WO2020220537A1

WO2020220537A1 - Controlling data transmission in wireless communication

Info

Publication number: WO2020220537A1
Application number: PCT/CN2019/103138
Authority: WO
Inventors: Kai Zhu; Yu Chen
Original assignee: Nokia Shanghai Bell Co Ltd; Nokia Solutions and Networks Oy; Nokia Technologies Oy
Current assignee: Nokia Shanghai Bell Co Ltd; Nokia Solutions and Networks Oy; Nokia Technologies Oy
Priority date: 2019-05-02
Filing date: 2019-08-28
Publication date: 2020-11-05
Anticipated expiration: 2021-11-02
Also published as: CN113767581A; WO2020221963A1; CN113767581B

Abstract

Methods and apparatuses for improving transmissions of data, (e.g., transport block (TB) ) are proposed. A transmitting device may combine a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to obtain a set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, and transmit the set of combined transport blocks to a receiving device. The combination pattern indicates one or more component transport blocks of the plurality of component transport blocks and an associated redundancy version for each of the component transport bocks to be used to obtain each combined transport block of the set of combined transport blocks. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

Description

CONTROLLING DATA TRANSMISSION IN WIRELESS COMMUNICATION

This application claims priority to U.S. provisional patent application Ser. No. 62/841962, filed on May 2, 2019, the disclosure of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The teachings in accordance with example embodiments of present disclosure relate generally to wireless communication and, more specifically, relate to improving transmissions of transport blocks for scenarios such as feedback-less transmission etc.

BACKGROUND

This section is intended to provide a background or context to example embodiments of the present disclosure. The description herein may include concepts that could be pursued, but are not necessarily ones that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated herein, what is described in this section is not prior art to the description and claims in this application and is not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.

Certain abbreviations that may be found in the description and/or in the Figures are herewith defined as follows:

ACK/NACK Acknowledgement/Negative Acknowledgement

BG Base Graph

gNB 5G Node B/Base Station

HARQ Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request

LDPC Low Density Parity Check

LEO Low Earth Orbit

LTE Long Term Evolution

MCS Modulation and Coding Scheme

NR New Radio (5G)

NTN Non-Terrestrial Network

Rel Release

RV Redundancy Version

SI Study Item

TB Transport Block

UE User Equipment

A new study item (SI) of the third generation partnership project (3GPP) titled “Solutions for NR to support Non-Terrestrial Network” was approved in the radio access network (RAN) #80 meeting, and details can be found in a 3GPP contribution RP-181370. One important deployment feature that would distinguish NTN from terrestrial networks (e.g. LTE, Rel15 NR) is that NTN base station nodes are generally satellites located on the Earth orbit with 600 -36000 km orbital altitude relative to UEs on Earth surface. This results in large propagation delay in NTN.

A communication environment like that in NTN may bring some challenge to communication performance.

SUMMARY

The scope of protection sought for various embodiments of the present disclosure is set out by the independent claims. The embodiments and features, if any, described in this specification that do not fall under the scope of the independent claims are to be interpreted as examples useful for understanding various embodiments of the present disclosure.

According to a first aspect, various embodiments provide a method for wireless communication at a transmitting device. The method comprises combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to obtain a set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, and transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to a receiving device. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

According to a second aspect, various embodiments provide a method for wireless communication at a receiving device. The method comprises receiving a set of combined transport blocks from a transmitting device, and detecting a plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

According to a third aspect, various embodiments provide a transmitting device for wireless communication. The transmitting device comprises means for combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to obtain a set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, and means for transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to a receiving device. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

According to a fourth aspect, various embodiments provide a receiving device for wireless communication. The receiving device comprises means for receiving a set of combined transport blocks from a transmitting device, and means for detecting a plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining

According to a fifth aspect, various embodiments provide a system for wireless communication. The system comprises a transmitting device and a receiving device. The transmitting device comprises means for combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to obtain a set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, and means for transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to the receiving device. The receiving device comprises means for receiving the set of combined transport blocks from the transmitting device, and means for detecting the plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on the combination pattern. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

According to a sixth aspect, various embodiments provide a transmitting device for wireless communication. The transmitting device comprises at least one processor and at least one memory including computer program code. The at least one memory and the computer program code are configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the transmitting device at least to perform combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to obtain a set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, and transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to a receiving device. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

According to a seventh aspect, various embodiments provide a receiving device for wireless communication. The receiving device comprises at least one processor and at least one memory including computer program code. The at least one memory and the computer program code are configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the receiving device at least to perform receiving a set of combined transport blocks from a transmitting device, and detecting a plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

According to an eighth aspect, various embodiments provide a system for wireless communication. The system comprises a transmitting device and a receiving device. The transmitting device comprises at least one first processor and at least one first memory including first computer program code. The receiving device comprises at least one second processor and at least one second memory including second computer program code. The at least first one memory and the first computer program code are configured to, with the at least one first processor, cause the transmitting device at least to perform combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to obtain a set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, and transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to the receiving device. The at least one second memory and the second computer program code configured to, with the at least one second processor, cause the receiving device at least to perform receiving the set of combined transport blocks from the transmitting device, and detecting the plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on the combination pattern. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

According to a ninth aspect, various embodiments provide a non-transitory computer readable medium. The non-transitory computer readable medium comprises program instructions for causing a transmitting device to at least perform combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to obtain a set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, and transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to a receiving device. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

According to a tenth aspect, various embodiments provide a non-transitory computer readable medium. The non-transitory computer readable medium comprises program instructions for causing a receiving device to at least perform receiving a set of combined transport blocks from a transmitting device, and detecting a plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

According to some embodiments, the combination pattern indicates one or more component transport blocks of the plurality of component transport blocks and an associated redundancy version for each of the component transport bocks to be used to obtain each combined transport block of the set of combined transport blocks.

According to some embodiments, the plurality of combination patterns associated with the same redundancy rate includes a first combination pattern and a second combination pattern. In some embodiments, the first combination pattern indicates a first set of component transport blocks associated with a first set of redundancy versions to be used for the combination, while the second combination pattern indicates the first set of component transport blocks associated with a different second set of redundancy versions to be used for the combination. In other embodiments, the first combination pattern indicates the first set of component transport blocks to be used for the combination, while the second combination pattern indicates a different second set of component transport blocks to be used for the combination. In yet other embodiments, a given redundancy version for a component transport block is used more frequently for the combining in the first combination pattern than in the second combination pattern.

According to some embodiments, the predefined set of combination patterns includes one or more subsets of combination patterns, and each of the subsets includes a plurality of combination patterns for one or more redundancy rates.

According to some embodiments, each of the subsets of combination patterns corresponds to a different range of supported coding rate.

According to some embodiments, the combination pattern is selected by selecting a subset from the one or more subsets of combination patterns, and selecting the combination pattern from the selected subset.

