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 11/04/2024 was filed. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Interpretation
During examination, claim terms are given their broadest reasonable interpretation consistent with the specification as that specification would be read by one of ordinary skill in the art (MPEP 2111). The constructions below govern the rejections that follow.
The recitation that an SRS resource set of the SRS is configured with a usage set to a nonCodebook is construed as an SRS resource set whose usage parameter is configured as non-codebook, that is, the sounding reference signal resource set used for non-codebook based uplink transmission. The specification uses the term in that sense (Specification, para [0453] “the CSI-RS resource set configured within the SRS resource set having usage configured as noncodebook and the resource-specific slot offset configured for all CSI-RS resources within the CSI-RS resource set, if the UE receives triggering on the aperiodic associated CSI-RS having a total number of CSI-RS ports greater than 32 (e.g., 48, 64, or 128) via DCI”).
The recitation of a channel state information (CSI)-reference signal (RS) resource set with more than 32 antenna ports whose contents are an aggregation of a plurality of CSI-RS resources as an associated CSI-RS is construed, consistently with that same passage, as the CSI-RS resource set configured within the non-codebook SRS resource set and having a total number of CSI-RS ports greater than 32, the specification giving 48, 64 and 128 as examples of that total. (See also paragraph [0372])
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 1-16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhang (US 2019/0327115 A1) in view of Liu (EP 4 236 151 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Zhang discloses: A method performed by a terminal in a wireless communication system, the method comprising: receiving, from a base station, configuration information on a channel state information (CSI)-reference signal (RS) resource, a next generation NodeB that configures for a user equipment, and thereby signals to it, one aperiodic CSI reference signal associated with a sounding reference signal resource set, which is the configuration information on a CSI-RS resource set that the terminal receives from the base station: (Zhang, para [0018] “For non-codebook based transmission, a next generation NodeB (gNB) can configure one aperiodic Channel State Information (CSI)-Reference Signal (RS) associated with a Sounding RS (SRS) resource set”).
Furthermore, Zhang discloses: receiving, from the base station, downlink control information (DCI) requesting a sounding reference signal (SRS), because Zhang teaches downlink control information carrying an SRS request field that requests the sounding reference signal, the field being present in the DCI formats the base station sends to the user equipment: (Zhang, para [0023] “a SRS request field (e.g., SRSRequest) in DCI of a NR wireless cellular system may jointly trigger an SRS and a CSI-RS”; Zhang, para [0024] “NR DCI formats 0_1, 1_1, and/or 2_3 may include one field of SRSRequest, which trigger the SRS”).
Moreover, Zhang discloses: receiving, from the base station, the associated CSI-RS, because Zhang teaches that the same downlink control information triggers the associated aperiodic CSI reference signal, which is then transmitted to the user equipment in the slot carrying that control information: (Zhang, para [0018] “the gNB can jointly trigger this aperiodic CSI-RS and SRS by a single Downlink Control Information (DCI), where the aperiodic CSI-RS is transmitted in the same slot as the DCI”).
In addition, Zhang discloses: transmitting, to the base station, the SRS based on the DCI, because Zhang teaches that the sounding reference signal is sent in response to that same downlink control information, the SRS request field in the DCI being what triggers it: (Zhang, para [0023] “FIG. 1 illustrates a PDCCH 102 that includes DCI with a SRS request field that jointly triggers a CSI-RS 104 and an SRS 106”).
Furthermore, Zhang discloses: transmitting, to the base station, a non-codebook based physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) according to the SRS, because Zhang teaches the non-codebook based uplink transmission scheme, in which the user equipment derives the uplink precoder for its uplink transmission from the channel estimated on the associated CSI-RS that the sounding reference signal resource set is tied to, and in which the same downlink control information format that requests the SRS is the format scheduling the uplink PUSCH: (Zhang, para [0018] “there are two uplink transmission schemes: codebook based transmission and non-codebook based transmission”; Zhang, para [0018] “a user equipment (UE) may calculate the downlink channel based on the aperiodic CSI-RS and derive the uplink precoder based on this estimated downlink channel”; Zhang, para [0019] “DCI format 0_1, which may be used to trigger uplink PUSCH, downlink CSI-RS (using the CSI-RS request field) and SRS (using the SRS request field)”).
