WO2025060474A1

WO2025060474A1 - Collision resolution for time-frequency resources

Info

Publication number: WO2025060474A1
Application number: PCT/CN2024/095438
Authority: WO
Inventors: Liqing Zhang; Jianglei Ma
Original assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Current assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Priority date: 2023-09-22
Filing date: 2024-05-27
Publication date: 2025-03-27
Anticipated expiration: 2026-03-22

Abstract

Example embodiments relate to methods, and devices, a non-transitory computer readable medium, a chip, and a computer program product for a collision solution, especially for integrated sensing and communication (ISAC). In an aspect, a user equipment (UE) receives a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource. The first time-frequency resource at least partially overlaps with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation. Moreover, the UE performs an action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information.In this way, it is possible to avoid resource collisions efficiently.

Description

COLLISION RESOLUTION FOR TIME-FREQUENCY RESOURCES

CORSS-REFERENCES TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims the benefit and priority to U.S. Patent Application No. 63/584,594 filed September 22, 2023, the content of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.

FIELD

Example embodiments of the present disclosure generally relate to the field of communication, and in particular, to methods, apparatuses, non-transitory computer readable mediums, and chips for a collision resolution related to integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) .

BACKGROUND

With the development of communication technology, future wireless networks such as the sixth generation (6G) network can support an important feature called ISAC. A communication operation is used to provide transmissions of data or control information between user equipment (UE) and network (e.g., base station) , between UEs and/or between base stations. A sensing operation is used to provide a measurement via a sensing signal, and the measurement may include an estimation of the distance, range, size, and/or orientation of a UE or an object target. The communication signals and sensing signals may or may not be similar in terms of, for example, carrier frequency band, component carrier, signal bandwidth, signal waveform, etc. However, various communication technologies, especially related to a collision resolution for ISAC, may need to be further improved or optimized, so as to enhance sensing performance, communication performance, or both.

SUMMARY

In general, example embodiments of the present disclosure provide a collision solution, in particular, for ISAC.

It is to be understood that the summary section is not intended to identify key or essential features of embodiments of the present disclosure, nor is it intended to be used to limit the scope of the present disclosure. Other features of the present disclosure will become easily comprehensible through the following description.

In a first aspect, there is provided a method implemented at a user equipment (UE) . In the method, the UE receives, a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource, the first time-frequency resource at least partially overlapping with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation. Moreover, the UE performs an action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information. In this way, it is possible to avoid resource collisions efficiently, and thus improve the flexibility and efficiency of the communication between the UE and the network side.

In some embodiments, the first operation comprises a transmission operation or a reception operation, the transmission operation or the reception operation associated with a traffic type or an application type, comprising enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) ; ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) ; massive machine-type communication (mMTC) ; system information; a UE specific signal; a long-term evolution (LTE) communication signal; a new radio (NR) communication signal; a sixth-generation (6G) communication signal; a sensing signal; or a wireless fidelity (WiFi) signal. Thus, the communication performance of multiple types of operations can be improved.

In some embodiments, the collision resolution information includes an indication that the first time-frequency resource is to be reserved or prioritized for usage by a second operation, the second operation different than the first operation. Thus, it is allowed to indicate the collision solution on the first time-frequency resource efficiently.

In some embodiments, the second operation comprises a transmission operation or a reception operation, the transmission operation or the reception operation associated with a traffic type or an application type, comprising enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) ; ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) ; massive machine-type communication (mMTC) ; system information; a UE specific signal; a long-term evolution (LTE) communication signal; a new radio (NR) communication signal; a sixth-generation (6G) communication signal; a sensing signal; or a wireless fidelity (WiFi) signal. Thus, the communication performance of multiple types of operations can be improved.

In some embodiments, the second operation is configured by at least one of a radio resource control (RRC) message, or downlink control information (DCI) . Thus, the second operation may be configured with enhanced flexibility.

In some embodiments, the first operation or the second operation comprises one of a communication operation; a sensing operation; or a WiFi operation. Thus, the communication performance of multiple types of operations can be improved.

In some embodiments, the collision resolution information includes an indication of one or more priority rules for usage of the first time-frequency resource. Thus, it is allowed to indicate the collision solution on the first time-frequency resource efficiently.

In some embodiments, the one or more priority rules comprises one of the following: a first communication operation being prioritized over a sensing operation, the first communication operation comprising one of a transmission of cell-common traffic, a transmission of group-common traffic, or a transmission of UE specific traffic; or a sensing operation being prioritized over a second communication operation, the second communication operation comprising a transmission of group-common traffic or a transmission of UE specific traffic. Thus, it is possible to indicate the one or more priority rules efficiently.

In some embodiments, the first signaling comprises at least one of a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) . Thus, it is allowed to improve the flexibility for the first signaling.

In some embodiments, the collision resolution information includes an indication to perform a rate matching for the first operation around the first time-frequency resource. Thus, it is allowed to indicate the collision solution on the first time-frequency resource efficiently.

In some embodiments, the UE further receives an indication of a type of rate matching to be performed, the type of rate matching to be performed comprising one of puncturing out the first time-frequency resource without usage by the first operation; or muting the first operation on the first time-frequency resource. Thus, it facilitates the rate matching at the UE.

In some embodiments, the indication of the type of rate matching is received as part of the first signaling, or a second signaling, wherein the second signaling comprises one of a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) . Thus, it is allowed to improve the flexibility for the indication of the type of rate matching.

In some embodiments, performing the action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information includes performing a rate matching, the rating matching performed in response to one of receiving no activation indication of usage of the first time-frequency resource for the first operation; or determining that a usage condition of the first time-frequency resource is not met for the first operation during a time period. Thus, the rating matching may be performed with the enhanced flexibility.

In some embodiments, performing the action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information includes performing a rate matching, the rating matching comprising one of puncturing out the first time-frequency resource without usage by the first operation; or muting the first operation on the first time-frequency resource. Thus, the rating matching may be performed with enhanced efficiency.

In some embodiments, the UE further receives an indication of a rate matching pattern over the first time-frequency resource, the rate matching pattern including at least one of the following associated parameters: a frequency band on which the rate matching is to be performed; a component carrier on which the rate matching is to be performed; or a traffic type or operation that has lower priority for usage of the first time-frequency resource. Thus, the rate matching pattern may be indicated efficiently.

In some embodiments, the indication of the rate matching pattern is received as part of the first signaling, or a third signaling, wherein the third signaling comprises at least one of a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) . Thus, the rate matching pattern may be indicated with enhanced flexibility.

In some embodiments, one of the LTE communication signal, the NR communication signal, or the 6G communication signal comprises at least one of an uplink signal transmission; a downlink signal transmission; or a sidelink signal transmission. Thus, the communication performance of multiple types of communication operations can be improved.

In a second aspect, there is provided a method implemented at a network device. In the method, the network device transmits a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource, the first time-frequency resource at least partially overlapping with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation. In this way, it is possible to avoid resource collisions efficiently, and thus improve the flexibility and efficiency of the communication between the UE and the network side.

In some embodiments, the first operation comprises a transmission operation or a reception operation, the transmission operation or the reception operation associated with a traffic type or an application type, comprising: enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) ; ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) ; massive machine-type communication (mMTC) ; system information; a UE specific signal; a long-term evolution (LTE) communication signal; a new radio (NR) communication signal; a sixth-generation (6G) communication signal; a sensing signal; or a wireless fidelity (WiFi) signal. Thus, the communication performance of multiple types of operations can be improved.

In some embodiments, the second operation comprises a transmission operation or a reception operation, the transmission operation or the reception operation associated with a traffic type or an application type, comprising: enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) ; ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) ; massive machine-type communication (mMTC) ; system information; a UE specific signal; a long-term evolution (LTE) communication signal; a new radio (NR) communication signal; a sixth-generation (6G) communication signal; a sensing signal; or a wireless fidelity (WiFi) signal. Thus, the communication performance of multiple types of operations can be improved.

In some embodiments, the one or more priority rules comprises one of the following: a first communication operation being prioritized over a sensing operation, the first communication operation comprising one of a transmission of a cell-common traffic, a transmission of group-common traffic, or a transmission of UE specific traffic; or a sensing operation being prioritized over a second communication operation, the second communication operation comprising a transmission of group-common traffic or a transmission of UE specific traffic. Thus, it is possible to indicate the one or more priority rules efficiently.

In some embodiments, the network device further an indication of a type of rate matching to be performed, the type of rate matching to be performed comprising one of puncturing out the first time-frequency resource without usage by the first operation; or muting the first operation on the first time-frequency resource. Thus, it facilitates the rate matching at the UE.

In some embodiments, the indication of the type of rate matching is transmitted as part of the first signaling, or a second signaling, wherein the second signaling comprises one of a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) . Thus, it is allowed to improve the flexibility for the indication of the type of rate matching.

In some embodiments, the network device further transmits an indication of a rate matching pattern over the first time-frequency resource, the rate matching pattern indicating at least one of the following associated parameters: a frequency band on which the rate matching is to be performed; a component carrier on which the rate matching is to be performed; or a traffic type or operation that has lower priority for usage of the first time-frequency resource. Thus, the rate matching pattern may be indicated efficiently.

In some embodiments, the indication of the rate matching pattern is transmitted as part of the first signaling, or a third signaling, wherein the third signaling comprises at least one of a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, downlink control information (DCI) , or a combination of thereof. Thus, the rate matching pattern may be indicated with enhanced flexibility.

In some embodiments, one of the LTE communication signal, the NR communication signal or the 6G communication signal comprises at least one of: an uplink signal transmission; a downlink signal transmission; or a sidelink signal transmission. Thus, the communication performance of multiple types of communication operations can be improved.

In a third aspect, there is provided a terminal device. The terminal device comprises a memory storing instructions; and a processor. The processor, by executing the instructions, is configured to: receive a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource, the first time-frequency resource at least partially overlapping with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation; and perform an action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information.

In a fourth aspect, there is provided a network device. The network device comprises a memory; and a processor. The processor, by executing the instructions, is configured to: transmit a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource, the first time-frequency resource at least partially overlapping with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation.

In a fifth aspect, there is provided a non-transitory computer readable medium. The non-transitory computer readable medium comprises computer program stored thereon, the computer program, when executed on at least one processor, causing the at least one processor to perform the method of the first aspect, the second aspect, or any possible implementation of the first aspect or the second aspect.

In a sixth aspect, there is provided a chip. The chip comprises at least one processing circuit configured to perform the method of the first aspect, the second aspect, or any possible implementation of the first aspect or the second aspect.

In a seventh aspect, there is provided a system. The system comprises at least one terminal device of the third aspect and the at least one network device of the fourth aspect.

In an eighth aspect, there is provided a computer program product tangibly stored on a computer-readable medium and comprising computer-executable instructions which, when executed, cause an apparatus to perform the method of the first aspect, the second aspect, or any possible implementation of the first aspect or the second aspect.

In a ninth aspect, there is provided an apparatus comprising a processing unit configured to perform the method of the first aspect, the second aspect, or any possible implementation of the first aspect or the second aspect.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Some example embodiments will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

FIG. 1A illustrates an example environment in which some embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented;

FIG. 1B illustrates an example communication system in which some embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented;

FIG. 1C illustrates an example of an electronic device (ED) and a base station associated with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 1D illustrates an example of units or modules in a device associated with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 1E illustrates another example communication system in which some embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented;

FIG. 1F illustrates an example of a sensing management function (SMF) associated with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 1G illustrates an example of ISAC associated with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 2 illustrates an example process according to some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 3A illustrates an example rate matching pattern configuration according to some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 3B illustrates an example overlapped time-frequency resource between communication and sensing operations according to some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 3C illustrates an example of performing rate matching around a collided resource portion according to some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 4 illustrates a flowchart of an example method implemented at a UE according to some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 5 illustrates a flowchart of an example method implemented at a network device according to some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of a device that may be used for implementing some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram of a structure of an apparatus in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure; and

FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram of a structure of an apparatus in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure.

Throughout the drawings, the same or similar reference numerals represent the same or similar elements.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Principles of the present disclosure will now be described with reference to some example embodiments. It is to be understood that these embodiments are described only for the purpose of illustration and to help those skilled in the art to understand and implement the present disclosure, without suggesting any limitation as to the scope of the disclosure. The disclosure described herein can be implemented in various manners other than 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 the ordinary skills in the art to which this disclosure belongs.

References in the present disclosure to “one embodiment” , “an embodiment” , “an example embodiment” , and the like indicate that the embodiment described may include a particular feature, structure, or characteristic, but it is not necessary that every embodiment includes the particular feature, structure, or characteristic. Moreover, such phrases are not necessarily referring to the same embodiment. Further, when a particular feature, structure, or characteristic is described in connection with an embodiment, it is submitted that it is within the knowledge of one skilled in the art to affect such feature, structure, or characteristic in connection with other embodiments whether or not explicitly described.

It shall be understood that although the terms “first” and “second” etc. may be used herein to describe various elements, these elements should not be limited by these terms. These terms are only used to distinguish one element from another. For example, a first element could be termed a second element, and similarly, a second element could be termed a first element, without departing from the scope of example embodiments. As used herein, the term “and/or” includes any and all combinations of one or more of the listed terms.

The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments only and is not intended to be limited to example embodiments. As used herein, the singular forms “a” , “an” and “the” are intended to include the plural forms as well, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise. It will be further understood that the terms “comprises” , “comprising” , “has” , “having” , “includes” and/or “including” , when used herein, specify the presence of stated features, elements, and/or components, etc., but do not preclude the presence or addition of one or more other features, elements, components and/or combinations thereof.

It should be noted that the message in the disclosure could be replaced with information, which may be carried in one single message, or be carried in more than one separate message. Without special noting, the terms “apparatus” and “device” are used as exchangeable, and the terms “identity” and “identifier” are used as exchangeable.

The terms “coupled” , “coupling” or “connected” as used herein may have several different meanings depending on the context in which these terms are used. For example, as used herein, the terms coupled, coupling, or connected may indicate that two elements or devices are directly connected to one another or connected to one another through one or more intermediate elements or devices via a mechanical element depending on the particular context.

The terms “receive” , “detect” and “decode” as used herein may have several different meanings depending on the context in which these terms are used. For example, without special note, the term “receive” may indicate that information (e.g., DCI, MAC-CE, RRC signaling, or a transport block (TB) ) is received successfully by the receiving node, which means the receiving side correctly detects and decode it. In this scenario, “receive” may cover “detect” and “decode” or may indicate the same thing, e.g., “receive paging” means decoding paging correctly and obtaining the paging successfully, accordingly, “the receiving side does not receive paging” means the receiving side does not detect and/or decoding the paging. “paging is not received” means the receiving side tries to detect and/or decoding the paging, but not obtain the paging successfully. The term “receive” may sometimes indicate that a signal arrives at the receiving side, but does not mean the information in the signal is detected and decoded correctly, then the receiving side needs to perform detecting and decoding on the signal to obtain the information carried in the signal. In this scenario, “receive” , “detect” and “decode” may indicate different procedures at the receiving side to obtain the information.

