WO2025156117A1

WO2025156117A1 - Devices, methods, and medium for communication

Info

Publication number: WO2025156117A1
Application number: PCT/CN2024/073694
Authority: WO
Inventors: Lei Chen; Gang Wang
Original assignee: NEC Corp
Current assignee: NEC Corp
Priority date: 2024-01-23
Filing date: 2024-01-23
Publication date: 2025-07-31
Anticipated expiration: 2026-07-23

Abstract

Example embodiments of the present disclosure relate to devices, methods, and computer storage medium for communication. In the solution, a terminal device receives a measurement gap configuration and an associated search space set configuration from a network device. In addition, the terminal device may receive a DCI based on the search space set configuration, and the DCI includes an indication indicating to the terminal device to skip one or more measurement gaps of the measurement gap configuration. As such, the one or more measurement gaps may be dynamically skipped based on an explicit indication in the DCI.

Description

DEVICES, METHODS, AND MEDIUM FOR COMMUNICATION

FIELD

Example embodiments of the present disclosure generally relate to the field of communication techniques and in particular, to devices, methods, and a computer readable medium for communication.

BACKGROUND

In third generation partner project (3GPP) new radio (NR) release 18 (Rel-18 or R18) , extended reality (XR) -specific enhancements were studied and specified. One of the enhancements is to support packet delay budget (PDB) based operation. In NR release 19 (Rel-19 or R19) , a work item on the further enhancements for XR services will be started. In order to further improve the PDB based operation, enhancements on measurement gap (MG) which allow gNB to schedule downlink (DL) or uplink (UL) transmissions for a user equipment (UE) in the measurement gap in case the remaining delay is very limited are further to be studied.

SUMMARY

In general, example embodiments of the present disclosure provide devices, methods, and a computer storage medium for communication.

In a first aspect, there is provided a terminal device. The terminal device comprises at least one processor configured to cause the terminal device at least to: receive, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration; receive, from the network device, downlink control information (DCI) based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and perform communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In a second aspect, there is provided a network device. The network device comprises at least one processor configured to cause the network device at least to: transmit, to at least one terminal device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration; transmit, to the at least one terminal device, a DCI based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and perform communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In a third aspect, there is provided a terminal device. The terminal device comprises at least one processor configured to cause the terminal device at least to: receive, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps; receive, from the network device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of configured grant (CG) transmissions or a plurality of semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) transmissions; and in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, skip the first measurement gap.

In a fourth aspect, there is provided a network device. The network device comprises at least one processor configured to cause the network device at least to: transmit, to a terminal device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps; transmit, to the terminal device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of CG transmissions or a plurality of SPS transmissions; and in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, skip the first measurement gap.

In a fifth aspect, there is provided a method of communication. The method comprises: receiving, at a terminal device from a network device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration; receiving, from the network device, a DCI based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and performing communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In a sixth aspect, there is provided a method of communication. The method comprises: transmitting, at a network device to at least one terminal device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration; transmitting, to the at least one terminal device, a DCI based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and performing communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In a seventh aspect, there is provided a method of communication. The method comprises: receiving, at a terminal device from a network device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps; receiving, from the network device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of CG transmissions or a plurality of SPS transmissions; and in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, skipping the first measurement gap.

In an eighth aspect, there is provided a method of communication. The method comprises: transmitting, at a network device to a terminal device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps; transmitting, to the terminal device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of CG transmissions or a plurality of SPS transmissions; and in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, skipping the first measurement gap.

In a ninth aspect, there is provided a computer readable medium having instructions stored thereon, the instructions, when executed on at least one processor, causing the at least one processor to carry out the method according to any of the fifth to the eighth aspects above.

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.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Through the more detailed description of some example embodiments of the present disclosure in the accompanying drawings, the above and other objects, features and advantages of the present disclosure will become more apparent, wherein:

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

FIG. 2 illustrates a signalling chart illustrating communication process in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIGS. 3A-3G illustrates some example schematics of DCIs scheduling a transmission overlapped with a measurement gap in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIGS. 4A-4C illustrates some example schematics of two adjacent measurement gaps in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 5 illustrates a signalling chart illustrating communication process in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIGS. 6A-6B illustrates some example schematics of DCIs with an indication for skipping a measurement gap in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 7 illustrates a flowchart of an example method implemented at a terminal device in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 8 illustrates a flowchart of an example method implemented at a network device in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 9 illustrates a flowchart of an example method implemented at a terminal device in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 10 illustrates a flowchart of an example method implemented at a network device in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure; and

FIG. 11 illustrates a simplified block diagram of a device that is suitable for implementing embodiments of the present disclosure.

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

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Principle 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 help those skilled in the art to understand and implement the present disclosure, without suggesting any limitation as to the scope of the disclosure. Embodiments 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 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 limiting of 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.

In some examples, values, procedures, or apparatus are referred to as “best, ” “lowest, ” “highest, ” “minimum, ” “maximum, ” or the like. It will be appreciated that such descriptions are intended to indicate that a selection among many used functional alternatives can be made, and such selections need not be better, smaller, higher, or otherwise preferable to other selections.

As used herein, the term “communication network” refers to a network following any suitable communication standards or technologies, such as New Radio (NR) , Long Term Evolution (LTE) , LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) , Code Divided Multiple Address (CDMA) , Frequency Divided Multiple Address (FDMA) , Time Divided Multiple Address (TDMA) , Frequency Divided Duplexer (FDD) , Time Divided Duplexer (TDD) , Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) , Orthogonal Frequency Divided Multiple Access (OFDMA) , cdma2000, Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA) , High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA) , Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) , Narrow Band Internet of Things (NB-IoT) and so on. Furthermore, the communications between a terminal device and a network device in the communication network may be performed according to any suitable generation communication protocols, including, but not limited to, the first generation (1G) , the second generation (2G) , 2.5G, 2.75G, the third generation (3G) , the fourth generation (4G) , 4.5G, the fifth generation (5G) , 5.5G, 5G-Advanced networks, beyond 5G (B5G) , the sixth generation (6G) communication protocols, wireless local network communication protocols such as Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 and the like, and/or any other protocols either currently known or to be developed in the future. The techniques described herein may be used for the wireless networks and radio technologies mentioned above as well as other wireless networks and radio technologies. Embodiments of the present disclosure may be applied in various communication systems. Given the rapid development in communications, there will of course also be future type communication technologies and systems with which the present disclosure may be embodied. It should not be seen as limiting the scope of the present disclosure to only the aforementioned system.

