WO2019210504A1

WO2019210504A1 - Channel quality for multi-beam operation introduction

Info

Publication number: WO2019210504A1
Application number: PCT/CN2018/085571
Authority: WO
Inventors: Ozcan Ozturk; Peng Cheng
Original assignee: Qualcomm Inc
Current assignee: Qualcomm Inc
Priority date: 2018-05-04
Filing date: 2018-05-04
Publication date: 2019-11-07
Anticipated expiration: 2020-11-04

Abstract

A method for providing techniques for determining channel quality for multi-beam operation. An exemplary method generally includes determining, during an idle or inactive mode, a baseline channel quality for a plurality of transmission beams associated with a first cell, wherein the baseline channel quality comprises a linear average of the plurality of transmission beams, determining an idle or inactive mode channel quality for the plurality of transmission beams as a function of the baseline channel quality, and performing a cell reselection procedure to select the first cell for service based, at least in part, on the idle or inactive mode channel quality.

Description

CHANNEL QUALITY FOR MULTI-BEAM OPERATION INTRODUCTION

Field of the Disclosure

Aspects of the present disclosure relate to wireless communications, and more particularly, to techniques for determining channel quality for multi-beam operation.

Description of Related Art

Wireless communication systems are widely deployed to provide various telecommunication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, broadcasts, etc. These wireless communication systems may employ multiple-access technologies capable of supporting communication with multiple users by sharing available system resources (e.g., bandwidth, transmit power, etc. ) . Examples of such multiple-access systems include 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Long Term Evolution (LTE) systems, LTE Advanced (LTE-A) systems, code division multiple access (CDMA) systems, time division multiple access (TDMA) systems, frequency division multiple access (FDMA) systems, orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) systems, single-carrier frequency division multiple access (SC-FDMA) systems, and time division synchronous code division multiple access (TD-SCDMA) systems, to name a few.

In some examples, a wireless multiple-access communication system may include a number of base stations (BSs) , which are each capable of simultaneously supporting communication for multiple communication devices, otherwise known as user equipments (UEs) . In an LTE or LTE-A network, a set of one or more base stations may define an eNodeB (eNB) . In other examples (e.g., in a next generation, a new radio (NR) , or 5G network) , a wireless multiple access communication system may include a number of distributed units (DUs) (e.g., edge units (EUs) , edge nodes (ENs) , radio heads (RHs) , smart radio heads (SRHs) , transmission reception points (TRPs) , etc. ) in communication with a number of central units (CUs) (e.g., central nodes (CNs) , access node controllers (ANCs) , etc. ) , where a set of one or more distributed units, in communication with a central unit, may define an access node (e.g., which may be referred to as a base station, 5G NB, next generation NodeB (gNB or gNodeB) , TRP, etc. ) . A base station or distributed unit may communicate with a set of UEs on downlink channels (e.g., for transmissions from a base station or to a UE) and uplink channels (e.g., for transmissions from a UE to a base station or distributed unit) .

These multiple access technologies have been adopted in various telecommunication standards to provide a common protocol that enables different wireless devices to communicate on a municipal, national, regional, and even global level. New Radio (NR) (e.g., 5G) is an example of an emerging telecommunication standard. NR is a set of enhancements to the LTE mobile standard promulgated by 3GPP. It is designed to better support mobile broadband Internet access by improving spectral efficiency, lowering costs, improving services, making use of new spectrum, and better integrating with other open standards using OFDMA with a cyclic prefix (CP) on the downlink (DL) and on the uplink (UL) . To these ends, NR supports beamforming, multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna technology, and carrier aggregation.

However, as the demand for mobile broadband access continues to increase, there exists a need for further improvements in NR and LTE technology. Preferably, these improvements should be applicable to other multi-access technologies and the telecommunication standards that employ these technologies.

BRIEF SUMMARY

The systems, methods, and devices of the disclosure each have several aspects, no single one of which is solely responsible for its desirable attributes. Without limiting the scope of this disclosure as expressed by the claims which follow, some features will now be discussed briefly. After considering this discussion, and particularly after reading the section entitled “Detailed Description” one will understand how the features of this disclosure provide advantages that include improved communications between access points and stations in a wireless network.

Certain aspects provide a method for wireless communication performed by a user equipment. The method generally includes determining, during an idle or inactive mode, a baseline channel quality for a plurality of transmission beams associated with a first cell, wherein the baseline channel quality comprises a linear average of the plurality of transmission beams, determining an idle or inactive mode channel quality for the plurality of transmission beams as a function of the baseline channel quality, and performing a cell reselection procedure to select the first cell for service based, at least in part, on the idle or inactive mode channel quality.

Certain aspects provide an apparatus for wireless communication performed by a user equipment. The apparatus generally includes at least one processor configured to determine, during an idle or inactive mode, a baseline channel quality for a plurality of transmission beams associated with a first cell, wherein the baseline channel quality comprises a linear average of the plurality of transmission beams, determine an idle or inactive mode channel quality for the plurality of transmission beams as a function of the baseline channel quality, and perform a cell reselection procedure to select the first cell for service based, at least in part, on the idle or inactive mode channel quality. The apparatus may also include a memory coupled with the at least one processor.

Certain aspects provide an apparatus for wireless communication performed by a user equipment. The apparatus generally includes means for determining, during an idle or inactive mode, a baseline channel quality for a plurality of transmission beams associated with a first cell, wherein the baseline channel quality comprises a linear average of the plurality of transmission beams, means for determining an idle or inactive mode channel quality for the plurality of transmission beams as a function of the baseline channel quality, and means for performing a cell reselection procedure to select the first cell for service based, at least in part, on the idle or inactive mode channel quality.

Certain aspects provide a non-transitory computer-readable medium for wireless communication performed by a user equipment. The non-transitory computer-readable medium generally includes instructions that, when executed by at least one processor, configure the at least one processor to determine, during an idle or inactive mode, a baseline channel quality for a plurality of transmission beams associated with a first cell, wherein the baseline channel quality comprises a linear average of the plurality of transmission beams, determine an idle or inactive mode channel quality for the plurality of transmission beams as a function of the baseline channel quality, and perform a cell reselection procedure to select the first cell for service based, at least in part, on the idle or inactive mode channel quality.

To the accomplishment of the foregoing and related ends, the one or more aspects comprise the features hereinafter fully described and particularly pointed out in the claims. The following description and the appended drawings set forth in detail certain illustrative features of the one or more aspects. These features are indicative, however, of but a few of the various ways in which the principles of various aspects may be employed.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

So that the manner in which the above-recited features of the present disclosure can be understood in detail, a more particular description, briefly summarized above, may be had by reference to aspects, some of which are illustrated in the drawings. It is to be noted, however, that the appended drawings illustrate only certain typical aspects of this disclosure and are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope, for the description may admit to other equally effective aspects.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram conceptually illustrating an example telecommunications system, in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating an example logical architecture of a distributed radio access network (RAN) , in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an example physical architecture of a distributed RAN, in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram conceptually illustrating a design of an example base station (BS) and user equipment (UE) , in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing examples for implementing a communication protocol stack, in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 6 illustrates an example of a frame format for a new radio (NR) system, in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 7 illustrates a cell reselection process, in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 8 illustrated example operations for wireless communications, in accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 9 illustrates a communications device that may include various components configured to perform operations for the techniques disclosed herein in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.

