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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 9/20/24 is being considered by the examiner.
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.
Claims 1, 2, 6-11, 14-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over NTT WO 2022153395 (citations from EP 4280643) as cited in the IDS, and further in view of Farag et al (Pub No: 2022/0232573).
As to claim 1, NTT teaches a user equipment (UE), comprising: at least one memory; and at least one processor coupled with the at least one memory and configured to cause the UE (NTT, Fig 7, a UE with processor and memory) to:
receive a configuration of a group of SRS resource(s) associated with a UL TCI state with a total of eight SRS ports for sounding eight antenna ports used for codebook or non-codebook based PUSCH transmission (NTT, [0080][0074], receiving SRS resource set configuration with 8 one-port SRS resources for codebook and non-codebook transmissions. [0042][0043] associated with UL TCI state “TCI state ID”); and
receive a DCI or a CG configuration for scheduling PUSCH transmission, wherein the DCI or the CG configuration contains an SRS resource indicator (SRI) field (NTT, [0072]-[0074], receive a DCI for scheduling the PUSCH with SRI field).
NTT does not explicitly teach associated with a same UL TCI state.
However, Farag teaches (Farag, [0431]-[0434], the SRS resources in a SRS resource set all have the same UL TCI state).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing data of the claimed invention to provide “the same TCI state” as taught by Farag in the system of NTT, so that it would provide beamforming gain, increased capacity and flexibly accommodate services/applications with different requirements (Farag, [0031]).
As to claim 2, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches wherein, the group of SRS resource(s) is one SRS resource with eight SRS ports (NTT, [0058], the SRS resource has 8 ports).
As to claim 6, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches wherein, the group of SRS resource(s) is two SRS resources each with four SRS ports, the four SRS ports of each SRS resource are associated with four antenna ports belonging to a different coherent antenna group (NTT, [0056]-[0071], two frames with 4 ports with non-coherent).
As to claim 7, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches wherein, the SRS resource indicator field indicates an index corresponding to 2 SRI values, where each SRI value indicates one SRS resource, or the SRS resource indicator field indicates an SRI value that corresponds to 2 SRS resources (NTT, [0085]-[0086], two SRS resource indicator fields).
As to claim 8, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches wherein, the group of SRS resource(s) is four SRS resources each with two SRS ports, the two SRS ports of each SRS resource are associated with two antenna ports belonging to a different coherent antenna group (NTT, [0061], four two SRS ports each with different coherency).
As to claim 9, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches wherein, the SRS resource indicator field indicates an index corresponding to 4 SRI values, where each SRI value indicates one SRS resource; or the SRS resource indicator field indicates an SRI value that corresponds to 4 SRS resources (NTT, [0085]-[0086], SRS resource indicator fields for each of the 4).
As to claim 10, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches wherein, the same frequency hopping parameters and/or the same repetition factors are configured for the SRS resources within an SRS group, and frequency hopping and/or repetition are performed per SRS group of SRS resource(s) (NTT, [0018], hopping-related information in the SRI for the SRS group).
As to claim 11, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches wherein, the group of SRS resource(s) is two SRS resource sets with a total of eight SRS resources each with one SRS port for non-codebook (NTT, [0080-0081], two sets with total of 8 SRS resources and one for non-codebook).
As to claim 14, NTT teaches a method performed at a user equipment (UE), the method (NTT, Fig 7 [0072], a method at a UE with processor and memory) to: comprising:
receiving a configuration of a group of SRS resource(s) associated with a same UL TCI state with a total of eight SRS ports for sounding eight antenna ports used for codebook or non-codebook based PUSCH transmission (NTT, [0080][0074], receiving SRS resource set configuration with 8 one-port SRS resources for codebook and non-codebook transmissions. [0042][0043] associated with UL TCI state “TCI state ID”); and
receiving a DCI or a CG configuration for scheduling PUSCH transmission, wherein the DCI or the CG configuration contains an SRS resource indicator (SRI) field (NTT, [0072]-[0074], receive a DCI for scheduling the PUSCH with SRI field)
NTT does not explicitly teach associated with a same UL TCI state.
However, Farag teaches (Farag, [0431]-[0434], the SRS resources in a SRS resource set all have the same UL TCI state).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing data of the claimed invention to provide “the same TCI state” as taught by Farag in the system of NTT, so that it would provide beamforming gain, increased capacity and flexibly accommodate services/applications with different requirements (Farag, [0031]).
As to claim 15, NTT teaches a base station unit, comprising: at least one memory; and at least one processor coupled with the at least one memory and configured to cause the base station (NTT, Fig 6, a base station with processor and memory) to:
transmit a configuration of a group of SRS resource(s) associated with a same UL TCI state with a total of eight SRS ports for sounding eight antenna ports used for codebook or non-codebook based PUSCH transmission (NTT, [0080][0074], sending SRS resource set configuration with 8 one-port SRS resources for codebook and non-codebook transmissions. [0042][0043] associated with UL TCI state “TCI state ID”); and transmit a DCI or a CG configuration for scheduling PUSCH transmission, wherein the DCI or the CG configuration contains an SRS resource indicator (SRI) field (NTT, [0072]-[0074], send a DCI for scheduling the PUSCH with SRI field).