When the functions are implemented in the form of a software functional unit and sold or used as an independent product, the functions may be stored in a computer-readable storage medium. Based on such an understanding, the technical solutions of this application essentially, or the part contributing to the prior art, or some of the technical solutions may be implemented in a form of a software product. The software product is stored in a storage medium, and includes several instructions for instructing a computer device (which may be a personal computer, a server, or a network device) to perform all or some of the steps of the methods described in the embodiments of this application. The foregoing storage medium includes: any medium that can store program code, such as a USB flash drive, a removable hard disk, a read-only memory (Read-Only Memory, ROM) , a random access memory (Random Access Memory, RAM) , a magnetic disk, or an optical disc.

The foregoing descriptions are merely specific implementations of this application, but are not intended to limit the protection scope of this application. Any variation or replacement readily figured out by a person skilled in the art within the technical scope disclosed in this application shall fall within the protection scope of this application. Therefore, the protection scope of this application shall be subject to the protection scope of the claims.

For illustrative purposes, principles and example embodiments of the present disclosure will be described below with reference to FIGS. 1A-8. However, it is to be noted that these embodiments are given to enable the skilled in the art to understand inventive concepts of some embodiments of the present disclosure and implement the solution as proposed herein and are not intended to limit the scope of the present disclosure in any way.

FIGS. 1A and 1B show some examples of the 6G system structure. Specifically, FIG. 1A illustrates an example environment in which some embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented. Referring to FIG. 1A, as an illustrative example without limitation, a simplified schematic illustration of a communication system is provided. The communication system 100 comprises a radio access network 120. The radio access network 120 may be a next-generation (e.g. sixth generation (6G) or later) radio access network, or a legacy (e.g. 5G, 4G, 3G, or 2G) radio access network. One or more communication electric devices (EDs) 110a-120j (generically referred to as 110) may be interconnected to one another or connected to one or more network nodes (170a, 170b, generically referred to as 170) in the radio access network 120. A core network 130 may be a part of the communication system and may be dependent or independent of the radio access technology used in the communication system 100. Also, the communication system 100 comprises a public switched telephone network (PSTN) 140, the internet 150, and other networks 160.

FIG. 1B illustrates an example communication system 100-1. In general, the communication system 100-1 enables multiple wireless or wired elements to communicate data and other content. The purpose of the communication system 100-1 may be to provide content, such as voice, data, video, and/or text, via broadcast, multicast and unicast, etc. The communication system 100-1 may operate by sharing resources, such as carrier spectrum bandwidth, between its constituent elements. The communication system 100-1 may include a terrestrial communication system and/or a non-terrestrial communication system. The communication system 100-1 may provide a wide range of communication services and applications (such as earth monitoring, remote sensing, passive sensing and positioning, navigation and tracking, autonomous delivery, and mobility, etc. ) . The communication system 100-1 may provide a high degree of availability and robustness through a joint operation of the terrestrial communication system and the non-terrestrial communication system. For example, integrating a non-terrestrial communication system (or components thereof) into a terrestrial communication system can result in what may be considered a heterogeneous network comprising multiple layers. Compared to conventional communication networks, the heterogeneous network may achieve better overall performance through efficient multi-link joint operation, more flexible functionality sharing, and faster physical layer link switching between terrestrial networks and non-terrestrial networks.

The terrestrial communication system and the non-terrestrial communication system could be considered sub-systems of the communication system. In the example shown, the communication system 100-1 includes electronic devices (ED) 110a-110d (generically referred to as ED 110) , radio access networks (RANs) 120a-120b, non-terrestrial communication network 120c, a core network 130, a public switched telephone network (PSTN) 140, the internet 150, and other networks 160. The RANs 120a-120b include respective base stations (BSs) 170a-170b, which may be generically referred to as terrestrial transmit and receive points (T-TRPs) 170a-170b. The non-terrestrial communication network 120c includes an access node 120c, which may be generically referred to as a non-terrestrial transmit and receive point (NT-TRP) 172.

Any ED 110 may be alternatively or additionally configured to interface, access, or communicate with any other T-TRP 170a-170b and NT-TRP 172, the internet 150, the core network 130, the PSTN 140, the other networks 160, or any combination of the preceding. In some examples, ED 110a may communicate an uplink and/or downlink transmission over an interface 190a with T-TRP 170a. In some examples, the EDs 110a, 110b, and 110d may also communicate directly with one another via one or more sidelink air interfaces 190b. In some examples, ED 110d may communicate an uplink and/or downlink transmission over an interface 190c with NT-TRP 172.

The air interfaces 190a and 190b may use similar communication technology, such as any suitable radio access technology. For example, the communication system 100-1 may implement one or more channel access methods, such as code division multiple access (CDMA) , time division multiple access (TDMA) , frequency division multiple access (FDMA) , orthogonal FDMA (OFDMA) , or single-carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA) in the air interfaces 190a and 190b. The air interfaces 190a and 190b may utilize other higher dimension signal spaces, which may involve a combination of orthogonal and/or non-orthogonal dimensions.

The air interface 190c can enable communication between the ED 110d and one or multiple NT-TRPs 172 via a wireless link or simply a link. For some examples, the link is a dedicated connection for unicast transmission, a connection for broadcast transmission, or a connection between a group of EDs and one or multiple NT-TRPs for multicast transmission.

The RANs 120a and 120b are in communication with the core network 130 to provide the EDs 110a 110b, and 110c with various services such as voice, data, and other services. The RANs 120a and 120b and/or the core network 130 may be in direct or indirect communication with one or more other RANs (not shown) , which may or may not be directly served by core network 130, and may or may not employ the same radio access technology as RAN 120a, RAN 120b or both. The core network 130 may also serve as a gateway access between (i) the RANs 120a and 120b or EDs 110a 110b, and 110c or both, and (ii) other networks (such as the PSTN 140, the internet 150, and the other networks 160) . In addition, some or all of the EDs 110a 110b, and 110c may include functionality for communicating with different wireless networks over different wireless links using different wireless technologies and/or protocols. Instead of wireless communication (or in addition thereto) , the EDs 110a 110b, and 110c may communicate via wired communication channels to a service provider or switch (not shown) , and to the internet 150. PSTN 140 may include circuit switched telephone networks for providing plain old telephone service (POTS) . Internet 150 may include a network of computers and subnets (intranets) or both, and incorporate protocols, such as Internet Protocol (IP) , Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) , and User Datagram Protocol (UDP) . EDs 110a 110b, and 110c may be multimode devices capable of operation according to multiple radio access technologies, and incorporate multiple transceivers necessary to support such.

An example of a 6G basic component structure is shown in FIG. 1C. Specifically, FIG. 1C illustrates another example of an ED 110 and a base station 170a, 170b, and/or 170c. The ED 110 is used to connect persons, objects, machines, etc. The ED 110 may be widely used in various scenarios, for example, cellular communications, device-to-device (D2D) , vehicle-to-everything (V2X) , peer-to-peer (P2P) , machine-to-machine (M2M) , machine-type communications (MTC) , internet of things (IoT) , virtual reality (VR) , augmented reality (AR) , industrial control, self-driving, remote medical, smart grid, smart furniture, smart office, smart wearable, smart transportation, smart city, drones, robots, remote sensing, passive sensing, positioning, navigation and tracking, autonomous delivery and mobility, etc.

Each ED 110 represents any suitable end user device for wireless operation and may include such devices (or may be referred to) as a user equipment/device (UE) , a wireless transmit/receive unit (WTRU) , a mobile station, a fixed or mobile subscriber unit, a cellular telephone, a station (STA) , a machine type communication (MTC) device, a personal digital assistant (PDA) , a smartphone, a laptop, a computer, a tablet, a wireless sensor, a consumer electronics device, a smart book, a vehicle, a car, a truck, a bus, a train, or an IoT device, an industrial device, or apparatus (e.g. communication module, modem, or chip) in the forgoing devices, among other possibilities. Future generation EDs 110 may be referred to using other terms. The base stations 170a and 170b are T-TRPs and will hereafter be referred to as T-TRP 170. Also shown in FIG. 3, an NT-TRP will hereafter be referred to as NT-TRP 172. Each ED 110 connected to T-TRP 170 and/or NT-TRP 172 can be dynamically or semi-statically turned-on (i.e., established, activated, or enabled) , turned-off (i.e., released, deactivated, or disabled) , and/or configured in response to one of more of: connection availability and connection necessity.

The ED 110 includes a transmitter 110-1 and a receiver 110-3 coupled to one or more antennas 110-4. Only one antenna 110-4 is illustrated. One, some, or all of the antennas may alternatively be panels. The transmitter 110-1 and the receiver 110-3 may be integrated, e.g. as a transceiver. The transceiver is configured to modulate data or other content for transmission by at least one antenna 110-4 or network interface controller (NIC) . The transceiver is also configured to demodulate data or other content received by the at least one antenna 110-4. Each transceiver includes any suitable structure for generating signals for wireless or wired transmission and/or processing signals received wirelessly or by wire. Each antenna 110-4 includes any suitable structure for transmitting and/or receiving wireless or wired signals.

The ED 110 includes at least one memory 110-8. The memory 110-8 stores instructions and data used, generated, or collected by the ED 110. For example, the memory 110-8 could store software instructions or modules configured to implement some or all of the functionality and/or embodiments described herein and that are executed by the processing unit (s) 110-9. Each memory 110-8 includes any suitable volatile and/or non-volatile storage and retrieval device (s) . Any suitable type of memory may be used, such as random access memory (RAM) , read only memory (ROM) , hard disk, optical disc, subscriber identity module (SIM) card, memory stick, secure digital (SD) memory card, on-processor cache, and the like.

The ED 110 may further include one or more input/output devices (not shown) or interfaces (such as a wired interface to the internet 150 in FIG. 1A) . The input/output devices permit interaction with a user or other devices in the network. Each input/output device includes any suitable structure for providing information to or receiving information from a user, such as a speaker, microphone, keypad, keyboard, display, or touch screen, including network interface communications.

The ED 110 further includes a processor 110-9 for performing operations including those related to preparing a transmission for uplink transmission to the NT-TRP 172 and/or T-TRP 170, those related to processing downlink transmissions received from the NT-TRP 172 and/or T-TRP 170, and those related to processing sidelink transmission to and from another ED 110. Processing operations related to preparing a transmission for uplink transmission may include operations such as encoding, modulating, transmit beamforming, and generating symbols for transmission. Processing operations related to processing downlink transmissions may include operations such as receive beamforming, demodulating, and decoding received symbols. Depending upon the embodiment, a downlink transmission may be received by the receiver 110-3, possibly using receive beamforming, and the processor 110-9 may extract signaling from the downlink transmission (e.g. by detecting and/or decoding the signaling) . An example of signaling may be a reference signal transmitted by NT-TRP 172 and/or T-TRP 170. In some embodiments, the processor 172-6 implements the transmit beamforming and/or receive beamforming based on the indication of beam direction, e.g. beam angle information (BAI) , received from T-TRP 170. In some embodiments, the processor 110-9 may perform operations relating to network access (e.g. initial access) and/or downlink synchronization, such as operations relating to detecting a synchronization sequence, decoding and obtaining the system information, etc. In some embodiments, the processor 110-9 may perform channel estimation, e.g. using a reference signal received from the NT-TRP 172 and/or T-TRP 170.

Although not illustrated, the processor 110-9 may form part of the transmitter 110-1 and/or receiver 110-3. Although not illustrated, the memory 110-8 may form part of the processor 110-9.

The processor 110-9, and the processing components of the transmitter 110-1 and receiver 110-3 may each be implemented by the same or different one or more processors that are configured to execute instructions stored in a memory (e.g. in memory 110-8) . Alternatively, some or all of the processor 110-9, and the processing components of the transmitter 110-1 and receiver 110-3 may be implemented using dedicated circuitry, such as a programmed field-programmable gate array (FPGA) , a graphical processing unit (GPU) , or an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) .

The T-TRP 170 may be known by other names in some implementations, such as a base station, a base transceiver station (BTS) , a radio base station, a network node, a network device, a device on the network side, a transmit/receive node, a Node B, an evolved NodeB (eNodeB or eNB) , a Home eNodeB, a next Generation NodeB (gNB) , a transmission point (TP) ) , a site controller, an access point (AP) , or a wireless router, a relay station, a remote radio head, a terrestrial node, a terrestrial network device, or a terrestrial base station, base band unit (BBU) , remote radio unit (RRU) , active antenna unit (AAU) , remote radio head (RRH) , central unit (CU) , distribute unit (DU) , positioning node, among other possibilities. The T-TRP 170 may be a macro BS, a pico BS, relay node, donor node, or the like, or combinations thereof. The T-TRP 170 may refer to the forging devices or apparatus (e.g. communication module, modem, or chip) in the forgoing devices.

In some embodiments, the parts of the T-TRP 170 may be distributed. For example, some of the modules of the T-TRP 170 may be located remotely from the equipment housing the antennas of the T-TRP 170, and may be coupled to the equipment housing the antennas over a communication link (not shown) sometimes known as front haul, such as common public radio interface (CPRI) . Therefore, in some embodiments, the term T-TRP 170 may also refer to modules on the network side that perform processing operations, such as determining the location of the ED 110, resource allocation (scheduling) , message generation, and encoding/decoding, and that are not necessarily part of the equipment housing the antennas of the T-TRP 170. The modules may also be coupled to other T-TRPs. In some embodiments, the T-TRP 170 may actually be a plurality of T-TRPs that are operating together to serve the ED 110, e.g. through coordinated multipoint transmissions.

The T-TRP 170 includes at least one transmitter 170-2 and at least one receiver 170-4 coupled to one or more antennas 170-6. Only one antenna 170-6 is illustrated. One, some, or all of the antennas may alternatively be panels. The transmitter 170-2 and the receiver 170-4 may be integrated as a transceiver. The T-TRP 170 further includes a processor 170-9 for performing operations including those related to: preparing a transmission for downlink transmission to the ED 110, processing an uplink transmission received from the ED 110, preparing a transmission for backhaul transmission to NT-TRP 172, and processing a transmission received over backhaul from the NT-TRP 172. Processing operations related to preparing a transmission for downlink or backhaul transmission may include operations such as encoding, modulating, precoding (e.g. MIMO precoding) , transmit beamforming, and generating symbols for transmission. Processing operations related to processing received transmissions in the uplink or over backhaul may include operations such as receive beamforming, and demodulating and decoding received symbols. The processor 170-9 may also perform operations relating to network access (e.g. initial access) and/or downlink synchronization, such as generating the content of synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) , generating the system information, etc. In some embodiments, the processor 170-9 also generates the indication of beam direction, e.g. BAI, which may be scheduled for transmission by scheduler 170-3. The processor 170-9 performs other network-side processing operations described herein, such as determining the location of the ED 110, determining where to deploy NT-TRP 172, etc. In some embodiments, the processor 170-9 may generate signaling, e.g. to configure one or more parameters of the ED 110 and/or one or more parameters of the NT-TRP 172. Any signaling generated by the processor 170-9 is sent by the transmitter 170-2. Note that “signaling” , as used herein, may alternatively be called control signaling. Dynamic signaling may be transmitted in a control channel, e.g. a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) , and static or semi-static higher layer signaling may be included in a packet transmitted in a data channel, e.g. in a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) .