To facilitate understanding, identical reference numerals have been used, where possible, to designate identical elements that are common to the figures. It is contemplated that elements disclosed in one aspect may be beneficially utilized on other aspects without specific recitation.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Aspects of the present disclosure provide apparatus, methods, processing systems, and computer readable mediums for determining channel quality for multi-beam operation

The following description provides examples, and is not limiting of the scope, applicability, or examples set forth in the claims. Changes may be made in the function and arrangement of elements discussed without departing from the scope of the disclosure. Various examples may omit, substitute, or add various procedures or components as appropriate. For instance, the methods described may be performed in an order different from that described, and various steps may be added, omitted, or combined. Also, features described with respect to some examples may be combined in some other examples. For example, an apparatus may be implemented or a method may be practiced using any number of the aspects set forth herein. In addition, the scope of the disclosure is intended to cover such an apparatus or method which is practiced using other structure, functionality, or structure and functionality in addition to, or other than, the various aspects of the disclosure set forth herein. It should be understood that any aspect of the disclosure disclosed herein may be embodied by one or more elements of a claim. The word “exemplary” is used herein to mean “serving as an example, instance, or illustration. ” Any aspect described herein as “exemplary” is not necessarily to be construed as preferred or advantageous over other aspects.

The techniques described herein may be used for various wireless communication technologies, such as LTE, CDMA, TDMA, FDMA, OFDMA, SC-FDMA and other networks. The terms “network” and “system” are often used interchangeably. A CDMA network may implement a radio technology such as Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (UTRA) , cdma2000, etc. UTRA includes Wideband CDMA (WCDMA) and other variants of CDMA. cdma2000 covers IS-2000, IS-95 and IS-856 standards. A TDMA network may implement a radio technology such as Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) . An OFDMA network may implement a radio technology such as NR (e.g. 5G RA) , Evolved UTRA (E-UTRA) , Ultra Mobile Broadband (UMB) , IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi) , IEEE 802.16 (WiMAX) , IEEE 802.20, Flash-OFDMA, etc. UTRA and E-UTRA are part of Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS) .

New Radio (NR) is an emerging wireless communications technology under development in conjunction with the 5G Technology Forum (5GTF) . 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE) and LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) are releases of UMTS that use E-UTRA. UTRA, E-UTRA, UMTS, LTE, LTE-A and GSM are described in documents from an organization named “3rd Generation Partnership Project” (3GPP) . cdma2000 and UMB are described in documents from an organization named “3rd Generation Partnership Project 2” (3GPP2) . The techniques described herein may be used for the wireless networks and radio technologies mentioned above as well as other wireless networks and radio technologies. For clarity, while aspects may be described herein using terminology commonly associated with 3G and/or 4G wireless technologies, aspects of the present disclosure can be applied in other generation-based communication systems, such as 5G and later, including NR technologies.

New radio (NR) access (e.g., 5G technology) may support various wireless communication services, such as enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) targeting wide bandwidth (e.g., 80 MHz or beyond) , millimeter wave (mmW) targeting high carrier frequency (e.g., 25 GHz or beyond) , massive machine type communications MTC (mMTC) targeting non-backward compatible MTC techniques, and/or mission critical targeting ultra-reliable low-latency communications (URLLC) . These services may include latency and reliability requirements. These services may also have different transmission time intervals (TTI) to meet respective quality of service (QoS) requirements. In addition, these services may co-exist in the same subframe.

Example Wireless Communications System

FIG. 1 illustrates an example wireless communication network 100 in which aspects of the present disclosure may be performed. For example, the wireless communication network 100 may be a New Radio (NR) or 5G network.

As illustrated in FIG. 1, the wireless network 100 may include a number of base stations (BSs) 110 and other network entities. A BS may be a station that communicates with user equipments (UEs) . Each BS 110 may provide communication coverage for a particular geographic area. In 3GPP, the term “cell” can refer to a coverage area of a Node B (NB) and/or a Node B subsystem serving this coverage area, depending on the context in which the term is used. In NR systems, the term “cell” and next generation NodeB (gNB) , new radio base station (NR BS) , 5G NB, access point (AP) , or transmission reception point (TRP) may be interchangeable. In some examples, a cell may not necessarily be stationary, and the geographic area of the cell may move according to the location of a mobile BS. In some examples, the base stations may be interconnected to one another and/or to one or more other base stations or network nodes (not shown) in wireless communication network 100 through various types of backhaul interfaces, such as a direct physical connection, a wireless connection, a virtual network, or the like using any suitable transport network.

In general, any number of wireless networks may be deployed in a given geographic area. Each wireless network may support a particular radio access technology (RAT) and may operate on one or more frequencies. A RAT may also be referred to as a radio technology, an air interface, etc. A frequency may also be referred to as a carrier, a subcarrier, a frequency channel, a tone, a subband, etc. Each frequency may support a single RAT in a given geographic area in order to avoid interference between wireless networks of different RATs. In some cases, NR or 5G RAT networks may be deployed.

A base station (BS) may provide communication coverage for a macro cell, a pico cell, a femto cell, and/or other types of cells. A macro cell may cover a relatively large geographic area (e.g., several kilometers in radius) and may allow unrestricted access by UEs with service subscription. A pico cell may cover a relatively small geographic area and may allow unrestricted access by UEs with service subscription. A femto cell may cover a relatively small geographic area (e.g., a home) and may allow restricted access by UEs having an association with the femto cell (e.g., UEs in a Closed Subscriber Group (CSG) , UEs for users in the home, etc. ) . A BS for a macro cell may be referred to as a macro BS. A BS for a pico cell may be referred to as a pico BS. A BS for a femto cell may be referred to as a femto BS or a home BS. In the example shown in FIG. 1, the

BSs

110a, 110b and 110c may be macro BSs for the

macro cells

102a, 102b and 102c, respectively. The BS 110x may be a pico BS for a pico cell 102x. The BSs 110y and 110z may be femto BSs for the femto cells 102y and 102z, respectively. A BS may support one or multiple (e.g., three) cells.

Wireless communication network 100 may also include relay stations. A relay station is a station that receives a transmission of data and/or other information from an upstream station (e.g., a BS or a UE) and sends a transmission of the data and/or other information to a downstream station (e.g., a UE or a BS) . A relay station may also be a UE that relays transmissions for other UEs. In the example shown in FIG. 1, a relay station 110r may communicate with the BS 110a and a UE 120r in order to facilitate communication between the BS 110a and the UE 120r. A relay station may also be referred to as a relay BS, a relay, etc.

