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
Examiner acknowledges Applicant’s claim to priority benefits of TW113118858 filed 05/22/2024.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement(s) (IDS) submitted on 6/9/2025 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement(s) is/are being considered if signed and initialed 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 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.
For applicant’s benefit portions of the cited reference(s) have been cited to aid in the review of the rejection(s). While every attempt has been made to be thorough and consistent within the rejection it is noted that the PRIOR ART MUST BE CONSIDERED IN ITS ENTIRETY, INCLUDING DISCLOSURES THAT TEACH AWAY FROM THE CLAIMS. See MPEP 2141.02 VI.
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.
Claims 1, 3 and 4-10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kim et al. (US 2021/0247508 A1), and further in view of Moutard et al. (US 2008/0170651 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Kim et al. (‘905) discloses “a method of estimating a direction of arrival (DoA) for a radar system (paragraph 2: a radio detection and ranging (radar) system; paragraph 6: method includes: obtaining a first reception signal and a second reception signal…through a radar sensor…determining an angle value of an object based on a signal obtained by compensating for the Doppler effect; paragraph 6: determining an angle value of an object),
the radar system being used for detecting an object (paragraph 4: analyze a signal reflected from a target and estimate a distance to the target and a velocity of the target; paragraph 7: determining the angle value of the object; paragraph 70: the radar sensor 410 may sense radar data) and
including a processing unit (paragraph 18: a processor; paragraph 69: Figure 4: processor 420),
a number M of transmitting antennas and a number K of receiving antennas forming an array of virtual antennas arranged in an MxK matrix configuration (paragraph 70: the radar sensor 410 may include a plurality of transmitting antennas and a plurality of receiving antennas; paragraph 59: In the case of a MIMO radar system using a plurality of transmitting antennas, the number of receiving antennas may virtually increase by a product from multiplication between the number of the transmitting antennas and the number of the receiving antennas),
the method comprising steps of:
for each time slot (paragraph 11: a first-time interval; paragraph 66: Figure 3: a first time interval 310…a second time interval 320),
one of the transmitting antennas emitting a transmitted signal (paragraph 14: transmitting antennas may be configured to alternately transmit a transmission signal in different time intervals; paragraph 62: a first transmission signal 242 may be transmitted from a first transmitting antenna 212 in a first time interval, and then a second transmission signal 244 may be transmitted from a second transmitting antenna 214 in a second time interval) which is to be reflected by the object to form a reflected signal (paragraph 56: reception signals obtained by being reflected from the object 120 and then received through the receiving antennas), the reflected signal being received at a current time of reception (paragraph 6: obtaining a first reception signal and a second reception signal that are received in different time intervals through a radar sensor; paragraph 59: reception signals obtained in different time intervals (e.g., the first time interval 310 and the second time interval 320),
the processing unit obtaining an estimated distance based on a duration between a time point at which the transmitted signal was emitted and a time of reception at which the reflected signal was received (paragraph 4: radar system may analyze a signal reflected from a target and estimate a distance to the target; paragraph 59: estimating a position of an object through a radar sensor…a distance to the object), and