As used herein, the term “terminal device” refers to any device having wireless or wired communication capabilities. Examples of terminal device include, but not limited to, user equipment (UE) , personal computers, desktops, mobile phones, cellular phones, smart phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs) , portable computers, tablets, wearable devices, internet of things (IoT) devices, Ultra-reliable and Low Latency Communications (URLLC) devices, Internet of Everything (IoE) devices, machine type communication (MTC) devices, device on vehicle for V2X communication where X means pedestrian, vehicle, or infrastructure/network, devices for Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) , Space borne vehicles or Air borne vehicles in Non-terrestrial networks (NTN) including Satellites and High Altitude Platforms (HAPs) encompassing Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) , eXtended Reality (XR) devices including different types of realities such as Augmented Reality (AR) , Mixed Reality (MR) and Virtual Reality (VR) , the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) commonly known as a drone which is an aircraft without any human pilot, devices on high speed train (HST) , or image capture devices such as digital cameras, sensors, gaming devices, music storage and playback appliances, or Internet appliances enabling wireless or wired Internet access and browsing and the like. The ‘terminal device’ can further has ‘multicast/broadcast’ feature, to support public safety and mission critical, V2X applications, transparent IPv4/IPv6 multicast delivery, IPTV, smart TV, radio services, software delivery over wireless, group communications and IoT applications. It may also be incorporated one or multiple Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) as known as Multi-SIM. The term “terminal device” can be used interchangeably with a UE, a mobile station, a subscriber station, a mobile terminal, a user terminal or a wireless device.

As used herein, the term “network device” refers to a device which is capable of providing or hosting a cell or coverage where terminal devices can communicate. Examples of a network device include, but not limited to, a satellite, an unmanned aerial systems (UAS) platform, a Node B (NodeB or NB) , an evolved NodeB (eNodeB or eNB) , a next generation NodeB (gNB) , a transmission reception point (TRP) , a remote radio unit (RRU) , a radio head (RH) , a remote radio head (RRH) , an IAB node, a low power node such as a femto node, a pico node, a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) , and the like.

In one embodiment, the terminal device may be connected with a first network device and a second network device. One of the first network device and the second network device may be a master node (MN) and the other one may be a secondary node (SN) . The first network device and the second network device may use different radio access technologies (RATs) . In one embodiment, the first network device may be a first RAT device and the second network device may be a second RAT device. In one embodiment, the first RAT device is eNB and the second RAT device is gNB. Information related with different RATs may be transmitted to the terminal device from at least one of the first network device and the second network device. In one embodiment, first information may be transmitted to the terminal device from the first network device and second information may be transmitted to the terminal device from the second network device directly or via the first network device. In one embodiment, information related with configuration for the terminal device configured by the second network device may be transmitted from the second network device via the first network device. Information related with reconfiguration for the terminal device configured by the second network device may be transmitted to the terminal device from the second network device directly or via the first network device.

The terminal device or the network device may have Artificial intelligence (AI) or machine learning capability. It generally includes a model which has been trained from numerous collected data for a specific function, and can be used to predict some information.

The terminal device or the network device may work on several frequency ranges, e.g. frequency range 1 (FR1) (410 MHz –7125 MHz) , frequency range 2 (FR2) (24.25GHz to 71GHz) , frequency band larger than 100GHz as well as Tera Hertz (THz) . It can further work on licensed/unlicensed/shared spectrum. The terminal device may have more than one connection with the network device under Multi-Radio Dual Connectivity (MR-DC) application scenario. The terminal device or the network device can work on full duplex, flexible duplex and cross division duplex modes.

The embodiments of the present disclosure may be performed in test equipment, e.g., signal generator, signal analyzer, spectrum analyzer, network analyzer, test terminal device, test network device, or channel emulator.

The embodiments of the present disclosure may be performed according to any generation communication protocols either currently known or to be developed in the future. Examples of the communication protocols include, but not limited to, the 1G, 2G, 2.5G, 2.75G, 3G, 4G, 4.5G, 5G, 5.5G, 5G-Advanced networks, or 6G networks.

The term “circuitry” used herein may refer to hardware circuits and/or combinations of hardware circuits and software. For example, the circuitry may be a combination of analog and/or digital hardware circuits with software/firmware. As a further example, the circuitry may be any portions of hardware processors with software including digital signal processor (s) , software, and memory (ies) that work together to cause an apparatus, such as a terminal device or a network device, to perform various functions. In a still further example, the circuitry may be hardware circuits and or processors, such as a microprocessor or a portion of a microprocessor, that requires software/firmware for operation, but the software may not be present when it is not needed for operation. As used herein, the term circuitry also covers an implementation of merely a hardware circuit or processor (s) or a portion of a hardware circuit or processor (s) and its (or their) accompanying software and/or firmware.

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. The term “includes” and its variants are to be read as open terms that mean “includes, but is not limited to. ” The term “based on” is to be read as “based at least in part on. ” The term “one embodiment” and “an embodiment” are to be read as “at least one embodiment. ” The term “another embodiment” is to be read as “at least one other embodiment. ” The terms “first, ” “second, ” and the like may refer to different or same objects. Other definitions, explicit and implicit, may be included below.

In NR Rel-18, XR-specific enhancements were studied and specified. Based on PDB based operation, gNB may be aware of the remaining delay budget of an XR traffic burst (i.e., a packet data unit (PDU) set) , and may determine its operations (e.g., scheduling timing) in order to transmit the traffic burst before the end of the delay budget. In NR Rel-19, a work item on the further enhancements for XR services will be started. In order to further improve the PDB based operation, enhancement on measurement gap which allow gNB to schedule DL/UL transmissions for a UE in the measurement gap in case the remaining delay is very limited. Therefore, mechanisms for measurement gap skipping (i.e., deactivating) is needed.

A UE may be configured with a measurement gap to perform: inter-frequency cells measurement for FR1 and FR2, intra-frequency cells measurement mainly for FR2, and positioning reference signal (RS) measurement.

A UE may be configured with one or more positioning measurement gap configurations, and the UE may request gNB to activate/deactivate a positioning measurement gap configuration by sending a medium access control (MAC) control element (CE) . The gNB may send a MAC-CE command to inform UE that a positioning measurement gap configuration is activated/de-activated. In this case, the MAC-CE command from the gNB is applied to the positioning measurement gap configuration, that is, all measurement gaps of the positioning measurement gap configuration will be activated/de-activated, which renders the flexibility low.