Wireless network 100 may be a heterogeneous network that includes BSs of different types, e.g., macro BS, pico BS, femto BS, relays, etc. These different types of BSs may have different transmit power levels, different coverage areas, and different impact on interference in the wireless network 100. For example, macro BS may have a high transmit power level (e.g., 20 Watts) whereas pico BS, femto BS, and relays may have a lower transmit power level (e.g., 1 Watt) .

Wireless communication network 100 may support synchronous or asynchronous operation. For synchronous operation, the BSs may have similar frame timing, and transmissions from different BSs may be approximately aligned in time. For asynchronous operation, the BSs may have different frame timing, and transmissions from different BSs may not be aligned in time. The techniques described herein may be used for both synchronous and asynchronous operation.

A network controller 130 may couple to a set of BSs and provide coordination and control for these BSs. The network controller 130 may communicate with the BSs 110 via a backhaul. The BSs 110 may also communicate with one another (e.g., directly or indirectly) via wireless or wireline backhaul.

The UEs 120 (e.g., 120x, 120y, etc. ) may be dispersed throughout the wireless network 100, and each UE may be stationary or mobile. A UE may also be referred to as a mobile station, a terminal, an access terminal, a subscriber unit, a station, a Customer Premises Equipment (CPE) , a cellular phone, a smart phone, a personal digital assistant (PDA) , a wireless modem, a wireless communication device, a handheld device, a laptop computer, a cordless phone, a wireless local loop (WLL) station, a tablet computer, a camera, a gaming device, a netbook, a smartbook, an ultrabook, an appliance, a medical device or medical equipment, a biometric sensor/device, a wearable device such as a smart watch, smart clothing, smart glasses, a smart wrist band, smart jewelry (e.g., a smart ring, a smart bracelet, etc. ) , an entertainment device (e.g., a music device, a video device, a satellite radio, etc. ) , a vehicular component or sensor, a smart meter/sensor, industrial manufacturing equipment, a global positioning system device, or any other suitable device that is configured to communicate via a wireless or wired medium. Some UEs may be considered machine-type communication (MTC) devices or evolved MTC (eMTC) devices. MTC and eMTC UEs include, for example, robots, drones, remote devices, sensors, meters, monitors, location tags, etc., that may communicate with a BS, another device (e.g., remote device) , or some other entity. A wireless node may provide, for example, connectivity for or to a network (e.g., a wide area network such as Internet or a cellular network) via a wired or wireless communication link. Some UEs may be considered Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices, which may be narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) devices.

Certain wireless networks (e.g., LTE) utilize orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) on the downlink and single-carrier frequency division multiplexing (SC-FDM) on the uplink. OFDM and SC-FDM partition the system bandwidth into multiple (K) orthogonal subcarriers, which are also commonly referred to as tones, bins, etc. Each subcarrier may be modulated with data. In general, modulation symbols are sent in the frequency domain with OFDM and in the time domain with SC-FDM. The spacing between adjacent subcarriers may be fixed, and the total number of subcarriers (K) may be dependent on the system bandwidth. For example, the spacing of the subcarriers may be 15 kHz and the minimum resource allocation (called a “resource block” (RB) ) may be 12 subcarriers (or 180 kHz) . Consequently, the nominal Fast Fourier Transfer (FFT) size may be equal to 128, 256, 512, 1024 or 2048 for system bandwidth of 1.25, 2.5, 5, 10, or 20 megahertz (MHz) , respectively. The system bandwidth may also be partitioned into subbands. For example, a subband may cover 1.08 MHz (i.e., 6 resource blocks) , and there may be 1, 2, 4, 8, or 16 subbands for system bandwidth of 1.25, 2.5, 5, 10 or 20 MHz, respectively.

While aspects of the examples described herein may be associated with LTE technologies, aspects of the present disclosure may be applicable with other wireless communications systems, such as NR. NR may utilize OFDM with a CP on the uplink and downlink and include support for half-duplex operation using TDD. Beamforming may be supported and beam direction may be dynamically configured. MIMO transmissions with precoding may also be supported. MIMO configurations in the DL may support up to 8 transmit antennas with multi-layer DL transmissions up to 8 streams and up to 2 streams per UE. Multi-layer transmissions with up to 2 streams per UE may be supported. Aggregation of multiple cells may be supported with up to 8 serving cells.

In some examples, access to the air interface may be scheduled, wherein a. A scheduling entity (e.g., a base station) allocates resources for communication among some or all devices and equipment within its service area or cell. The scheduling entity may be responsible for scheduling, assigning, reconfiguring, and releasing resources for one or more subordinate entities. That is, for scheduled communication, subordinate entities utilize resources allocated by the scheduling entity. Base stations are not the only entities that may function as a scheduling entity. In some examples, a UE may function as a scheduling entity and may schedule resources for one or more subordinate entities (e.g., one or more other UEs) , and the other UEs may utilize the resources scheduled by the UE for wireless communication. In some examples, a UE may function as a scheduling entity in a peer-to-peer (P2P) network, and/or in a mesh network. In a mesh network example, UEs may communicate directly with one another in addition to communicating with a scheduling entity.

In FIG. 1, a solid line with double arrows indicates desired transmissions between a UE and a serving BS, which is a BS designated to serve the UE on the downlink and/or uplink. A finely dashed line with double arrows indicates interfering transmissions between a UE and a BS.

FIG. 2 illustrates an example logical architecture of a distributed Radio Access Network (RAN) 200, which may be implemented in the wireless communication network 100 illustrated in FIG. 1. A 5G access node 206 may include an access node controller (ANC) 202. ANC 202 may be a central unit (CU) of the distributed RAN 200. The backhaul interface to the Next Generation Core Network (NG-CN) 204 may terminate at ANC 202. The backhaul interface to neighboring next generation access Nodes (NG-ANs) 210 may terminate at ANC 202. ANC 202 may include one or more transmission reception points (TRPs) 208 (e.g., cells, BSs, gNBs, etc. ) .

The TRPs 208 may be a distributed unit (DU) . TRPs 208 may be connected to a single ANC (e.g., ANC 202) or more than one ANC (not illustrated) . For example, for RAN sharing, radio as a service (RaaS) , and service specific AND deployments, TRPs 208 may be connected to more than one ANC. TRPs 208 may each include one or more antenna ports. TRPs 208 may be configured to individually (e.g., dynamic selection) or jointly (e.g., joint transmission) serve traffic to a UE.

The logical architecture of distributed RAN 200 may support fronthauling solutions across different deployment types. For example, the logical architecture may be based on transmit network capabilities (e.g., bandwidth, latency, and/or jitter) .