According to some embodiments, the subset selection is based on at least a link direction and/or channel condition between the transmitting device and the receiving device.

According to some embodiments, the combination pattern is selected based on self-decodability of a component transport block.

According to some embodiments, the combination pattern is selected based on an encoding parameter for channel coding applied to generate the component transport block. In some embodiments, the encoding parameter includes a codeblock size adopted by a component transport block, and/or a Base Graph used for LDPC channel coding, and/or the maximum coding rate supported by a component transport block.

According to some embodiments, the combination pattern is selected based on detection performance of the combined transport blocks at the receiving device. In some embodiments, the detection performance at least includes an indication for the number of component transport blocks recovered from a previous detection process at the receiving device.

According to some embodiments, the operation of obtaining the set of combined TBs comprises obtaining one combined transport block of the set of combined transport blocks from one component transport block of the plurality of component transport blocks,

According to some embodiments, the operation of obtaining the set of combined TBs comprises obtaining one combined transport block of the set of combined transport blocks by an XOR operation of at least two component transport blocks of the plurality of component transport blocks.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and other aspects, features, and benefits of various embodiments of the present disclosure will become more fully apparent from the following detailed description with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which like reference signs are used to designate like or equivalent elements. The drawings are illustrated for facilitating better understanding of embodiments of the disclosure and are not necessarily drawn to scale, in which:

FIG. 1 shows an example schematic structure of an NTN;

FIG. 2 shows a high level block diagram of various devices used in carrying out some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 3 shows an example of simplified flow diagram in a process for a TB Combination between Original TB0 and TB1 in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 4 shows an example of simplified schematic diagram for erasure encoding and decoding according to some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 5a shows a method that may be performed by apparatuses in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIGs. 5b and 5c show examples of a method that may be performed by a transmitting device and a receiving device, respectively in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure; and

FIG. 6 shows an example of the (quasi) -HARQ feedback-less call flow for downlink (DL) in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure.

DETAILED EMBODIMENTS

Principle of the present disclosure will now be described with reference to some example embodiments. It is to be understood that these example embodiments are described only for the purpose of illustration and for helping those skilled in the art to understand and implement the present disclosure, without suggesting any limitation as to the scope of the disclosure. The embodiments described herein can be implemented in various manners which are not limited to the ones described below.

In the following description and claims, unless defined otherwise, all technical and scientific terms used herein have the same meaning as commonly understood by one of ordinary skills in the art to which this disclosure belongs.

As used herein, the term “terminal device” or “user equipment” (UE) refers to any terminal device capable of wireless communications with each other or with the base station. The communications may involve transmitting and/or receiving wireless signals using electromagnetic signals, radio waves, infrared signals, and/or other types of signals suitable for conveying information over air. In some example embodiments, the UE may be configured to transmit and/or receive information without direct human interaction. For example, the UE may transmit information to a network device on predetermined schedules, when triggered by an internal or external event, or in response to requests from the network side.

Examples of the UE include, but are not limited to, user equipment (UE) such as smart phones, wireless-enabled tablet computers, laptop-embedded equipment (LEE) , laptop-mounted equipment (LME) , wireless customer-premises equipment (CPE) , sensors, metering devices, personal wearables such as watches etc., and/or vehicles that are capable of communication. For the purpose of discussion, some example embodiments will be described with reference to UEs as examples of the terminal devices, and the terms “terminal device” and “user equipment” (UE) may be used interchangeably in the context of the present disclosure.

As used herein, the term “network device” refers to a device via which services can be provided to a terminal device in a communication network. The network device may comprise an access network device and a core network device. The access network device may comprise any suitable device via which a terminal device or UE can access the communication network. Examples of the access network devices include a relay, an access point (AP) , a transmission point (TRP) , a node B (NodeB or NB) , an evolved NodeB (eNodeB or eNB) , a New Radio (NR) NodeB (gNB) , a Remote Radio Module (RRU) , a radio header (RH) , a remote radio head (RRH) , a low power node such as a femto, a pico, and the like.

The communication system and associated devices (e.g., UE and network devices) typically operate in accordance with a given standard or specification which sets out what various entities associated with the system are permitted to do and how that should be achieved. Communication protocols and/or parameters which shall be used for the connection are also typically defined. One example of a communications system long-term evolution (LTE) of the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) radio-access technology and so-called 5G or New Radio (NR) networks.

FIG. 1 shows a schematic of NTN network in which some embodiments of the present disclosure may be implemented. It should be appreciated that embodiments of the present disclosure are not limited to being applied in such an NTN network, but could be more widely used in wireless communication networks.

As shown in FIG. 1, a LEO satellite 101 with an altitude of 600 km provides a coverage area of a NR cell 107. A GEO satellite 102 with a much higher altitude of 35786 km provides a broader coverage on earth. The LEO satellite 101 may communicate with a gNB 103 on earth via a feeder link 105, and may commnicate with a UE on a ship104 via an access/service link 106.

Propagation time for electromagnetic waves to travel through such distances, e.g., the distance from the LEO satellite 101 to UE and the distance from the GEO satellite 102 to UE in FIG. 1, are measured and shown in Table 1. Obviously, propagation delay of NTN is much higher than what could be possibly tolerated by Rel15 NR Physical Layer Specification, which is limited by a maximum propagation distance of 300km.

Table 1: Platform altitude and one-way propagation delay

Platform	Typical Altitude	Propagation Delay
Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite	600 km	～12.9 ms
Geostationary Earth Orbit (GEO) satellite	35 786 km	～270 ms

In some example embodiments, methods and apparatuses for improving transmissions of data, (e.g., transport block (TB) ) are proposed. In some embodiments, combined TBs (also referred to as TB combinations) are transmitted. The combined TBs may be generated, for example (but not necessarily) , using a principle similar to erasure coding. Some embodiments may reduce the communication latency, which may be a problem for scenarios such as NTN with a large propagation delay.

Before describing the example embodiments of the present disclosure in detail, reference is made to FIG. 2 for illustrating a simplified block diagram of various electronic devices that are suitable for use in practicing some example embodiments of this present disclosure.

FIG. 2 shows a block diagram of one possible and non-limiting example system in which some example embodiments of the present disclosure may be practiced. In FIG. 2, a UE 10 is in wireless communication with a wireless network 1. A UE is a wireless, typically mobile device that can access a wireless network. The UE 10 may include one or more processors DP 10A, one or more memories MEM 10B, and one or more transceivers TRANS 10D interconnected, e.g., through one or more buses. Each of the one or more transceivers TRANS 10D may include a receiver and a transmitter. The one or more buses may be address, data, or control buses, and may include any interconnection mechanism, such as a series of lines on a motherboard or integrated circuit, fiber optics or other optical communication equipment, and the like. The one or more transceivers TRANS 10D may be connected to one or more antennas for

communication

21 and 22 to NN 12 and NN 13, respectively. The one or more memories MEM 10B include computer program code PROG 10C. The UE 10 may communicate with NN 12 and/or NN 13 via a wireless link.