the processing unit obtaining a relative speed (paragraph 59: estimating a position of an object through a radar sensor may include estimating…a velocity of the object) based on the estimated distance and another estimated distance which was obtained for an immediately prior time slot (paragraph 54: the position of the object 120 may be represented by a distance between the radar sensor 110 and the object 120; paragraph 55: the radar sensor 110 may radiate a transmission signal through at least one transmitting antenna to estimate the position of the object 120; paragraph 66: Figure 3: in a first time interval 310, the first transmitting antenna 212 transmits the first transmission signal and the first transmission signal is reflected from the object 300 and then obtained by receiving antennas 222 and 224 as first reception signals…. subsequently, in a second time interval 320, the second transmitting antenna 214 transmits the second transmission signal and the second transmission signal is reflected from the object 300 and then obtained by the receiving antennas 222 224 as second reception signals; paragraph 73: sets of position information that specifies a position of the object; paragraph 105: the transmitting antenna 710 may be reflected from the object located at a first position 720, and a second transmission signal (or a second chirp signal) transmitted from the transmitting antenna 715 may be reflected from the object located at a second position 725)”,
“in response to determining that the stop condition is met, the processing unit setting the relative speed that was most recently obtained as an iterative relative speed (paragraph 73: the signal processor 420 may sequentially compensate for a Doppler effect in a reception signal and for an angle value of an object, and estimate a velocity of the object based on a compensated signal obtained through the sequential compensation);
the processing unit obtaining a compensation phase value based on the iterative relative speed (Paragraph 67: an object velocity detecting apparatus may calculate a phase shift value caused by such a Doppler effect between reception signals obtained in different time intervals (e.g., the first time interval 310 and the second time interval 320), and accurately estimate an angle value of the object 300 by compensating for the phase shift value in the reception signals…the object velocity detecting apparatus may compensate for the accurately estimated angle value of the object 300 in the initially obtained reception signals, and estimate a velocity value of the object 300 based on reception signals obtained by compensating for the angle value; paragraph 75: he signal processor 420 may compensate for the phase shift value in the second reception signal, obtain a compensated signal by compensating for the phase shift value, and estimate the angle value of the object using the compensated signal obtained by compensating for the phase shift value); and
the processing unit obtaining the DoA based on the compensation phase value and a distance between adjacent two of the virtual antennas (paragraphs 82-83:
PNG
media_image1.png
38
410
media_image1.png
Greyscale
in Equation 6 above, d denotes a distance or interval between receiving antennas in an antenna array included in the radar sensor 410… j denotes an imaginary unit…
PNG
media_image2.png
26
24
media_image2.png
Greyscale
denotes a wavelength corresponding to a carrier frequency of the ith sample data…
PNG
media_image3.png
22
24
media_image3.png
Greyscale
denotes a kth angle in
PNG
media_image4.png
30
28
media_image4.png
Greyscale
…
PNG
media_image5.png
18
50
media_image5.png
Greyscale
denotes a vector corresponding to an angle
PNG
media_image3.png
22
24
media_image3.png
Greyscale
at a carrier frequency corresponding to an ith time index of the frequency modulation model…
PNG
media_image6.png
24
26
media_image6.png
Greyscale
denotes a K×M matrix including K rows and M columns; paragraph 75: d denotes a distance or interval between receiving antennas in an antenna array included in the radar sensor; paragraph 106: a distance between the two receiving antennas 730 and 735 is dr, and a phase difference by the distance dr between the receiving antennas 730 and 735 may be dr sin θ).”
Kim et al. (‘905) does not explicitly disclose “in response to performing the above steps at least twice, the processing unit determining whether a stop condition is met.”
Moutard et al. (‘651) relates to phase and amplitude correction for received signal. Moutard et al. (‘651) teaches “in response to performing the above steps at least twice, the processing unit determining whether a stop condition is met (by periodically repeating the steps of the method, a better correction of the phase mismatches may be obtained; paragraph 125: steps are intended to typically be repeated; Figure 2; Figure 4).”
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill-in-the-art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the method of Kim et al. (‘905) with the teaching of Moutard et al. (‘651) for a better correction of the phase mismatches (Moutard et al. (‘651) – paragraph 30). In addition, both of the prior art references, (Kim et al. (‘905) and Moutard et al. (‘651)) teach features that are directed to analogous art and they are directed to the same field of endeavor, such as, phase compensation for improving angle detection.