The logical architecture of distributed RAN 200 may share features and/or components with LTE. For example, next generation access node (NG-AN) 210 may support dual connectivity with NR and may share a common fronthaul for LTE and NR.

The logical architecture of distributed RAN 200 may enable cooperation between and among TRPs 208, for example, within a TRP and/or across TRPs via ANC 202. An inter-TRP interface may not be used.

Logical functions may be dynamically distributed in the logical architecture of distributed RAN 200. As will be described in more detail with reference to FIG. 5, the Radio Resource Control (RRC) layer, Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP) layer, Radio Link Control (RLC) layer, Medium Access Control (MAC) layer, and a Physical (PHY) layers may be adaptably placed at the DU (e.g., TRP 208) or CU (e.g., ANC 202) .

FIG. 3 illustrates an example physical architecture of a distributed Radio Access Network (RAN) 300, according to aspects of the present disclosure. A centralized core network unit (C-CU) 302 may host core network functions. C-CU 302 may be centrally deployed. C-CU 302 functionality may be offloaded (e.g., to advanced wireless services (AWS) ) , in an effort to handle peak capacity.

A centralized RAN unit (C-RU) 304 may host one or more ANC functions. Optionally, the C-RU 304 may host core network functions locally. The C-RU 304 may have distributed deployment. The C-RU 304 may be close to the network edge.

A DU 306 may host one or more TRPs (Edge Node (EN) , an Edge Unit (EU) , a Radio Head (RH) , a Smart Radio Head (SRH) , or the like) . The DU may be located at edges of the network with radio frequency (RF) functionality.

FIG. 4 illustrates example components of BS 110 and UE 120 (as depicted in FIG. 1) , which may be used to implement aspects of the present disclosure. For example, antennas 452,

processors

466, 458, 464, and/or controller/processor 480 of the UE 120 and/or antennas 434,

processors

420, 460, 438, and/or controller/processor 440 of the BS 110 may be used to perform the various techniques and methods described herein.

At the BS 110, a transmit processor 420 may receive data from a data source 412 and control information from a controller/processor 440. The control information may be for the physical broadcast channel (PBCH) , physical control format indicator channel (PCFICH) , physical hybrid ARQ indicator channel (PHICH) , physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) , group common PDCCH (GC PDCCH) , etc. The data may be for the physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) , etc. The processor 420 may process (e.g., encode and symbol map) the data and control information to obtain data symbols and control symbols, respectively. The processor 420 may also generate reference symbols, e.g., for the primary synchronization signal (PSS) , secondary synchronization signal (SSS) , and cell-specific reference signal (CRS) . A transmit (TX) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) processor 430 may perform spatial processing (e.g., precoding) on the data symbols, the control symbols, and/or the reference symbols, if applicable, and may provide output symbol streams to the modulators (MODs) 432a through 432t. Each modulator 432 may process a respective output symbol stream (e.g., for OFDM, etc. ) to obtain an output sample stream. Each modulator may further process (e.g., convert to analog, amplify, filter, and upconvert) the output sample stream to obtain a downlink signal. Downlink signals from modulators 432a through 432t may be transmitted via the antennas 434a through 434t, respectively.

At the UE 120, the antennas 452a through 452r may receive the downlink signals from the base station 110 and may provide received signals to the demodulators (DEMODs) in transceivers 454a through 454r, respectively. Each demodulator 454 may condition (e.g., filter, amplify, downconvert, and digitize) a respective received signal to obtain input samples. Each demodulator may further process the input samples (e.g., for OFDM, etc. ) to obtain received symbols. A MIMO detector 456 may obtain received symbols from all the demodulators 454a through 454r, perform MIMO detection on the received symbols if applicable, and provide detected symbols. A receive processor 458 may process (e.g., demodulate, deinterleave, and decode) the detected symbols, provide decoded data for the UE 120 to a data sink 460, and provide decoded control information to a controller/processor 480.

On the uplink, at UE 120, a transmit processor 464 may receive and process data (e.g., for the physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) ) from a data source 462 and control information (e.g., for the physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) from the controller/processor 480. The transmit processor 464 may also generate reference symbols for a reference signal (e.g., for the sounding reference signal (SRS) ) . The symbols from the transmit processor 464 may be precoded by a TX MIMO processor 466 if applicable, further processed by the demodulators in transceivers 454a through 454r (e.g., for SC-FDM, etc. ) , and transmitted to the base station 110. At the BS 110, the uplink signals from the UE 120 may be received by the antennas 434, processed by the modulators 432, detected by a MIMO detector 436 if applicable, and further processed by a receive processor 438 to obtain decoded data and control information sent by the UE 120. The receive processor 438 may provide the decoded data to a data sink 439 and the decoded control information to the controller/processor 440.

The controllers/

processors

440 and 480 may direct the operation at the base station 110 and the UE 120, respectively. The processor 440 and/or other processors and modules at the BS 110 may perform or direct the execution of processes for the techniques described herein. The

memories

442 and 482 may store data and program codes for BS 110 and UE 120, respectively. A scheduler 444 may schedule UEs for data transmission on the downlink and/or uplink.

FIG. 5 illustrates a diagram 500 showing examples for implementing a communications protocol stack, according to aspects of the present disclosure. The illustrated communications protocol stacks may be implemented by devices operating in a wireless communication system, such as a 5G system (e.g., a system that supports uplink-based mobility) . Diagram 500 illustrates a communications protocol stack including a Radio Resource Control (RRC) layer 510, a Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP) layer 515, a Radio Link Control (RLC) layer 520, a Medium Access Control (MAC) layer 525, and a Physical (PHY) layer 530. In various examples, the layers of a protocol stack may be implemented as separate modules of software, portions of a processor or ASIC, portions of non-collocated devices connected by a communications link, or various combinations thereof. Collocated and non-collocated implementations may be used, for example, in a protocol stack for a network access device (e.g., ANs, CUs, and/or DUs) or a UE.

A first option 505-a shows a split implementation of a protocol stack, in which implementation of the protocol stack is split between a centralized network access device (e.g., an ANC 202 in FIG. 2) and distributed network access device (e.g., DU 208 in FIG. 2) . In the first option 505-a, an RRC layer 510 and a PDCP layer 515 may be implemented by the central unit, and an RLC layer 520, a MAC layer 525, and a PHY layer 530 may be implemented by the DU. In various examples the CU and the DU may be collocated or non-collocated. The first option 505-a may be useful in a macro cell, micro cell, or pico cell deployment.

A second option 505-b shows a unified implementation of a protocol stack, in which the protocol stack is implemented in a single network access device. In the second option, RRC layer 510, PDCP layer 515, RLC layer 520, MAC layer 525, and PHY layer 530 may each be implemented by the AN. The second option 505-b may be useful in, for example, a femto cell deployment.