A scheduler 170-3 may be coupled to the processor 170-9. The scheduler 170-3 may be included within or operated separately from the T-TRP 170, which may schedule uplink, downlink, and/or backhaul transmissions, including issuing scheduling grants and/or configuring scheduling-free ( “configured grant” ) resources. The T-TRP 170 further includes a memory 170-8 for storing information and data. The memory 170-8 stores instructions and data used, generated, or collected by the T-TRP 170. For example, the memory 170-8 could store software instructions or modules configured to implement some or all of the functionality and/or embodiments described herein and that are executed by the processor 170-9.

Although not illustrated, the processor 170-9 may form part of the transmitter 170-2 and/or receiver 170-4. Also, although not illustrated, the processor 170-9 may implement the scheduler 170-3. Although not illustrated, the memory 170-8 may form part of the processor 170-9.

The processor 170-9, the scheduler 170-3, and the processing components of the transmitter 170-2 and receiver 170-4 may each be implemented by the same or different one or more processors that are configured to execute instructions stored in a memory, e.g. in memory 170-8. Alternatively, some or all of the processor 170-9, the scheduler 170-3, and the processing components of the transmitter 170-2 and receiver 170-4 may be implemented using dedicated circuitry, such as an FPGA, a GPU, or an ASIC.

Although the NT-TRP 172 is illustrated as a drone only as an example, the NT-TRP 172 may be implemented in any suitable non-terrestrial form. Also, the NT-TRP 172 may be known by other names in some implementations, such as a non-terrestrial node, a non-terrestrial network device, or a non-terrestrial base station. The NT-TRP 172 includes a transmitter 172-2 and a receiver 172-4 coupled to one or more antennas 172-9. Only one antenna 172-9 is illustrated. One, some, or all of the antennas may alternatively be panels. The transmitter 172-2 and the receiver 172-4 may be integrated as a transceiver. The NT-TRP 172 further includes a processor 172-6 for performing operations including those related to: preparing a transmission for downlink transmission to the ED 110, processing an uplink transmission received from the ED 110, preparing a transmission for backhaul transmission to T-TRP 170, and processing a transmission received over backhaul from the T-TRP 170. Processing operations related to preparing a transmission for downlink or backhaul transmission may include operations such as encoding, modulating, precoding (e.g. MIMO precoding) , transmit beamforming, and generating symbols for transmission. Processing operations related to processing received transmissions in the uplink or over backhaul may include operations such as receive beamforming, and demodulating and decoding received symbols. In some embodiments, the processor 172-6 implements the transmit beamforming and/or receive beamforming based on beam direction information (e.g. BAI) received from T-TRP 170. In some embodiments, the processor 172-6 may generate signaling, e.g. to configure one or more parameters of the ED 110. In some embodiments, the NT-TRP 172 implements physical layer processing, but does not implement higher layer functions such as functions at the medium access control (MAC) or radio link control (RLC) layer. As this is only an example, more generally, the NT-TRP 172 may implement higher layer functions in addition to physical layer processing.

The NT-TRP 172 further includes a memory 172-8 for storing information and data. Although not illustrated, the processor 172-6 may form part of the transmitter 172-2 and/or receiver 172-4. Although not illustrated, the memory 172-8 may form part of the processor 172-6.

The processor 172-6 and the processing components of the transmitter 172-2 and receiver 172-4 may each be implemented by the same or different one or more processors that are configured to execute instructions stored in a memory, e.g. in memory 172-8. Alternatively, some or all of the processor 172-6 and the processing components of the transmitter 172-2 and receiver 172-4 may be implemented using dedicated circuitry, such as a programmed FPGA, a GPU, or an ASIC. In some embodiments, the NT-TRP 172 may actually be a plurality of NT-TRPs that are operating together to serve the ED 110, e.g. through coordinated multipoint transmissions.

The T-TRP 170, the NT-TRP 172, and/or the ED 110 may include other components, but these have been omitted for the sake of clarity.

An example of a 6G basic module structure may refer to FIG. 1D. One or more steps of the embodiment methods provided herein may be performed by corresponding units or modules, according to FIG. 1D. FIG. 1D illustrates units or modules in a device, such as in ED 110, in T-TRP 170, or in NT-TRP 172. For example, a signal may be transmitted by a transmitting unit or a transmitting module. For example, a signal may be transmitted by a transmitting unit or a transmitting module. A signal may be received by a receiving unit or a receiving module. A signal may be processed by a processing unit or a processing module. Other steps may be performed by an artificial intelligence (AI) or machine learning (ML) module. The respective units or modules may be implemented using hardware, one or more components or devices that execute software, or a combination thereof. For instance, one or more of the units or modules may be an integrated circuit, such as a programmed FPGA, a GPU, or an ASIC. It will be appreciated that where the modules are implemented using software for execution by a processor for example, they may be retrieved by a processor, in whole or part as needed, individually or together for processing, in single or multiple instances, and that the modules themselves may include instructions for further deployment and instantiation.

Additional details regarding the EDs 110, T-TRP 170, and NT-TRP 172 are known to those of skill in the art. As such, these details are omitted here.

6G Intelligent Air Interface is described below. An air interface generally includes a number of components and associated parameters that collectively specify how a transmission is to be sent and/or received over a wireless communications link between two or more communicating devices. For example, an air interface may include one or more components defining the waveform (s) , frame structure (s) , multiple access scheme (s) , protocol (s) , coding scheme (s) , and/or modulation scheme (s) for conveying information (e.g. data) over a wireless communications link. The wireless communications link may support a link between a radio access network and user equipment (e.g. a “Uu” link) , and/or the wireless communications link may support a link between device and device, such as between two user equipments (e.g. a “sidelink” ) , and/or the wireless communications link may support a link between a non-terrestrial (NT) -communication network and user equipment (UE) . The following are some examples for the above components:

Example 1: A waveform component may specify a shape and form of a signal being transmitted. Waveform options may include orthogonal multiple access waveforms and non-orthogonal multiple access waveforms. Non-limiting examples of such waveform options include Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) , Filtered OFDM (f-OFDM) , Time windowing OFDM, Filter Bank Multicarrier (FBMC) , Universal Filtered Multicarrier (UFMC) , Generalized Frequency Division Multiplexing (GFDM) , Wavelet Packet Modulation (WPM) , Faster Than Nyquist (FTN) Waveform, and low Peak to Average Power Ratio Waveform (low PAPR WF) .

Example 2: A frame structure component may specify a configuration of a frame or group of frames. The frame structure component may indicate one or more of a time, frequency, pilot signature, code, or other parameter of the frame or group of frames. More details of the frame structure will be discussed below.

Example 3: A multiple access scheme component may specify multiple access technique options, including technologies defining how communicating devices share a common physical channel, such as Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) , Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) , Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) , Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access (SC-FDMA) , Low Density Signature Multicarrier Code Division Multiple Access (LDS-MC-CDMA) , Non-Orthogonal Multiple Access (NOMA) , Pattern Division Multiple Access (PDMA) , Lattice Partition Multiple Access (LPMA) , Resource Spread Multiple Access (RSMA) , and Sparse Code Multiple Access (SCMA) . Furthermore, multiple access technique options may include: scheduled access vs. non-scheduled access, also known as grant-free access; non-orthogonal multiple access vs. orthogonal multiple access, e.g., via a dedicated channel resource (e.g., no sharing between multiple communicating devices) ; contention-based shared channel resources vs. non-contention-based shared channel resources, and cognitive radio-based access.

Example 4: A hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) protocol component may specify how a transmission and/or a re-transmission is to be made. Non-limiting examples of transmission and/or re-transmission mechanism options include those that specify a scheduled data pipe size, a signaling mechanism for transmission and/or re-transmission, and a re-transmission mechanism.

Example 5: A coding and modulation component may specify how the information being transmitted may be encoded/decoded and modulated/demodulated for transmission/reception purposes. Coding may refer to methods of error detection and forward error correction. Non-limiting examples of coding options include turbo trellis codes, turbo product codes, fountain codes, low-density parity check codes, and polar codes. Modulation may refer, simply, to the constellation (including, for example, the modulation technique and order) , or more specifically to various types of advanced modulation methods such as hierarchical modulation and low PAPR modulation.

In some embodiments, the air interface may be a “one-size-fits-all concept” . For example, the components within the air interface cannot be changed or adapted once the air interface is defined. In some implementations, only limited parameters or modes of an air interface, such as a cyclic prefix (CP) length or a multiple input multiple output (MIMO) mode, can be configured. In some embodiments, an air interface design may provide a unified or flexible framework to support below 6GHz and beyond 6GHz frequency (e.g., mmWave) bands for both licensed and unlicensed access. As an example, the flexibility of a configurable air interface provided by a scalable numerology and symbol duration may allow for transmission parameter optimization for different spectrum bands and for different services/devices. As another example, a unified air interface may be self-contained in a frequency domain, and a frequency domain self-contained design may support more flexible radio access network (RAN) slicing through channel resource sharing between different services in both frequency and time.

The frame structure is described below. A frame structure is a feature of the wireless communication physical layer that defines a time domain signal transmission structure, e.g. to allow for timing reference and timing alignment of basic time domain transmission units. Wireless communication between communicating devices may occur on time-frequency resources governed by a frame structure. The frame structure may sometimes instead be called a radio frame structure.

Depending upon the frame structure and/or configuration of frames in the frame structure, frequency division duplex (FDD) , and/or time-division duplex (TDD) , and/or full duplex (FD) communication may be possible. FDD communication is when transmissions in different directions (e.g. uplink vs. downlink) occur in different frequency bands. TDD communication is when transmissions in different directions (e.g. uplink vs. downlink) occur over different time durations. FD communication is when transmission and reception occur on the same time-frequency resource, i.e. a device can both transmit and receive on the same frequency resource concurrently in time.

One example of a frame structure is a frame structure in long-term evolution (LTE) having the following specifications: each frame is 10ms in duration; each frame has 10 subframes, which are each 1ms in duration; each subframe includes two slots, each of which is 0.5ms in duration; each slot is for transmission of 7 OFDM symbols (assuming normal CP) ; each OFDM symbol has a symbol duration and a particular bandwidth (or partial bandwidth or bandwidth partition) related to the number of subcarriers and subcarrier spacing; the frame structure is based on OFDM waveform parameters such as subcarrier spacing and CP length (where the CP has a fixed length or limited length options) ; and the switching gap between uplink and downlink in TDD has to be the integer time of OFDM symbol duration.

Another example of a frame structure is a frame structure in new radio (NR) having the following specifications: multiple subcarrier spacings are supported, each subcarrier spacing corresponding to a respective numerology; the frame structure depends on the numerology, but the frame length is set at 10ms, and consists of ten subframes of 1ms each; a slot is defined as 14 OFDM symbols, and slot length depends upon the numerology. For example, the NR frame structure for normal CP 15 kHz subcarrier spacing ( “numerology 1” ) and the NR frame structure for normal CP 30 kHz subcarrier spacing ( “numerology 2” ) are different. For 15 kHz subcarrier spacing a slot length is 1ms, and for 30 kHz subcarrier spacing a slot length is 0.5ms. The NR frame structure may have more flexibility than the LTE frame structure.

Another example of a frame structure is an example flexible frame structure, e.g. for use in a 6G network or later. In a flexible frame structure, a symbol block may be defined as the minimum duration of time that may be scheduled in the flexible frame structure. A symbol block may be a unit of transmission having an optional redundancy portion (e.g. CP portion) and an information (e.g. data) portion. An OFDM symbol is an example of a symbol block. A symbol block may alternatively be called a symbol. Embodiments of flexible frame structures include different parameters that may be configurable, e.g. frame length, subframe length, symbol block length, etc. A non-exhaustive list of possible configurable parameters in some embodiments of a flexible frame structure include:

(1) Frame: The frame length need not be limited to 10ms, and the frame length may be configurable and change over time. In some embodiments, each frame includes one or multiple downlink synchronization channels and/or one or multiple downlink broadcast channels, and each synchronization channel and/or broadcast channel may be transmitted in a different direction by different beamforming. The frame length may be more than one possible value and configured based on the application scenario. For example, autonomous vehicles may require relatively fast initial access, in which case the frame length may be set as 5ms for autonomous vehicle applications. As another example, smart meters on houses may not require fast initial access, in which case the frame length may be set as 20ms for smart meter applications.

(2) Subframe duration: A subframe might or might not be defined in the flexible frame structure, depending upon the implementation. For example, a frame may be defined to include slots, but no subframes. In frames in which a subframe is defined, e.g. for time domain alignment, then the duration of the subframe may be configurable. For example, a subframe may be configured to have a length of 0.1 ms or 0.2 ms or 0.5 ms or 1 ms or 2 ms or 5 ms, etc. In some embodiments, if a subframe is not needed in a particular scenario, then the subframe length may be defined to be the same as the frame length or not defined.

(3) Slot configuration: A slot might or might not be defined in the flexible frame structure, depending upon the implementation. In frames in which a slot is defined, then the definition of a slot (e.g. in time duration and/or in number of symbol blocks) may be configurable. In one embodiment, the slot configuration is common to all UEs or a group of UEs. For this case, the slot configuration information may be transmitted to UEs in a broadcast channel or common control channel (s) . In other embodiments, the slot configuration may be UE specific, in which case the slot configuration information may be transmitted in a UE-specific control channel. In some embodiments, the slot configuration signaling can be transmitted together with frame configuration signaling and/or subframe configuration signaling. In other embodiments, the slot configuration can be transmitted independently from the frame configuration signaling and/or subframe configuration signaling. In general, the slot configuration may be system common, base station common, UE group common, or UE specific.

(4) Subcarrier spacing (SCS) : SCS is one parameter of scalable numerology that may allow the SCS to possibly range from 15 KHz to 480 KHz. The SCS may vary with the frequency of the spectrum and/or maximum UE speed to minimize the impact of the Doppler shift and phase noise. In some examples, there may be separate transmission and reception frames, and the SCS of symbols in the reception frame structure may be configured independently from the SCS of symbols in the transmission frame structure. The SCS in a reception frame may be different from the SCS in a transmission frame. In some examples, the SCS of each transmission frame may be half the SCS of each reception frame. If the SCS between a reception frame and a transmission frame is different, the difference does not necessarily have to scale by a factor of two, e.g. if more flexible symbol durations are implemented using inverse discrete Fourier transform (IDFT) instead of fast Fourier transform (FFT) . Additional examples of frame structures can be used with different SCSs.