Although Zhang teaches the non-codebook based uplink transmission scheme in which a base station configures, for a terminal, a CSI reference signal associated with a sounding reference signal resource set and jointly triggers that CSI-RS and the SRS by a single downlink control information, from which the terminal derives the uplink precoder: (Zhang, para [0018], para [0019]), Zhang does not explicitly disclose that the configured CSI-RS resource set has more than 32 antenna ports and is made up of an aggregation of a plurality of CSI-RS resources serving as that associated CSI-RS, nor that the number of those CSI-RS resources is one of 2, 3, or 4.
However, Zhang in view of Liu discloses set with more than 32 antenna ports, wherein the CSI-RS resource set includes an aggregation of a plurality of CSI-RS resources as an associated CSI-RS because Liu teaches a network side that configures for one terminal two CSI-RS resources, one carrying 32 CSI-RS antenna ports and one carrying 16, and then treats the ports of both resources as a single aggregated pool of 48 antenna ports on which the beamformed CSI-RS is sent, so that the terminal is configured with a CSI-RS resource set whose port count exceeds 32 precisely because it is an aggregation of several CSI-RS resources (Liu, para [0089], “the network side configures a CSI-RS resource (marked as CSI-RS 0) including 32 CSI-RS antenna ports and a CSI-RS resource (marked as CSI-RS 1) including 16 CSI-RS antenna ports respectively for the terminal side”; Liu, para [0090], “the total number of the CSI-RS antenna ports used by the network side for sending beams is P=32+16=48”).
Moreover, Liu discloses wherein a number of the plurality of CSI-RS resources is one of 2, 3, or 4 because Liu teaches that the CSI-RS resource set it configures for the terminal side is made up of exactly two CSI-RS resources, CSI-RS 0 and CSI-RS 1, so that the number of CSI-RS resources aggregated into the set is two, which is one of the three numbers the claim permits (Liu, para [0089], “a CSI-RS resource (marked as CSI-RS 0) including 32 CSI-RS antenna ports and a CSI-RS resource (marked as CSI-RS 1) including 16 CSI-RS antenna ports”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to build the CSI reference signal that Zhang associates with the sounding reference signal resource set out of Liu's aggregation of a plurality of CSI-RS resources spanning more than 32 antenna ports, with the number of aggregated resources being two, three or four. Liu names the limited total number of CSI-RS antenna ports available in an NR system as the very constraint that keeps a network side from sounding every beam it needs to send, and Zhang's non-codebook procedure computes the uplink precoder from the downlink channel the terminal estimates on the associated CSI-RS, so the number of antenna ports that associated CSI-RS can span directly bounds how faithfully that precoder can represent the base station's array. Aggregating a small number of CSI-RS resources is the technique Liu supplies for lifting exactly that port ceiling, and applying it to Zhang's associated CSI-RS is the use of a known technique to improve a comparable system in the same way, yielding no more than the predictable result of a non-codebook uplink precoder derived over an antenna array larger than 32 ports. One of ordinary skill would further have had a reasonable expectation of success, since Liu's aggregation changes only how the ports of the associated CSI-RS are partitioned among resources and leaves Zhang's trigger, sounding and PUSCH procedure untouched.
Regarding claim 2, which depends on claim 1, Zhang discloses The method of claim 1, wherein an SRS resource set of the SRS is configured with a usage set to a nonCodebook, as Zhang further discloses that the sounding reference signal resource set with which the CSI reference signal is associated is the resource set the base station configures for non-codebook based transmission, which is exactly the usage the claimed nonCodebook setting designates (Zhang, para [0018] “For non-codebook based transmission, a next generation NodeB (gNB) can configure one aperiodic Channel State Information (CSI)-Reference Signal (RS) associated with a Sounding RS (SRS) resource set”).