Regardless of whether a network access device implements part or all of a protocol stack, a UE may implement an entire protocol stack as shown in 505-c (e.g., the RRC layer 510, the PDCP layer 515, the RLC layer 520, the MAC layer 525, and the PHY layer 530) .

In LTE, the basic transmission time interval (TTI) or packet duration is the 1 ms subframe. In NR, a subframe is still 1 ms, but the basic TTI is referred to as a slot. A subframe contains a variable number of slots (e.g., 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, …slots) depending on the subcarrier spacing. The NR RB is 12 consecutive frequency subcarriers. NR may support a base subcarrier spacing of 15 KHz and other subcarrier spacing may be defined with respect to the base subcarrier spacing, for example, 30 kHz, 60 kHz, 120 kHz, 240 kHz, etc. The symbol and slot lengths scale with the subcarrier spacing. The CP length also depends on the subcarrier spacing.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of a frame format 600 for NR. The transmission timeline for each of the downlink and uplink may be partitioned into units of radio frames. Each radio frame may have a predetermined duration (e.g., 10 ms) and may be partitioned into 10 subframes, each of 1 ms, with indices of 0 through 9. Each subframe may include a variable number of slots depending on the subcarrier spacing. Each slot may include a variable number of symbol periods (e.g., 7 or 14 symbols) depending on the subcarrier spacing. The symbol periods in each slot may be assigned indices. A mini-slot is a subslot structure (e.g., 2, 3, or 4 symbols) .

Each symbol in a slot may indicate a link direction (e.g., DL, UL, or flexible) for data transmission and the link direction for each subframe may be dynamically switched. The link directions may be based on the slot format. Each slot may include DL/UL data as well as DL/UL control information.

In NR, a synchronization signal (SS) block is transmitted. The SS block includes a PSS, a SSS, and a two symbol PBCH. The SS block can be transmitted in a fixed slot location, such as the symbols 0-3 as shown in FIG. 6. The PSS and SSS may be used by UEs for cell search and acquisition. The PSS may provide half-frame timing, the SS may provide the CP length and frame timing. The PSS and SSS may provide the cell identity. The PBCH carries some basic system information, such as downlink system bandwidth, timing information within radio frame, SS burst set periodicity, system frame number, etc. The SS blocks may be organized into SS bursts to support beam sweeping. Further system information such as, remaining minimum system information (RMSI) , system information blocks (SIBs) , other system information (OSI) can be transmitted on a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) in certain subframes.

In some circumstances, two or more subordinate entities (e.g., UEs) may communicate with each other using sidelink signals. Real-world applications of such sidelink communications may include public safety, proximity services, UE-to-network relaying, vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communications, Internet of Everything (IoE) communications, IoT communications, mission-critical mesh, and/or various other suitable applications. Generally, a sidelink signal may refer to a signal communicated from one subordinate entity (e.g., UE1) to another subordinate entity (e.g., UE2) without relaying that communication through the scheduling entity (e.g., UE or BS) , even though the scheduling entity may be utilized for scheduling and/or control purposes. In some examples, the sidelink signals may be communicated using a licensed spectrum (unlike wireless local area networks, which typically use an unlicensed spectrum) .

A UE may operate in various radio resource configurations, including a configuration associated with transmitting pilots using a dedicated set of resources (e.g., a radio resource control (RRC) dedicated state, etc. ) or a configuration associated with transmitting pilots using a common set of resources (e.g., an RRC common state, etc. ) . When operating in the RRC dedicated state, the UE may select a dedicated set of resources for transmitting a pilot signal to a network. When operating in the RRC common state, the UE may select a common set of resources for transmitting a pilot signal to the network. In either case, a pilot signal transmitted by the UE may be received by one or more network access devices, such as an AN, or a DU, or portions thereof. Each receiving network access device may be configured to receive and measure pilot signals transmitted on the common set of resources, and also receive and measure pilot signals transmitted on dedicated sets of resources allocated to the UEs for which the network access device is a member of a monitoring set of network access devices for the UE. One or more of the receiving network access devices, or a CU to which receiving network access device (s) transmit the measurements of the pilot signals, may use the measurements to identify serving cells for the UEs, or to initiate a change of serving cell for one or more of the UEs.

Example Channel Quality for Multi-Beam Operation

In 5G NR multi-beam operation, in Connected mode, a user equipment (UE) may derive a baseline channel quality from multiple transmission beams associated with a cell, taking into account a beam quality threshold and a maximum number of beams, N, which may be configured by a camped cell or provided by the UE’s last serving cell. To derive the baseline channel quality, the UE may take the linear average of up to N best beams above this configured beam quality threshold. The UE may then use this baseline channel quality when performing a cell reselection procedure to select a (new) serving cell from which to receive service.

FIG. 7 illustrates an of the cell reselection procedure described above. For example, at step A in FIG. 7, the UE performs beam measurements (e.g., beam specific samples, such as reference signal received power (RSRP) , reference signal received quality (RSRQ) , and/or signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) ) internal to the physical layer, for example, to determine a baseline channel quality. According to aspects, internal layer 1 filtering of the inputs measured at point A are performed. In some cases, the exact filtering process may be implementation dependent. Additionally, how the measurements are actually executed in the physical layer by an implementation (inputs A and Layer 1 filtering) may not be constrained by a standard. At step A ¹, measurements (i.e. beam specific measurements) may be reported by layer 1 to layer 3 after layer 1 filtering.

Next, beam specific measurements may be consolidated to derive cell quality. The behavior of the Beam consolidation/selection may be standardized and the configuration of this module may be provided by RRC signaling received from the UE’s serving cell. According to aspects, the reporting period at B equals one measurement period at A ¹.

At step B in FIG. 7, a measurement (i.e. cell quality) may be derived from beam-specific measurements reported to layer 3 after beam consolidation/selection. Thereafter, filtering may be performed on the measurements provided at point B. In some cases, the behavior of the Layer 3 filters may be standardized and the configuration of the layer 3 filters may be provided by RRC signaling received from the UE’s serving cell. Filtering reporting period at C equals one measurement period at B.

According to aspects, at step C, a measurement after processing in the layer 3 filter is performed. For example, the UE may compare a filtered value after the L3 filtering to a configured threshold as explained below. According to aspects, the reporting rate may be identical to the reporting rate at point B. Further, this measurement may be used as input for one or more evaluation of reporting criteria.

After step C, the UE may check whether actual measurement reporting is necessary at point D. In some cases, this evaluation may be based on more than one flow of measurements at reference point C, for example, to compare between different measurements. This is illustrated by input C and C1 in FIG. 7. In some cases, the UE may evaluate the reporting criteria at least every time a new measurement result is reported at point C, C1. Further, in some cases, the reporting criteria may be standardized and the configuration may be provided by RRC signaling (UE measurements) for the UE’s serving cell.