The NN 12 (which may be a NR/5G Node B, an evolved NB, or LTE device) is a network device such as a master or secondary node base station (e.g., for NR or LTE) that communicates with devices such as NN 13 and/or UE 10 of FIG. 2. The NN 12 may provide access to wireless devices such as the UE 10 to the wireless network 1. The NN 12 may include one or more processors DP 12A, one or more memories MEM 12C, and one or more transceivers TRANS 12D interconnected, e.g., through one or more buses. In accordance with some example embodiments, these TRANS 12D may include X2 and/or Xn interfaces for use to perform some example embodiments of the present disclosure. Each of the one or more transceivers TRANS 12D may include a receiver and a transmitter. The one or more transceivers TRANS 12D may be connected to one or more antennas, e.g., for communication over at least a link 21 with the UE 10. The one or more memories MEM 12B and the computer program code PROG 12C may be configured, with the one or more processors DP 12A, to cause the NN 12 to perform one or more of the operations as described herein. The NN 12 may communicate with another network device, e.g., a gNB or eNB, or a device such as the NN 13. Further, the link 21 and or any other link may be wired or wireless or both and may implement, e.g., an X2 or Xn interface. Further the link 21 may be through other network devices such as, but not limited to an NCE/MME/SGW device such as the NCE 14 of FIG. 2.

In some embodiments, the NN 13 may comprise a mobility function device such as an AMF or SMF. In some embodiments, the NN 13 may comprise a NR/5G Node B (also referred to as gNB) or possibly an evolved NB (eNB) which may be a master or secondary node base station (e.g., for NR or LTE) that communicates with devices such as the NN 12 and/or UE 10 and/or the wireless network 1. The NN 13 may include one or more processors DP 13A, one or more memories MEM 13B, one or more network interfaces, and one or more transceivers TRANS 12D interconnected, e.g., through one or more buses. In accordance with some example embodiments, these network interfaces of NN 13 may include X2 and/or Xn interfaces for use to perform some example embodiments of the present disclosure. Each of the one or more transceivers TRANS 13D may include a receiver and a transmitter connected to one or more antennas. The one or more memories MEM 13B may include computer program code PROG 13C. For instance, the one or more memories MEM 13B and the computer program code PROG 13C may be configured, with the one or more processors DP 13A, to cause the NN 13 to perform one or more of the operations as described herein. The NN 13 may communicate with another mobility function device and/or gNB such as the NN 12 using e.g., link 32, and may communicate with the UE 10 or any other device using, e.g., link 22 or another link. These links maybe wired or wireless or both and may implement, e.g., an X2 or Xn interface. Further, the link 22 may be through other network devices such as, but not limited to an NCE/MME/SGW device such as the NCE 14 of FIG. 2.

The one or more buses of the device of FIG. 2 may be address, data, or control buses, and may include any interconnection mechanism, such as a series of lines on a motherboard or integrated circuit, fiber optics or other optical communication equipment, wireless channels, and the like. For example, the one or more transceivers TRANS 12D, TRANS 13D and/or TRANS 10D may be implemented as a remote radio head (RRH) , with the other elements of the NN 12 being physically in a different location from the RRH, and the one or more buses may be implemented in part as fiber optic cable to connect the other elements of the NN 12 to a RRH.

It is noted that although FIG. 2 shows network devices such as NN 12 and NN 13, any of these nodes may incorporate or be incorporated into an eNB or gNB, and would still be configurable to perform example embodiments of the present disclosure.

It is also noted that description herein indicates that “cells” perform some functions, but it should be clear that a network device (e.g., an eNB or gNB) which provides the cell performs the functions, facilitated with a user equipment and/or a mobility management function device in some cases. In addition, the cell makes up part of a gNB, and there can be multiple cells per gNB.

The wireless network 1 may include a network control element (NCE) 14 that may include MME (Mobility Management Entity) /SGW (Serving Gateway) functionality, and which provides connectivity with a further network, such as a telephone network and/or a data communications network (e.g., the Internet) . The NN 12 and the NN 13 may be coupled via a link 31 and/or link 32 to the NCE 14. In addition, it is noted that operations in accordance with some example embodiments, as performed by the NN 13, may also be performed at the NCE 14.

The NCE 14 may include one or more processors DP 14A, one or more memories MEM 14B, and one or more network interfaces (N/W I/F (s) ) , interconnected, e.g., through one or more buses coupled with the link 13 and/or 14. In accordance with some example embodiments, these network interfaces may include X2 and/or Xn interfaces for use to perform some example embodiments of the present disclosure. The one or more memories MEM 14B may include computer program code PROG 14C. The one or more memories MEM 14B and the computer program code PROG 14C may be configured to, with the one or more processors DP 14A, cause the NCE 14 to perform one or more operations which may be needed to support the operations in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure.

The wireless network 1 may implement network virtualization, which is the process of combining hardware and software network resources and network functionality into a single, software-based administrative entity, a virtual network. Network virtualization involves platform virtualization, often combined with resource virtualization. Network virtualization is categorized as either external, combining many networks, or parts of networks, into a virtual unit, or internal, providing network-like functionality to software containers on a single system. Note that the virtualized entities that result from the network virtualization may still be implemented, at some level, using hardware such as processors DP10, DP12A, DP13A, and/or DP14A and memories MEM 10B, MEM 12B, MEM 13B, and/or MEM 14B, and also such virtualized entities create technical effects.

The computer readable memories MEM 12B, MEM 13B, and MEM 14B may be of any type suitable to the local technical environment and may be implemented using any suitable data storage technology, such as semiconductor based memory devices, flash memory, magnetic memory devices and systems, optical memory devices and systems, fixed memory and removable memory. The computer readable memories MEM 12B, MEM 13B, and MEM 14B may be means for performing storage functions. The processors DP10, DP12A, DP13A, and DP14A may be of any type suitable to the local technical environment, and may include one or more of general purpose computers, special purpose computers, microprocessors, digital signal processors (DSPs) and processors based on a multi-core processor architecture, as non-limiting examples. The processors DP10, DP12A, DP13A, and DP14A may be means for performing functions, such as controlling the UE 10, NN 12, NN 13, and other functions as described herein.

In some embodiments, a set of TB combinations, which may be generated, e.g., using a principle similar to erasure coding from a plurality of TBs, can be transmitted between a transmitting device and a receiving device in a wireless network. The transmission may be performed, e.g., between a UE and a gNB in a terrestrial network or an NTN. The transmitting device and the receiving device are a pair of relative devices. For an uplink (UL) transmission, the UE is the transmitting device and the gNB is the receiving device. For a downlink (DL) transmission, a gNB may be the transmitting device and the UE is the receiving device. As an example, the pair of communication devices may be a UE 10 and a NN 12 in FIG. 2, or two network devices transmitting to each other such as a NN12 and a NN13 in FIG. 2.