Regarding claim 3, which is dependent on independent claim 1, Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) discloses the method of claim 1. Kim et al. (‘905) further discloses “for a current time slot, one of the transmitting antennas emits a current transmitted signal which is to be reflected by the object to form a current reflected signal; for a previous time slot immediately before the current time slot, one of the transmitting antennas emitted a previous transmitted signal which was reflected by the object to form a previous reflected signal (paragraph 58: in a TDM MIMO radar system using a TDM method, a first transmitting antenna 212 may transmit a first transmission signal, and a second transmitting antenna 214 may then transmit a second transmission signal); and
wherein for the current time slot, the step of obtaining the relative speed includes:
obtaining a current initial phase value based on the estimated distance obtained for the current time slot and a wavelength of the current reflected signal, and obtaining a previous initial phase value based on the estimated distance obtained for the previous time slot and a wavelength of the previous reflected signal (paragraph 18: obtain a first reception signal and a second reception signal that are received in deferent time intervals through the radar sensor; paragraph 59: reception signals obtained in different time intervals (e.g., the first time interval 310 and the second time interval 320; paragraph 59: reception signals obtained in different time intervals (e.g., the first time interval 310 and the second time interval 320));
obtaining a phase difference based on the current initial phase value and the previous initial phase value; and obtaining the relative speed based on the phase difference and the duration (paragraph 106: Figure 7B: the radar system includes a receiving antenna RX1 730 and a receiving antenna RX2 735…a distance between the two receiving antennas 730 and 735 is dr, and a phase difference by the distance dr between the receiving antennas 730 and 735 may be dr sin θ; paragraph 109: a phase difference PD between the first transmission signal and the second transmission signal may be represented by Equation 11 below, for example.
PNG
media_image7.png
22
162
media_image7.png
Greyscale
paragraph 110: in Equation 11, Tc denotes a period of the first transmission signal, and v denotes a velocity of the object. fD denotes a phase shift value as a Doppler frequency by a Doppler effect…the reception signals S21 and S22 may include a Doppler effect component by the movement of the object…this Doppler effect component may act as a factor that prevents accurate estimation of an angle value with respect to a position of the object. An object velocity detecting apparatus may estimate a phase shift value corresponding to the Doppler effect component in the reception signals S21 and S22 based on an antenna overlapping method, for example; paragraph 111: through the antenna overlapping method, a MIMO radar system may be designed such that the reception signal S12 and the reception signal S21 overlap each other, that is, phase differences, or phase path differences, of the reception signal S12 and the reception signal S21 are the same. In this case, the object velocity detecting apparatus may estimate the phase shift value due to the movement of the object based on a phase difference between the two reception signals S12 and S21…phase differences of the reception signals S12 and S21 modeled in Equations 8 and 9 may be dr sin θ and dt sin θ, respectively…when the MIMO radar system is designed such that dr and dt have the same value, the phase differences of the reception signals S12 and S21 may be the same…between the reception signals S12 and S21, there may only be a difference between R and R′).”
Regarding claim 4, which is dependent on claim 3, Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) discloses the method of claim 3. Kim et al. (‘905) further discloses “obtaining the current initial phase value and the previous initial phase value is to calculate each of the current initial phase value and the previous initial phase value based on
PNG
media_image8.png
38
74
media_image8.png
Greyscale
, where
PNG
media_image9.png
40
134
media_image9.png
Greyscale
represents the current initial phase value or the previous initial phase value, c is speed of light,
PNG
media_image10.png
18
16
media_image10.png
Greyscale
is the duration, and d represents the estimated distance obtained for the current time slot and f represents a frequency of the current reflected signal when the current initial phase value is being calculated, and d represents the estimated distance obtained for the previous time slot and f represents a frequency of the previous reflected signal when the previous initial phase value is being calculated (paragraph 109: a phase difference PD between the first transmission signal and the second transmission signal may be represented by Equation 11 below, for example.