Embodiments of the present disclosure provide a solution of communication. In the solution, a terminal device receives a measurement gap configuration and an associated search space set configuration from a network device. In addition, the terminal device may receive a DCI based on the search space set configuration, and the DCI includes an indication indicating to the terminal device to skip one or more measurement gaps of the measurement gap configuration. As such, the one or more measurement gaps may be dynamically skipped based on an explicit indication in the DCI. Therefore, a better flexibility can be reached, and a transmission scheduled by the DCI, if any, may be performed in a more efficient way. Principles and implementations of the present disclosure will be described in detail below with reference to the figures.

In the present disclosure, a measurement gap configuration may include or indicate or configure multiple measurement gaps. For example, a measurement gap may be determined based on the measurement gap configuration.

In the present disclosure, a scheduling restriction configuration may include or indicate or configure multiple scheduling restriction periods. For example, the scheduling restriction configuration may be based on a measurement configuration, a positioning measurement configuration, or a gNB indication (such as a dedicated indication from the network device) . For example, a scheduling restriction period is a period in which the scheduling may be interrupted. For example, a scheduling restriction period may include a measurement gap and a gap period, where the gap period may be used for preparation or for frame structure alignment.

In the present disclosure, the term “measurement gap configuration” is used in the following embodiments which may also be replaced by the scheduling restriction configuration in some cases. In the present disclosure, the term “measurement gap” is used in the following embodiments which may also be replaced by the scheduling restriction period in some cases.

In the present disclosure, a measurement gap may be deactivated, and the term “deactivate” may be interchangeably used with one of the following: skip, cancel, drop, disable, deprioritize, etc. For example, if a measurement gap is deprioritized, the terminal device should prioritize a downlink reception or an uplink transmission in the measurement gap and/or deprioritize the measurement, optionally, it is up to the implementation of the terminal device (UE implementation) or an indication from the network device whether the measurement should be performed in the deprioritized measurement gap. For ease of description, the term “skip” is used in the following embodiments.

FIG. 1 illustrates an example communication network 100 in which some embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented. The communication network 100 may also be called as a network environment, a network system, a communication system, a communication environment, or the like, the present disclosure does not limit this aspect. The communication network 100 includes a terminal device 110 and a network device 120 which may communicate with each other. The communication network 100 may also include a core network (CN) which may involve a variety of network functions or entities.

In the communication network 100, the network device 120 and the terminal devices 110 can communicate data and control information to each other, and the communications in the communication network may be implemented according to any proper communication protocol (s) .

Embodiments of the present disclosure can be applied to any suitable scenarios. For example, embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented at reduced capability NR devices. Alternatively, embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented in one of the followings: NR multiple-input and multiple-output (MIMO) , NR sidelink enhancements, NR systems with frequency above 52.6GHz, an extending NR operation up to 71GHz, narrow band-Internet of Thing (NB-IOT) /enhanced Machine Type Communication (eMTC) over non-terrestrial networks (NTN) , NTN, UE power saving enhancements, NR coverage enhancement, NB-IoT and LTE-MTC, Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) , NR Multicast and Broadcast Services, or enhancements on Multi-Radio Dual-Connectivity.

It is to be understood that the numbers of devices and their connection relationships and types shown in FIG. 1 are only for the purpose of illustration without suggesting any limitation. For example, there may be multiple terminal devices connecting to the network device 120, for example the network 100 may include any suitable numbers of devices adapted for implementing embodiments of the present disclosure.

Reference is further made to FIG. 2, which illustrates a signalling chart illustrating communication process 200 in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. The process 200 may involve a terminal device 110 and a network device 120 as shown in FIG. 1. It would be appreciated that the process 200 may be applied to other communication scenarios, which will not be described in detail.

In the process 200, the network device 120 transmits 210 a measurement gap configuration 212 to the terminal device 110. As mentioned above, the measurement gap configuration 212 may also be referred to as a scheduling restriction configuration, which is e.g. based on a measurement configuration, a positioning measurement configuration, or a gNB indication. The measurement gap configuration may indicate one or more measurement gaps, which may also be referred to as a scheduling restriction period.

On the other side of communication, the terminal device 110 receives 214 the measurement gap configuration 212. In some implementations, the terminal device 110 may accordingly determine at least one measurement gap based on the measurement gap configuration 212. In some examples, the measurement gap configuration 212 may indicate gap pattern configurations as shown in Table 1 below:

Table 1: gap pattern configurations

In the process 200, the network device 120 transmits 220 a DCI 222 which indicates time domain resources of a transmission to the terminal device 110. In some implementations, the DCI 222 may be any of: a DL scheduling DCI, a UL scheduling DCI, a group common DCI, etc. In some implementations, the transmission may be regarded as a first transmission for ease of description, which may be any of: a dynamic grant (DG) physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) , a SPS PDSCH, a DG physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , a CG-PUSCH, a channel state indicator (CSI) reporting, a sounding reference signal (SRS) transmission, a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) transmission, etc.

In some implementations, the terminal device 110 may be configured with a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) search space set configuration, for example the network device 120 may configure a control resource set (CORESET) to the terminal device 110 and the CORESET may be associated with a search space set (SSS) . In some implementations, the PDCCH search space set configuration may indicate multiple search space occasions which may periodically appear, and the terminal device 110 may monitor a DCI format in the multiple search space occasions based on the PDCCH search space set configuration. In the process 200, the terminal device 110 receives 224 the DCI 222 by detecting.

In some implementations, the DCI 222 may schedule a first transmission, for example, the DCI 222 indicates time domain resources of the first transmission, which may include at least one OFDM symbol. In some example embodiments, the time domain resources for the first transmission may be overlapped with a measurement gap.

If the time domain resources for the first transmission indicated by the DCI 222 is overlapped with a measurement gap determined based on the measurement gap configuration 212, the terminal device 110 skips 230 the measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the DCI 222 may be a DL scheduling DCI (e.g., DCI format 1-0, 1-1, or 1-2) , the first transmission is a PDSCH, and the DCI 222 may include a time domain resource assignment for the PDSCH. FIG. 3A illustrates an example schematic of DCI 310 which schedules a PDSCH overlapped with the measurement gap. As shown in FIG. 3A, the PDSCH scheduled by the DCI will be performed in a slot within the measurement gap, then the measurement gap will be skipped.

In some example embodiments, the DCI 222 may be a UL scheduling DCI (e.g., DCI format 0-0, 0-1, or 0-2) , the first transmission is a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , and the DCI 222 may include a time domain resource assignment for the PUSCH. FIG. 3B illustrates an example schematic of DCI 320 which schedules a PUSCH overlapped with the measurement gap. As shown in FIG. 3B, the PUSCH scheduled by the DCI will be performed in a slot within the measurement gap, then the measurement gap will be skipped.

