NUR WAHEED/Examiner, Art Unit 3648
Prosecution Insights