FIGs. 3 and 4 illustrate an example procedure for TB combination and elimination according to an example embodiment of the present disclosure.

To facilitate following descriptions in this specification, definitions for some terms used herein are provided.

Original TB, indicates a TB containing original information. A TB is defined in current 3GPP specifications, which can correspond to a MAC PDU or a part of a MAC PDU. The original TB may be processed (e.g., via parity check, channel coding and rate matching) , and the processed TB may serve as a component TB for TB combining.

Component TB, indicates a TB ready for TB combining to generate one or more combined TBs, and/or a TB used in a set of combined TBs.

A set of combined TBs, indicates a result of TB combining of a plurality of component TBs according to a TB combination pattern. It includes a plurality of TB combinations generated from the plurality of component TBs. One combined TB of the set of combined TBs is also referred to as a TB combination.

TB combination pattern, indicates which one or more component TBs and which associated RV for each of the one or more component TBs are to be used to obtain each of the set of combined TBs.

Combination degree, indicates the number of component TB (s) used to generate a TB combination.

In an example embodiment shown in FIG. 3, in order to generate the component TB0 341 for combination, operations of Parity Check 301, Channel Coding 303, and Rate Matching/RV Associating 305 may be performed on the original TB0 331. Likewise, in order to generate the component TB1 342 for combination, operations of Parity Check 302, Channel Coding 304, and Rate Matching/RV Associating 306 may be performed on the original TB1 332. In the operation of RV Associating 305, TB0 is associated with a specific RV (e.g., RV0) of a set of RVs such as {RV0, RV1, RV2, RV3} , based on needs. In the operation of RV Associating 306, TB1 is also associated with a specific RV (e.g., RV1) from the set of RVs. Then in the operation of TB combining 310, a component TB0 341 associated with a specific RV and a component TB1 342 associated with a specific RV may be selected for combining to generate a set of combined TBs 350.

It should be appreciated that in some embodiments, the operations to generate the component TBs from the original TBs as shown in FIG. 3 may not be necessary, and embodiments are not limited to any specific way to obtain the component TBs.

In some example embodiments, component TBs are combined according to one combination pattern to generate a set of combined TBs and then transmitted. In an example shown in FIG. 4, TB0 (denoted as S0) and TB1 (denoted as S1) are combined to get the set of combined TBs, i.e., TB0, TB0+TB1 and TB1. The resulting TB0 and TB1 are both degree-1 combinations and TB0+TB1 is a degree-2 combination. This combination pattern may be obtained, e.g., by a code construction of erasure code, e.g. Luby-Transform (LT) code.

As shown in FIG. 4, the TB combination and elimination process are summarized in one example where the transmitting device transmits two component TBs (e.g., TB0, TB1) by generating and transmitting three TB combinations, e.g., TB0, TB0+TB1, TB1. At the Input 401, component TB0 denoted as S1 and component TB2 denoted as S2 serve as two inputs to be encoded in the Encoder 402. In this example, XOR operations are performed to combine these component TBs, and S0, S1 and S0+S1 (where + represents the XOR operation) are obtained at the Encoder 402. In this example, the redundancy rate of the combining is 3/2. The resultant three TB combinations are transmitted to the receiver 403. As an example, assuming S0 is missed by the receiver, whereas other two S1, S0+S1 are received with success, then at the elimination phase (I) 404, the TB combination including only one effectively received component TB (S1) is assumed to be decoded and become the “ripple” . In the next elimination phase (II) 405, the “ripple” may be used to perform TB elimination (via another XOR) with the other successfully received TB combination, i.e. S0+S1. Then the missed component TB0 (S0) is recovered. If more TB combinations are transmitted and received, the TB elimination may continue until all component TBs are recovered, or all component TBs in the ripple have been eliminated from the others.

In some embodiments, with the TB combination and elimination process, the classic ACK/NACK signaling can be saved by consecutive transmissions of the set of combined TBs. For example, current transmission may be independent of the outcome of a previous transmission. In other words, the transmitting side may send succeeding TB combinations (which may be erasure coded based on a combination pattern) without being notified whether the previous transmission succeeded or failed. Hence, such feedback-less transmission may reduce overall end-to-end latency and signaling overhead. However, embodiments are not limited to being used in a network configured with feedback-less transmission.

In some embodiments, the above described TB combing and eliminating process can be further improved, especially when considering features of channel coding and erasure coding.

For illustration rather than limitation, assume that a payload size (plus CRC bits) of a TB is small and LDPC BG2 is used to perform channel coding for the TB. Further assume that, based on previous estimation of channel quality, the coding rate of the channel coding is determined to be 0.5. Moreover, as an example, a redundancy rate of 8/4 for the combining operation may be selected, and an example TB combination pattern is shown in Table 2 below. Here, a redundancy rate indicates a ratio between the number of transmissions of the TB combinations and the number of component TBs involved in TB combining and intended to be conveyed to a receiving side. Take the Table 2 below for example, there are 4 component TBs (i.e. TB0, TB1, TB2, TB3) to be used for combining and 8 resultant TB combinations for transmission, so the redundancy rate is 8/4.

Table 2: TB combination pattern for redundancy rate of 8/4

With the example combination pattern shown in Table 2, in case a transmission at transmission instance #4 failed, even if TB3 (either TB3 (RV1) from #5 or TB3 (RV2) from #7) is successfully recovered, it may still be useless to perform further decoding (e.g., LDPC decoding) of TB3. This is because, under such transmission configuration, self-decodability of LDPC-encoded TBs requires RV0 or RV3. RV1 and RV2 of TB3 are not self-decodable, as the maximum coding rates supported by both RVs are below 0.5. Here, self-decodability refers to the property that the channel decoder in a receiving device is able to decode original information from a TB based on a single transmission, i.e., without soft-combining with other TB (s) associated with other RV (s) received from one or more further transmissions. For example, TB3 (RV0) is self-decodable, whereas TB3 (RV1) and TB3 (RV2) need to be soft-combined together to decode the original information included in TB3. As an example, Table 3 summarizes maximum coding rates supporting the self-decodability of TBs that are coded with Rel15 LDPC (transmitted on data channel) . It can be seen that different maximum coding rate allows unique self-decodability for different LDPC RVs.

Table 3: Maximum Rel15 LDPC coding rate supporting self-decodability

	Base Graph#1	Base Graph#2
RV0	0.97	0.95
RV1	0.43	0.26
RV2	0.55	0.39

RV3

0.91

0.71

Note that in some embodiments, TB elimination may be used at the receiving device to recover component TBs from the received combined TBs. The TB elimination may work in a successive way, and as a result, the elimination process could not proceed any further until a certain TB (e.g., TB3) is recovered. That is, detection failure of a TB may block the whole detection process. Such undesired elimination behavior could cause failure of the feedback-less transmission. Feedback-less transmission is supposed to provide technical effects similar to HARQ. Since there would be no HARQ retransmissions in NTN systems, a failed feedback-less transmission may lead to catastrophic consequence. The recovery of this missed portion of data could only be sorted by high layer, meaning significantly increase in latency and terrible user experience. For delay-sensitive service, this is unacceptable.

In accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure, a set of combination patterns is proposed. The set of combination patterns comprises combination patterns for different redundancy rates, and comprises a plurality of combination patterns for each redundancy rate. A proper combination pattern can be selected based on needed, e.g., to guarantee the self-decodability of each component TB in this combination pattern.

Here, a combination pattern defines a way for combining components TBs to obtain a set of combined TBs. That is, the combination pattern indicates which component TB (s) with which RV (s) should be used to generate each of the set of combined TBs. Each of the set of combined TBs generated based on a combination pattern is a combination of one or more component TBs, i.e., a TB combination, where each of the component TBs is associated with an RV.

Each combination pattern corresponds to a redundancy rate, and a plurality of combination patterns may correspond to a same redundancy rate. For example, a given redundancy rate may be associated with a plurality of combination patterns includes a first combination pattern and a second combination pattern. In some embodiments, the first combination pattern and the second combination pattern satisfy one of the following requirements:

Requirement i. the first combination pattern indicates a first set of component TBs associated with a first set of RVs to be used for the combination, while the second combination pattern indicates the first set of component TBs associated with a different second set of RVs to be used for the combination.

In an example embodiment of the present disclosure, for a redundancy rate of 8/4, the first combination pattern may be same as that shown in above Table 2. The second combination pattern may involve the same set of combined TBs as those in the first combination pattern, but the RVs associated with these component TBs may be different. Table 4 below illustrates an example of the second combination pattern.

Table 4: an example of a second TB combination pattern for a redundancy rate of 8/4

Comparing the first combination pattern in Table 2 and the second combination pattern in Table 4, it can be observed that the component TB (s) in each TB combination is the same, whereas the RVs associated with the same component TB can be different. For example, in transmission instance#4, same component TBs of TB3, TB1 and TB0 are used to obtain a TB combination; but TB1 is associated with RV1 in Table 2 and associated with RV3 in Table 4.

For a TB combination includes only one component TB, RVs associated with this TB can also be different in the first combination pattern and the second combination pattern.

Requirement ii. the first combination pattern indicates the first set of component transport blocks to be used for the combination, while the second combination pattern indicates a different second set of component transport blocks to be used for the combination.

In an example embodiment of the present disclosure, for a redundancy rate of 8/4, still take the above Table 2 as an illustration of the first combination pattern. The second combination pattern may involve a different set of combined TBs than those in the first combination pattern. Table 5 below illustrated an example of such second combination pattern.

Table 5: another example of second TB combination pattern for a redundancy rate of 8/4

It can be seen that in transmission instance#3, the TB combination is generated by combining TB2 and TB0 in Table 2, but the corresponding TB combination is generated by combining TB1 and TB2 in Table 5.

Requirement iii. a given RV for a component TB is used more frequently for the combining in the first combination pattern than in the second combination pattern.

The occurrence probability of individual RV for some component TBs may be different in each combination pattern. In an example embodiment, the first combination pattern may involve frequent use of TB1 associated with RV0, while the second combination pattern may involve more frequent use of TB1 associated with RV3.

In an example embodiment of the present disclosure, the set of combination patterns may include one or more subsets of combination patterns, and each of the one or more subset may include a plurality combination patterns for one or more redundancy rates.

The subsets can be classified based on different strategies.

In an example embodiment of the present disclosure, the subsets may be classified by link direction and/or channel condition between the transmitting device and the receiving device. For example, there may be two subsets of combination patterns, one for UL and the other for DL.

In an example embodiment of the present disclosure, the subsets may be classified by a different range of supported coding rate for channel coding. Then the self-decodability of component TBs may be maximized within each subset. For example, two subsets of combination patterns may be provided, one for low～medium coding rate (e.g. 0.1～0.4) , and another for medium～high coding rate (0.5～0.9) .

As described above, if transmission instance#4 in Table 2 failed, TB3 would not be self-decoded. Table 2 can be seen as an example for low～medium coding rate combination pattern, which guarantees the self-decodability of the component TBs with low coding rate.

Some modifications can be done to Table 2 to obtain a medium～high coding rate combination pattern as shown in Table 4. The medium～high combination pattern of Table 4 is just an example, and some generic rules to generate such a TB combination pattern may be as follows:

i. avoiding using RV1 and RV2 alone in degree-1 TB combinations. For example, the RVs in instances #6 and #7 may be changed to either RV0 or RV3. Considering that RV0 of TB2/TB3 is used in instances#3/#4, RV3 would be a better choice to maximize the combining gain.

ii. placing RVs with high self-decodability first, i.e. postponing the occurrence of RVs with low self-decodability. Hence, RV3 may be suitable to be used for TB0 in instance#3. TB0 in instance#4 can be set to RV2 as there are two copies of TB0 with high self-decodability from earlier.

Different combination patterns for a same redundancy rate makes it possible for the transmitting device to select a proper one based on needs, and therefore helps to improve communication performance. For example, the transmitting device may determine a combination pattern based on required self-decodability, channel condition, etc.

Now referring to Figs. 5a-5c which show examples of a method for transmission and reception of combined TBs according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure. FIG. 5a shows interactions between a transmitting device (e.g., UE or gNB) and a receiving device (e.g., gNB or UE) , while FIG. 5b and 5c show operations performed at the transmitting device and the receiving device respectively.

At step 501, a transmitting device combines a plurality of component TBs to be transmitted to a receiving device, to obtain a set of combined transport blocks, based on a combination pattern. And the combination pattern is one from a predefined set of combination patterns. The predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.

In some embodiments, the operation of obtaining the set of combined TBs may comprise obtaining one combined TB of the set of combined TBs from only one of the plurality of component transport blocks. That is, a TB combination of degree 1 includes only one component TB.

In some embodiments, the transmitting device may obtain one combined TB of the set of combined TBs by an XOR operation of at least two of the plurality of component transport blocks. Such a combined TB is a TB combination with a degree of two or more which includes 2 or more component TBs combined by XOR operation.

Take the combination pattern shown in Table 2 for example, a redundancy rate of 8/4 is chosen, which means every 8 transmissions over the physical interface will transmit a total of 4 component TBs. The component TBs to be transmitted are TB0, TB1, TB2 and TB3. The set of combined TBs includes 8 TB combinations such as the transmission instance#1-8.

In some embodiments, the transmitting device may communicate with the receiving device for the determination of redundancy rate and the combination pattern. In an example embodiment of the present disclosure, the transmitting device is a UE and the receiving device is a gNB. The gNB determines the redundancy rate for UE, selects a corresponding combination pattern for the redundancy rate and informs UE the selection by an index indication from a predefined set of combination patterns.