(5) Flexible transmission duration of basic transmission unit: The basic transmission unit may be a symbol block (alternatively called a symbol) , which in general includes a redundancy portion (referred to as the CP) and an information (e.g. data) portion, although in some embodiments the CP may be omitted from the symbol block. The CP length may be flexible and configurable. The CP length may be fixed within a frame or flexible within a frame, and the CP length may possibly change from one frame to another, or from one group of frames to another group of frames, or from one subframe to another subframe, or from one slot to another slot, or dynamically from one scheduling to another scheduling. The information (e.g. data) portion may be flexible and configurable. Another possible parameter relating to a symbol block that may be defined is a ratio of CP duration to information (e.g. data) duration. In some embodiments, the symbol block length may be adjusted according to: channel condition (e.g. multi-path delay, Doppler) ; and/or latency requirement; and/or available time duration. As another example, a symbol block length may be adjusted to fit an available time duration in the frame.

(6) Flexible switch gap: A frame may include both a downlink portion for downlink transmissions from a base station, and an uplink portion for uplink transmissions from UEs. A gap may be present between each uplink and downlink portion, which is referred to as a switching gap. The switching gap length (duration) may be configurable. A switching gap duration may be fixed within a frame or flexible within a frame, and a switching gap duration may possibly change from one frame to another, or from one group of frames to another group of frames, or from one subframe to another subframe, or from one slot to another slot, or dynamically from one scheduling to another scheduling.

The contents below are related to Cell/Carrier/Bandwidth Parts (BWPs) /Occupied Bandwidth. A device, such as a base station, may provide coverage over a cell. Wireless communication with the device may occur over one or more carrier frequencies. A carrier frequency will be referred to as a carrier. A carrier may alternatively be called a component carrier (CC) . A carrier may be characterized by its bandwidth and a reference frequency, e.g. the center or lowest or highest frequency of the carrier. A carrier may be on a licensed or unlicensed spectrum. Wireless communication with the device may also or instead occur over one or more bandwidth parts (BWPs) . For example, a carrier may have one or more BWPs. More generally, wireless communication with the device may occur over spectrum. The spectrum may comprise one or more carriers and/or one or more BWPs.

A cell may include one or multiple downlink resources and optionally one or multiple uplink resources, or a cell may include one or multiple uplink resources and optionally one or multiple downlink resources, or a cell may include both one or multiple downlink resources and one or multiple uplink resources. As an example, a cell might only include one downlink carrier/BWP, or only include one uplink carrier/BWP, or include multiple downlink carriers/BWPs, or include multiple uplink carriers/BWPs, or include one downlink carrier/BWP and one uplink carrier/BWP, or include one downlink carrier/BWP and multiple uplink carriers/BWPs, or include multiple downlink carriers/BWPs and one uplink carrier/BWP, or include multiple downlink carriers/BWPs and multiple uplink carriers/BWPs. In some embodiments, a cell may instead or additionally include one or multiple sidelink resources, including sidelink transmitting and receiving resources.

A BWP is a set of contiguous or non-contiguous frequency subcarriers on a carrier, or a set of contiguous or non-contiguous frequency subcarriers on multiple carriers, or a set of non-contiguous or contiguous frequency subcarriers, which may have one or more carriers.

In some embodiments, a carrier may have one or more BWPs, e.g. a carrier may have a bandwidth of 20 MHz and consist of one BWP, or a carrier may have a bandwidth of 80 MHz and consist of two adjacent contiguous BWPs, etc. In other embodiments, a BWP may have one or more carriers, e.g. a BWP may have a bandwidth of 40 MHz and consists of two adjacent contiguous carriers, where each carrier has a bandwidth of 20 MHz. In some embodiments, a BWP may comprise non-contiguous spectrum resources which consist of non-contiguous multiple carriers, where the first carrier of the non-contiguous multiple carriers may be in mmW band, the second carrier may be in a low band (such as 2GHz band) , the third carrier (if it exists) may be in THz band, and the fourth carrier (if it exists) may be in a visible light band. Resources in one carrier which belong to the BWP may be contiguous or non-contiguous. In some embodiments, a BWP has non-contiguous spectrum resources on one carrier.

Wireless communication may occur over an occupied bandwidth. The occupied bandwidth may be defined as the width of a frequency band such that, below the lower and above the upper frequency limits.

The carrier, the BWP, or the occupied bandwidth may be signaled by a network device (e.g. base station) dynamically, e.g. in physical layer control signaling such as DCI, or semi-statically, e.g. in radio resource control (RRC) signaling or in the medium access control (MAC) layer, or be predefined based on the application scenario; or be determined by the UE as a function of other parameters that are known by the UE, or may be fixed, e.g. by a standard.

Timing Reference Point is described below. In current networks, frame timing and synchronization is established based on synchronization signals, such as a primary synchronization signal (PSS) and a secondary synchronization signal (SSS) . Notably, known frame timing and synchronization strategies involve adding a timestamp, e.g., (xx0: yy0: zz) , to a frame boundary, where xx0, yy0, zz in the timestamp may represent a time format such as hour, minute, and second, respectively.

It is anticipated that diverse applications and use cases in future networks may involve the usage of different periods of frames, slots, and symbols to satisfy the different requirements, functionalities, and Quality of Service (QoS) types. It follows that the usage of different periods of frames to satisfy these applications may present challenges for frame timing alignment among diverse frame structures. Consider, for example, frame timing alignment for a TDD configuration in neighboring carrier frequency bands or among sub-bands (or bandwidth parts) of one channel/carrier bandwidth.

The present disclosure relates, generally, to mobile, wireless communication and, in particular embodiments, to a frame timing alignment/realignment, where the frame timing alignment/realignment may comprise a timing alignment/realignment in terms of a boundary of a symbol, a slot or a sub-frame within a frame; or a frame (thus the frame timing alignment/realignment here is more general, not limiting to the cases where a timing alignment/realignment is from a frame boundary only) . Also, in this application, relative timing to a frame or frame boundary should be interpreted in a more general sense, i.e., the frame boundary means a timing point of a frame element with the frame such as (starting or ending of) a symbol, a slot or subframe within a frame, or a frame. In the following, the phrases “ (frame) timing alignment or timing realignment” and “relative timing to a frame boundary” are used in a more general sense described above.

In overview, aspects of the present application relate to a network device, such as a base station 170, referenced hereinafter as a TRP 170, transmitting signaling that carries a timing realignment indication message. The timing realignment indication message includes information allowing a receiving UE 110 to determine a timing reference point. On the basis of the timing reference point, transmission of frames, by the UE 110, may be aligned. In some aspects of the present application, the frames that become aligned are in different sub-bands of one carrier frequency band. In other aspects of the present application, the frames that become aligned are found in neighboring carrier frequency bands.

On the TRP 170 side, aspects of the present application relate to the use of one or more types of signaling to indicate the timing realignment (and/or timing correction) message. Two example types of signaling are provided here to show the schemes. The first example type of signaling may be referenced as cell-specific signaling, examples of which include group common signaling and broadcast signaling. The second example type of signaling may be referenced as UE-specific signaling. One of these two types of signaling or a combination of the two types of signaling may be used to transmit a timing realignment indication message. The timing realignment indication message may be shown to notify one or more UEs 110 of a configuration of a timing reference point. References, hereinafter, to the term “UE 110” may be understood to represent reference to a broad class of generic wireless communication devices within a cell (i.e., a network receiving node, such as a wireless device, a sensor, a gateway, a router, etc. ) , that is, being served by the TRP 170. A timing reference point is a timing reference instant and may be expressed in terms of a relative timing, in view of a timing point in a frame, such as (starting or ending boundary of) a symbol, a slot or a sub-frame within a frame; or a frame. For a simple description in the following, the term “aframe boundary” is used to represent a boundary of possibly a symbol, a slot or a sub-frame within a frame; or a frame. Thus, the timing reference point may be expressed in terms of a relative timing, in view of a current frame boundary, e.g., the start of the current frame. Alternatively, the timing reference point may be expressed in terms of an absolute timing based on certain standards timing reference such as a GNSS (e.g., GPS) , Coordinated Universal Time ( “UTC” ) , etc. In the absolute timing version of the timing reference point, a timing reference point may be explicitly stated.

The timing reference point may be shown to allow for timing adjustments to be implemented at the UEs 110. The timing adjustments may be implemented for improvement of accuracy for a clock at the UE 110. Alternatively, or additionally, the timing reference point may be shown to allow for adjustments to be implemented in future transmissions made from the UEs 110. The adjustments may be shown to cause realignment of transmitted frames at the timing reference point. Note that the realignment of transmitted frames at the timing reference point may comprise the timing realignment from (the starting boundary of) a symbol, a slot, or a sub-frame within a frame; or a frame at the timing reference point for one or more UEs and one or more BSs (in a cell or a group of cells) , which applies across the application below.

At UE 110 side, the UE 110 may monitor for the timing realignment indication message. Responsive to receiving the timing realignment indication message, the UE 110 may obtain the timing reference point and take steps to cause frame realignment at the timing reference point. Those steps may, for example, include commencing transmission of a subsequent frame at the timing reference point.

Furthermore, or alternatively, before monitoring for the timing realignment indication message, the UE 110 may cause the TRP 170 to transmit the timing realignment indication message by transmitting, to the TRP 170, a request for a timing realignment, that is, a timing realignment request message. Responsive to receiving the timing realignment request message, the TRP 170 may transmit, to the UE 110, a timing realignment indication message including information on a timing reference point, thereby allowing the UE 110 to implement a timing realignment (and/or a timing adjustment including clock timing error correction) , wherein the timing realignment is in terms of (e.g., a starting boundary of) a symbol, a slot or a sub-frame within a frame; or a frame for UEs and base station (s) in a cell (or a group of cells) .

According to aspects of the present application, a TRP 170 associated with a given cell may transmit a timing realignment indication message. The timing realignment indication message may include enough information to allow a receiver of the message to obtain a timing reference point. The timing reference point may be used, by one or more UEs 110 in the given cell, when performing a timing realignment (and/or a timing adjustment including clock timing error correction) .

According to aspects of the present application, the timing reference point may be expressed, within the timing realignment indication message, relative to a frame boundary (where, as previously described and to be applicable below across the application, a frame boundary can be a boundary of a symbol, a slot or a sub-frame with a frame; or a frame) . The timing realignment indication message may include a relative timing indication, Δt. It may be shown that the relative timing indication, Δt, expresses the timing reference point as occurring a particular duration, i.e., Δt, subsequent to a frame boundary for a given frame. Since the frame boundary is important to allowing the UE 110 to determine the timing reference point, it is important that the UE 110 be aware of the given frame that has the frame boundary of interest. Accordingly, the timing realignment indication message may also include a system frame number (SFN) for the given frame.

It is known, in 5G NR, that the SFN is a value in range from 0 to 1023, inclusive. Accordingly, 10 bits may be used to represent a SFN. When a SFN is carried by an SSB, six of the 10 bits for the SFN may be carried in a Master Information Block (MIB) and the remaining four bits of the 10 bits for the SFN may be carried in a Physical Broadcast Channel (PBCH) payload.

Optionally, the timing realignment indication message may include other parameters. The other parameters may, for example, include a minimum time offset. The minimum time offset may establish a duration of time preceding the timing reference point. The UE 110 may rely upon the minimum time offset as an indication that DL signaling, including the timing realignment indication message, will allow the UE 110 enough time to detect the timing realignment indication message to obtain information on the timing reference point.

6G Integrated Sensing and Communication is described below. User Equipment (UE) position information is often used in cellular communication networks to improve various performance metrics for the network. Such performance metrics may, for example, include capacity, agility, and efficiency. The improvement may be achieved when elements of the network exploit the position, the behavior, the mobility pattern, etc., of the UE in the context of a priori information describing a wireless environment in which the UE is operating.

A sensing system may be used to help gather UE pose information, including its location in a global coordinate system, its velocity and direction of movement in the global coordinate system, orientation information, and the information about the wireless environment. “Location” is also known as “position” and these two terms may be used interchangeably herein. Examples of well-known sensing systems include RADAR (Radio Detection and Ranging) and LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) . While the sensing system can be separate from the communication system, it could be advantageous to gather the information using an integrated system, which reduces the hardware (and cost) in the system as well as the time, frequency, or spatial resources needed to perform both functionalities. However, using the communication system hardware to perform sensing of UE pose and environment information is a highly challenging and open problem. The difficulty of the problem relates to factors such as the limited resolution of the communication system, the dynamicity of the environment, and the huge number of objects whose electromagnetic properties and position are to be estimated.

Accordingly, integrated sensing and communication (also known as integrated communication and sensing) is a desirable feature in existing and future communication systems

Sensing Node, Sensing Management Function may refer to FIG. 1E. FIG. 1E illustrates another example communication system in which some embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented. Any or all of the EDs 110 and BS 170 may be sensing nodes in the system 100-2. Sensing nodes are network entities that perform sensing by transmitting and receiving sensing signals. Some sensing nodes are communication equipment that perform both communications and sensing. However, it is possible that some sensing nodes do not perform communications, and are instead dedicated to sensing. The sensing agent 174 is an example of a sensing node that is dedicated to sensing. Unlike the EDs 110 and BS 170, the sensing agent 174 does not transmit or receive communication signals. However, the sensing agent 174 may communicate configuration information, sensing information, signaling information, or other information within the communication system 100-2. The sensing agent 174 may be in communication with the core network 130 to communicate information with the rest of the communication system 100-2. By way of example, the sensing agent 174 may determine the location of the ED 110a, and transmit this information to the base station 170a via the core network 130. Although only one sensing agent 174 is shown in FIG. 1E, any number of sensing agents may be implemented in the communication system 100-2. In some embodiments, one or more sensing agents may be implemented at one or more of the RANs 120.

A sensing node may combine sensing-based techniques with reference signal-based techniques to enhance UE pose determination. This type of sensing node may also be known as a sensing management function (SMF) . In some networks, the SMF may also be known as a location management function (LMF) . The SMF may be implemented as a physically independent entity located at the core network 130 with connections to the multiple BSs 170. In other aspects of the present application, the SMF may be implemented as a logical entity co-located inside a BS 170 through logic carried out by the processor 170-9.

FIG. 1F illustrates an example of SMF associated with some embodiments of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 1F, the SMF 176, when implemented as a physically independent entity, includes at least one processor 176-9, at least one transmitter 176-2, at least one receiver 176-4, one or more antennas 176-6, and at least one memory 176-8. A transceiver, not shown, may be used instead of the transmitter 176-2 and receiver 176-4. A scheduler 176-3 may be coupled to the processor 176-9. The scheduler 176-3 may be included within or operated separately from the SMF 176. The processor 176-9 implements various processing operations of the SMF 176, such as signal coding, data processing, power control, input/output processing, or any other functionality. The processor 176-9 can also be configured to implement some or all of the functionality and/or embodiments described in more detail above. Each processor 176-9 includes any suitable processing or computing device configured to perform one or more operations. Each processor 176-9 could, for example, include a microprocessor, microcontroller, digital signal processor, field programmable gate array, or application specific integrated circuit.