Regarding claim 3, which depends on claim 1, Zhang discloses The method of claim 1, wherein the DCI and the associated CSI-RS are received in a same slot, as Zhang further discloses that the aperiodic CSI reference signal jointly triggered by the downlink control information is carried in the very slot that carries that control information (Zhang, para [0018] “the aperiodic CSI-RS is transmitted in the same slot as the DCI”; Zhang, para [0023] “the CSI-RS 104 may be transmitted in a same slot as the PDCCH 102”).
Regarding claim 4, which depends on claim 1, Zhang discloses The method of claim 1, wherein the associated CSI-RS is an aperiodic CSI-RS, and wherein the SRS is an aperiodic SRS, as Zhang further discloses that the CSI reference signal associated with the sounding reference signal resource set is an aperiodic CSI-RS and that the sounding reference signal the downlink control information requests is an aperiodic SRS (Zhang, para [0018] “a next generation NodeB (gNB) can configure one aperiodic Channel State Information (CSI)-Reference Signal (RS) associated with a Sounding RS (SRS) resource set”; Zhang, para [0019] “there are multiple DCI formats that can trigger aperiodic SRS”).
Regarding claim 5, Zhang discloses: A method performed by a base station in a wireless communication system, the method comprising: transmitting, to a terminal, configuration information on a channel state information (CSI)-reference signal (RS) resource, because Zhang teaches a next generation NodeB that configures for a user equipment, and thereby signals to it, one aperiodic CSI reference signal associated with a sounding reference signal resource set, which is the configuration information on a CSI-RS resource set that the base station transmits to the terminal: (Zhang, para [0018] “For non-codebook based transmission, a next generation NodeB (gNB) can configure one aperiodic Channel State Information (CSI)-Reference Signal (RS) associated with a Sounding RS (SRS) resource set”).
Furthermore, Zhang discloses: transmitting, to the terminal, downlink control information (DCI) requesting a sounding reference signal (SRS), because Zhang teaches downlink control information carrying an SRS request field that requests the sounding reference signal, the field being present in the DCI formats the base station sends to the user equipment: (Zhang, para [0023] “a SRS request field (e.g., SRSRequest) in DCI of a NR wireless cellular system may jointly trigger an SRS and a CSI-RS”; Zhang, para [0024] “NR DCI formats 0_1, 1_1, and/or 2_3 may include one field of SRSRequest, which trigger the SRS”).
Moreover, Zhang discloses: transmitting, to the terminal, the associated CSI-RS, because Zhang teaches that the same downlink control information triggers the associated aperiodic CSI reference signal, which is then transmitted by the base station in the slot carrying that control information: (Zhang, para [0018] “the gNB can jointly trigger this aperiodic CSI-RS and SRS by a single Downlink Control Information (DCI), where the aperiodic CSI-RS is transmitted in the same slot as the DCI”).
In addition, Zhang discloses: receiving, from the terminal, the SRS based on the DCI, because Zhang teaches that the sounding reference signal is sent in response to that same downlink control information, the SRS request field in the DCI being what triggers it: (Zhang, para [0023] “FIG. 1 illustrates a PDCCH 102 that includes DCI with a SRS request field that jointly triggers a CSI-RS 104 and an SRS 106”).
Furthermore, Zhang discloses: receiving, from the terminal, a non-codebook based physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) according to the SRS, because Zhang teaches the non-codebook based uplink transmission scheme, in which the user equipment derives the uplink precoder for its uplink transmission from the channel estimated on the associated CSI-RS that the sounding reference signal resource set is tied to, and in which the same downlink control information format that requests the SRS is the format scheduling the uplink PUSCH: (Zhang, para [0018] “there are two uplink transmission schemes: codebook based transmission and non-codebook based transmission”; Zhang, para [0018] “a user equipment (UE) may calculate the downlink channel based on the aperiodic CSI-RS and derive the uplink precoder based on this estimated downlink channel”; Zhang, para [0019] “DCI format 0_1, which may be used to trigger uplink PUSCH, downlink CSI-RS (using the CSI-RS request field) and SRS (using the SRS request field)”).