In some embodiments, the combination pattern may be selected from the predefined set of combination patterns based on self-decodability of a component TB.

In some embodiments, the recovered TB in a single transmission needs to associate with an RV supporting the coding rate of the TB. For example, a TB with coding rate 0.8 needs to associate with RV0 or RV3 to guarantee the self-decodability when recovered at the receiving side.

In some embodiments, alternatively or additionally, the combination pattern may be selected based on an encoding parameter for channel coding of the component TB. As an example, the encoding parameter may include a codeblock size adopted by a component TB, a Base Graph used for LDPC channel coding, and/or the maximum coding rate supported by a component TB.

In some embodiments, alternatively or additionally, the combination pattern may be selected based on detection performance of the combined TBs at the receiving device, which at least includes an indication for the number of component TBs recovered from a previous detection process at the receiving device. For example, the indication may be a number or a ratio indicating the number of component TBs recovered from a previous detection process.

In an example embodiment of the present disclosure, for the selection of the combination pattern, a subset of combination patterns, e.g. a subset for DL, may first be selected from a plurality of subsets, then the combination pattern may be selected from the selected subset.

At step 502, the transmitting device transmits the set of combined TBs to the receiving device.

And then at step 503, the receiving device receives the set of combined TBs from the transmitting device.

At step 504, the receiving device detects a plurality of component TBs from the set of combined TBs based on the combination pattern.

In some example embodiments of the present disclosure, the receiving device reverses the combining to recover the component TBs from the set of combined TBs. In some embodiments, the receiving device eliminates a currently received TB combination from one or more previously received TB combinations to recover a plurality of component TBs based on the combination pattern. In this example, the eliminating operation can be XOR, i.e., the receiving device may perform XOR operations among received TB combinations until all the component TBs in this combination pattern are recovered. It should be appreciated that other operations than XOR operation may be used for performing the TB combining at the transmitting side in some embodiments, and in such embodiments, the receiving side needs to perform corresponding reverse operations accordingly.

Note that, for a feedback-less transmission incorporating N/M redundancy rate, it is possible that the total number of transmitted TB combinations is less than N when M component TBs have been successfully recovered.

At the receiving side, TB eliminating procedure reverses the operations as performed at the transmitting device side, an example of which has been illustrated in FIG. 4. One important caveat should not be overlooked during system design is that, feedback-less transmission scheme related parameters, including TB combination redundancy rate, combination degree, TB combination pattern, etc. should be carefully selected so that the recovered TBs obtained from TB elimination are guaranteed to be self-decodable for the given encoding parameters of channel coding, e.g., BG and/or coding rate for NR LDPC.

In some embodiments, when the channel condition is deteriorating as detected from UE measurement, in order to keep consistent reception quality, modulation order and coding rate (e.g., MCS) can be adapted. With the introduction of TB combination and elimination, in order to guarantee feedback-less transmission scheme functional as expected, TB combination redundancy rate, combination degree, etc. may also be considered when determining the combination pattern, to refrain the self-decodability of recovered TB from going beyond what can be supported by specific channel condition. Such adaptive design feature would also be beneficial for receivers to achieve better soft-combining gain.

Now referring to FIG. 6, which shows operations between a UE 10 and a gNB 12, such as the UE 10 and a gNB 12 as in FIG. 2, in accordance with an example embodiment of the present disclosure. In this example, the transmission process between the UE 10 and the gNB 12 repurpose the HARQ retransmission.

As shown in step 605, the gNB 12 communicates with the UE 10 to obtain information regarding capabilities of the UE 10 for (quasi) feedback-less HARQ capability.

In this step 605, there is an exchange of UE capabilities, which can occur in the initial connection setup. The reported capabilities may include the capabilities of the UE with respect to the proposed (quasi) feedback-less HARQ, including (but not limited to) :

i. the capability of combining and elimination of TBs; and

ii. the number of process available for (quasi) feedback-less HARQ.

As shown in FIG. 6,

steps

610, 615, 620, and 625 as described below are part of a setup phase 607. In step 610, the gNB 12 communicates with the UE 10 to activate (quasi) feedback-less HARQ features. In this subsequent step 610, the gNB 12 sends a signal to the UE 10, informing that the feature must be activated (the HARQ buffers must be repurposed) . This signaling may be a unicast RRC message or broadcasted to several NTN users.

In step 615, a redundancy rate is set. In regards to this step 615, the gNB 12 scheduler assigns the redundancy rate to be used. The selection of the physical channel redundancy rate may be, for example,

i. pre-assigned, depending on the QoS information, UE class or other;

ii. dependent on UE channel quality estimation or other radio channel measurements;

iii. dependent on past ACK/NACK ratio; and/or

iv. based on current MCS and UE Tx Power.

In step 620, in accordance with an example embodiment of the present disclosure, a sequence of TB combinations is set. In regards to this step 620 of FIG. 6, the gNB 12 informs the UE 10 about the sequence of TB combinations to be used, based on a combination pattern for the redundancy rate. That is, the set of combined TBs is determined.

In step 625, a sequence of RV for component TBs is set. In regards to this step 625, the gNB 12 informs the UE 10 about the sequence of RVs associated with each component TB in each TB combination, based on the combination pattern.

Alternatively, in an embodiment, steps 615, 620 and 625 of FIG. 6 can be condensed and transmitted by the gNB 12 via an index to a table indicating a combination pattern, in order to minimize the overhead of signaling messages. Such tables can be pre-defined in specifications.

In some embodiments, the sequence of TB combinations and its corresponding RV sequence for the component TBs are determined by the gNB based on a combination pattern which is selected from a set of predefined combination patterns. The set of predefined combination patterns may include a plurality of combination patterns for a given redundancy rate.

As shown in step 627, the operation of TB combination is performed by the gNB 12 based on the combination pattern. In regards to step 627, the transmitting end performs the combining of component TBs. In some embodiments, after UE and gNB agree on the set of combined TBs (the sequence of TB combinations) to be transmitted, XOR operations are performed on the component TBs to obtain the TB combinations prior to the transmission.

As shown in step 630, a first DL transmission with a first TB combination is communicated between the gNB 12 and the UE 10. Then as shown in step 640, the UE 10 performs reception and elimination of TB combinations for this first DL transmission.

In step 645, there is a second DL transmission with a second TB combination communicated between the gNB 12 and the UE 10. Then in step 650, the UE 12 performs reception and elimination of TB combinations for this second DL transmission.

In step 655, there is a kth DL transmission communicated with a kth TB combination communicated between the gNB 12 and the UE 10. Then in step 660, the UE 12 performs reception and elimination of TB combinations for this kth DL transmission, where k is an integer.