PNG
media_image7.png
22
162
media_image7.png
Greyscale
paragraph 110: in Equation 11, Tc denotes a period of the first transmission signal, and v denotes a velocity of the object. fD denotes a phase shift value as a Doppler frequency by a Doppler effect…the reception signals S21 and S22 may include a Doppler effect component by the movement of the object…this Doppler effect component may act as a factor that prevents accurate estimation of an angle value with respect to a position of the object. An object velocity detecting apparatus may estimate a phase shift value corresponding to the Doppler effect component in the reception signals S21 and S22 based on an antenna overlapping method, for example; paragraphs 82-83:
PNG
media_image1.png
38
410
media_image1.png
Greyscale
in Equation 6 above, d denotes a distance or interval between receiving antennas in an antenna array included in the radar sensor 410… j denotes an imaginary unit…
PNG
media_image2.png
26
24
media_image2.png
Greyscale
denotes a wavelength corresponding to a carrier frequency of the ith sample data…
PNG
media_image3.png
22
24
media_image3.png
Greyscale
denotes a kth angle in
PNG
media_image4.png
30
28
media_image4.png
Greyscale
…
PNG
media_image5.png
18
50
media_image5.png
Greyscale
denotes a vector corresponding to an angle
PNG
media_image3.png
22
24
media_image3.png
Greyscale
at a carrier frequency corresponding to an ith time index of the frequency modulation model…
PNG
media_image6.png
24
26
media_image6.png
Greyscale
denotes a K×M matrix including K rows and M columns; paragraph 75: d denotes a distance or interval between receiving antennas in an antenna array included in the radar sensor; paragraph 106: a distance between the two receiving antennas 730 and 735 is dr, and a phase difference by the distance dr between the receiving antennas 730 and 735 may be dr sin θ).”
Regarding claim 5, which is dependent on claim 3, Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) discloses the method of claim 3. Kim et al. (‘905) further discloses “the step of obtaining the phase difference includes calculating the phase difference using
PNG
media_image11.png
28
126
media_image11.png
Greyscale
, where
PNG
media_image12.png
24
26
media_image12.png
Greyscale
is the current initial phase value and
PNG
media_image13.png
24
26
media_image13.png
Greyscale
is the previous initial phase value (paragraph 109: a phase difference PD between the first transmission signal and the second transmission signal may be represented by Equation 11 below, for example.
PNG
media_image7.png
22
162
media_image7.png
Greyscale
paragraph 110: in Equation 11, Tc denotes a period of the first transmission signal, and v denotes a velocity of the object. fD denotes a phase shift value as a Doppler frequency by a Doppler effect…the reception signals S21 and S22 may include a Doppler effect component by the movement of the object…this Doppler effect component may act as a factor that prevents accurate estimation of an angle value with respect to a position of the object. An object velocity detecting apparatus may estimate a phase shift value corresponding to the Doppler effect component in the reception signals S21 and S22 based on an antenna overlapping method, for example; paragraph 111: through the antenna overlapping method, a MIMO radar system may be designed such that the reception signal S12 and the reception signal S21 overlap each other, that is, phase differences, or phase path differences, of the reception signal S12 and the reception signal S21 are the same. In this case, the object velocity detecting apparatus may estimate the phase shift value due to the movement of the object based on a phase difference between the two reception signals S12 and S21…phase differences of the reception signals S12 and S21 modeled in Equations 8 and 9 may be dr sin θ and dt sin θ, respectively…when the MIMO radar system is designed such that dr and dt have the same value, the phase differences of the reception signals S12 and S21 may be the same…between the reception signals S12 and S21, there may only be a difference between R and R′)).”
