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 .
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 text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
Claim(s) 1, 13, 24, and 29 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Seo (US 20230155786 A1), hereinafter Seo and further in view of Lei (US 20210120594 A1), hereinafter Lei.
Regarding claim 1,
Seo teaches a user equipment (UE), comprising: one or more memories storing processor-executable code; and one or more processors coupled with the one or more memories and individually or collectively operable to execute the code to cause the UE to:
receive a control signal that indicates a segmentation of a control resource set (CORESET) into a plurality of sub-CORESETs in accordance with a sub-CORESET architecture ([0205] FIG. 10, resource indexing may be performed after CORESET 1 is decomposed into two subCORESETs (CORESET 1-1 and CORESET 1-2) for which different durations are configured. A subCORESET pattern may be predefined or signaled to the UE by the network/BS)
receiving a configuration signal that indicates one or more demodulation reference signal parameters associated with the sub-CORESET architecture; monitoring the plurality of sub-CORESETs for a demodulation reference signal in accordance with the one or more demodulation reference signal parameters (Fig. 10 and [0266] The configuration for each of the multiple sub-control resource sets may be determined separately from the configuration for the control resource set due to the overlapped region).
Seo does not explicitly teach perform a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring early termination procedure based at least in part on the monitoring.
Lei teaches perform a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring early termination procedure based at least in part on the monitoring ([0050] performing early termination of reception of the PDCCH communication based at least in part on the RAR type; ... [0073] a demodulation reference signal (DMRS)-based RAR type indication.... [0089] For the CORESET-based RAR type indication scheme, the UE 120 may attempt to obtain the PDCCH communication by monitoring for the PDCCH communication in the CORESET (e.g., defined or configured according to the CORESET configuration) and/or the SS (e.g., defined or configured according to the SS configuration)).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Lei to the teaching of Seo. The motivation for such an addition would be to reduce latency (Lei [0069]).
Claim(s) [13] (apparatus; network entity), [24] (method; UE), and [29] (method; network entity) is/are rejected under the same reasoning as claim(s) [1] (apparatus; UE), where Seo teaches both device and method ([0001]).
Claim(s) 2-3, 14-15, 25-26, and 30 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Seo and Lei in view of Ren (US 20220190988 A1), hereinafter Ren.
Regarding claim 2,
Seo and Lei teach the UE of claim 1,
Seo and Lei do not explicitly teach wherein the one or more demodulation reference signal parameters maps the demodulation reference signal to a plurality of contiguous resource element groups in a sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs.
Ren teaches wherein the one or more demodulation reference signal parameters maps the demodulation reference signal to a plurality of contiguous resource element groups in a sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs ([0008] method generally includes allocating at least one resource element group (REG) for transmission of a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) to user equipment (UE) or a group of UEs, wherein the REG is in a segment of a control resource set (CORESET) configured for the UE).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Ren to the teaching of Seo and Lei. The motivation for such an addition would be to improve communications between access points and stations in a wireless network (Ren [0007]).
Regarding claim 3,
Seo and Lei and Ren teach the UE of claim 2,
Seo and Lei do not teach wherein, to monitor the plurality of sub-CORESETs for the demodulation reference signal, the one or more processors are individually or collectively further operable to execute the code to cause the UE to: monitor the plurality of contiguous resource element groups in the sub-CORESET for the demodulation reference signal.
Ren teaches wherein, to monitor the plurality of sub-CORESETs for the demodulation reference signal, the one or more processors are individually or collectively further operable to execute the code to cause the UE to: monitor the plurality of contiguous resource element groups in the sub-CORESET for the demodulation reference signal ([0009] method generally includes detecting a portion of ... (PDCCH) to the UE in at least one ... (REG), wherein the REG is in a segment of a ...(CORESET) configured for the UE or a group of UEs including the UE and the REG is during a first search space (SS) set occasion configured for the UE or the group of UEs; and processing wideband (WB) demodulation reference signals (DMRS) in the segment during the first SS set occasion and in the segment during at least one second SS set occasion).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Ren to the teaching of Seo and Lei. The motivation for such an addition would be to improve communications between access points and stations in a wireless network (Ren [0007]).
Claim(s) [14-15] (apparatus; network entity), [25-26] (method; UE), and [30] (method; network entity) is/are rejected under the same reasoning as claim(s) [2-3] (apparatus; UE), where Seo teaches both device and method ([0001]).
Claim(s) 4, 16, and 27 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Seo and Lei and Ren in view of Seo (US 20190103941 A1), hereinafter Seo3941.