A reference signal-based pose determination technique belongs to an “active” pose estimation paradigm. In an active pose estimation paradigm, the enquirer of pose information (i.e., the UE) takes part in process of determining the pose of the enquirer. The enquirer may transmit or receive (or both) a signal specific to pose determination process. Positioning techniques based on a global navigation satellite system (GNSS) such as Global Positioning System (GPS) are other examples of the active pose estimation paradigm.

In contrast, a sensing technique, based on radar, for example, may be considered as belonging to a “passive” pose determination paradigm. In a passive pose determination paradigm, the target is oblivious to the pose determination process.

By integrating sensing and communications in one system, the system need not operate according to only a single paradigm. Thus, the combination of sensing-based techniques and reference signal-based techniques can yield enhanced pose determination.

The enhanced pose determination may, for example, include obtaining UE channel sub-space information, which is particularly useful for UE channel reconstruction at the sensing node, especially for a beam-based operation and communication. The UE channel sub-space is a subset of the entire algebraic space, defined over the spatial domain, in which the entire channel from the TP to the UE lies. Accordingly, the UE channel sub-space defines the TP-to-UE channel with very high accuracy. The signals transmitted over other sub-spaces result in a negligible contribution to the UE channel. Knowledge of the UE channel sub-space helps to reduce the effort needed for channel measurement at the UE and channel reconstruction at the network-side. Therefore, the combination of sensing-based techniques and reference signal-based techniques may enable the UE channel reconstruction with much less overhead as compared to traditional methods. Sub-space information can also facilitate sub-space based sensing to reduce sensing complexity and improve sensing accuracy.

An aspect below is related to sensing channel. In some embodiments of integrated sensing and communication, a same radio access technology (RAT) is used for sensing and communication. This avoids the need to multiplex two different RATs under one carrier spectrum, or necessitating two different carrier spectrums for the two different RATs.

In embodiments that integrate sensing and communication under one RAT, a first set of channels may be used to transmit a sensing signal, and a second set of channels may be used to transmit a communications signal. In some embodiments, each channel in the first set of channels and each channel in the second set of channels is a logical channel, a transport channel, or a physical channel.

At the physical layer, communication and sensing may be performed via separate physical channels. For example, a first physical downlink shared channel PDSCH-C is defined for data communication, while a second physical downlink shared channel PDSCH-Sis defined for sensing. Similarly, separate physical uplink shared channels (PUSCH) , PUSCH-C and PUSCH-S, could be defined for uplink communication and sensing.

In another example, the same PDSCH and PUSCH could be also used for both communication and sensing, with separate logical layer channels and/or transport layer channels defined for communication and sensing. Note also that control channel (s) and data channel (s) for sensing can have the same or different channel structure (format) , occupy same or different frequency bands or bandwidth parts.

In a further example, a common physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) and a common physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) are used to carry control information for both sensing and communication. Alternatively, separate physical layer control channels may be used to carry separate control information for communication and sensing. For example, PUCCH-S and PUCCH-C could be used for uplink control for sensing and communication respectively, and PDCCH-S and PDCCH-C for downlink control for sensing and communication respectively.

Different combinations of shared and dedicated channels for sensing and communication, at each of the physical, transport, and logical layers, are possible.

An aspect below is related to radar. The term RADAR originates from the phrase Radio Detection and Ranging; however, expressions with different forms of capitalization (i.e., Radar and radar) are equally valid and now more common. Radar is typically used for detecting a presence and a location of an object. A radar system radiates radio frequency energy and receives echoes of the energy reflected from one or more targets. The system determines the pose of a given target based on the echoes returned from the given target. The radiated energy can be in the form of an energy pulse or a continuous wave, which can be expressed or defined by a particular waveform. Examples of waveforms used in radar include frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) and ultra-wideband (UWB) waveforms.

Radar systems can be monostatic, bi-static, or multi-static. In a monostatic radar system, the radar signal transmitter and receiver are co-located, such as being integrated in a transceiver. In a bi-static radar system, the transmitter and receiver are spatially separated, and the distance of separation is comparable to, or larger than, the expected target distance (often referred to as the range) . In a multi-static radar system, two or more radar components are spatially diverse but with a shared area of coverage. A multi-static radar is also referred to as a multisite or netted radar.

Terrestrial radar applications encounter challenges such as multipath propagation and shadowing impairments. Another challenge is the problem of identifiability because terrestrial targets have similar physical attributes. Integrating sensing into a communication system is likely to suffer from these same challenges, and more.

An aspect below is related to half-duplex and full-duplex. Communication nodes can be either half-duplex or full-duplex. A half-duplex node cannot both transmit and receive using the same physical resources (time, frequency, etc. ) ; conversely, a full-duplex node can transmit and receive using the same physical resources. Existing commercial wireless communications networks are all half-duplex. Even if full-duplex communications networks become practical in the future, it is expected that at least some of the nodes in the network will still be half-duplex nodes because half-duplex devices are less complex, and have lower cost and lower power consumption. In particular, full-duplex implementation is more challenging at higher frequencies (e.g. in the millimeter wave bands) , and very challenging for small and low-cost devices, such as femtocell base stations and UEs.

The limitation of half-duplex nodes in the communications network presents further challenges toward integrating sensing and communications into the devices and systems of the communications network. For example, both half-duplex and full-duplex nodes can perform bi-static or multi-static sensing, but monostatic sensing typically requires the sensing node have full-duplex capability. A half-duplex node may perform monostatic sensing with certain limitations, such as in a pulsed radar with a specific duty cycle and ranging capability.

An aspect below is related to sensing signal waveform and frame structure. Properties of a sensing signal, or a signal used for both sensing and communication, include the waveform of the signal and the frame structure of the signal. The frame structure defines the time-domain boundaries of the signal. The waveform describes the shape of the signal as a function of time and frequency. Examples of waveforms that can be used for a sensing signal include ultra-wide band (UWB) pulse, Frequency-Modulated Continuous Wave (FMCW) or “chirp” , orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) , cyclic prefix (CP) -OFDM, and Discrete Fourier Transform spread (DFT-s) -OFDM.

In an embodiment, the sensing signal is a linear chirp signal with bandwidth B and time duration T. Such a linear chirp signal is generally known from its use in FMCW radar systems. A linear chirp signal is defined by an increase in frequency from an initial frequency, f_chirp0, at an initial time, t_chirp0, to a final frequency, f_chirp1, at a final time, t_chirp1 where the relation between the frequency (f) and time (t) can be expressed as a linear relation of f-f_chirp0=α (t-t_chirp0) , whereis defined as the chirp slope. The bandwidth of the linear chirp signal may be defined as B=f_chirp1-f_chirp0 and the time duration of the linear chirp signal may be defined as T=t_chirp1-t_chirp0. Such linear chirp signal can be presented asin the baseband representation.

An aspect below is related to Precoding. Precoding as used herein may refer to any coding operation (s) or modulation (s) that transform a […] input signal into a […] output signal. Precoding may be performed in different domains, and typically transform the input signal in a first domain to an output signal in a second domain. Precoding may include linear operations.

6G Integrated TN &NTN is described below. A terrestrial communication system may also be referred to as a land-based or ground-based communication system, although a terrestrial communication system can also, or instead, be implemented on or in water. The non-terrestrial communication system may bridge the coverage gaps for underserved areas by extending the coverage of cellular networks through non-terrestrial nodes, which will be key to ensuring global seamless coverage and providing mobile broadband services to unserved/underserved regions, in this case, it is hardly possible to implement terrestrial access-points/base-stations infrastructure in the areas like oceans, mountains, forests, or other remote areas.

The terrestrial communication system may be a wireless communications using 5G technology and/or later generation wireless technology (e.g., 6G or later) . In some examples, the terrestrial communication system may also accommodate some legacy wireless technology (e.g., 3G or 4G wireless technology) . The non-terrestrial communication system may be a communications using the satellite constellations like Geo-Stationary Orbit (GEO) satellites which utilizing broadcast public/popular contents to a local server, Low earth orbit (LEO) satellites establishing a better balance between large coverage area and propagation path-loss/delay, stabilize satellites in very low earth orbits (VLEO) enabling technologies substantially reducing the costs for launching satellites to lower orbits, high altitude platforms (HAPs) providing a low path-loss air interface for the users with limited power budget, or Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) (or unmanned aerial system (UAS) ) achieving a dense deployment since their coverage can be limited to a local area, such as airborne, balloon, quadcopter, drones, etc. In some examples, GEO satellites, LEO satellites, UAVs, HAPs and VLEOs may be horizontal and two-dimensional. In some examples, UAVs, HAPs and VLEOs coupled to integrate satellite communications to cellular networks emerging 3D vertical networks consist of many moving (other than geostationary satellites) and high altitude access points such as UAVs, HAPs and VLEOs.

6G MIMO is described below. Multiple input multiple-output (MIMO) technology allows an antenna array of multiple antennas to perform signal transmissions and receptions to meet high transmission rate requirement. The above ED110 and T-TRP 170, and/or NT-TRP use MIMO to communicate over the wireless resource blocks. MIMO utilizes multiple antennas at the transmitter and/or receiver to transmit wireless resource blocks over parallel wireless signals. MIMO may beamform parallel wireless signals for reliable multipath transmission of a wireless resource block. MIMO may bond parallel wireless signals that transport different data to increase the data rate of the wireless resource block.

In recent years, a MIMO (large-scale MIMO) wireless communication system with the above T-TRP 170, and/or NT-TRP 172 configured with a large number of antennas has gained wide attentions from the academia and the industry. In the large-scale MIMO system, the T-TRP 170, and/or NT-TRP 172 is generally configured with more than ten antenna units (such as 128 or 170-6) , and serves for dozens of the ED 110 (such as 40) in the meanwhile. A large number of antenna units of the T-TRP 170, and NT-TRP 172 can greatly increase the degree of spatial freedom of wireless communication, greatly improve the transmission rate, spectrum efficiency and power efficiency, and eliminate the interference between cells to a large extent. The increase of the number of antennas makes each antenna unit be made in a smaller size with a lower cost. Using the degree of spatial freedom provided by the large-scale antenna units, the T-TRP 170, and NT-TRP 172 of each cell can communicate with many ED 110 in the cell on the same time-frequency resource at the same time, thus greatly increasing the spectrum efficiency. A large number of antenna units of the T-TRP 170, and/or NT-TRP 172 also enable each user to have better spatial directivity for uplink and downlink transmission, so that the transmitting power of the T-TRP 170, and/or NT-TRP 172 and an ED 110 is obviously reduced, and the power efficiency is greatly increased. When the antenna number of the T-TRP 170, and/or NT-TRP 172 is sufficiently large, random channels between each ED 110 and the T-TRP 170, and/or NT-TRP 172 can approach to be orthogonal, and the interference between the cell and the users and the effect of noises can be eliminated. The plurality of advantages described above enable the large-scale MIMO to have a magnificent application prospect.

A MIMO system may include a receiver connected to a receive (Rx) antenna, a transmitter connected to transmit (Tx) antenna, and a signal processor connected to the transmitter and the receiver. Each of the Rx antenna and the Tx antenna may include a plurality of antennas. For instance, the Rx antenna may have an ULA antenna array in which the plurality of antennas are arranged in line at even intervals. When a radio frequency (RF) signal is transmitted through the Tx antenna, the Rx antenna may receive a signal reflected and returned from a forward target.

A non-exhaustive list of possible unit or possible configurable parameters or in some embodiments of a MIMO system include:

(i) Panel: unit of antenna group, or antenna array, or antenna sub-array which can control its Tx or Rx beam independently.

(ii) Beam: A beam is formed by performing amplitude and/or phase weighting on data transmitted or received by at least one antenna port, or may be formed by using another method, for example, adjusting a related parameter of an antenna unit. The beam may include a Tx beam and/or a Rx beam. The transmit beam indicates distribution of signal strength formed in different directions in space after a signal is transmitted through an antenna. The receive beam indicates distribution of signal strength that is of a wireless signal received from an antenna and that is in different directions in space. The beam information may be a beam identifier, or antenna port (s) identifier, or CSI-RS resource identifier, or SSB resource identifier, or SRS resource identifier, or other reference signal resource identifier.

6G AI/ML is described below. Artificial Intelligence technologies can be applied in communication, including artificial intelligence or machine learning (AI/ML) based communication in the physical layer and/or AI/ML based communication in the higher layer, e.g., medium access control (MAC) layer. For example, in the physical layer, the AI/ML based communication may aim to optimize component design and/or improve the algorithm performance. For the MAC layer, the AI/ML based communication may aim to utilize the AI/ML capability for learning, prediction, and/or making a decision to solve a complicated optimization problem with possible better strategy and/or optimal solution, e.g. to optimize the functionality in the MAC layer, e.g. intelligent TRP management, intelligent beam management, intelligent channel resource allocation, intelligent power control, intelligent spectrum utilization, intelligent modulation and coding scheme (MCS) , intelligent hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) strategy, intelligent transmit/receive (Tx/Rx) mode adaption, etc.

The following are some terminologies which are used in AI/ML field:

Data collection. Data is the very important component for AI/ML techniques. Data collection is a process of collecting data by the network nodes, management entity, or UE for the purpose of AI/ML model training, data analytics and inference.

AI/ML model training. AI/ML model training is a process to train an AI/ML Model by learning the input/output relationship in a data driven manner and obtain the trained AI/ML Model for inference.

AI/ML model inference. A process of using a trained AI/ML model to produce a set of outputs based on a set of inputs.

AI/ML model validation. As a sub-process of training, validation is used to evaluate the quality of an AI/ML model using a dataset different from the one used for model training. Validation can help selecting model parameters that generalize beyond the dataset used for model training. The model parameter after training can be adjusted further by the validation process.

AI/ML model testing. Similar with validation, testing is also a sub-process of training, and it is used to evaluate the performance of a final AI/ML model using a dataset different from the one used for model training and validation. Differently from AI/ML model validation, testing do not assume subsequent tuning of the model.

Online training: Online training means an AI/ML training process where the model being used for inference is typically continuously trained in (near) real-time with the arrival of new training samples.

Offline training: An AI/ML training process where the model is trained based on collected dataset, and where the trained model is later used or delivered for inference.

AI/ML model delivery/transfer. A generic term referring to delivery of an AI/ML model from one entity to another entity in any manner. Delivery of an AI/ML model over the air interface includes either parameters of a model structure known at the receiving end or a new model with parameters. Delivery may contain a full model or a partial model.

Life cycle management (LCM) . When the AI/ML model is trained and/or inferred at one device, it is necessary to monitor and manage the whole AI/ML process to guarantee the performance gain obtained by AI/ML technologies. For example, due to the randomness of wireless channels and the mobility of UEs, the propagation environment of wireless signals changes frequently. Nevertheless, it is difficult for an AI/ML model to maintain optimal performance in all scenarios for all the time, and the performance may even deteriorate sharply in some scenarios. Therefore, the lifecycle management (LCM) of AI/ML models is essential for sustainable operation of AI/ML in NR air-interface.

