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 .
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 10/10/2024, 12/10/2024, 07/25/2025 and 06/10/2026 are considered. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1-10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Independent claim 1 recites the limitation "a second DU" in line 5. It is not clear if the claim limitation "a second DU" in line 5 is related to the claim limitation "a second DU" in line 3. If they are related, Applicant is advised to revise the claim limitation "a second DU" in line 5 into “[[a]] the second DU”. If they are not related, Applicant is advised to revise the claim language to avoid issues under 35 USC 112(b). There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
In the examination of the claims, the Examiner has interpreted the claim limitations to be related with each other. This is consistent with the other independent claims.
Dependent claims 2-10 are rejected based on the same reasoning by virtue of their dependency on independent claim 1.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 11-20 are allowed.
Independent claims 11 and 20 are directed to devices for reconfiguring time-frequency resources based at least on buffer status/occupancy. Similarly, the independent claims recite: “…transmit to a second DU connected to the RU, a request message including information on a report period, receive, from the second DU, a response message in accordance with the report period, the response message including information on time-frequency resources for a buffer occupancy (BO) of the second DU, obtain time-frequency resources for a BO of the first DU, determine whether to reconfigure the time-frequency resources of the second DU based on a time-domain resource duration of the time-frequency resources of the first DU and a time-domain resource duration of the time-frequency resources of the second DU, and in accordance with a determination to reconfigure the time-frequency resources of the second DU: obtain information regarding reconfigure of the time-frequency resources of the second DU such that a time-domain resource duration of the reconfigured time-frequency resources of the second DU is reduced based on the time-domain resource duration of the time-frequency resources of the first DU, and transmit, to the second DU, a configuration message indicating information regarding the reconfigured time-frequency resources of the second DU.”
One of the relevant prior art includes Luo et al. (US 20190373627 A1). Similar to the claimed invention, the disclosure of Luo shows a base station central unit (CU) may receive a measurement report from one or more user equipments (UEs). The CU may identify a scheduling plan indication (SPI) for one or more scheduling nodes (DUs) in a network, based at least in part on the received measurement reports. The SPI may specify a pattern of scheduling states, over a period of time, to be used by the one or more scheduling nodes to schedule communication resources for one or more UEs in the network. The scheduling states may (e.g., based on an interference profile determined from the received measurement reports) specify UEs or other communication resources for transmission scheduling decisions made by the scheduling nodes, or may specify beam patterns for beamforming procedures performed by the scheduling nodes. In some cases, the scheduling nodes may identify tentative SPIs, which the CU may pass amongst other scheduling nodes for distributed scheduling coordination schemes. Relevant sections of Luo include Par. 0100, 0125-0131 and 167 and Figure 6. However, Luo does not anticipate nor render obvious the claimed invention when viewed as a whole and as specifically presented in each of the independent claims.
Claims 1-10 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
US 12356201 B2 - SLOT FORMATS FOR SEMI-STATIC DOWNLOAD-UPLINK CONFIGURATION AND DYNAMIC SLOT FORMAT INDICATION IN INTEGRATED ACCESS AND BACKHAUL NETWORKS
US 20250175814 A1 - MANAGING RADIO RESOURCE CONFIGURATIONS FOR SMALL DATA COMMUNICATION
US 20250168093 A1 - DELAYING REQUESTS FOR RESOURCES RELATED SMALL DATA TRANSMISSION
US 20230067851 A1 - COMMUNICATION METHOD AND APPARATUS
US 20220417879 A1 - COMMUNICATION METHOD, APPARATUS, AND DEVICE, AND COMPUTER-READABLE STORAGE MEDIUM
US 20220159768 A1- UPLINK (UL) RETRANSMISSION AND RADIO LINK FAILURE (RLF) RECOVERY IN A MULTI-HOP RELAY NETWORK
US 20220022228 A1 - RESOURCE CONFIGURATION FOR SIDELINK COMMUNICATION
US 20220022214 A1- SCHEDULING BIAS FOR RADIO LINK CONTROL (RLC) CHANNELS IN INTEGRATED ACCESS AND BACKHAUL NETWORKS
US 20210378010 A1 - SHARING CHANNEL OCCUPANCY TIME OF A NODE IN AN INTEGRATED ACCESS BACKHAUL NETWORK
US 20200068565 A1 - WIRELESS COMMUNICATION METHOD AND WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS APPARATUS
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to REDENTOR M PASIA whose telephone number is (571)272-9745. The examiner can normally be reached Mondays-Fridays 5am-245pm.
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, Un Cho can be reached at (571)272-7919. 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.
/REDENTOR PASIA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2413
Prosecution Insights