As shown in step 665, in accordance with example embodiments of the present disclosure, there is soft-combining of erroneous recovered TBs. In step 670, there is optionally HARQ feedback communicated between the UE 10 and the gNB 12. In step 675 and step 677, the UE 10 and the gNB 12, respectively, may flush its buffer, such as buffers where signaling associated with HARQ processes are stored. Then at step 680, there can be a re-start of at least some of the processes as described above in accordance with example embodiments of the present disclosure.

In accordance with example embodiments of the present disclosure there may be size matching in the TB combining (transmitting side) . For example, in the case two component TBs to be combined have different sizes (because of difference in the MAC PDU sizes or other reason) , the smaller component TB may be “filled” with extra bits to match the size of the larger component TB. In accordance with example embodiments of the present disclosure, a resource allocation for the TB combining is determined based on the size of the largest component TB.

For illustration purpose, some further examples for TB size matching are provided below. In some example embodiments, the smaller TB requires extension to match the size of the largest TB. The extension sequence may be one of:

i. dummy bits (for example sequence of “0” or sequence of “1” ) ;

ii. known specific sequence;

iii. repetition of the initial of part of the smaller TB version (adding more redundancy) ; and

iv. parts of the sequence of RV to be used in a following round of transmissions (adding more redundancy to the information) .

The “size matching” sequence may be used to improve the reception capabilities (repeating information) by using, for example, soft combining of the repeated versions of the information.

The receiving end reverses the operations performed by the transmitting end.

In accordance with example embodiments of the present disclosure, every received TB combination is stored into a buffer previously assigned to different HARQ processes. Processes in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure may include:

i. the first received TB combination is stored in the buffer corresponding to the HARQ Process ID 0, the second is stored in the buffer corresponding to the HARQ Process ID 1, etc. ;

ii. TB combinations of degree 1 are decoded as in the legacy process; and

iii. the recovered TB passes the parity check after decoded, it can be “eliminated” for every other TB combination received or to be received by an XOR operation.

In order to describe the steps at the receiving end, in this example, it can be assumed the first four transmissions are received as depicted in FIG. 6. All the first four transmissions are TB combinations of degree 1. Those can be directly decoded and have their parity checked.

Regardless of the result of the CRC check, all received TB combinations must be moved to buffer positions.

The TB combination cannot be decoded until its degree is decomposed to degree 1.

Perform soft-combining on erroneous versions of recovered TB. In accordance with example embodiments of the present disclosure, the recovered TBs which have failed the parity check and correspond to the same original TB, may be recombined for adding more redundancy, before submitting it to the decoder again.

In case a component TB, due to the TB size matching feature, has being repeated more than once according to a TB combination pattern, the receiving side may attempt to perform soft combining of the received information (implementation) .

The soft-combining operation may be performed at any time, given the conditions are met. It does not need to be at the end of the kth transmission as depicted in FIG. 6.

In general, various embodiments may be implemented in hardware or special purpose circuitry, software, logic or any combination thereof. For example, some aspects may be implemented in hardware, while other aspects may be implemented in firmware or software which may be executed by a controller, microprocessor or other computing device, although the present disclosure is not limited thereto. While various aspects of the present disclosure may be illustrated and described as block diagrams, flow charts, or using some other pictorial representation, it is well understood that these blocks, apparatus, systems, techniques or methods described herein may be implemented in, as non-limiting examples, hardware, software, firmware, special purpose circuits or logic, general purpose hardware or controller or other computing devices, or some combination thereof.

For example, embodiments of the present disclosures may be practiced in various components such as integrated circuit modules. The design of integrated circuits is by and large a highly automated process. Complex and powerful software tools are available for converting a logic level design into a semiconductor circuit design ready to be etched and formed on a semiconductor substrate.

As used in this disclosure, the term “circuitry” may refer to one or more or all of the following:

(a) hardware-only circuit implementations (such as implementations in only analog and/or digital circuitry) and

(b) combinations of hardware circuits and software, such as (as applicable) :

(i) a combination of analog and/or digital hardware circuit (s) with software/firmware and

(ii) any portions of hardware processor (s) with software (including digital signal processor (s) ) , software, and memory (ies) that work together to cause an apparatus, such as a mobile phone or server, to perform various functions) and

(c) hardware circuit (s) and or processor (s) , such as a microprocessor (s) or a portion of a microprocessor (s) , that requires software (e.g., firmware) for operation, but the software may not be present when it is not needed for operation.

This definition of circuitry applies to all uses of this term in the present disclosure, including in any claims. As a further example, as used in the present disclosure, the term circuitry also covers an implementation of merely a hardware circuit or processor (or multiple processors) or portion of a hardware circuit or processor and its (or their) accompanying software and/or firmware. The term circuitry also covers, for example and if applicable to the particular claim element, a baseband integrated circuit or processor integrated circuit for a mobile device or a similar integrated circuit in server, a cellular network device, or other computing or network device.

The word "example" is used herein to mean "serving as an example, instance, or illustration. " Any embodiment described herein as "example" is not necessarily to be construed as preferred or advantageous over other embodiments. All of the embodiments described in this Detailed Description are example embodiments provided to enable persons skilled in the art to make or use the present disclosure and not to limit the scope of the present disclosure which is defined by the claims.

The foregoing description has provided by way of example and non-limiting examples a full and informative description of the best method and apparatus presently contemplated by the inventors for carrying out the present disclosure. However, various modifications and adaptations may become apparent to those skilled in the relevant arts in view of the foregoing description, when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and the appended claims. However, all such and similar modifications of the teachings of this present disclosure will still fall within the scope of this present disclosure.

It should be noted that the terms "connected, " "coupled, " or any variant thereof, mean any connection or coupling, either direct or indirect, between two or more elements, and may encompass the presence of one or more intermediate elements between two elements that are "connected" or "coupled" together. The coupling or connection between the elements can be physical, logical, or a combination thereof. As employed herein two elements may be considered to be "connected" or "coupled" together by the use of one or more wires, cables and/or printed electrical connections, as well as by the use of electromagnetic energy, such as electromagnetic energy having wavelengths in the radio frequency region, the microwave region and the optical (both visible and invisible) region, as several non-limiting and non-exhaustive examples.

Furthermore, some of the features of some example embodiments of this present disclosure could be used to advantage without the corresponding use of other features. As such, the foregoing description should be considered as merely illustrative of the principles of the present disclosure, and not in limitation thereof.