In some example embodiments, the DCI 222 may be a DL or UL scheduling DCI or a group common DCI (e.g., DCI format 2-3) , the first transmission is an SRS, and the DCI 222 may include an SRS request field. FIG. 3C illustrates an example schematic of DCI 330 which schedules an SRS overlapped with the measurement gap. As shown in FIG. 3C, the SRS scheduled by the DCI will be performed in a slot within the measurement gap, then the measurement gap will be skipped.

In some example embodiments, the DCI 222 indicates an activation of an SPS PDSCH transmission, for example, the DCI 222 may be a DL scheduling DCI (e.g., DCI format 1-1) which is scrambled by a configured scheduling-radio network temporary identifier (CS-RNTI) , and the first transmission is the first SPS PDSCH transmission after the DCI 222. FIG. 3D illustrates an example schematic of DCI 340 for SPS PDSCH activation. As shown in FIG. 3D, the DCI may activate multiple SPS PDSCH transmissions, where the first SPS PDSCH will be performed in a slot within the measurement gap, then the measurement gap will be skipped.

In some example embodiments, the DCI 222 indicates an activation of a CG PUSCH transmission, for example, the DCI 222 may be a UL scheduling DCI (e.g., DCI format 0-1) which is scrambled by CS-RNTI and a DCI format indicator field is set to 0, and the first transmission is the first CG PUSCH transmission after the DCI 222. FIG. 3E illustrates an example schematic of DCI 350 for CG PUSCH activation. As shown in FIG. 3E, the DCI may activate multiple CG PUSCH transmissions, where the first CG PUSCH will be performed in a slot within the measurement gap, then the measurement gap will be skipped.

It is to be noted that although some examples above discuss that the first SPS PDSCH (or the first CG PUSCH) overlapped with the measurement gap is considered, in some other cases, the first M SPS PDSCH transmissions (or the first M CG PUSCH transmissions) may be considered. For example, assume M=2, if the first SPS PDSCH (first CG PUSCH) and the second SPS PDSCH (second CG PUSCH) are overlapped with a measurement gap, then the measurement gap is skipped. For example, assume M=2, if the first SPS PDSCH (first CG PUSCH) is overlapped with a first measurement gap and the second SPS PDSCH (second CG PUSCH) is overlapped with a second measurement gap, then the first measurement gap and the second measurement gap are skipped.

In some example embodiments, the DCI 222 may be a scheduling DCI, the first transmission is a PUCCH, and the DCI 222 may include a PUCCH resource indicator (such as k1) which is used to indicate a time domain resource for the PUCCH. FIG. 3F illustrates an example schematic of DCI 360 which schedules a PUCCH overlapped with the measurement gap. As shown in FIG. 3F, the PUCCH scheduled by the DCI will be performed in a slot within the measurement gap, then the measurement gap will be skipped.

In some example embodiments, the DCI 222 may be a scheduling DCI, the first transmission is a PUCCH, and the DCI 222 may include a PDSCH-to-HARQ (hybrid automatic repeat request) feedback timing indicator which is used to indicate a time domain resource for the PUCCH. FIG. 3G illustrates an example schematic of DCI 370 which schedules a PDSCH. As shown in FIG. 3G, the HARQ-ACK on PUCCH for a PDSCH scheduled by the DCI will be performed in a slot within the measurement gap, then the measurement gap will be skipped.

In some other implementations, the DCI 222 may indicate time domain resources for a first transmission which is overlapped with a first measurement gap, and there is also a second measurement gap which is associated with the first measurement gap, then the terminal device 110 may determine to skip the first measurement gap, in addition, the terminal device 110 may further determine whether to skip the second measurement gap. For example, an association of the two measurement gaps may include: the two measurement gaps are overlapped in time, the two measurement gaps are contiguous in time, or a gap between the two measurement gaps (e.g., a time duration from an end of the first measurement gap to a start of the second measurement gap) is smaller than or not larger than a gap threshold (such as 1 slot, 2 slots, or another value) .

In some embodiments, the terminal device 110 may determine to skip both the first measurement gap and the second measurement gap. FIG. 4A illustrates an example schematic of two overlapped measurement gaps 410. As shown in FIG. 4A, MG1 will be skipped due to the DL scheduling DCI which schedules a PDSCH overlapped with MG1, and MG2 will be skipped since it is overlapped with MG1. FIG. 4B illustrates an example schematic of two contiguous measurement gaps 420. As shown in FIG. 4B, MG1 will be skipped due to the DL scheduling DCI which schedules a PDSCH overlapped with MG1, and MG2 will be skipped since it is contiguous with MG1. FIG. 4C illustrates an example schematic of two measurement gaps 420 with a small gap. As shown in FIG. 4C, MG1 will be skipped due to the DL scheduling DCI which schedules a PDSCH overlapped with MG1, and MG2 will be skipped since the gap between MG1 and MG 2 is smaller than a gap threshold.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 110 may determine whether to skip the second measurement gap based on a specific indication from the network device 120. In some examples, the network device 120 may transmit the specific indication (e.g. RRC control information) to the terminal device 110, and the specific indication may indicate to the terminal device 110 to skip a measurement gap in case it is associated with another measurement gap to be skipped. In some examples, the terminal device 110 may determine to skip both the first measurement gap and the second measurement gap based on the specific indication from the network device 120.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 110 may determine whether to skip the second measurement gap based on a determination whether the second measurement gap is overlapped with time domain resources of a transmission (e.g. the first transmission or a different second transmission) . In this way, whether a measurement gap will be skipped may be determined separately.

In some examples, the terminal device 110 may determine to skip the first measurement gap and not skip the second measurement gap. For example, if the first measurement gap and the second measurement gap are overlapped in time, and the terminal device 110 determine to skip the first one but not skip the second one, then the terminal device 110 should not perform a DL reception or a UL transmission in an overlapped part of the first measurement gap. For a specific example, if the first measurement gap with a time duration from t1 to t3 is overlapped with a second measurement gap with a time duration from t2 to t4, and t1<t2<t3<t4, then the terminal device 110 should skip measurement from t1 to t2, and should perform a DL reception or a UL transmission in the overlapped part, i.e., from t2 to t3. In other words, a first part of the first measurement gap that is not overlapped with the second measurement gap may be skipped. That is, the skipping of the first measurement gap may be aborted by the second measurement gap from a start of the second measurement gap (i.e. t2 in the above example) .