Although Zhang teaches the non-codebook based uplink transmission scheme in which a base station configures, for a terminal, a CSI reference signal associated with a sounding reference signal resource set and jointly triggers that CSI-RS and the SRS by a single downlink control information, from which the terminal derives the uplink precoder: (Zhang, para [0018], para [0019]), Zhang does not explicitly disclose that the configured CSI-RS resource set has more than 32 antenna ports and is made up of an aggregation of a plurality of CSI-RS resources serving as that associated CSI-RS, nor that the number of those CSI-RS resources is one of 2, 3, or 4.
Conversely, Zhang in view of Liu discloses set with more than 32 antenna ports, wherein the CSI-RS resource set includes an aggregation of a plurality of CSI-RS resources as an associated CSI-RS because Liu teaches a network side that configures for one terminal two CSI-RS resources, one carrying 32 CSI-RS antenna ports and one carrying 16, and then treats the ports of both resources as a single aggregated pool of 48 antenna ports on which the beamformed CSI-RS is sent, so that the terminal is configured with a CSI-RS resource set whose port count exceeds 32 precisely because it is an aggregation of several CSI-RS resources (Liu, para [0089], “the network side configures a CSI-RS resource (marked as CSI-RS 0) including 32 CSI-RS antenna ports and a CSI-RS resource (marked as CSI-RS 1) including 16 CSI-RS antenna ports respectively for the terminal side”; Liu, para [0090], “the total number of the CSI-RS antenna ports used by the network side for sending beams is P=32+16=48”).
Moreover, Liu discloses wherein a number of the plurality of CSI-RS resources is one of 2, 3, or 4 because Liu teaches that the CSI-RS resource set it configures for the terminal side is made up of exactly two CSI-RS resources, CSI-RS 0 and CSI-RS 1, so that the number of CSI-RS resources aggregated into the set is two, which is one of the three numbers the claim permits (Liu, para [0089], “a CSI-RS resource (marked as CSI-RS 0) including 32 CSI-RS antenna ports and a CSI-RS resource (marked as CSI-RS 1) including 16 CSI-RS antenna ports”).
For these reasons, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to build the CSI reference signal that Zhang associates with the sounding reference signal resource set out of Liu's aggregation of a plurality of CSI-RS resources spanning more than 32 antenna ports, with the number of aggregated resources being two, three or four. Liu names the limited total number of CSI-RS antenna ports available in an NR system as the very constraint that keeps a network side from sounding every beam it needs to send, and Zhang's non-codebook procedure computes the uplink precoder from the downlink channel the terminal estimates on the associated CSI-RS, so the number of antenna ports that associated CSI-RS can span directly bounds how faithfully that precoder can represent the base station's array. Aggregating a small number of CSI-RS resources is the technique Liu supplies for lifting exactly that port ceiling and applying it to Zhang's associated CSI-RS is the use of a known technique to improve a comparable system in the same way, yielding no more than the predictable result of a non-codebook uplink precoder derived over an antenna array larger than 32 ports. One of ordinary skill would further have had a reasonable expectation of success, since Liu's aggregation changes only how the ports of the associated CSI-RS are partitioned among resources and leaves Zhang's trigger, sounding and PUSCH procedure untouched.
Regarding claim 6, which depends on claim 5, Zhang discloses The method of claim 5, wherein an SRS resource set of the SRS is configured with a usage set to a nonCodebook, as Zhang further discloses that the sounding reference signal resource set with which the CSI reference signal is associated is the resource set the base station configures for non-codebook based transmission, which is exactly the usage the claimed nonCodebook setting designates (Zhang, para [0018] “For non-codebook based transmission, a next generation NodeB (gNB) can configure one aperiodic Channel State Information (CSI)-Reference Signal (RS) associated with a Sounding RS (SRS) resource set”).