Regarding claim 6, which is dependent on independent claim 1, Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) discloses the method of claim 1. Kim et al. (‘905) further discloses “for the current time slot, the step of obtaining the relative speed includes calculating the relative speed using
PNG
media_image14.png
46
84
media_image14.png
Greyscale
, where
PNG
media_image15.png
20
16
media_image15.png
Greyscale
is the wavelength of the current reflected signal,
PNG
media_image16.png
26
32
media_image16.png
Greyscale
is the phase difference, Tc=Tb- Ta , Tb is a current time of reception at which the receiving antenna received the current reflected signal, and Ta is a previous time of reception at which the receiving antenna received the previous reflected signal (paragraph 67: the object 300 moves in a time interval between a point in time at which the first transmission signal is reflected from the object 300 and a point in time at which the second transmission signal is reflected from the object 300. Due to such a movement of the object 300, a Doppler effect may occur…the Doppler effect may be a phenomenon in which a frequency and a wavelength of reception signals change due to a relative velocity between the object 300 and the radar sensor…the Doppler effect may be a factor that reduces a level of accuracy in estimating an angle of the object 300…an object velocity detecting apparatus may calculate a phase shift value caused by such a Doppler effect between reception signals obtained in different time intervals (e.g., the first time interval 310 and the second time interval 320), and accurately estimate an angle value of the object 300 by compensating for the phase shift value in the reception signals…the object velocity detecting apparatus may compensate for the accurately estimated angle value of the object 300 in the initially obtained reception signals, and estimate a velocity value of the object 300 based on reception signals obtained by compensating for the angle value).”
Regarding claim 7, which is dependent on independent claim 1, Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) discloses the method of claim 1. Kim et al. (‘905) further discloses “for a current time slot, one of the transmitting antennas emits a current transmitted signal which is to be reflected by the object to form a current reflected signal; for a previous time slot immediately before the current time slot, one of the transmitting antennas emitted a previous transmitted signal which was reflected by the object to form a previous reflected signal; and wherein the step of obtaining the compensation phase value includes calculating the compensation phase value using
PNG
media_image17.png
62
118
media_image17.png
Greyscale
, where
PNG
media_image18.png
26
32
media_image18.png
Greyscale
is the compensation phase value,
PNG
media_image19.png
26
24
media_image19.png
Greyscale
is the iterative relative speed, Tc-Tb- Ta,Tb is a current time of reception at which the current reflected signal is received, Ta is a previous time of reception at which the previous reflected signal was received, and
PNG
media_image20.png
22
14
media_image20.png
Greyscale
is the wavelength of the current reflected signal (paragraph 109-110: a phase difference PD between the first transmission signal and the second transmission signal may be represented by Equation 11 below, for example
PNG
media_image21.png
24
266
media_image21.png
Greyscale
In Equation 11,
PNG
media_image22.png
24
20
media_image22.png
Greyscale
denotes a period of the first transmission signal, and v denotes a velocity of the object
PNG
media_image23.png
22
20
media_image23.png
Greyscale
denotes a phase shift value as a Doppler frequency by a Doppler effect).”
Regarding claim 8, which is dependent on independent claim 1, Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) discloses the method of claim 1. Kim et al. (‘905) further discloses “the step of obtaining the DoA includes sub-steps of: obtaining a compensated phase difference based on the compensation phase value and an initial phase value set, and obtaining the DoA based on the compensated phase difference (paragraph 75: the signal processor 420 may compensate for the phase shift value in the second reception signal, obtain a compensated signal by compensating for the phase shift value, and estimate the angle value of the object using the compensated signal obtained by compensating for the phase shift value…the signal processor 420 may estimate the angle value using, for example, a fast Fourier transform (FFT) algorithm, a digital beamforming (DBF) algorithm, estimation of signal parameters via rotational invariance techniques (ESPRIT), and/or a multiple signal classification (MUSIC) algorithm).”