NTT does not explicitly teach associated with a same UL TCI state.
However, Farag teaches (Farag, [0431]-[0434], the SRS resources in a SRS resource set all have the same UL TCI state).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing data of the claimed invention to provide “the same TCI state” as taught by Farag in the system of NTT, so that it would provide beamforming gain, increased capacity and flexibly accommodate services/applications with different requirements (Farag, [0031]).
As to claim 16, NTT teaches a processor for wireless communication, comprising: at least one controller coupled with at least one memory and configured to cause the processor (NTT, Fig 7, a UE with processor and memory) to:
receive a configuration of a group of SRS resource(s) associated with a same UL TCI state with a total of eight SRS ports for sounding eight antenna ports used for codebook or non-codebook based PUSCH transmission (NTT, [0080][0074], receiving SRS resource set configuration with 8 one-port SRS resources for codebook and non-codebook transmissions. [0042][0043] associated with UL TCI state “TCI state ID”); and
receive a DCI or a CG configuration for scheduling PUSCH transmission, wherein the DCI or the CG configuration contains an SRS resource indicator (SRI) field (NTT, [0072]-[0074], receive a DCI for scheduling the PUSCH with SRI field)
NTT does not explicitly teach associated with a same UL TCI state.
However, Farag teaches (Farag, [0431]-[0434], the SRS resources in a SRS resource set all have the same UL TCI state).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing data of the claimed invention to provide “the same TCI state” as taught by Farag in the system of NTT, so that it would provide beamforming gain, increased capacity and flexibly accommodate services/applications with different requirements (Farag, [0031]).
As to claim 17, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches wherein, the group of SRS resource(s) is one SRS resource with eight SRS ports (NTT, [0058], the SRS resource has 8 ports).
Claims 4 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over NTT and Farag as applied to claims above, and further in view of Huang et al (Pub No: 2024/0039670).
As to claim 4, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches the limitations of claim 2.
The combination does not explicitly teach wherein, the eight SRS ports are transmitted in two adjacent symbols.
However, Huang teaches wherein, the eight SRS ports are transmitted in two adjacent symbols (Huang, [0038], map 8 ports to more than one symbol (across multiple symbols, 2)).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing data of the claimed invention to provide “transmitting across adjacent symbols” as taught by Huang in the system of NTT and Farag, so that it would support improved SRS port enhancements (Huang, [0004]).
As to claim 19, the combination of NTT and Farag teaches the limitations of claim 2.
The combination does not explicitly teach wherein, the eight SRS ports are transmitted in two adjacent symbols.
However, Huang teaches wherein, the eight SRS ports are transmitted in two adjacent symbols (Huang, [0038], map 8 ports to more than one symbol (across multiple symbols, 2)).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing data of the claimed invention to provide “transmitting across adjacent symbols” as taught by Huang in the system of NTT and Farag, so that it would support improved SRS port enhancements (Huang, [0004]).
Claims 5 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over NTT and Farag and Huang as applied to claims above, and further in view of Manolakos et al (Pub No: 2021/0385766).
As to claim 5, the combination of NTT, Farag and Huang teaches the limitations of claim 4.
The combination does not explicitly teach if one of the two symbols is dropped due to collision handling, the one SRS resource on the two symbols is dropped.
However, Manolakos teaches if one of the two symbols is dropped due to collision handling, the one SRS resource on the two symbols is dropped (Manolakos, [0062], where collision is detected, a SRS is dropped in that symbol).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing data of the claimed invention to provide “drop SRS in collisions” as taught by Manolakos in the system of NTT, Farag and Huang, so that it would support timing accuracy (Manolakos, [0002]).
As to claim 20, the combination of NTT, Farag and Huang teaches the limitations of claim 4.
The combination does not explicitly teach if one of the two symbols is dropped due to collision handling, the one SRS resource on the two symbols is dropped.
However, Manolakos teaches if one of the two symbols is dropped due to collision handling, the one SRS resource on the two symbols is dropped (Manolakos, [0062], where collision is detected, a SRS is dropped in that symbol).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing data of the claimed invention to provide “drop SRS in collisions” as taught by Manolakos in the system of NTT, Farag and Huang, so that it would support timing accuracy (Manolakos, [0002]).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1, 12, 13 and 18 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
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to AFSHAWN M TOWFIGHI whose telephone number is (571)270-7296. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:00 AM -5:00 PM.
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/AFSHAWN M TOWFIGHI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2469
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