Regarding claim 4,
Seo and Lei and Ren teach the UE of claim 2,
Seo and Lei and Ren do not explicitly wherein the one or more processors are individually or collectively further operable to execute the code to cause the UE to: apply a common wideband precoder to the plurality of contiguous resource element groups in the sub-CORESET.
Seo3941 teaches wherein the one or more processors are individually or collectively further operable to execute the code to cause the UE to: apply a common wideband precoder to the plurality of contiguous resource element groups in the sub-CORESET. ([0158] FIG. 7, when a subCORESET is configured and a wideband RS is applied only to subCORESET0, a different precoder from a precoder of subCORESET0 in which the wideband RS is transmitted may be applied to an REG (or REG bundle) of subCORESET1.)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Seo3941 to the teaching of Seo and Lei and Ren. The motivation for such an addition would be to achieve effectively and accurately transmitting or receiving downlink control information through resource element group (REG) bundling in wireless communication system. ([0006-0008] Seo3941).
Claim(s) [16] (apparatus; network entity), and [27] (method; UE) is/are rejected under the same reasoning as claim(s) [4] (apparatus; UE), where Seo Teaches both device and method ([0001]).
Claim(s) 5-9, 17-21, and 28 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Li and Lei in view of Li (US 20230246778), hereinafter Li778.
Regarding claim 5,
Seo and Lei teach the UE of claim 1,
Seo and Lei do not explicitly teach wherein the one or more demodulation reference signal parameters indicates a demodulation reference signal density as a function of the sub-CORESET architecture.
Li778 teaches wherein the one or more demodulation reference signal parameters indicates a demodulation reference signal density as a function of the sub-CORESET architecture ([0005] The UE may decode the control information based at least in part on receiving the first set of DMRS transmissions and the second set of DMRS transmissions. In some examples, parameter values may indicate a DMRS density for receiving one or more DMRS transmissions ... [0127] repetition 420 being associated with a one OFDM symbol CORESET and a set of repetitions 420 including four repetitions 420, it is to be understood that any CORESET and/or size of a set of repetitions 420 may be used ...).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Li778 to the teaching of Seo and Lei. The motivation for such an addition would be to improve performance and communication efficiency ([0004] Li778).
Regarding claim 6,
Seo and Lei and Li778 teach the UE of claim 5,
Seo and Lei do not explicitly teach wherein a first sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs is associated with a higher demodulation reference signal density than a second sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs.
Li778 teaches wherein a first sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs is associated with a higher demodulation reference signal density than a second sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs (fig. 4 and [0127] a portion of the OFDM symbols may be configured with a first DMRS density and a portion of the OFDM symbols may be configured with a second DMRS density (e.g., one symbol of a two symbol CORESET may correspond to a higher DMRS density than a second symbol of the two symbol CORESET)).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Li778 to the teaching of Seo and Lei. The motivation for such an addition would be to improve performance and communication efficiency ([0004] Li778).
Regarding claim 7,
Seo and Lei and Li778 teach the UE of claim 6,
Seo and Lei do not explicitly teach wherein the first sub-CORESET is received earlier in time domain than the second sub-CORESET.
Li778 teaches wherein the first sub-CORESET is received earlier in time domain than the second sub-CORESET (fig. 3 and fig. 4).
PNG
media_image1.png
771
517
media_image1.png
Greyscale
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Li778 to the teaching of Seo and Lei. The motivation for such an addition would be to improve performance and communication efficiency ([0004] Li778)
Regarding claim 8,
Seo and Lei and Li778 teach the UE of claim 6,
Seo and Lei do not explicitly teach wherein a symbol index associated with the first sub-CORESET is lower than a symbol index associated with the second sub-CORESET.
Li778 teaches wherein a symbol index associated with the first sub-CORESET is lower than a symbol index associated with the second sub-CORESET (Fig. 4 and [0127] a portion of the OFDM symbols may be configured with a first DMRS density and a portion of the OFDM symbols may be configured with a second DMRS density (e.g., one symbol of a two symbol CORESET may correspond to a higher DMRS density than a second symbol of the two symbol CORESET)).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Li778 to the teaching of Seo and Lei. The motivation for such an addition would be to improve performance and communication efficiency ([0004] Li778).
Regarding claim 9,
Seo and Lei and Li778 teach the UE of claim 5,
Seo and Lei do not explicitly teach wherein a first portion of a sub-CORESET has a higher demodulation reference signal density than a second portion of the sub-CORESET.