Regarding claim 9, which is dependent on independent claim 1, Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) discloses the method of claim 1. Kim et al. (‘905) further discloses “the sub-step of obtaining the compensated phase difference includes calculating a compensated horizontal phase difference
PNG
media_image24.png
30
38
media_image24.png
Greyscale
and a compensated vertical phase difference
PNG
media_image25.png
28
40
media_image25.png
Greyscale
using following formulas:
PNG
media_image26.png
76
166
media_image26.png
Greyscale
where
PNG
media_image27.png
24
46
media_image27.png
Greyscale
an initial horizontal phase difference that is the phase difference between the reflected signal simulated to be received by one of the virtual antennas and the reflected signal simulated to be received by a horizontally adjacent one of the virtual antennas at the moment the reflected signal arrives ,
PNG
media_image28.png
26
52
media_image28.png
Greyscale
an initial vertical phase difference between the reflected signal simulated to be received by one of the virtual antennas and the reflected signal simulated to be received by a vertically adjacent one of the virtual antennas at the moment the reflected signal arrives,
PNG
media_image29.png
24
32
media_image29.png
Greyscale
is the compensation phase value; and wherein the compensated horizontal phase difference and the compensated vertical phase difference cooperatively serve as the compensated phase difference (paragraph 38: TDM MIMO radar system; paragraph 59: in the case of a MIMO radar system using a plurality of transmitting antennas, the number of receiving antennas may virtually increase by a product from multiplication between the number of the transmitting antennas and the number of the receiving antennas; paragraph 75: the signal processor 420 may compensate for the phase shift value in the second reception signal, obtain a compensated signal by compensating for the phase shift value, and estimate the angle value of the object using the compensated signal obtained by compensating for the phase shift value).”
Regarding claim 10, which is dependent on claim 9, Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) discloses the method of claim 1. Kim et al. (‘905) further discloses “the sub-step of obtaining the DoA based on the compensated phase difference includes calculating a horizontal angle and a vertical angle using following formulas:
PNG
media_image30.png
104
168
media_image30.png
Greyscale
where
PNG
media_image31.png
26
24
media_image31.png
Greyscale
is the horizontal angle,
PNG
media_image32.png
26
22
media_image32.png
Greyscale
is the vertical angle,
PNG
media_image33.png
22
14
media_image33.png
Greyscale
is the distance between adjacent two of the virtual antennas; and wherein the horizontal angle and the vertical angle serve as the DoA. (paragraph 82: in Equation 4, A.sub.fi denotes a first matrix operation for the ith sample data that convers a time-domain value corresponding to the ith sample data to angle information using a carrier frequency corresponding to ith sample data of a frequency modulation model. A.sub.f0.sup.-1 is an inverse matrix of A.sub.f0, and denotes a second matrix operation that inversely converts angle information to a time-domain value using a reference frequency f.sub.0. The first matrix operation A.sub.fi in Equation 4 may be represented by Equations 5 and 6 below, for example.
PNG
media_image34.png
250
540
media_image34.png
Greyscale
; paragraph 83: in Equation 5 above, the first matrix operation A.sub.fi may be represented as a set of vector α.sub.fi(θ.sub.k). Herein, K denotes a natural number greater than or equal to 1, and k denotes a natural number greater than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to K…in Equation 6 above, d denotes a distance or interval between receiving antennas in an antenna array included in the radar sensor 410. j denotes an imaginary unit. λ.sub.fi denotes a wavelength corresponding to a carrier frequency of the ith sample data. θ.sub.k denotes a kth angle in A.sub.fi. α.sub.fi(θ.sub.k) denotes a vector corresponding to an angle θ.sub.k at a carrier frequency corresponding to an ith time index of the frequency modulation model. A.sub.fi denotes a K × M matrix including K rows and M columns).”
Claim 2 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kim et al. (US 2021/0247508 A1)/Moutard et al. (US 2008/0170651 A1), and further in view of Aizawa (US 2015/0130655 A1).
Regarding claim 2, which is dependent on independent claim 1, Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) discloses the method of claim 1. Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) does not explicitly disclose “the step of obtaining the estimated distance includes calculating the estimated distance using
PNG
media_image35.png
36
60
media_image35.png
Greyscale
, where d is estimated distance, c is speed of light, and x is the duration.”