In some example embodiments, the first measurement gap may be determined based on a measurement gap configuration (such as the measurement gap configuration 212) , and the second measurement map may be determined based on a further measurement gap configuration (e.g. different from the measurement gap configuration 212) . For example, the terminal device 110 may be configured with multiple different measurement gap configurations. For example, the first measurement gap and the second measurement map may have different parameters, such as a measurement gap length and/or a measurement gap repetition period that in Table 1.

Referring back to FIG. 2, the terminal device 110 and the network device 120 perform 240 the first transmission based on the DCI 222. Specifically, the terminal device 110 does not perform a measurement in the measurement gap, and perform a transmission or a reception that is scheduled or configured in the measurement gap. For example, the UL transmission or the DL reception may include one of: a DG-PDSCH, a SPS PDSCH, a DG-PUSCH, a CG-PUSCH, a CSI reporting, an SRS transmission, or a PUCCH transmission.

It should be noted that the embodiments described above are provided in case a DCI 220 indicating time domain resources of a first transmission overlapped with the measurement gap is detected by the terminal device 110. In some other cases, if the terminal device 110 does not receive a DCI which indicates time domain resources overlapped with the measurement gap, then the measurement gap may be kept activated. That is, the terminal device 110 may determine that the measurement gap is a valid measurement gap, and in addition the terminal device 110 may perform a measurement in the measurement gap but not perform a transmission or reception. Specifically, during an activated measurement gap, the MAC entity shall, on the serving cell (s) in the corresponding frequency range of the measurement gap configured by measGapConfig:

1> not perform the transmission of HARQ feedback, SR, and CSI;

1> not report SRS;

1> not transmit on uplink shared channel (UL-SCH) except for Msg3 or the MSGA payload;

1> if the ra-ResponseWindow or the ra-ContentionResolutionTimer or the msgB-ResponseWindow is running:

2> monitor the physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) .

1> else:

2> not monitor the PDCCH;

2> not receive on downlink shared channel (DL-SCH) .

According to some example embodiments with reference to FIGS. 2-4C, a measurement gap may be skipped in case a DCI which indicates time domain resources overlapped with the measurement gap is received, as such, a dynamic deactivation of the measurement gap may be achieved. The DCI which indicates time domain resources overlapped with the measurement gap may be regarded as an implicit indication for skipping the measurement gap, thus there is no need to introduce a new DCI or revise the existing DCI to support the skipping, thus an impact to the current 3GPP specification may be minimized. The DCI may be with two functions: implicitly indicating skipping a measurement gap and indicating time domain resources for a first transmission, thus the overhead may be saved and a communication of the first transmission may be more efficient.

Reference is further made to FIG. 5, which illustrates a signalling chart illustrating communication process 500 in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. The process 500 may involve a terminal device 110 and a network device 120 as shown in FIG. 1. It would be appreciated that the process 500 may be applied to other communication scenarios, which will not be described in detail.

In the process 500, the network device 120 transmits 510 a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration 512 to the terminal device 110. On the other side of communication, the terminal device 110 receives 514 the measurement gap configuration and the search space set configuration 512. In some implementations, the measurement gap configuration may indicate multiple measurement gaps, details of which may refer to those discussed above and will not be repeated herein for brevity.

In some implementations, the search space set configuration (also called as a PDCCH SSS configuration) is associated with the measurement gap configuration, for example, an association between the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration may be predefined or preconfigured.

In some implementations, the search space set configuration may indicate multiple search space occasions, that is at least one time duration of a search space occasion may be configured. In the present disclosure, a search space occasion may be a set of consecutive time domain resources which the terminal device should monitor at least one PDCCH candidate.

In some example embodiments, an association between the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration may include: a periodicity of search space occasions indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a measurement gap repetition period of measurement gaps indicated by the measurement gap configuration. In some example embodiments, an association between the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration may include: a start time of a search space occasion indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a start time of a measurement gap indicated by the measurement gap configuration. For example, a search space occasion may be started from a time offset (T1) before a start time of a measurement gap. FIG. 6A illustrates an example schematic of an association 610 of a search space occasion and a measurement gap. As shown in FIG. 6A, the search space occasion is started from T1 before a start time of MG1, then the search space occasion is associated with MG1. For example, the DCI in the search space occasion may include an indication indicating whether to skip MG1.

In some example embodiments, an association between the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration may include: the search space set configuration is configured to indicate the one or more measurement gaps. For example, the search space set configuration may be used to indicate skipping one or more measurement gaps of the measurement gap configuration.

In some implementations, a measurement gap should be configured in a time duration in which one or more neighbor cells will transmit their synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) . Therefore, it is likely that multiple terminal devices are configured with same measurement gap configuration if same neighbor cells are configured for the multiple terminal devices. In some examples, the measurement gap configuration may be configured to and be shared by multiple terminal devices.

In some implementations, the search space set configuration may be a group common PDCCH search space set configuration which is shared by multiple terminal devices including the terminal device 110. In some other implementations, the search space set configuration may be a UE specific search space set configuration.

In some implementations, the terminal device 110 may be configured with multiple measurement gap configurations. In some example embodiments, a search space set configuration may be configured to the terminal device 110 and is associated with one of the multiple measurement gap configurations. For example, the terminal device 110 may be configured with multiple search space set configurations each associated with a measurement gap configuration. In some other example embodiments, the terminal device 110 is configured with a single search space set configuration which is associated with every one of the multiple measurement gap configurations. For example, a search space occasion of the single search space set configuration may appear in front of each measurement gap of the multiple measurement gap configurations.

It is to be noted that the measurement gap configuration and the search space set configuration 512 may be transmitted/configured by the network device 120 together e.g. in a same configuration message, or separately e.g. in different configuration messages, the present disclosure does not limit this aspect.

In the process 500, the network device 120 transmits 520 a DCI 522 to the terminal device 110, where the DCI 522 includes an indication for indicating that one or more measurement gaps should be skipped. On the other side of communication, the terminal device 110 may monitor a DCI format in the multiple search space occasions based on the search space set configuration which is associated with the measurement gap configuration. In the process 500, the terminal device 110 receives 524 the DCI 522 which includes the indication, and the terminal device 110 skips 530 the one or more measurement gaps based on the DCI 522. Specifically, the one or more measurement gaps (the number of which may represented as N, and N is a positive integer) after the DCI 522 may be determined to be skipped.

In some implementations, the search space set may be a UE specific search space set, and the terminal device 110 may monitor a DL scheduling DCI (format 1-0, 1-1, 1-2) , or a UL scheduling DCI (format 0-0, 0-1, 0-2) in each search space occasion.