Regarding claim 7, which depends on claim 5, Zhang discloses The method of claim 5, wherein the DCI and the associated CSI-RS are transmitted in a same slot, as Zhang further discloses that the aperiodic CSI reference signal jointly triggered by the downlink control information is carried in the very slot that carries that control information (Zhang, para [0018] “the aperiodic CSI-RS is transmitted in the same slot as the DCI”; Zhang, para [0023] “the CSI-RS 104 may be transmitted in a same slot as the PDCCH 102”).
Regarding claim 8, which depends on claim 5, Zhang discloses The method of claim 5, wherein the associated CSI-RS is an aperiodic CSI-RS, and wherein the SRS is an aperiodic SRS, as Zhang further discloses that the CSI reference signal associated with the sounding reference signal resource set is an aperiodic CSI-RS and that the sounding reference signal the downlink control information requests is an aperiodic SRS (Zhang, para [0018] “a next generation NodeB (gNB) can configure one aperiodic Channel State Information (CSI)-Reference Signal (RS) associated with a Sounding RS (SRS) resource set”; Zhang, para [0019] “there are multiple DCI formats that can trigger aperiodic SRS”).
Regarding claim 9, the claim recites: A terminal in a wireless communication system, the terminal comprising: a transceiver; and at least one processor coupled with the transceiver and configured to: receive, from a base station, configuration information on a channel state information (CSI)-reference signal (RS) resource set with more than 32 antenna ports, wherein the CSI-RS resource set includes an aggregation of a plurality of CSI-RS resources as an associated CSI-RS, receive, from the base station, downlink control information (DCI) requesting a sounding reference signal (SRS), receive, from the base station, the associated CSI-RS, transmit, to the base station, the SRS based on the DCI, and transmit, to the base station, a non-codebook based physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) according to the SRS, wherein a number of the plurality of CSI-RS resources is one of 2, 3, or 4. Claim 9 is analogous to claim 1 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 10, which depends on claim 9, the claim recites: The terminal of claim 9, wherein an SRS resource set of the SRS is configured with a usage set to a nonCodebook. Claim 10 is analogous to claim 2 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 11, which depends on claim 9, the claim recites: The terminal of claim 9, wherein the DCI and the associated CSI-RS are received in a same slot. Claim 11 is analogous to claim 3 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 12, which depends on claim 9, the claim recites: The terminal of claim 9, wherein the associated CSI-RS is an aperiodic CSI-RS, and wherein the SRS is an aperiodic SRS. Claim 12 is analogous to claim 4 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 13, the claim recites: A base station in a wireless communication system, the base station comprising: a transceiver; and at least one processor coupled with the transceiver and configured to: transmit, to a terminal, configuration information on a channel state information (CSI)-reference signal (RS) resource set with more than 32 antenna ports, wherein the CSI-RS resource set includes an aggregation of a plurality of CSI-RS resources as an associated CSI-RS, transmit, to the terminal, downlink control information (DCI) requesting a sounding reference signal (SRS), transmit, to the terminal, the associated CSI-RS, receive, from the terminal, the SRS based on the DCI, and receive, from the terminal, a non-codebook based physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) according to the SRS, wherein a number of the plurality of CSI-RS resources is one of 2, 3, or 4. Claim 13 is analogous to claim 5 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 14, which depends on claim 13, the claim recites: The base station of claim 13, wherein an SRS resource set of the SRS is configured with a usage set to a nonCodebook. Claim 14 is analogous to claim 6 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 15, which depends on claim 13, the claim recites: The base station of claim 13, wherein the DCI and the associated CSI-RS are transmitted in a same slot. Claim 15 is analogous to claim 7 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 16, which depends on claim 13, the claim recites: The base station of claim 13, wherein the associated CSI-RS is an aperiodic CSI-RS, and wherein the SRS is an aperiodic SRS. Claim 16 is analogous to claim 8 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Conclusion
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/CHONGSUH PARK/Examiner, Art Unit 2478
/JOSEPH E AVELLINO/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2478
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