At step D, measurement report information (e.g., a message) may be sent on a radio interface.

According to aspects, L3 Beam filtering occurring after layer 1 filtering may involve filtering performed on the measurements (i.e. beam specific measurements) provided at point A1. According to aspects, the behavior of the beam filters may be standardized and the configuration of the beam filters may be provided by RRC signaling received from the UE’s serving cell. Further, according to aspects, filtering reporting period at E may equal one measurement period at A1.

According to aspects, at step E, a measurement (i.e. beam-specific measurement) after processing in the beam filter may be performed by the UE. In some cases, the reporting rate may be identical to the reporting rate at point A1. Further, this measurement may be used as input for selecting the X measurements to be reported. Thereafter, Beam Selection for beam reporting may be performed, which may involve selecting the X measurements from the measurements provided at point E. According to aspects, the behavior of the beam selection may be standardized and the configuration of this module may be provided by RRC signaling received from the UE’s serving cell.

According to aspects, at step F, beam measurement information included in a measurement report may be sent on the radio interface.

It should be noted that Layer 1 filtering may introduce a certain level of measurement averaging. How and when the UE exactly performs the required measurements may be implementation specific to the point that the output at B fulfils the performance requirements set in 3GPP TS 38.133. Additionally, Layer 3 filtering for cell quality and related parameters used may be specified in 3GPP TS 38.331 and may not introduce any delay in the sample availability between B and C. Further, measurement at point C, C ¹ may be used as the input used in the event evaluation. Additionally, L3 Beam filtering and related parameters used may be specified in 3GPP TS 38.331 and may not introduce any delay in the sample availability between E and F.

According to aspects, while a baseline channel quality measurement (i.e., a linear average) may be sufficient for the cell reselection procedure described above for a connected mode of operation (e.g., since the cell/eNB can configure the UE to report beam level measurements) , beam level measurements in Idle and Inactive mode are not possible. Thus, in some cases, for an idle and/or inactive mode of operation, the baseline channel quality may not be sufficient for a cell reselection procedure. Thus, aspects of the present disclosure provide techniques for determining a channel quality for multi-beam operation associated with an idle and/or inactive mode of operation. In some cases, determining a channel quality for an Idle and/or Inactive mode of operation may involve determining a baseline channel quality and determining an idle or inactive mode channel quality as a function of the baseline channel quality, at described below.

FIG. 8 illustrates example operations 800 for wireless communications performed by a user equipment. In some cases, operations 800 may be used to determine an idle and/or inactive mode channel quality, for example, for a cell reselection procedure.

Operations 800 begin at 802 by determining, during an idle or inactive mode, a baseline channel quality for a plurality of transmission beams associated with a first cell, wherein the baseline channel quality comprises a linear average of the plurality of transmission beams. At 804, the UE determines an idle or inactive mode channel quality for the plurality of transmission beams as a function of the baseline channel quality. At 806 the UE performs a cell reselection procedure to select the first cell for service based, at least in part, on the idle or inactive mode channel quality.

As noted above, aspects of the present disclosure propose techniques for determining an idle and/or inactive mode channel quality as a function of a baseline channel quality. For example, tet T and N be the beam threshold and maximum number of good beams to consider for the baseline formula in Connected mode. Additionally, let K be the number of beams above the threshold and let Qb be the baseline quality according to the Connected formulate and Q be the optimized formula. Further, let X be the set of quality of good beams (i.e. X_i is the measured quantity of beam i) . Thus Qb = mean (X) .

In some cases, the function may comprise adding an offset or weight to the baseline channel quality to account for the idle or inactive mode. For example, in some cases, the function may comprise Q = Qb* (1+K*delta) , wherein Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, and delta is a value configured by the first cell. According to aspects, an advantage with the current function is that the sum of the all beams may be used in addition to the baseline. Thus, a cell with smaller average value but with more beams of total quality may be selected by the UE.

According to aspects, in some cases, the function may comprise applying a standard deviation to a set of quality of good beams. For example, in some cases, the functions may comprise dB (Q) = dB (Qb) + log (1+K*delta_1) + delta_2*std_dev (X) , wherein dB is decibels, Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, and delta_1 is a value configured by the base station, delta_2 is a value configured by the base station, X is the std_dev a set of quality of good beams, and std_dev (X) is the standard deviation of X. It should be noted that, as used herein, ‘dB (x) ’ means the 10*log10 (x) and that the value of Q is also in dB when dB (Qb) is used. According to aspects, by adding a standard deviation factor, beams either with more variation or less variation may be preferred (depending on whether delta is positive or negative) .

In some cases, the function may comprise Q = Qb*K, wherein Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, and K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold. According to aspects, the current function is advantageous as the cell with total beam quality may be selected instead of average beam quality since averaging may hide the total number of good beams.

In some cases, the function may comprise Q = Qc, wherein Qc is the a linear sum of the best N3 beams, wherein N3 is configured by the base station. According to aspects, the current function allows the network to force the UE to only take the top N3 beams into account during a cell reselection process.

In some cases, the function may comprise dB (Q) = dB (Qb*K) + K*delta , wherein dB is decibels, Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, and delta is a value configured by the base station. According to aspects, the current function adds an offset to the total sum (in dB) so that for the same total value, the cell with more beams may be selected.

In some cases, the function may comprise Q = Qb + min (K, N4) *delta, wherein Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, delta is a value configured by the base station, and N4 is a value configured by the base station to limit the impact of the delta, and delta is a value configured by the base station. According to aspects, the current function gives more weight to the cell with more good beams over a cell with similar average. Additionally, N4 limits the impact of K since in reality only the few best beams may be better.

In some cases, the function may comprise dB (Q) = dB (Qb) + min (K, N4) *delta, wherein dB is decibels, Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, N4 is a value configured by the base station, and delta is a value configured by the base station. According to aspects, the current function may provide similar advantages as the function described immediately above, but may take into account the channel quality in decibels.

According to certain aspects, operations 800 may also include determining a second baseline channel quality and a second idle or inactive mode channel quality associated with a second plurality of transmission beams from at least a second cell. Further, according to certain aspects, performing the cell reselection procedure may further comprise determining which cell, between the first cell and the second cell, to select based, at least in part on their respective idle or inactive mode channel quality.

In some cases, operations 800 may further include determining a quality of a best beam associated with the first cell and determining a quality of a best beam associated with a second cell. Additionally, according to aspects, performing the cell reselection procedure may further comprise selecting the first cell if the best beam quality associated with the first cell is greater than the best beam quality associated with the second cell by a threshold or selecting the second cell if the best beam quality associated with the second cell is greater than the best beam quality associated with the first cell by a threshold. Additionally, in some cases, the UE may receive information indicating a number of best beams to compare between the first and second cell.