Life cycle management covers the whole procedure of AI/ML technologies which applied on one or more nodes. In specific, it includes at least one of the following sub-process: data collection, model training, model identification, model registration, model deployment, model configuration, model inference, model selection, model activation, deactivation, model switching, model fallback, model monitoring, model update, model transfer/delivery and UE capability report.

Model monitoring can be based on inference accuracy, including metrics related to intermediate key performance indicator (KPI) s, and it can also be based on system performance, including metrics related to system performance KPIs, e.g., accuracy and relevance, overhead, complexity (computation and memory cost) , latency (timeliness of monitoring result, from model failure to action) and power consumption. Moreover, data distribution may shift after deployment due to the environment changes, thus the model based on input or output data distribution should also be considered.

Supervised learning: The goal of supervised learning algorithms is to train a model that maps feature vectors (inputs) to labels (output) , based on the training data which includes the example feature-label pairs. The supervised learning can analyze the training data and produce an inferred function, which can be used for mapping the inference data.

Supervised learning can be further divided into two types: Classification and Regression. Classification is used when the output of the AI/ML model is categorical i.e. with two or more classes. Regression is used when the output of the AI/ML model is a real or continuous value.

Unsupervised learning: In contrast to supervised learning where the AI/ML models learn to map the input to the target output, the unsupervised methods learn concise representations of the input data without the labelled data, which can be used for data exploration or to analyze or generate new data. One typical unsupervised learning is clustering which explores the hidden structure of input data and provide the classification results for the data.

Reinforce learning: Reinforce learning is used to solve sequential decision-making problems. Reinforce learning is a process of training the action of intelligent agent from input (state) and a feedback signal (reward) in an environment. In reinforce learning, an intelligent agent interacts with an environment by taking an action to maximize the cumulative reward. Whenever the intelligent agent takes one action, the current state in the environment may transfer to the new state, and the new state resulted by the action will bring to the associated reward. Then the intelligent agent can take the next action based on the received reward and new state in the environment. During the training phase, the agent interacts with the environment to collect experience. The environments often mimicked by the simulator since it is expensive to directly interact with the real system. In the inference phase, the agent can use the optimal decision-making rule learned from the training phase to achieve the maximal accumulated reward.

Federated learning: Federated learning (FL) is a machine learning technique that is used to train an AI/ML model by a central node (e.g., server) and a plurality of decentralized edge nodes (e.g., UEs, next Generation NodeBs, “gNBs” ) .

According to the wireless FL technique, a server may provide, to an edge node, a set of model parameters (e.g., weights, biases, gradients) that describe a global AI/ML model. The edge node may initialize a local AI/ML model with the received global AI/ML model parameters. The edge node may then train the local AI/ML model using local data samples to, thereby, produce a trained local AI/ML model. The edge node may then provide, to the serve, a set of AI/ML model parameters that describe the local AI/ML model.

Upon receiving, from a plurality of edge nodes, a plurality of sets of AI/ML model parameters that describe respective local AI/ML models at the plurality of edge nodes, the server may aggregate the local AI/ML model parameters reported from the plurality of UEs and, based on such aggregation, update the global AI/ML model. A subsequent iteration progresses much like the first iteration. The server may transmit the aggregated global model to a plurality of edge nodes. The above procedure is performed multiple iterations until the global AI/ML model is considered to be finalized, e.g., the AI/ML model is converged or the training stopping conditions are satisfied.

Notably, the wireless FL technique does not involve exchange of local data samples. Indeed, the local data samples remain at respective edge nodes.

AI technologies (which encompass ML technologies) may be applied in communication, including AI-based communication in the physical layer and/or AI-based communication in the MAC layer. For the physical layer, the AI communication may aim to optimize component design and/or improve the algorithm performance. For example, AI may be applied in relation to the implementation of: channel coding, channel modelling, channel estimation, channel decoding, modulation, demodulation, MIMO, waveform, multiple access, physical layer element parameter optimization and update, beam forming, tracking, sensing, and/or positioning, etc. For the MAC layer, the AI communication may aim to utilize the AI capability for learning, prediction, and/or making a decision to solve a complicated optimization problem with possible better strategy and/or optimal solution, e.g. to optimize the functionality in the MAC layer. For example, AI may be applied to implement: intelligent TRP management, intelligent beam management, intelligent channel resource allocation, intelligent power control, intelligent spectrum utilization, intelligent MCS, intelligent HARQ strategy, and/or intelligent transmission/reception mode adaption, etc.

An AI architecture may involve multiple nodes, where the multiple nodes may possibly be organized in one of two modes, i.e., centralized and distributed, both of which may be deployed in an access network, a core network, or an edge computing system or third party network. A centralized training and computing architecture is restricted by possibly large communication overhead and strict user data privacy. A distributed training and computing architecture may comprise several frameworks, e.g., distributed machine learning and federated learning. In some embodiments, an AI architecture may comprise an intelligent controller which can perform as a single agent or a multi-agent, based on joint optimization or individual optimization. New protocols and signaling mechanisms are desired so that the corresponding interface link can be personalized with customized parameters to meet particular requirements while minimizing signaling overhead and maximizing the whole system spectrum efficiency by personalized AI technologies.

New protocols and signaling mechanisms are provided for operating within and switching between different modes of operation, including between AI and non-AI modes, and for measurement and feedback to accommodate the different possible measurements and information that may need to be fed back, depending upon the implementation.

An air interface that uses AI as part of the implementation, e.g. to optimize one or more components of the air interface, will be referred to herein as an “AI enabled air interface” . In some embodiments, there may be two types of AI operation in an AI enabled air interface: both the network and the UE implement learning; or learning is only applied by the network.

FIG. 1G illustrates an example of ISAC associated with some embodiments of the present disclosure. In FIG. 1G, the horizontal axis represents time and the vertical axis represents frequency. As shown, a communication operation (for example, shown as data for communication) and a sensing operation (for example, shown as a signal for sensing) may be scheduled in separate time-frequency resources or in a shared spectrum with time-domain separation. Usually, sensing operations may target at distance or orientation estimation such that sensing signals may often have a (much) larger signal bandwidth (BW) than signals for data communication where the throughput and spectrum efficiency are of more interest.

In the current new radio (NR) network, integrated sensing and communication are discussed with potential benefits from each other. Sensing signals may be bursty in certain patterns over time and frequency resources and be transmitted periodically or aperiodically. Due to the nature of sensing operation, e.g., the usage of large BW signals with bursty patterns, it is possible that communication and sensing signals may overlap or collide over certain time-frequency resource (s) . In some scenarios, it is hard to avoid resource collisions for communication and sensing operations. As of now, there is no efficient way to resolve the collided or overlapped resource (s) between communication and sensing operations or to deal with the collided resource (s) for such two operations. Therefore, there is a need for an improved solution for such resource collisions.

Embodiments of the present disclosure provide a solution for ISAC. In one aspect of the solution of the present disclosure, a UE receives a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource. The first time-frequency resource at least partially overlaps a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation. Moreover, the UE performs an action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information.

By obtaining the collision resolution information, it is allowed for the UE to perform the subsequent action for the first operation. In this way, it is possible to avoid resource collisions efficiently, and thus improve the flexibility and efficiency of the communication between the UE and the network side.

FIG. 2 illustrates an example process according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 2, a UE 201 and a network device 202 are involved in the process 200. The UE 201 may be an example of the ED 110 in FIGS. 1A to 1E. The network device 202 may be an example of the T-TRP 170 and/or NT-TRP 172 in FIGS. 1A to 1E. It would be appreciated that although the process flow 200 has been described with reference to FIGS. 1A to 1E, this process may be likewise applied to other communication scenarios.

As shown in FIG. 2, the network device 202 transmits (205) , to the UE 201, a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource. Accordingly, the UE 201 receives (210) the first signaling from the network device 202. The first time-frequency resource may at least partially overlap with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation. For example, the first signaling may comprise at least one of a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) .

In some embodiments, a collision may occur on the first time-frequency resource, and the first time-frequency resource may be referred to as a collided (or overlapped) time-frequency resource. As an example, the collision may occur due to the reason that the first time-frequency resource is to be reserved. As another example, the collision may occur due to the reason that the first time-frequency resource is prioritized for usage by a second operation which is different from the first operation. In this case, for example, the first time-frequency resource may be a collided or overlapped resource between the allocated sensing resource and communication resource, such as a collided or overlapped resource between a sensing signal and a cell-common/cell-group signaling for communication, or a collided resource between a sensing signal and a UE specific communication signal. The collided resource between the communication and sensing operations may happen in downlink (DL) , uplink (UL) , or side-link (SL) signal transmissions. In some embodiments, a resource for a DL transmission may collide with a sensing resource of the UE 201 that is used for a sensing signal transmission (for example, a UL or side-link transmission) or a sensing signal transmission towards the UE 201. For example, a cell-common signaling such as an SSB or a group-common signaling such as a paging based PDCCH occasion may have a resource that collides with a sensing resource of the UE 201. In other embodiments, the collided resource may happen between two UL (or SL) signal transmissions from, e.g., communication or/and sensing operations, or from one or more UEs. It is to be understood that the terms “collided” and “overlapped” may be interchangeably used to describe an allocated time and frequency resource for two or more operations (e.g., sensing, communication, etc. ) that have an overlapped portion in time and frequency domains, or to describe a set of reserved time-frequency resources that may be used by an indication (e.g., an activation indication) .

In some embodiments, the above first operation and/or the second operation may comprise a transmission operation or a reception operation. For example, the transmission operation or the reception operation may be associated with a traffic type or an application type, comprising one or more of enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) , ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) , massive machine-type communication (mMTC) , system information, a UE specific signal, a long-term evolution (LTE) communication signal, a new radio (NR) communication signal, a sixth-generation (6G) communication signal, a sensing signal, or a wireless fidelity (WiFi) signal. The LTE communication signal, the NR communication signal, or the 6G communication signal may comprise at least one of an uplink signal transmission, a downlink signal transmission, or a sidelink signal transmission.

Then, the UE 201 performs (215) , an action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information. In some implementations, the UE 201 may perform a rate matching around the first time-frequency resource to avoid the resource collision. For example, the UE 201 may avoid using the first time-frequency resource for signal transmission, for example, in a configured or indicated period. In some implementations, the UE 201 may puncture out the first time-frequency resource without usage by the first operation, or mute the first operation on the first time-frequency resource.

In some embodiments, the first time-frequency resource may be explicitly configured or indicated. In some implementations, the collision resolution information may include an indication that the first time-frequency resource is to be reserved. For example, a certain time and frequency resource (or resource set) may be predefined by the standard specifications, preconfigured, or configured by the network device 202 as a reserved resource (or resource set) . The reserved resource may be used in a way of an activation or deactivation scheme, where the certain time and frequency resource (or resource set) may be optionally indexed such that a resource (set) index may be used for an indication of activation, deactivation or usage switching, etc. For example, an activation or deactivation indication for the sensing or communication operation to use the first time-frequency resource may be provided via an RRC signaling, a MAC-CE message, or a DCI. Furthermore, this indication may include a resource index to indicate a part or all of the first time-frequency resource. Alternatively or additionally, this indication may include at least one of the start time (such as a slot, a symbol index in a slot) , a resource block (RB) , a bandwidth part, a frequency band, etc.

In the cases where the first time-frequency resource is a reserved resource, by default, the overlapped resource may be reserved and not used by any UE (including the UE 201) . In this case, as an example, the UE 201 may perform the rating matching if it fails to receive an activation indication of usage of the first time-frequency resource for the first operation. As an example implementation, if the first operation (for example, a transmission or sensing operation) of the UE 201 has an allocated transmission resource (i.e., the second time-frequency resource) that partially or entirely collides or overlaps with the reserved resource (or resource set) without (receiving) an explicit (or implicit) activation indication of using the overlapped resource (i.e., the first time-frequency resource) , a rate matching scheme may be applied for the first operation, for example, either muting the first operation on the overlapped resource or resource elements in the overlapped resource may be punctured. Alternatively or additionally, if the first operation (for example, a communication or sensing operation) of the UE 201 has a scheduled transmission resource (i.e., the second time-frequency resource) that partially or entirely collides or overlaps with the reserved resource (or resource set) while an explicit or implicit indication of using the overlapped resource (i.e., the first time-frequency resource) is instructed (for example, using an activation indication comprising a resource index) , the UE 201 may use the overlapped resource based on this indication. In the case where the overlapped resource (i.e., the first time-frequency resource) is explicitly configured or indicated, an indication of using or not using it (or part of it) may be explicit or implicit. For example, an explicit way may be via the activation or de-activation of usage of the first time-frequency resource for the first operation, such as a communication or sensing operation. As another example, an implicit way may be via configuring a usage condition or criterion of the first time-frequency resource in a (specific) time period for the first operation, such as a communication operation or sensing operation. In this case, the UE 201 may perform the rating matching if a usage condition of the first time-frequency resource is not met for the first operation during a time period.

In some embodiments, the first time-frequency resource may occur and be indicated implicitly. For example, the UE 201 may be pre-configured or configured with a time and frequency resource (or resource set) for a sensing operation, where the time and frequency resource (or resource set) may be in a form of a time and frequency domain pattern. The sensing operation may be indicated to have at least a start time, and optionally an operation duration or a (sensing operation) periodicity. However, in some cases, the time and frequency resource (or resource set) for the sensing operation may collide with a time and frequency resource (or resource set) for a system information transmission in a communication operation such as a cell-common signaling, e.g., an SSB, or a group-common signaling, e.g., a paging based PDCCH occasion. In this case, the UE 201 may determine (or in other words, figure out) the collided resource portion between its (pre-) configured sensing operation resource and the resource for the system information. Alternatively or additionally, the UE 201 may also participate in a communication where a time and frequency resource for communication is allocated or scheduled for its traffic transmission, such as a UE specific communication signal. In this case, the UE 201 may figure out the overlapped resource portion between its (pre-) configured sensing operation resource and its allocated communication resource.

In the embodiments where the collision occurs due to the reason that the first time-frequency resource is prioritized for usage by a second operation, the collision resolution information may include an indication that the first time-frequency resource is prioritized for usage by the second operation. As an example, the second operation may be configured by at least one of an RRC message or a DCI. In this case, the first operation (such as a sensing or communication operation) may perform rate matching around the overlapped time-frequency resource (i.e., the first time-frequency resource) as this operation is indicated with a lower priority in using the overlapped resource. For example, the first operation and/or the second operation may comprise one of a communication operation, a sensing operation, or a WiFi operation. In some implementations, a set of resource pools and resource patterns may be configured as sensing resources, communication resources, and/or WiFi resources. In this case, one operation (e.g., a sensing operation, a communication operation, or a WiFi operation) may be indicated to use part or all of the resource (s) from the set of resource pools and resource patterns. Moreover, RRC-configured/preconfigured sensing, communication, or WiFi resources and patterns may also include resource indices.

