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 02/21/2025 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
(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) 35-41, 43-51, 53-54 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) and 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Duan et al. (US 20210112498).
Regarding claim 35, Duan discloses an apparatus comprising at least one processor, and at least one memory comprising computer program code that, when executed by at least one processor (FIG. 3, base station 310 and UE 350 in an access network; [0065]), causes the apparatus to:
receive, from a network element of a radio access network, an uplink reference signal resource configuration comprising a plurality of uplink reference signal resources (base station may schedule a number of SRS resource sets for a particular UE. The scheduling may be performed using a radio resource control (RRC) protocol. Each SRS resource set is provided in a different UL slot and includes one or more SRS resources; [0039]),
wherein the uplink reference signal resource configuration is based on at least one of: a maximum number of transmit antenna ports supported for simultaneous transmissions from the apparatus to the network, or an antenna switching capability (schedule a number of SRS resource sets for a particular UE based on the number of RX antenna ports of the UE, and the number of RX antenna ports in excess of four. The scheduling of SRS resource sets for a particular UE may depend on the number of transmit (TX) chains of the UE with antenna switching capabilities. UE may dynamically report its antenna switching capabilities to the base station; [0039-0041]; and
transmit, to the network element, the plurality of uplink reference signal resources based on the uplink reference signal resource configuration (scheduling a number of sounding reference signal (SRS) resource sets for the UE, and receiving, from the UE, uplink (UL) transmissions of one or more SRS resources for each of the scheduled SRS resource sets; [0007]).
Regarding claim 36, Duan discloses wherein transmitting the plurality of uplink reference signal resources comprises transmitting an uplink reference signal in each of the plurality of uplink reference signal resources (SRS resources may be used by a base station to estimate the channel quality associated with the UE's various RX antenna ports. More specifically, SRS resources may be transmitted by the UE on each of its RX antenna ports. The number of SRS resources needed to sound each of the RX antenna ports may depend on the number of TX chains and RX antenna ports of the UE. For example, a UE with 1 TX chain and 4 RX antenna ports (1T4R) may require 4 SRS resources to sound all 4 RX antenna ports (with each SRS resource having a single port and each SRS port being associated with a different RX antenna port). On the other hand, a UE with 2 TX chains and 4 RX antenna ports (2T4R) may require only 2 SRS resources to sound all 4 antenna ports (with each SRS resource having two ports and each SRS port being associated with a different RX antenna port); [0074]).
Regarding claim 37, Duan discloses wherein the plurality of uplink reference signal resources comprises at least a first resource and a second resource, wherein at least one of the first and second resources is associated with a different number of antenna ports (The number of SRS resources needed to sound each of the RX antenna ports may depend on the number of TX chains and RX antenna ports of the UE. For example, a UE with 1 TX chain and 4 RX antenna ports (1T4R) may require 4 SRS resources to sound all 4 RX antenna ports (with each SRS resource having a single port and each SRS port being associated with a different RX antenna port). On the other hand, a UE with 2 TX chains and 4 RX antenna ports (2T4R) may require only 2 SRS resources to sound all 4 antenna ports (with each SRS resource having two ports and each SRS port being associated with a different RX antenna port); [0074]).
Regarding claim 38, Duan discloses wherein the first resource and the second resource are transmitted with at least one guard period between the first resource and the second resource (A guard period is inserted between individual SRS resources (not shown for simplicity) to allow time for the TX chains of the UE to switch between different RX antenna ports. A guard period may be provided at the beginning of the SRS resource set (such as symbol 8) to allow time for the UE to switch from transmitting UL data to SRS resources. A guard period is provided at the end of the SRS resource set (such as symbol 13) to allow time the UE to switch communications between adjacent slots (such as from UL traffic to DL traffic); [0081]).
Regarding claim 39, Duan discloses wherein a number of antenna ports associated with the first resource, or the second resource is equal to the maximum number of transmit antenna ports supported for the simultaneous transmissions (the number of SRS resource sets (and UL slots) needed to sound each RX antenna port of a multi-antenna UE may depend, at least in part, on the number of RX antenna ports of the UE and the number of TX chains switchably coupled to the RX antenna ports. For example, a UE having 8 RX antenna ports and a number (x) of TX chains switchably coupled to the RX antenna ports (xT8R) may require 8/x or 4/x SRS resource sets to sound all 8 antenna ports when transmitting 1 or 2 SRS resources, respectively, per SRS resource set. On the other hand, a UE having 6 RX antenna ports presents several unique scenarios for sounding all 6 antenna ports depending on the number (x) of TX chains switchably coupled to the RX antenna ports (xT6R) and the maximum number of SRS resources that can be scheduled in each SRS resource set (1, 2 or 3); [0083]).