In some cases, operation 800 may comprise determining a first baseline channel quality associated with a first cell and a second baseline channel quality associated with a second cell and determining that a difference between the first baseline channel quality and the second baseline channel quality is below a threshold. According to aspects, during the cell reselection procedure, the UE may then select the first cell or the second cell based on which of the first cell or the second cell has a highest best beam quality. For example, the UE may select the first cell if the first cell has the highest best beam quality as compared to the second cell.

It should be noted that while aspects of the present disclosure propose techniques for cell reselection when a UE is in an Idle or Inactive mode of operation, these techniques may also be used when the UE is operating in a connected mode of operation. For example, the functions described above could be used by a UE when operating in a connected mode and performing a cell reselection procedure.

FIG. 9 illustrates a communications device 900 that may include various components (e.g., corresponding to means-plus-function components) configured to perform operations for the techniques disclosed herein, such as the operations illustrated in FIG. 8. The communications device 900 includes a processing system 902 coupled to a transceiver 908. The transceiver 908 is configured to transmit and receive signals for the communications device 900 via an antenna 910, such as the various signal described herein. The processing system 902 may be configured to perform processing functions for the communications device 900, including processing signals received and/or to be transmitted by the communications device 900.

The processing system 902 includes a processor 904 coupled to a computer-readable medium/memory 912 via a bus 906. In certain aspects, the computer-readable medium/memory 912 is configured to store instructions that when executed by processor 904, cause the processor 904 to perform the operations illustrated in FIG. 8, or other operations for performing the various techniques discussed herein.

In certain aspects, the processing system 902 further includes a Baseline Channel Quality Determination component 914 for performing the operations illustrated in 802 of FIG. 8. Additionally, the processing system 902 includes an Idle or Inactive Mode Channel Quality Determination component 916 for performing the operations illustrated in 804 of FIG. 8. Additionally, the processing system 902 includes a Cell Reselection component 918 for performing the operations illustrated in 806 of FIG. 8. The Baseline Channel Quality Determination component 914, Idle or Inactive Mode Channel Quality Determination component 916, and the Cell Reselection component 918 may be coupled to the processor 904 via bus 906. In certain aspects, the Baseline Channel Quality Determination component 914, Idle or Inactive Mode Channel Quality Determination component 916, and the Cell Reselection component 918 may be hardware circuits. In certain aspects, the Baseline Channel Quality Determination component 914, Idle or Inactive Mode Channel Quality Determination component 916, and Cell Reselection component 918 may be software components that are executed and run on processor 904.

The methods disclosed herein comprise one or more steps or actions for achieving the methods. The method steps and/or actions may be interchanged with one another without departing from the scope of the claims. In other words, unless a specific order of steps or actions is specified, the order and/or use of specific steps and/or actions may be modified without departing from the scope of the claims.

As used herein, a phrase referring to “at least one of” a list of items refers to any combination of those items, including single members. As an example, “at least one of: a, b, or c” is intended to cover a, b, c, a-b, a-c, b-c, and a-b-c, as well as any combination with multiples of the same element (e.g., a-a, a-a-a, a-a-b, a-a-c, a-b-b, a-c-c, b-b, b-b-b, b-b-c, c-c, and c-c-c or any other ordering of a, b, and c) .

As used herein, the term “determining” encompasses a wide variety of actions. For example, “determining” may include calculating, computing, processing, deriving, investigating, looking up (e.g., looking up in a table, a database or another data structure) , ascertaining and the like. Also, “determining” may include receiving (e.g., receiving information) , accessing (e.g., accessing data in a memory) and the like. Also, “determining” may include resolving, selecting, choosing, establishing and the like.

The previous description is provided to enable any person skilled in the art to practice the various aspects described herein. Various modifications to these aspects will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art, and the generic principles defined herein may be applied to other aspects. Thus, the claims are not intended to be limited to the aspects shown herein, but is to be accorded the full scope consistent with the language of the claims, wherein reference to an element in the singular is not intended to mean “one and only one” unless specifically so stated, but rather “one or more. ” Unless specifically stated otherwise, the term “some” refers to one or more. All structural and functional equivalents to the elements of the various aspects described throughout this disclosure that are known or later come to be known to those of ordinary skill in the art are expressly incorporated herein by reference and are intended to be encompassed by the claims. Moreover, nothing disclosed herein is intended to be dedicated to the public regardless of whether such disclosure is explicitly recited in the claims. No claim element is to be construed under the provisions of 35 U.S.C. §112 (f) unless the element is expressly recited using the phrase “means for” or, in the case of a method claim, the element is recited using the phrase “step for. ”

The various operations of methods described above may be performed by any suitable means capable of performing the corresponding functions. The means may include various hardware and/or software component (s) and/or module (s) , including, but not limited to a circuit, an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) , or processor. Generally, where there are operations illustrated in figures, those operations may have corresponding counterpart means-plus-function components with similar numbering.

The various illustrative logical blocks, modules and circuits described in connection with the present disclosure may be implemented or performed with a general purpose processor, a digital signal processor (DSP) , an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) , a field programmable gate array (FPGA) or other programmable logic device (PLD) , discrete gate or transistor logic, discrete hardware components, or any combination thereof designed to perform the functions described herein. A general-purpose processor may be a microprocessor, but in the alternative, the processor may be any commercially available processor, controller, microcontroller, or state machine. A processor may also be implemented as a combination of computing devices, e.g., a combination of a DSP and a microprocessor, a plurality of microprocessors, one or more microprocessors in conjunction with a DSP core, or any other such configuration.

If implemented in hardware, an example hardware configuration may comprise a processing system in a wireless node. The processing system may be implemented with a bus architecture. The bus may include any number of interconnecting buses and bridges depending on the specific application of the processing system and the overall design constraints. The bus may link together various circuits including a processor, machine-readable media, and a bus interface. The bus interface may be used to connect a network adapter, among other things, to the processing system via the bus. The network adapter may be used to implement the signal processing functions of the PHY layer. In the case of a user terminal 120 (see FIG. 1) , a user interface (e.g., keypad, display, mouse, joystick, etc. ) may also be connected to the bus. The bus may also link various other circuits such as timing sources, peripherals, voltage regulators, power management circuits, and the like, which are well known in the art, and therefore, will not be described any further. The processor may be implemented with one or more general-purpose and/or special-purpose processors. Examples include microprocessors, microcontrollers, DSP processors, and other circuitry that can execute software. Those skilled in the art will recognize how best to implement the described functionality for the processing system depending on the particular application and the overall design constraints imposed on the overall system.