In the embodiments where the rate matching scheme may be applied to the collided (or overlapped) resource (i.e., the first time-frequency resource) for the UE 201, the usage priority over the collided (or overlapped) resource (that is, the priority to use the overlapped resource) may be set up, for example, for communication and sensing operations. One operation with a higher priority may use the collided resource portion and the other operation with a lower priority may perform rate matching around the collided resource, for example, perform a punctuation or mute on the collided resource. In this case, the collision resolution information may include an indication of one or more priority rules for usage of the first time-frequency resource. For example, the above one or more priority rules (or in other words, the usage priority) may be indicated, predefined, preconfigured, and/or configured by the network device 202. In some implementations, a semi-static configuration (e.g. via an RRC message, a MAC-CE message, etc. ) may be used to instruct the one or more priority rules below on priority ordering for different traffic, signaling, or operations. Alternatively or additionally, a dynamic indication (e.g. via an L1 signaling, a DCI, etc. ) may be used to instruct the one or more priority rules below on priority ordering for different traffic, signaling, or operations. As an example, the one or more priority rules may comprise a first communication operation (comprising one of a transmission of cell-common traffic, a transmission of group-common traffic, or a transmission of UE specific traffic) being prioritized over a sensing operation. As another example, the one or more priority rules may comprise a sensing operation being prioritized over a second communication operation (comprising a transmission of group-common traffic or a transmission of UE specific traffic) . Giving an example implementation, one or more priority rules may comprise a priority rule 1: cell-common > group-common signaling > sensing operation > UE traffic, or a priority rule 2: cell-common > group-common signaling >(specified) UE traffic such as URLLC traffic > sensing operation. In the embodiments where the dynamic indication is applied, the dynamic indication of the one or more priority rules may use a rule index (e.g., one bit, “0” for the priority rule 1, and “1” for the priority rule 2) that can be provided in, e.g., the DCI field, where the rule details may be preconfigured or configured via, e.g., an RRC message.

In some embodiments, the collision resolution information may include an indication to perform a rate matching for the first operation around the first time-frequency resource. As an example implementation, the network device 202 may transmit, to the UE 201, an indication of a type of rate matching to be performed, such as puncturing out the first time-frequency resource without usage by the first operation, or muting the first operation on the first time-frequency resource. In an example implementation, the indication of the type of rate matching may be received as part of the first signaling, or a second signaling (such as an RRC message, a MAC CE message, or a DCI) .

In some embodiments, the network device 202 may transmit, to the UE 201, an indication of a rate matching pattern over the first time-frequency resource. For example, the rate matching pattern may be transmitted as part of the first signaling, or a third signaling (such as an RRC message, a MAC CE message, or a DCI) . The rate matching pattern may include at least one of a frequency band on which the rate matching is to be performed, a component carrier on which the rate matching is to be performed, or a traffic type or operation that has lower priority for usage of the first time-frequency resource.

In the embodiments where a certain time and frequency resource or resource is configured as a reserved resource around which the first operation may need to perform rate matching if it is configured with a low priority upon resource collision (that is if no activation is received) , a rate matching pattern may be configured over a time and frequency domain resource, as well as the occurring periodicity and frequency band. For example, the resource configured with the rate matching pattern may be indicated to use or perform rate matching for a traffic or an application type (e.g., eMBB traffic, URLLC traffic, a text message, a real-time message, etc. ) , a channel (a PDSCH, or a PUSCH, etc. ) , or operation type (e.g., sensing, communication, etc. ) . As an example, one way for a semi-static indication is to configure, for example, via an RRC signaling or a MAC-CE message, a priority and rule in using the resource and optionally an associated usage condition or criteria. As another example, another way for a dynamic indication is to use a scheduling signaling such as a DCI to provide, e.g., a rate match pattern identity to use or perform rate matching around the resource.

As an example, the reserved resource may be configured by an RRC signaling in terms of the rate matching pattern. The rate matching pattern configuration may include one or more fields. FIG. 3A illustrates an example rate matching pattern configuration according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 3A, the rate matching fields may comprise one or more of the following:

- Rate matching pattern identification or identity, which is used to identify each rate matching pattern.

- Frequency band, such as one or more frequency bands below 6GHz, one or more frequency bands beyond 6GHz, etc.

- Component carrier, including one or more component carrier options in a frequency band.

- Rate matching resources for transmission of a traffic type or operation (e.g., communication or sensing) , which can be optional if an indication on using or not using the rate matching resources is provided during the communication or sensing operation.

- Pattern description type may be based on a bitmap that indicates rate matching pattern by a pair of bitmaps resourceBlocks and symbolsInResourceBlock to define the rate match pattern within one or two slots, and a third bitmap periodicityAndPattern to define the repetition pattern with which the pattern defined by the above bitmap pair occurs.

- ResourceBlocks: A resource block level bitmap in the frequency domain. A bit in the bitmap setting to 1 (or 0) indicates that the UE shall apply rate matching in the corresponding resource block in accordance with the symbolsInResourceBlock bitmap. If used as cell-level rate matching pattern, the bitmap identifies "common resource blocks (CRB) " .

- SymbolsInResourceBlock: A symbol level bitmap in the time domain. It indicates with a bit set to true that the UE shall rate match around the corresponding symbol. This pattern recurs (in the time domain) with the configured periodicityAndPattern.

- PeriodicityAndPattern: A time domain repetition pattern at which the pattern defined by symbolsInResourceBlock and resourceBlocks recurs. This slot pattern repeats itself continuously. Absence of this field indicates the value n1.

- SubcarrierSpacing: The SubcarrierSpacing for this resource pattern. If the field is absent, the UE applies the SCS of the associated BWP. The value 15 kHz corresponds to numerology index μ=0, the value 30 kHz corresponds to μ=1, and so on, with scalable SCSs over 15kHz by a factor of 2^μ.

- ControlResourceSet: This ControlResourceSet is used as, e.g., a PDSCH rate matching pattern, i.e., PDSCH reception rate matches around it. In the frequency domain, the resource is determined by the frequency domain resource of the CORESET (Control Resource SET) with the corresponding CORESET ID. Time domain resource is determined by the parameters of the associated search space of the CORESET.

Reference is made to FIG. 3B to discuss an example overlapped time-frequency resource between communication and sensing operations. In FIG. 3B, the communication operation is shown as “data for commucation” and the sensing operation is shown as a “signal for sensing. ” In this case, for the collision on the overlapped time-frequency resource between communication and sensing operations, a priority setup and a rate matching scheme as described above may be applied to resolve the collision on the overlapped resource. For example, depending on a priority indication or configuration for communication and sensing operations as described above, an operation with a lower priority in resource usage may perform the rate matching over or muting on the overlapped time-frequency resource, or in other words, avoid using the overlapped time-frequency resource. The priority setup may depend on the importance and urgency requirement of the involved transmissions or operations. For example, the priority may be configured in a semi-statically way, e.g., via an RRC signaling, and/or indicated dynamically, e.g., via a DCI. For example, the system information such as an SSB (or a paging based PDCCH occasion) may be configured (or set) as the highest priority, which means that the resource if collided with the system information may not be used by the UE 201 in a transmission of any UE specific traffic in a communication or sensing operation.

In some embodiments considering the example overlapped time-frequency resource as shown in FIG. 3B, a sensing operation of the UE 201 may be configured/indicated with a higher priority to use the resource upon resource collision over a communication operation. For example, the UE 201 may have been scheduled with a time-frequency resource for a UL transmission of eMBB traffic previously (e.g., in one or more slots earlier) , but there is urgent sensing demanding in the network, e.g., for environment sensing around a certain area in with a higher priority, thus the network device 202 may schedule or activate a resource for the UE 201 to perform a sensing operation right way, while the resource scheduled for sensing may overlap with the time-frequency resource for the communication operation. As a result, the UE 201 may use the overlapped time-frequency resource (or resource part) to perform the sensing operation while the communication signal may not be transmitted in the overlapped time-frequency resource (or resource part) . A priority indication of using the overlapped time-frequency resource may be configured in a semi-static way (for example, via an RRC signaling) or indicated in a dynamic way (via a DCI) in the scheduling information for communication and sensing operation.

In some other embodiments considering the example overlapped time-frequency resource as shown in FIG. 3B, a sensing operation of the UE 201 may be configured/indicated with a lower priority to use the resource upon resource collision with a communication operation. For example, the UE 201 may have been scheduled with a time-frequency resource for a sensing operation previously (e.g., in one or more slots earlier) , but there is urgent communication demanding in the network, e.g., due to the URLLC traffic arrival, thus the network device 202 may schedule or activate a resource for the UE 201 to perform transmission or reception on the URLLC traffic right way whereas the resource scheduled for the URLLC traffic may overlap with the time-frequency resource for the sensing operation. As a result, the UE 201 may use the overlapped time-frequency resource (or resource part) to transmit or receive the URLLC traffic while the sensing signal may not be transmitted in or may mute on the overlapped time-frequency resource (or resource part) . A priority indication of using the overlapped time-frequency resource may be configured in a semi-static way (for example, via an RRC signaling) or indicated in a dynamic way (via a DCI) in the scheduling information for communication and sensing operation.

Reference is made to FIG. 3C to discuss an example of performing rate matching around a collided resource portion. As shown in FIG. 3C, the UE 201 may be allocated resources for data or control information transmission or reception for the communication operation, and the UE 201 may be allocated resources for the sensing operation. As shown, there may be a collided resource portion between resources for communication and sensing operations (due to, e.g., an urgent demand for the sensing operation) . As an example, a dynamic indication, e.g., via a DCI, may be provided to indicate the sensing operation as a higher priority in collided resource usage over the communication operation, thus the UE 201 may perform a rate matching for the communication operation around the collided resource portion. Alternatively or additionally, the collided resource portion between communication and sensing resources may be prioritized for use by the communication operation over the sensing operation, for example, in a case where the communication operation is dealing with high-reliability low-latency traffic such as URLLC traffic. In this case, a dynamic indication, e.g., via a DCI, may be provided to indicate the communication operation with a higher priority in collided resource usage over the sensing operation, thus the UE 201 may perform a rate matching for the sensing operation around the collided resource portion. Alternatively or additionally, a semi-static configuration, e.g., via an RRC signaling or a MAC-CE message, may be provided to set up the priority in the collided resource usage.

According to some embodiments with reference to FIGs. 2 to 3C, an explicit or implicit indication may be provided to instruct which operation (for example, the communication or sensing operation) to operate on the collided resource, or avoid using the collided resource that had been allocated previously. In this way, it is allowed to avoid resource usage collision efficiently.

FIG. 4 illustrates a flowchart of an example method 400 implemented at a UE according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 4, at block 410, the UE receives a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource. The first time-frequency resource at least partially overlaps with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation. At block 420, the UE performs an action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information. An example of the UE performing the method 400 may be the UE 201. The operations in the method 400 performed by the UE may further refer to the embodiments as mentioned in the process 200 above.

FIG. 5 illustrates a flowchart of an example method 500 implemented at a network device according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 5, at block 510, the network device transmits a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource. The first time-frequency resource at least partially overlaps with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation. An example of the network device performing the method 500 may be the network device 202. The operations in the method 500 performed by the network device may further refer to the embodiments as mentioned in the process 200 above.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of a device 600 that may be used for implementing some embodiments of the present disclosure. In some embodiments, the device 600 may be an element of communications network infrastructure, such as a base station (for example, a NodeB, an evolved Node B (eNodeB, or eNB) , a next generation NodeB (sometimes referred to as a gNodeB or gNB) , a home subscriber server (HSS) , a gateway (GW) such as a packet gateway (PGW) or a serving gateway (SGW) or various other nodes or functions within a core network (CN) or a Public Land Mobility Network (PLMN) . In other embodiments, the device 600 may be a device that connects to the network infrastructure over a radio interface, such as a mobile phone, smart phone or other such device that may be classified as a User Equipment (UE) . In some embodiments, the device 600 may be a Machine Type Communications (MTC) device (also referred to as a machine-to-machine (M2M) device) , or another such device that may be categorized as a UE despite not providing a direct service to a user. In some embodiments, the device 600 may be a road side unit (RSU) , a vehicle UE (V-UE) , pedestrian UE (P-UE) or an infrastructure UE (I-UE) . In some scenarios, the device 600 may also be referred to as a mobile device, a term intended to reflect devices that connect to mobile network, regardless of whether the device itself is designed for, or capable of, mobility. Specific devices may utilize all of the components shown or only a subset of the components, and levels of integration may vary from device to device. Furthermore, the device 600 may contain multiple instances of a component, such as multiple processors, memories, transmitters, receivers, etc.

The device 600 typically includes a processor 602, such as a Central Processing Unit (CPU) , and may further include specialized processors such as a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) or other such processor, a memory 604, a network interface 606 and a bus 608 to connect the components of the device 600. The device 600 may optionally also include components such as a mass storage device 610, a video adapter 612, and an I/O interface 616 (shown in dashed lines) .

The memory 604 may comprise any type of non-transitory system memory, readable by the processor 602, such as static random access memory (SRAM) , dynamic random access memory (DRAM) , synchronous DRAM (SDRAM) , read-only memory (ROM) , or a combination thereof. In an embodiment, the memory 604 may include more than one type of memory, such as ROM for use at boot-up, and DRAM for program and data storage for use while executing programs. The bus 608 may be one or more of any type of several bus architectures including a memory bus or memory controller, a peripheral bus, or a video bus.

The device 600 may also include one or more network interfaces 606, which may include at least one of a wired network interface and a wireless network interface. As illustrated in FIG. 6, network interface 606 may include a wired network interface to connect to a network 622, and also may include a radio access network interface 620 for connecting to other devices over a radio link. When the device 600 is a network infrastructure element, the radio access network interface 620 may be omitted for nodes or functions acting as elements of the PLMN other than those at the radio edge (e.g., an eNB) . When the device 600 is infrastructure at the radio edge of a network, both wired and wireless network interfaces may be included. When the device 600 is a wirelessly connected device, such as a User Equipment, radio access network interface 620 may be present and it may be supplemented by other wireless interfaces such as WiFi network interfaces. The network interfaces 606 allow the device 600 to communicate with remote entities such as those connected to network 622.

The mass storage 610 may comprise any type of non-transitory storage device configured to store data, programs, and other information and to make the data, programs, and other information accessible via the bus 608. The mass storage 610 may comprise, for example, one or more of a solid state drive, hard disk drive, a magnetic disk drive, or an optical disk drive. In some embodiments, the mass storage 610 may be remote to the device 600 and accessible through use of a network interface such as interface 606. In the illustrated embodiment, the mass storage 610 is distinct from memory 604 where it is included, and may generally perform storage tasks compatible with higher latency, but may generally provide lesser or no volatility. In some embodiments, the mass storage 610 may be integrated with a heterogeneous memory 604.