In some examples, if there are two or more measurement gaps overlapped in time or the gap between any two consecutive measurement gaps is smaller than a threshold, the terminal device 110 may determine that the search space occasion for the first measurement gap (i.e., started earliest) is used to indicate the other measurement gaps of the two or more measurement gaps. For example, the two or more measurement gaps may be determined based on different measurement gap configurations.

In some implementations, the search space set may be a group common search space set, and the terminal device 110 may monitor a group common DCI, e.g., a DCI format 2_X where X is an integer. In some examples, a group common PDCCH may be used to inform the skipping of one or more measurement gaps for multiple terminal devices which share a same measurement gap configuration. In this case, the signalling overhead may be reduced. For example, a single group common DCI may be used to indicate to multiple terminal devices to skip one or more measurement gaps.

In some implementations, the DCI 522 may include a first field which carries the indication. For example, the first field may be a measurement gap skipping (or deactivation) indication field. For example, the first field may indicate whether to skip one or more measurement gaps.

In some implementations, the search space set configuration may be associated with multiple measurement gap configurations. In some examples, the DCI 522 may include multiple fields corresponding to the multiple measurement gap configurations respectively. For example, each of the multiple fields may be a measurement gap skipping (or deactivation) indication field which carries the indication. In some other examples, the DCI 522 may include a field which carries the indication and the indication should be applied for the multiple measurement gap configurations. For example, for each measurement gap configuration, the terminal device 110 may determine whether there is at least one measurement gap should be skipped based on the DCI 522.

In some example embodiments, the DCI 522 may include a second field, which include at least one bit indicating a type of the DCI 522. In some examples, the second field may be a DCI type indication field, e.g. with 1 bit indication. For example, the second field may be a first value (such as “1” or “0” ) indicating that the DCI 522 is used for indicating skipping measurement gap (s) . In some examples, after receiving the DCI 522, the terminal device 110 may read the second field, if the second field is the first value, the terminal device 110 may determine that a measurement gap skipping (or deactivation) indication field is present in the DCI 522, and e.g. a resource allocation field will not be present in the DCI 522. In some other examples, if the second field is a second value (different from the first value, e.g. “0” or “1” correspondingly) , then the terminal device 110 may determine that the received DCI is used for resource scheduling, e.g. a resource allocation field will be present in the received DCI while a measurement gap skipping/deactivation indication field is not present.

In the present disclosure, the DCI 522 may include an indication indicating skipping one or more measurement gaps, for example, the indication may be one or more bits in the first field (i.e. a measurement gap skipping/deactivation indication field) .

In some implementations, the indication may be a one-bit indication. The one-bit indication may be set to be a first value indicating that one or more measurement gaps after the DCI 522 should be skipped.

In some embodiments, the one-bit indication may have a first value, and the terminal device 110 may determine that the next (single) measurement gap after the reception of the DCI should be skipped. Otherwise, if the one-bit indication has a second value, the terminal device 110 may determine that the next (single) measurement gap after the reception of the DCI should not be skipped. For example, the first value is 1 (or 0) , and the second value is 0 (or 1) .

In some other embodiments, the one-bit indication may have a first value, and the terminal device 110 may determine that the next one or more measurement gaps after the reception of the DCI should be skipped. Otherwise, if the one-bit indication has a second value, the terminal device 110 may determine that the next one or more measurement gaps after the reception of the DCI should not be skipped. For example, the first value is 1 (or 0) , and the second value is 0 (or 1) .

In some examples, a number of the one or more measurement gaps (represented as N) or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps locate are (represented as T) may be preconfigured. In some examples, the terminal device 110 may determine the one or more measurement gaps based on the number or the time duration after a reception of the DCI 522.

In some examples, the terminal device 110 may be configured with a timer or a counter. For example, after receiving the DCI 522 (i.e. the one-bit indication with a first value) , the terminal device 110 may determine that the one or more measurement gaps in the time duration of T should be skipped, for example, the one or more measurement gaps are overlapped with the time duration T, or the start time instances of the one or more measurement gaps are within the time duration T. For example, after receiving the DCI 522 (i.e. the one-bit indication with a first value) , the terminal device 110 may start a counter and determine the one or more measurement gaps based on the counter. In some examples, in case the timer or the counter is not expired (still running) at a start time of a certain measurement gap, then the certain measurement gap should be skipped.

In some other embodiments, the one-bit indication may have a first value, and the terminal device 110 may start skipping the measurement gaps after receiving the DCI 522. In some examples, the terminal device 110 may determine that all following measurement gaps should be skipped until a further DCI is received. For example, the further DCI may include a one-bit indication with a second value.

In some implementations, if the DCI 522 which indicate that a measurement gap should be skipped is received by the terminal device 110, the terminal device 110 may not expect to receive another DCI which indicate that the measurement gap should not be skipped.

In some examples, if a further DCI is received, e.g. during the skipping of the one or more measurement gaps (for example, during the time duration or during the running of the counter) , and the further DCI indicates to stop skipping measurement gaps, then the terminal device 110 may stop skipping based on the further DCI. For example, the further DCI may include a one-bit indication with a second value. In this case, the number of measurement gaps actually being skipped may be less than N. For example, there may be one or more than one measurement gap between the DCI 522 and the further DCI, and the one or more than one measurement gap is skipped. In some examples, in case the timer or the counter is not expired (still running) at a start time of a certain measurement gap, then the certain measurement gap should be skipped.

In some implementations, the indication may be a multi-bit indication, that is, the indication includes multiple bits. The indication may indicate that one or more measurement gaps after the DCI 522 should be skipped.

In some embodiments, the indication (multiple bits) may indicate a number of the one or more measurement gaps, which may be represented as N. In some examples, the multiple bits may be 2 bits which may represent 4 values, i.e., 0, 1, 2, 3 for decimal numbers. For example, “0” may represent that the following 3 measurement gaps after the DCI 522 should not be skipped, “1” may represent that the following first measurement gap after the DCI 522 should be skipped, “2” may represent that the following first and second measurement gaps after the DCI 522 should be skipped, and “3” may represent that the following three measurement gaps after the DCI 522 should be skipped. For another example, “0” may represent that the following first measurement gaps after the DCI 522 should be skipped, “1” may represent that the following first and second measurement gaps after the DCI 522 should be skipped, “2” may represent that the following 3 measurement gaps after the DCI 522 should be skipped, and “3” may represent that the following 4 measurement gaps after the DCI 522 should be skipped.