If implemented in software, the functions may be stored or transmitted over as one or more instructions or code on a computer readable medium. Software shall be construed broadly to mean instructions, data, or any combination thereof, whether referred to as software, firmware, middleware, microcode, hardware description language, or otherwise. Computer-readable media include both computer storage media and communication media including any medium that facilitates transfer of a computer program from one place to another. The processor may be responsible for managing the bus and general processing, including the execution of software modules stored on the machine-readable storage media. A computer-readable storage medium may be coupled to a processor such that the processor can read information from, and write information to, the storage medium. In the alternative, the storage medium may be integral to the processor. By way of example, the machine-readable media may include a transmission line, a carrier wave modulated by data, and/or a computer readable storage medium with instructions stored thereon separate from the wireless node, all of which may be accessed by the processor through the bus interface. Alternatively, or in addition, the machine-readable media, or any portion thereof, may be integrated into the processor, such as the case may be with cache and/or general register files. Examples of machine-readable storage media may include, by way of example, RAM (Random Access Memory) , flash memory, ROM (Read Only Memory) , PROM (Programmable Read-Only Memory) , EPROM (Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory) , EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory) , registers, magnetic disks, optical disks, hard drives, or any other suitable storage medium, or any combination thereof. The machine-readable media may be embodied in a computer-program product.

A software module may comprise a single instruction, or many instructions, and may be distributed over several different code segments, among different programs, and across multiple storage media. The computer-readable media may comprise a number of software modules. The software modules include instructions that, when executed by an apparatus such as a processor, cause the processing system to perform various functions. The software modules may include a transmission module and a receiving module. Each software module may reside in a single storage device or be distributed across multiple storage devices. By way of example, a software module may be loaded into RAM from a hard drive when a triggering event occurs. During execution of the software module, the processor may load some of the instructions into cache to increase access speed. One or more cache lines may then be loaded into a general register file for execution by the processor. When referring to the functionality of a software module below, it will be understood that such functionality is implemented by the processor when executing instructions from that software module.

Also, any connection is properly termed a computer-readable medium. For example, if the software is transmitted from a website, server, or other remote source using a coaxial cable, fiber optic cable, twisted pair, digital subscriber line (DSL) , or wireless technologies such as infrared (IR) , radio, and microwave, then the coaxial cable, fiber optic cable, twisted pair, DSL, or wireless technologies such as infrared, radio, and microwave are included in the definition of medium. Disk and disc, as used herein, include compact disc (CD) , laser disc, optical disc, digital versatile disc (DVD) , floppy disk, and

disc where disks usually reproduce data magnetically, while discs reproduce data optically with lasers. Thus, in some aspects computer-readable media may comprise non-transitory computer-readable media (e.g., tangible media) . In addition, for other aspects computer-readable media may comprise transitory computer- readable media (e.g., a signal) . Combinations of the above should also be included within the scope of computer-readable media.

Thus, certain aspects may comprise a computer program product for performing the operations presented herein. For example, such a computer program product may comprise a computer-readable medium having instructions stored (and/or encoded) thereon, the instructions being executable by one or more processors to perform the operations described herein. For example, instructions for performing the operations described herein and illustrated in Fig. 8.

Further, it should be appreciated that modules and/or other appropriate means for performing the methods and techniques described herein can be downloaded and/or otherwise obtained by a user terminal and/or base station as applicable. For example, such a device can be coupled to a server to facilitate the transfer of means for performing the methods described herein. Alternatively, various methods described herein can be provided via storage means (e.g., RAM, ROM, a physical storage medium such as a compact disc (CD) or floppy disk, etc. ) , such that a user terminal and/or base station can obtain the various methods upon coupling or providing the storage means to the device. Moreover, any other suitable technique for providing the methods and techniques described herein to a device can be utilized.

It is to be understood that the claims are not limited to the precise configuration and components illustrated above. Various modifications, changes and variations may be made in the arrangement, operation and details of the methods and apparatus described above without departing from the scope of the claims.

Claims

A method of wireless communications performed by a user equipment, comprising:

determining, during an idle or inactive mode, a baseline channel quality for a plurality of transmission beams associated with a first cell, wherein the baseline channel quality comprises a linear average of the plurality of transmission beams;

determining an idle or inactive mode channel quality for the plurality of transmission beams as a function of the baseline channel quality; and

performing a cell reselection procedure to select the first cell for service based, at least in part, on the idle or inactive mode channel quality.
The method of claim 1, wherein the function comprises adding an offset or weight to the baseline channel quality to account for the idle or inactive mode.
The method of claim 1, wherein the function comprises:

Q = Qb* (1+K*delta) , wherein Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, and delta is a value configured by the base station.
The method of claim 1, wherein the function comprises applying a standard deviation to a set of quality of good beams.
The method of claim 1, wherein the function comprises:

dB (Q) = dB (Qb) + log (1+K*delta_1) + delta_2*std_dev (X) , wherein dB is decibels, Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, and delta_1 is a value configured by the base station, delta_2 is a value configured by the base station, X is the std_dev a set of quality of good beams, and std_dev (X) is the standard deviation of X.
The method of claim 1, wherein the function comprises:

Q = Qb*K, wherein Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, and K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold.
The method of claim 1, wherein the function comprises:

Q = Qc, wherein Qc is a linear sum of the best N3 beams, wherein N3 is configured by the base station.
The method of claim 1, wherein the function comprises:

dB (Q) = dB (Qb*K) + K*delta, wherein dB is decibels, Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, and delta is a value configured by the base station.
The method of claim 1, wherein the function comprises:

Q = Qb + min (K, N4) *delta, wherein Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, delta is a value configured by the base station, and N4 is a value configured by the base station to limit the impact of the delta, and.
The method of claim 1, wherein the function comprises:

Q = dB (Qb) + min (K, N4) *delta, wherein dB is decibels, Q is the idle mode channel quality, Qb is the baseline channel quality, K is a number of the plurality of transmission beams above a threshold, N4 is a value configured by the base station, and delta is a value configured by the base station.
The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining a second baseline channel quality and a second idle or inactive mode channel quality associated with a second plurality of transmission beams from at least a second cell, wherein performing the cell reselection procedure comprises determining which cell, between the first cell and the second cell, to select based, at least in part on their respective idle or inactive mode channel quality.
The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining a quality of a best beam associated with the first cell;

determining a quality of a best beam associated with a second cell; and performing the cell reselection procedure comprises:

selecting the first cell if the best beam quality associated with the first cell is greater than the best beam quality associated with the second cell by a threshold;

selecting the second cell if the best beam quality associated with the second cell is greater than the best beam quality associated with the first cell by a threshold; or

determining a quality of a second best beam associated with the first cell and a quality of a second best beam associated with the second cell if neither the best beam quality associated with the first cell and the best beam quality associated with the second cell are greater than the other by a threshold.
The method of claim 12, further comprising receiving information indicating a number of best beams to compare between the first and second cell.
The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining a first baseline channel quality associated with a first cell and a second baseline channel quality associated with a second cell;

determining that a difference between the first baseline channel quality and the second baseline channel quality is below a threshold; and

wherein performing a cell reselection procedure comprising selecting the first cell or the second cell based on which of the first cell or the second cell has a highest best beam quality.