Aizawa (‘655) relates to a radar apparatus that receives a reflected wave reflected by a target object by an antenna to detect the direction of the target object. Aizawa (‘655) teaches “the step of obtaining the estimated distance includes calculating the estimated distance using
PNG
media_image35.png
36
60
media_image35.png
Greyscale
, where d is estimated distance, c is speed of light, and x is the duration (paragraph 63: since the millimeter wave makes a round trip to the target at a distance R, time T that passes from transmission of the transmission wave until reception of the reflected wave is represented as follows, where C represents the speed of light
PNG
media_image36.png
18
52
media_image36.png
Greyscale
).”
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill-in-the-art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the method of Kim et al. (‘905)/Moutard et al. (‘651) with the teaching of Aizawa (‘655) for a better correction of the phase mismatches (Aizawa (‘655) – paragraph 30). In addition, all of the prior art references, (Kim et al. (‘905), Moutard et al. (‘651) and Aizawa (‘655)) teach features that are directed to analogous art and they are directed to the same field of endeavor, such as, phase compensation for improving angle detection.
Citation of Pertinent Prior Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Kim et al. (US 2021/0080542 A1) describes technique for estimating a direction of arrival (DOA) of a radar reception signal (paragraph 2); estimating the DOA of a radar reception signal for improving resolution of adjacent targets (paragraph 7); receiving, through N actual antennas (paragraph 16); receiving, through N actual antennas, radio signals in time domain reflected from a target in front (paragraph 16); the data processing unit 40 (paragraph 51); the ULA transmitting antenna unit 70 may include a plurality of antennas (paragraph 52).
Alexander et al. (DE 102017128508 A1) [English Translation] describes
the target speed can be determined from the Doppler frequency shift. The
Doppler frequency shift is typically measured by the phase difference between transmitted chirps and received reflections…the chirp duration determines the desired latency and the maximum range of the radar, thereby limiting the number of chirps to be transmitted…this in turn affects the Doppler resolution for a given maximum range, which affects the maximum resolvable speed…the velocity v is given by:
PNG
media_image37.png
54
48
media_image37.png
Greyscale
…the frame duration (Tf ) results from a product of the number of chirps and the chirp duration is the speed of light (3 * 10 .sup.8 meters/ second) and fc is the carrier frequency …the frame duration is inversely proportional to the Doppler frequency resolution…the minimization of the frame duration thus improves the Doppler frequency resolution…the frame duration must be at least as long that the transmission of a chirp over each transmit element is possible (page 2 last paragraph – page 3 first paragraph).
Lee et al. (US 10,389,421 B2) describes an embodiment of the present invention provides an apparatus for estimating an arrival-angle of a signal by using an array antenna, which may include: a phase compensation value calculating unit that is configured to obtain a phase compensation value for each measurement angle by using a reference value that is obtained by calculating the degree of distortion of the magnitude and phase of a reception signal for each measurement angle; a steering vector calculating unit that is configured to calculate a compensation steering vector by using an array antenna compensation value that is calculated by reflecting the phase compensation value and by using a predetermined steering vector…an arrival-angle estimating unit that is configured to estimate an arrival-angle through a spectrum that is created based on the calculated compensation steering vector and the reception signal that is received from two or more receiving channels of the array antenna (column 2 line 54-column 3 line 3).
Cho et al. (US 12,487,322 B2) describes an electronic device includes: a radar sensor configured to radiate a radar signal and receive a reflected signal of the radiated radar signal by: transmitting at least some chirp signals among a plurality of chirp signals belonging to the same frame through a single antenna among a plurality of antennas of the radar sensor; and transmitting other chirp signals among the plurality of chirp signals belonging to the same frame through at least two antennas among the plurality of antennas…one or more processors configured to detect a target and determine a direction of arrival (DOA) of the target from radar data determined based on the at least some chirp signals, the other chirp signals, and the reflected signal (column 1 lines 41-53).
Contact Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to NUZHAT PERVIN whose telephone number is (571)272-9795. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:00AM-5:00PM.
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, William J Kelleher can be reached at 571-272-7753. 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.
/NUZHAT PERVIN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3648