In some embodiments, the indication (multiple bits) may indicate a time duration of the one or more measurement gaps, which may be represented as T. For example, all of the one or more measurement gaps should be within the time duration, or each start time of the one or more measurement gaps should be within the time duration. For example, a front part of the last measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps is within the time duration, and a rear part of the last measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps is out of the time duration. In some examples, the multiple bits may be 2 bits which may represent 1, 2, 4, and 8 time units respectively, where the time unit may be one of: slot, sub-frame, frame, millisecond, second, etc.

In some examples, the terminal device 110 may be configured with a timer or a counter. For example, after receiving the DCI 522 (i.e. the multi-bit indication indicating the time duration T) , the terminal device 110 may determine that the one or more measurement gaps in the time duration of T should be skipped, for example, the one or more measurement gaps are overlapped with the time duration T, or the start time instances of the one or more measurement gaps are within the time duration T. For example, after receiving the DCI 522 (i.e. the multi-bit indication indicating the number N) , the terminal device 110 may start the counter and may determine the one or more measurement gaps based on the counter.

In some embodiments, the indication (multiple bits) may be a bitmap corresponding to multiple measurement gaps after the DCI 522. In some examples, the bitmap may have K bits, if the i-th bit is a first value, it may represent that the i-th measurement gap after the DCI 522 should be skipped; if the i-th bit is a second value, it may represent that the i-th measurement gap after the DCI 522 should not be skipped. For example, the first value may be 1 (or 0) and the second value may be 0 (or 1) . For example, the number of the one or more measurement gaps that should be skipped may equal to or less than K. For example, the one or more measurement gaps may not be contiguous.

In some implementations, if multiple DCIs have been received before a start of a measurement gap, then the terminal device 110 may determine whether to skip the measurement gap based on a latest received DCI in the multiple DCIs. For example, the DCI 522 (with one-bit indication or multi-bit indication) may be a latest one in the multiple DCIs before the measurement gap.

In some implementations, the DCI 522 may a group common DCI. In some implementations, the DCI 522 (i.e. the group common DCI) may include multiple indication fields corresponding to multiple terminal devices. FIG. 6B illustrates an example schematic of a group common DCI 620. As shown in FIG. 6B, the DCI in the search space occasion is a group common DCI, which may indicate MG1 for a first UE and MG2 for a second UE to be skipped. As such, multiple terminal devices may share a same group common DCI, signalling overhead may be reduced since there is no need to transmit separate DCIs for each terminal device.

For example, the multiple indication fields may be multiple information blocks. In some implementations, the terminal device 110 may determine, from the multiple information blocks, a specific information block which is corresponding to the terminal device 110. In some examples, the terminal device 110 may be preconfigured with an integer which indicates the specific information block from the multiple information blocks, and further determine the measurement gap skipping/deactivation indication field based on the specific information block. For example, the terminal device 110 may be preconfigured with an integer M0 which indicate the M0-th information block of the multiple information blocks. In some examples, the group common DCI may be transmitted with a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) scrambled by a specific radio network temporary identity (RNTI) . For example, the specific RNTI may be a measurement group RNTI (MG-RNTI) , a scheduling restriction RNTI (SR-RNTI) , or another dedicated RNTI.

In some implementations, each of the one or more measurement gaps will be skipped. In some examples, the following measurement gaps (e.g. after the one or more measurement gaps) may be resumed or kept activated after the end of the time duration of after the N measurement gaps.

In some other implementations, for a measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps (such as a specific MG) , the terminal device 110 may further determine whether an exception condition is met. If the exception condition is met, then the measurement gap will not be skipped. In some embodiments, the exception condition may include one of: a repetition period of the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a period threshold, a measurement gap configuration for the specific measurement gap configures that the specific measurement gap is not allowed for skipping, or a number of consecutive measurement gaps with a same measurement gap configuration being skipped before the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a number threshold. For example, the specific measurement gap may be determined based on a specific measurement gap configuration, which is configured by the network device 120 not to allow skipping, e.g. in RRC signalling or in a specific information element such as “MeasGapConfig” . It should be noted that some other exception conditions may be included in some other cases, which will not be listed herein.

In some examples, the terminal device 110 determines to skip multiple measurement gaps, but a measurement gap should not be skipped if an exception condition is met, for example, the repetition period of this measurement gap configuration is equal to or larger than a threshold (such as 80 ms or 160 ms) , or the measurement gap configuration is preconfigured as an exception (i.e., do not allow skipping) , or the number of consecutive skipped measurement gaps of this measurement gap configuration before the start of this measurement gap is larger than or equal to a threshold (such as 3, 4 or another value) .

In the process 500, the terminal device 110 and the network device 120 perform 540 communications, e.g. during the one or more measurement gaps.

In some implementations, the network device 120 may transmit another DCI (such as a second DCI, for example the DCI 522 may be a first DCI) within a measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps. In some implementations, the second DCI may indicate that the skipping is terminated or completed. In some other implementations, the second DCI may be a scheduling DCI, e.g. scheduling a DL transmission or a UL transmission.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device 110 receives the second DCI in a measurement gap, and the second DCI may indicate that the skipping is terminated or completed, then the terminal device 110 may stop the transmission/reception in the remaining time of the measurement gap. In some examples, the terminal device 110 may perform (ore resume) neighbor cell measurement in the remaining time of the measurement gap. In some other examples, it may be up to the implementation of the terminal device 110 (UE implementation) to determine whether to preform measurement in the remaining time of the measurement gap.

In some embodiments, the remaining time of the measurement gap may refer to the part of measurement gap after the end of the second DCI. In some other embodiments, the remaining time of the measurement gap may refer to the part of measurement gap after a specific offset from an end of the second DCI.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device 110 may be configured with a further timer (which may be referred to as a second timer, for example, the time for the time duration discussed above may be a first timer) , and the terminal device 110 may reset or start the second timer after it receives a scheduling DCI (e.g. the second DCI) in the measurement gap or after the end of the indicated time duration (e.g. the first timer) , or the terminal device 110 may reset or start the second timer after it transmits a UL transmission (e.g., a HARQ-ACK feedback) or receives a DL transmission (e.g., a PDSCH or a PDCCH which comprise HARQ-ACK information) , and if the second timer ends (e.g. equals to 0 or a set maximum value) or is expired and the measurement gap is not ended yet, the terminal device 110 may determine that the measurement gap skipping is terminated/completed, and the terminal device 110 may perform measurement in the remaining time of the measurement gap. In some examples, the terminal device 110 will stop (or cease) skipping the remaining time of the measurement gap. In some examples, the second timer is started after the end of the time duration (i.e. the first timer) , then the measurement gap may be the last one in the one or more measurement gaps. In some examples, the remaining time of the measurement gap may be the part of the measurement gap after the expiry of the second timer.