Regarding claim 40, Duan discloses wherein the plurality of uplink reference signal resources comprises at least two resources that are transmitted in consecutive symbols without a guard period between the at least two resources (Under certain conditions (such as when no guard period is needed at the beginning of the SRS resource set or when no guard period is needed at the end of the SRS resource set), the number of SRS resources included in the SRS resource set may be extended up to 3; [0082]),
wherein a sum of antenna ports associated with the at least two resources are less than or equal to the maximum number of transmit antenna ports supported for the simultaneous transmissions (a UE having 8 RX antenna ports and a number (x) of TX chains switchably coupled to the RX antenna ports (xT8R) may require 8/x or 4/x SRS resource sets to sound all 8 antenna ports when transmitting 1 or 2 SRS resources, respectively, per SRS resource set. On the other hand, a UE having 6 RX antenna ports presents several unique scenarios for sounding all 6 antenna ports depending on the number (x) of TX chains switchably coupled to the RX antenna ports (xT6R) and the maximum number of SRS resources that can be scheduled in each SRS resource set (1, 2 or 3); [0083]).
Regarding claim 41, Duan discloses wherein a number of resources comprised in the plurality of uplink reference signal resources is equal to a number of receive antenna ports divided by a number of antenna ports associated per resource of the plurality of uplink reference signal resources (As shown in Table 1, a UE having 6 RX antenna ports may require a different number of SRS resource sets to sound all 6 antenna ports depending on whether each SRS resource set includes 1,2, or 3 SRS resources. For example, a UE having a 2T6R antenna switching capability may sound 2 RX antenna ports per SRS resource. However, when the number of SRS resources in an SRS resource set is limited to 2, the UE may sound at most 4 RX antennas using the SRS resource set (with 2 SRS resources). Thus, an additional SRS resource set (with only 1 SRS resource) is needed to sound the remaining 2 RX antenna ports. A UE having a 4T6R antenna switching capability can sound up to 4 RX antenna ports per SRS resource, and thus, 2 resources configured in one or two resource sets can be used to sound all 6 RX antennas (shown in Table 1 as “option 1”). In another example, as 2 RX antenna ports cannot be sounded per SRS resource, the 2 RX antennas that are not sounded may be switched at a time. Thus, the un-sounded 2 RX antennas can also cycle through all 6 RX antennas (shown in Table 1 as “option 2”). In this case, all the 6 Rx antennas can be sounded twice; [0084]).
Regarding claim 43, Duan discloses wherein at least a subset of the plurality of uplink reference signal resources are transmitted without a guard period between the at least subset of the plurality of uplink reference signal resources (Under certain conditions (such as when no guard period is needed at the beginning of the SRS resource set or when no guard period is needed at the end of the SRS resource set), the number of SRS resources included in the SRS resource set may be extended up to 3; [0082]),
wherein a number of resources in the at least subset of the plurality of uplink reference signal resources is less than or equal to a number of antenna ports associated with the antenna switching capability (the RX antennas may outnumber the TX chains (and power amplifiers) in a particular UE. In such cases, one or more of the TX chains may be switchably coupled to multiple RX antennas. In some implementations, each of the SRS resource sets may comprise the last 6 symbols of its respective UL slot and include up to 2 SRS resources. In some instances where an SRS resource set comprises the last 6 symbols of its respective UL slot, the number of TX chains with antenna switching capabilities may be equal to 1 and the number of SRS resource sets may be greater than 2. In some other instances where an SRS resource set comprises the last 6 symbols of its respective UL slot, the number of TX chains with antenna switching capabilities may be greater than 1 and the number of SRS resources may also be greater than or equal to 1; [0077]).
Regarding claim 44, Duan discloses transmit, to the network element, one or more indications indicating at least one of: the maximum number of transmit antenna ports supported for the simultaneous transmissions, the antenna switching capability, wherein the antenna switching capability indicates a capability to transmit an uplink reference signal on two or more antenna ports of a plurality of receive antenna ports of the apparatus (UE 704 may generate an antenna switching capability report and transmit the report to the base station 702 via an RRC connection request. The report may indicate a number of RX antenna ports available for DL communications and a number of TX chains switchably coupled to the RX antenna ports. More specifically, the report may include only the number of TX chains with antenna switching capabilities. In some implementations, the number of RX antenna ports included in the report may be greater than 4. In some other implementations, the number of TX chains included in the report may be greater than 4; [0096]).
Regarding claim 45, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the reasons cited in claim 35.
Regarding claim 46, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the reasons cited in claim 36.
Regarding claim 47, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the reasons cited in claim 37.
Regarding claim 48, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the reasons cited in claim 38.
Regarding claim 49, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the reasons cited in claim 39.
Regarding claim 50, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the reasons cited in claim 40.
Regarding claim 51, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the reasons cited in claim 41.
Regarding claim 53, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the reasons cited in claim 43.
Regarding claim 54, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the reasons cited in claim 44.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 42 and 52 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.
Abdelghaffar et al. (US 20240048348), “ADAPTIVE ANTENNA SWITCHING AND RESOURCE CONFIGURATION WITHIN A BANDWIDTH PART.”
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/OUSSAMA ROUDANI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2413
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