Li778 teaches wherein a first portion of a sub-CORESET has a higher demodulation reference signal density than a second portion of the sub-CORESET (fig. 4 and [0127] a portion of the OFDM symbols may be configured with a first DMRS density and a portion of the OFDM symbols may be configured with a second DMRS density (e.g., one symbol of a two symbol CORESET may correspond to a higher DMRS density than a second symbol of the two symbol CORESET)).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Li778 to the teaching of Seo and Lei. The motivation for such an addition would be to improve performance and communication efficiency ([0004] Li778).
Claim(s) [17-21] (apparatus; network entity), and [28] (method; UE) are rejected under the same reasoning as claim(s) [5-9] (apparatus; UE), where Seo teaches both device and method ([0001]).
Claim(s) 10-11 and 22 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Seo and Lei and Seo3941.
Regarding claim 10,
Seo and Lei teach the UE of claim 1,
Seo and Lei do not exility teaches wherein the one or more processors are individually or collectively further operable to execute the code to cause the UE to receive a priority indication associated with each sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs, wherein a first sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs is associated with a higher priority than a second sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs.
Seo3941 teaches wherein the one or more processors are individually or collectively further operable to execute the code to cause the UE to receive a priority indication associated with each sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs, wherein a first sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs is associated with a higher priority than a second sub-CORESET of the plurality of sub-CORESETs (Fig. 7 and [0194] When an RS (e.g., wideband RS) transmitted irrespective of whether a PDCCH is transmitted in a specific CORESET (or specific time/the frequency domain) and another CORESET that overlaps with the corresponding CORESET is configured, a UE may assume only an RS pattern of a CORESET with high priority in a section (e.g., region 0 of FIG. 11)).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Seo3941 to the teaching of Seo and Lei. The motivation for such an addition would be to achieve effectively and accurately transmitting or receiving downlink control information through resource element group (REG) bundling in wireless communication system ([0006]-[0008] Seo3941).
Regarding claim 11,
Seo and Lei teach the UE of claim 10,
Seo and Lei do not teach wherein, to monitor the plurality of sub-CORESETs, the one or more processors are individually or collectively further operable to execute the code to cause the UE to:
monitor the first sub-CORESET prior to monitoring the second sub-CORESET based at least in part on receiving the priority indication.
Seo3941 teaches wherein, to monitor the plurality of sub-CORESETs, the one or more processors are individually or collectively further operable to execute the code to cause the UE to:
monitor the first sub-CORESET prior to monitoring the second sub-CORESET based at least in part on receiving the priority indication ([0196] When a CORESET in which a wideband RS is transmitted and a CORESET in which a DMRS is transmitted entirely or partially overlap with each other (e.g., when a wideband RS is used in CORESET 0 and a DMRS is used in CORESET1 in FIG. 11) and Option 3 or Option 4 is used, even if time domain bundling is applied to CORESET1, a UE may separately perform channel estimation with respect to each of Region0 and Region1).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Seo3941 to the teaching of Seo and Lei. The motivation for such an addition would be to achieve effectively and accurately transmitting or receiving downlink control information through resource element group (REG) bundling in wireless communication system ([0006]-[0008] Seo3941).
Claim(s) [22] (apparatus; network entity) is/are rejected under the same reasoning as claim(s) [10] (apparatus; UE), where Seo teaches both device and method ([0001]).
Claim(s) 12 and 23 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Seo and Lei and Seo3941 in view of Li778.
Regarding claim 12,
Seo and Lei and Seo3941 teach the UE of claim 10,
Seo and Lei and Seo3941 do not explicitly teach wherein the one or more demodulation reference signal parameters indicates that the first sub-CORESET is associated with a higher demodulation reference signal density than the second sub-CORESET.
Li788 teaches wherein the one or more demodulation reference signal parameters indicates that the first sub-CORESET is associated with a higher demodulation reference signal density than the second sub-CORESET (fig. 4 and [0127] a portion of the OFDM symbols may be configured with a first DMRS density and a portion of the OFDM symbols may be configured with a second DMRS density (e.g., one symbol of a two symbol CORESET may correspond to a higher DMRS density than a second symbol of the two symbol CORESET)).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to add the teaching of Li778 to the teaching of Seo and Lei and Seo3941. The motivation for such an addition would be to improve performance and communication efficiency ([0004] Li778).
Claim(s) [23] (apparatus; network entity) is/are rejected under the same reasoning as claim(s) [12] (apparatus; UE), where Seo teaches both device and method ([0001]).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to VAN T NGUYEN whose telephone number is (571)272-6178. The examiner can normally be reached 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM (EST). 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, Ayman A Abaza can be reached at (571) 270-0422. 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.
/VAN TA NGUYEN/Examiner, Art Unit 2465 /AYMAN A ABAZA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2465