The optional video adapter 612 and the I/O interface 616 (shown in dashed lines) provide interfaces to couple the device 600 to external input and output devices. Examples of input and output devices include a display 614 coupled to the video adapter 612 and an I/O device 618 such as a touch-screen coupled to the I/O interface 616. Other devices may be coupled to the device 600, and additional or fewer interfaces may be utilized. For example, a serial interface such as Universal Serial Bus (USB) (not shown) may be used to provide an interface for an external device. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that in embodiments in which the device 600 is part of a data center, I/O interface 616 and Video Adapter 612 may be virtualized and provided through network interface 606.

FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram of a structure of an apparatus in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram of a structure of an apparatus 700 in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 7, the apparatus 700 includes a receiving unit 702 and a performing unit 704. The apparatus 700 may be applied to the communication systems as shown in FIGS. 1A, 1B, and 1E, and may implement any of the methods provided in the foregoing embodiments. Optionally, a physical representation form of the apparatus 700 may be a communication device, for example, a UE. Alternatively, the apparatus 700 may be another apparatus that can implement a function of a communication device, for example, a processor or a chip inside the communication device. Specifically, the apparatus 700 may be some programmable chips such as a field-programmable gate array (field-programmable gate array, FPGA) , a complex programmable logic device (complex programmable logic device, CPLD) , an application-specific integrated circuit (application-specific integrated circuits, ASIC) , or a system on a chip (System on a chip, SOC) .

In some embodiments, the receiving unit 702 may be configured to receive a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource. The first time-frequency resource at least partially overlaps with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation. The performing unit 704 may be configured to perform an action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information. In some embodiments, the receiving unit 702 and the performing unit 704 may be part of a processing unit (e.g. processor, processing circuitry, etc. ) .

In some other embodiments, the apparatus 700 can include various other units or modules which may be configured to perform various operations or functions as described in connection with the foregoing method embodiments. The details can be obtained referring to the detailed description of the foregoing method embodiments and are not described herein again.

FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram of a structure of an apparatus in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 8, the apparatus 800 includes a transmitting unit 802. The apparatus 800 may be applied to the communication systems as shown in FIGS. 1A, 1B, and 1E, and may implement any of the methods provided in the foregoing embodiments. Optionally, a physical representation form of the apparatus 800 may be a communication device, for example, a network device. Alternatively, the apparatus 800 may be another apparatus that can implement a function of a communication device, for example, a processor or a chip inside the communication device. Specifically, the apparatus 800 may be some programmable chips such as a field-programmable gate array (field-programmable gate array, FPGA) , a complex programmable logic device (complex programmable logic device, CPLD) , an application-specific integrated circuit (application-specific integrated circuits, ASIC) , or a system on a chip (System on a chip, SOC) .

In some embodiments, the transmitting unit 802 may be configured to transmit a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource. The first time-frequency resource at least partially overlaps with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation. In some embodiments, the transmitting unit 802 may be part of a processing unit (e.g. processor, processing circuitry, etc. ) .

In some other embodiments, the apparatus 800 can include various other units or modules which may be configured to perform various operations or functions as described in connection with the foregoing method embodiments. The details can be obtained referring to the detailed description of the foregoing method embodiments and are not described herein again.

It should be noted that division into the units or modules in the foregoing embodiments of the present disclosure is an example, and is merely logical function division. In actual implementation, there may be another division manner. In addition, function units in embodiments of the present disclosure may be integrated into one processing unit, or may exist alone physically, or two or more units may be integrated into one unit. The integrated unit may be implemented in a form of hardware, or may be implemented in a form of a software function unit.

When the integrated unit is implemented in a form of a software function unit and sold or used as an independent product, the integrated unit may be stored in a computer-readable storage medium. Based on such an understanding, the technical solutions of the present disclosure essentially, or all or some of the technical solutions may be implemented in a form of a software product. The computer software product is stored in a storage medium and includes several instructions for instructing a computer device (which may be a personal computer, a server, or a network device) or a processor (processor) to perform all or some of the steps of the methods described in embodiments of the present disclosure. The foregoing storage medium includes any medium that can store program code, such as a USB flash drive, a removable hard disk, a read-only memory (Read-Only Memory, ROM) , a random access memory (Random Access Memory, RAM) , a magnetic disk, or an optical disc.

Based on the foregoing embodiments, an embodiment of this application further provides a computer program. When the computer program is run on a computer, the computer is enabled to perform any of the methods provided in the foregoing embodiments.

Based on the foregoing embodiments, an embodiment of this application further provides a computer-readable storage medium. The computer-readable storage medium stores a computer program. When the computer program is executed by a computer, the computer is enabled to perform the any of the methods provided in the foregoing embodiments. The storage medium may be any usable medium that can be accessed by a computer. By way of example and not limitation, the computer-readable medium may include a RAM, a ROM, an EEPROM, a CD-ROM or another optical disk storage, a magnetic disk storage medium or another magnetic storage device, or any other medium that can be used to carry or store expected program code in a form of an instruction or a data structure and that can be accessed by a computer.

Based on the foregoing embodiments, an embodiment of the present disclosure further provides a chip. The chip is configured to read a computer program stored in a memory, to implement any of the methods provided in the foregoing embodiments.

Based on the foregoing embodiments, an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a chip system. The chip system includes a processor, configured to support a computer apparatus in implementing functions related to communication devices in the foregoing embodiments. In a possible design, the chip system further includes a memory, and the memory is configured to store a program and data that are necessary for the computer apparatus. The chip system may include a chip, or may include a chip and another discrete component.

A person skilled in the art should understand that embodiments of the present disclosure may be provided as a method, a system, or a computer program product. Therefore, the present disclosure may be in a form of a hardware-only embodiment, a software-only embodiment, or an embodiment combining software and hardware aspects. In addition, the present disclosure may be in a form of a computer program product implemented on one or more computer-usable storage media (including but not limited to a magnetic disk memory, a CD-ROM, an optical memory, and the like) including computer-usable program code.

The present disclosure is described with reference to the flowcharts and/or block diagrams of the method, the device (system) , and the computer program product according to the present disclosure. It should be understood that computer program instructions may be used to implement each process and/or each block in the flowcharts and/or the block diagrams and a combination of a process and/or a block in the flowcharts and/or the block diagrams. These computer program instructions may be provided for a general-purpose computer, a dedicated computer, an embedded processor, or a processor of another programmable data processing device to generate a machine, so that the instructions executed by a computer or a processor of another programmable data processing device generate an apparatus for implementing a specific function in one or more processes in the flowcharts and/or in one or more blocks in the block diagrams.

These computer program instructions may alternatively be stored in a computer-readable memory that can indicate a computer or another programmable data processing device to work in a specific manner, so that the instructions stored in the computer-readable memory generate an artifact that includes an instruction apparatus. The instruction apparatus implements a specific function in one or more processes in the flowcharts and/or in one or more blocks in the block diagrams.

These computer program instructions may alternatively be loaded onto a computer or another programmable data processing device, so that a series of operations and steps are performed on the computer or another programmable device, to generate computer-implemented processing. Therefore, the instructions executed on the computer or the another programmable device provide steps for implementing a specific function in one or more processes in the flowcharts and/or in one or more blocks in the block diagrams.

It is clear that a person skilled in the art may make various modifications and variations to the present disclosure without departing from the protection scope of the present disclosure. Thus, the present disclosure is intended to cover these modifications and variations, provided that they fall within the scope of the claims of the present disclosure and their equivalent technologies.

Claims

A method comprising:

receiving, by a user equipment (UE) , a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource, the first time-frequency resource at least partially overlapping with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation; and

performing, by the UE, an action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information.
The method of claim 1, wherein the first operation comprises a transmission operation or a reception operation, the transmission operation or the reception operation associated with a traffic type or an application type, comprising:

enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) ;

ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) ;

massive machine-type communication (mMTC) ;

system information;

a UE specific signal;

a long-term evolution (LTE) communication signal;

a new radio (NR) communication signal;

a sixth-generation (6G) communication signal;

a sensing signal; or

a wireless fidelity (WiFi) signal.
The method of claim 1, wherein the collision resolution information includes an indication that the first time-frequency resource is to be reserved or prioritized for usage by a second operation, the second operation different than the first operation.
The method of claim 3, wherein the second operation comprises a transmission operation or a reception operation, the transmission operation or the reception operation associated with a traffic type or an application type, comprising:

enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) ;

ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) ;

massive machine-type communication (mMTC) ;

system information;

a UE specific signal;

a long-term evolution (LTE) communication signal;

a new radio (NR) communication signal;

a sixth-generation (6G) communication signal;

a sensing signal; or

a wireless fidelity (WiFi) signal.
The method of claim 3, wherein the second operation is configured by at least one of: a radio resource control (RRC) message, or downlink control information (DCI) .
The method of any of claims 1 to 5, wherein the first operation or the second operation comprises one of:

a communication operation;

a sensing operation; or

a WiFi operation.
The method of claim 1, wherein the collision resolution information includes an indication of one or more priority rules for usage of the first time-frequency resource.
The method of claim 7, wherein the one or more priority rules comprises one of the following:

a first communication operation being prioritized over a sensing operation, the first communication operation comprising one of: a transmission of cell-common traffic, a transmission of group-common traffic, or a transmission of UE specific traffic; or

a sensing operation being prioritized over a second communication operation, the second communication operation comprising a transmission of group-common traffic or a transmission of UE specific traffic.
The method of any of claims 1 to 8, wherein the first signaling comprises at least one of: a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) .
The method of any one of claims 1 to 9, wherein the collision resolution information includes an indication to perform a rate matching for the first operation around the first time-frequency resource.
The method of claim 10, further comprising:

receiving, by the UE, an indication of a type of rate matching to be performed, the type of rate matching to be performed comprising one of:

puncturing out the first time-frequency resource without usage by the first operation; or

muting the first operation on the first time-frequency resource.
The method of claim 11, wherein the indication of the type of rate matching is received as part of the first signaling, or a second signaling, wherein the second signaling comprises one of: a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) .
The method of claim 1, wherein performing the action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information includes performing a rate matching, the rating matching performed in response to one of:

receiving no activation indication of usage of the first time-frequency resource for the first operation; or

determining that a usage condition of the first time-frequency resource is not met for the first operation during a time period.
The method of claim 1, wherein performing the action for the first operation based on the collision resolution information includes performing a rate matching, the rating matching comprising one of:

puncturing out the first time-frequency resource without usage by the first operation; or

muting the first operation on the first time-frequency resource.
The method of any of claims 1 to 14, further comprising:

receiving, by the UE, an indication of a rate matching pattern over the first time-frequency resource, the rate matching pattern including at least one of the following associated parameters:

a frequency band on which the rate matching is to be performed;

a component carrier on which the rate matching is to be performed; or

a traffic type or operation that has lower priority for usage of the first time-frequency resource.
The method of claim 15, wherein the indication of the rate matching pattern is received as part of the first signaling, or a third signaling, wherein the third signaling comprises at least one of: a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) .
The method of claim 2 or 4, wherein one of the LTE communication signal, the NR communication signal, or the 6G communication signal comprises at least one of:

an uplink signal transmission;

a downlink signal transmission; or

a sidelink signal transmission.
A method comprising:

transmitting, by a network device, a first signaling including collision resolution information for a first operation over a first time-frequency resource, the first time-frequency resource at least partially overlapping with a second time-frequency resource that is scheduled for the first operation.
The method of claim 18, wherein the first operation comprises a transmission operation or a reception operation, the transmission operation or the reception operation associated with a traffic type or an application type, comprising:

enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) ;

ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) ;

massive machine-type communication (mMTC) ;

system information;

a UE specific signal;

a long-term evolution (LTE) communication signal;

a new radio (NR) communication signal;

a sixth-generation (6G) communication signal;

a sensing signal; or

a wireless fidelity (WiFi) signal.
The method of claim 18, wherein the collision resolution information includes an indication that the first time-frequency resource is to be reserved or prioritized for usage by a second operation, the second operation different than the first operation.
The method of claim 20, wherein the second operation comprises a transmission operation or a reception operation, the transmission operation or the reception operation associated with a traffic type or an application type, comprising:

enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) ;

ultra-reliable and low-latency communication (URLLC) ;

massive machine-type communication (mMTC) ;

system information;

a UE specific signal;

a long-term evolution (LTE) communication signal;

a new radio (NR) communication signal;

a sixth-generation (6G) communication signal;

a sensing signal; or

a wireless fidelity (WiFi) signal.
The method of claim 20, wherein the second operation is configured by at least one of: a radio resource control (RRC) message, or downlink control information (DCI) .
The method of any of claims 18 to 22, wherein the first operation or the second operation comprises one of:

a communication operation;

a sensing operation; or

a WiFi operation.
The method of claim 18, wherein the collision resolution information includes an indication of one or more priority rules for usage of the first time-frequency resource.
The method of claim 24, wherein the one or more priority rules comprises one of the following:

a first communication operation being prioritized over a sensing operation, the first communication operation comprising one of: a transmission of a cell-common traffic, a transmission of group-common traffic, or a transmission of UE specific traffic; or

a sensing operation being prioritized over a second communication operation, the second communication operation comprising a transmission of group-common traffic or a transmission of UE specific traffic.
The method of any of claims 18 to 25, wherein the first signaling comprises at least one of: a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) .
The method of any one of claims 18 to 26, wherein the collision resolution information includes an indication to perform a rate matching for the first operation around the first time-frequency resource.
The method of claim 27, further comprising:

transmitting, by the network device, an indication of a type of rate matching to be performed, the type of rate matching to be performed comprising one of:

puncturing out the first time-frequency resource without usage by the first operation; or

muting the first operation on the first time-frequency resource.
The method of claim 28, wherein the indication of the type of rate matching is transmitted as part of the first signaling, or a second signaling, wherein the second signaling comprises one of: a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, or downlink control information (DCI) .
The method of any of claims 18 to 29, further comprising:

transmitting, by the network device, an indication of a rate matching pattern over the first time-frequency resource, the rate matching pattern indicating at least one of the following associated parameters:

a frequency band on which the rate matching is to be performed;

a component carrier on which the rate matching is to be performed; or

a traffic type or operation that has lower priority for usage of the first time-frequency resource.
The method of claim 30, wherein the indication of the rate matching pattern is transmitted as part of the first signaling, or a third signaling, wherein the third signaling comprises at least one of: a radio resource control (RRC) message, a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) message, downlink control information (DCI) , or a combination of thereof.
The method of claim 19 or 21, wherein one of the LTE communication signal, the NR communication signal or the 6G communication signal comprises at least one of:

an uplink signal transmission;

a downlink signal transmission; or

a sidelink signal transmission.
An apparatus comprising a processing unit configured to perform the method according to any one of claims 1-17 or 18-32.
A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising computer program stored thereon, the computer program, when executed on at least one processor, causing the at least one processor to perform the method of any of claims 1-17 or 18-32.
A computer program product tangibly stored on a computer-readable medium and comprising computer-executable instructions which, when executed, cause an apparatus to perform the method of any of claims 1-17 or 18-32.