Claims

A method for wireless communication, comprising:

combining, by a transmitting device, a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to a receiving device, to obtain a set of combined transport blocks, based on a combination pattern, the combination pattern indicating one or more component transport blocks of the plurality of component transport blocks and an associated redundancy version for each of the one or more component transport blocks to be used to obtain each of the set of combined transport blocks; and

transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to the receiving device;

wherein the combination pattern is from a predefined set of combination patterns, the predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.
The method of Claim 1, wherein the plurality of combination patterns associated with the same redundancy rate includes a first combination pattern and a second combination pattern, and the first combination pattern and the second combination pattern satisfy one of the following:

- the first combination pattern indicates a first set of component transport blocks associated with a first set of redundancy versions to be used for the combination, while the second combination pattern indicates the first set of component transport blocks associated with a different second set of redundancy versions to be used for the combination,

- the first combination pattern indicates the first set of component transport blocks to be used for the combination, while the second combination pattern indicates a different second set of component transport blocks to be used for the combination, and

- a given redundancy version for a component transport block is used more frequently for the combining in the first combination pattern than in the second combination pattern.
The method of Claim 1, wherein the predefined set of combination patterns includes one or more subsets of combination patterns, and each of the one or more subsets includes a plurality of combination patterns for one or more redundancy rates.
The method of Claim 3, wherein each of the one or more subsets corresponds to a different range of supported coding rate.
The method of Claim 1, wherein the combination pattern is selected based on at least one of:

self-decodability of a component transport block,

an encoding parameter for channel coding applied to generate the component transport block, and

detection performance of the combined transport blocks at the receiving device.
The method of Claim 5, wherein the encoding parameter includes one or more of:

a codeblock size adopted by a component transport block,

a Base Graph for Low Density Parity Check channel coding, and

the maximum coding rate supported by a component transport block.
The method of Claim 5, wherein the detection performance at least includes an indication for the number of component transport blocks recovered from a previous detection process at the receiving device.
The method of any of Claims 1-7, wherein the combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to a receiving device to obtain a set of combined transport blocks comprises at least one of:

- obtaining one of the set of combined transport blocks from one of the plurality of component transport blocks; and

- obtaining one of the set of combined transport blocks by an XOR operation of at least two of the plurality of component transport blocks.
A method for wireless communication, comprising: receiving, by a receiving device, a set of combined transport blocks from a transmitting device; and

detecting a plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, the predefined set of combination patterns including a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combination.
A transmitting device for wireless communication, comprising:

at least one processor; and

at least one memory including computer program code;

the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the transmitting device at least to perform:

combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to a receiving device, to obtain a set of combined transport blocks, based on a combination pattern, the combination pattern indicating one or more component transport blocks of the plurality of component transport blocks and an associated redundancy version for each of the one or more component transport blocks to be used to obtain each of the set of combined transport blocks; and

transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to the receiving device;

wherein the combination pattern is from a predefined set of combination patterns, the predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.
The transmitting device of Claim 10, wherein the plurality of combination patterns associated with the same redundancy rate includes a first combination pattern and a second combination pattern, and the first combination pattern and the second combination pattern satisfy one of the following:

- the first combination pattern indicates a first set of component transport blocks associated with a first set of redundancy versions to be used for the combination, while the second combination pattern indicates the first set of component transport blocks associated with a different second set of redundancy versions to be used for the combination,

-t he first combination pattern indicates the first set of component transport blocks to be used for the combination, while the second combination pattern indicates a different second set of component transport blocks to be used for the combination, and

- a given redundancy version for a component transport block is used more frequently for the combining in the first combination pattern than in the second combination pattern.
The transmitting device of Claim 10, wherein the predefined set of combination patterns includes one or more subsets of combination patterns, and each of the one or more subsets includes a plurality of combination patterns for one or more redundancy rates.
The transmitting device of Claim 12, wherein each of the one or more subsets corresponds to a different range of supported coding rate.
The transmitting device of Claim 10, wherein the combination pattern is selected based on at least one of:

self-decodability of a component transport block,

an encoding parameter for channel coding applied to generate the component transport block, and

detection performance of the combined transport blocks at the receiving device.
The transmitting device of Claim 14, wherein the encoding parameter includes one or more of:

a codeblock size adopted by a component transport block,

a Base Graph for Low Density Parity Check channel coding, and

the maximum coding rate supported by a component transport block.
The transmitting device of Claim 14, wherein the detection performance at least includes an indication for the number of component transport blocks recovered from a previous detection process at the receiving device.
The transmitting device of any of Claims 10-16, wherein the combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to a receiving device to obtain a set of combined transport blocks comprises at least one of:

- obtaining one of the set of combined transport blocks from one of the plurality of component transport blocks; and

- obtaining one of the set of combined transport blocks by an XOR operation of at least two of the plurality of component transport blocks.
A receiving device for wireless communication, comprising:

at least one processor; and

at least one memory including computer program code;

the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the receiving device at least to perform:

receiving a set of combined transport blocks from a transmitting device; and

detecting a plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, the predefined set of combination patterns including a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combination.
A system for wireless communication, comprising a transmitting device and a receiving device,

wherein the transmitting device comprises:

at least one first processor; and

at least one first memory including first computer program code;

the at least first one memory and the first computer program code configured to, with the at least one first processor, cause the transmitting device at least to perform:

combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to a receiving device, to obtain a set of combined transport blocks, based on a combination pattern, the combination pattern indicating one or more component transport blocks of the plurality of component transport blocks and an associated redundancy version for each of the one or more component transport blocks to be used to obtain each of the set of combined transport blocks; and

transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to the receiving device;

wherein the receiving device comprises:

at least one second processor; and

at least one second memory including second computer program code;

the at least one second memory and the second computer program code configured to, with the at least one second processor, cause the receiving device at least to perform:

receiving the set of combined transport blocks from the transmitting device; and

detecting the plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on the combination pattern;

wherein the combination pattern is from a predefined set of combination patterns, the predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.
A transmitting device for wireless communication, comprising:

means for combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to a receiving device, to obtain a set of combined transport blocks, based on a combination pattern, the combination pattern indicating one or more component transport blocks of the plurality of component transport blocks and an associated redundancy version for each of the one or more component transport blocks to be used to obtain each of the set of combined transport blocks; and

means for transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to the receiving device; wherein the combination pattern is from a predefined set of combination patterns, the predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.
A receiving device for wireless communication, comprising:

means for receiving a set of combined transport blocks from a transmitting device; and means for detecting a plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, the predefined set of combination patterns including a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combination.
A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising program instructions for causing a transmitting device to perform at least the following:

combining a plurality of component transport blocks to be transmitted to a receiving device, to obtain a set of combined transport blocks, based on a combination pattern, the combination pattern indicating one or more component transport blocks of the plurality of component transport blocks and an associated redundancy version for each of the one or more component transport blocks to be used to obtain each of the set of combined transport blocks; and

transmitting the set of combined transport blocks to the receiving device;

wherein the combination pattern is from a predefined set of combination patterns, the predefined set of combination patterns includes a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combining.
A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising program instructions for causing a receiving device to perform at least the following:

receiving a set of combined transport blocks from a transmitting device; and

detecting a plurality of component transport blocks from the set of combined transport blocks based on a combination pattern from a predefined set of combination patterns, the predefined set of combination patterns including a plurality of combination patterns associated with a same redundancy rate for the combination.