Although the process 500 is discussed with an indication in the DCI 522 considered by the terminal device 110, in some other scenarios, the indication in the DCI 522 may be ignored by the terminal device 110.

In some implementations, the terminal device 110 may determine to ignore the indication in the DCI 522 or the terminal device 110 may not expect to receive the DCI 522 if at least one of the following conditions is met: a trigger event for a measurement report is met, a measurement report has been transmitted from the terminal device, or a last measurement result indicates that a channel quality a serving cell of the terminal device is lower than or not larger than a threshold.

In some examples, if a trigger event (e.g., event A1/A2/A3/A4/A5/A6) for measurement reporting is met and/or the terminal device 110 has sent a measurement reporting, the terminal device 110 does not expect receive a DCI which indicates to skip measurement gap (s) . In some examples, if the last one or more reported (or measured) RRM measurement results (e.g., RSRP, RSSI, etc. ) of a serving cell (e.g., a PCell or a PScell) is equal to or lower than a threshold, the terminal device 110 does not expect receive a DCI which indicates to skip measurement gap (s) . In this case, if the DCI 522 is received, the terminal device 110 may ignore it, and does not skip the one or more following MGs (i.e., regardless of which measurement gap configuration it is associated) .

For example, the measurement gap is not skipped if it is associated with the trigger event or the measurement report, for example, the measurement gap is used to measure a neighbor cell which is associated with the trigger event or the measurement event.

In some implementations, if the terminal device 110 does not expect to receive the DCI (with a measurement gap skipping/deactivation indication) or has determined to ignore the DCI (with a measurement gap skipping/deactivation indication) , the terminal device 110 may not perform monitoring for the DCI in the search space set. In some examples, the terminal device 110 may monitor the DCI 522 in the search space set if any of the conditions is not met.

In some implementations, the terminal device 110 may transmit feedback information to the network device 120. For example, the feedback information may indicate that the DCI (with a measurement gap skipping/deactivation indication) is not expected or is ignored. In some examples, after the terminal device 110 determines to ignore the indication in the DCI, the terminal device 110 may transmit the feedback information to the network device 120 to indicate that the indication is ignored. For example, the feedback information may be transmitted by one of: a PUCCH (e.g., reusing scheduling resource) , a random access channel (RACH) preamble, or a MAC-CE.

According to some example embodiments discussed with reference to FIGS. 5-6B, an indication for skipping one or more measurement gaps may be explicitly included in the DCI from the network device 120, in addition, one or more measurement gaps may be skipped, as such, a dynamic deactivation of the measurement gap may be achieved.

FIG. 7 illustrates a flowchart of an example method 700 implemented at a terminal device in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. For the purpose of discussion, the terminal device which may perform the method 700 can be the terminal device 110 discussed above.

At block 710, the terminal device receives, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, where the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration. At block 720, the terminal device receives, from the network device, a DCI based on the search space set configuration, where the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped. At block 730, the terminal device performs communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In some example embodiments, an association of the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration comprises at least one of: a periodicity of search space occasions indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a measurement gap repetition period of measurement gaps indicated by the measurement gap configuration, a start time of a search space occasion indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a start time of a measurement gap indicated by the measurement gap configuration, or the search space set configuration is configured to indicate the one or more measurement gaps to be skipped.

In some example embodiments, an association of the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration comprises at least one of: the search space occasion starts from a time offset before the start time of the measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the DCI comprises at least one of: a downlink scheduling DCI dedicated to the terminal device, an uplink scheduling DCI dedicated to the terminal device, or a group common DCI for a plurality of terminal devices which comprises the terminal device.

In some example embodiments, the DCI comprises the group common DCI and the group common DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of terminal devices respectively, and the terminal device determines, from the plurality of fields, a field corresponding to the terminal device, wherein the field comprises the indication.

In some example embodiments, the group common DCI is transmitted with a CRC scrambled by a specific RNTI.

In some example embodiments, the DCI comprises at least one of: a first field comprising at least one bit indicating whether to skip the one or more measurement gaps or not, or a second field comprising at least one bit indicating a type of the DCI.

In some example embodiments, the indication comprises a bit with a first value indicating to the terminal device to skip the one or more measurement gaps after a reception of the DCI.

In some example embodiments, a number of the one or more measurement gaps or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps locate is preconfigured.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device receives, from the network device, a further DCI comprises a bit with a second value indicating to the terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps after a reception of the further DCI, where the one or more measurement gaps are between the reception of the DCI and the reception of the further DCI.

In some example embodiments, the indication comprises a plurality of bits indicating one of: a number of the one or more measurement gaps to be skipped, or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device determines the one or more measurement gaps based on the time duration, where a start time of each of the one or more measurement gaps is within the time duration.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device starts a counter based on the number of the one or more measurement gaps after receiving the DCI; or starts a timer based on the time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are after receiving the DCI.

In some example embodiments, if the counter or the timer is not expired at a start time of a measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps, the terminal device skips the measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the indication comprises a bitmap, and wherein the bitmap comprises one or more bits corresponding to the one or more measurement gaps respectively.

In some example embodiments, a first bit in the one or more bits has a first value indicating that a corresponding measurement gap is to be skipped, or a second bit in the one or more bits has a second value indicating that a corresponding gap is not to be skipped.

In some example embodiments, if an exception condition associated with a specific measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps is met, the terminal device ceases skipping for the specific measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the exception condition associated with the specific measurement gap comprises at least one of: a repetition period of the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a period threshold, a measurement gap configuration for the specific measurement gap configures that the specific measurement gap is not allowed for skipping, or a number of consecutive measurement gaps with a same measurement gap configuration being skipped before the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a number threshold.

In some example embodiments, a plurality of DCIs has been received by the terminal device, and the DCI is a latest one in the plurality of DCIs.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device receives, from the network device, a further DCI within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, wherein the further DCI indicates to the terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device starts a further timer, within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, after a time duration indicated by the DCI or after receiving a scheduling DCI within the certain measurement gap; and if the further timer is expired within the certain measurement gap, the terminal device stops skipping a remaining part of the certain measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, if at least one of the following conditions is met, the terminal device ignores the indication in the DCI: a trigger event for a measurement report is met, a measurement report has been transmitted from the terminal device, or a last measurement result indicates that a channel quality a serving cell of the terminal device is lower than or not larger than a threshold. In some example embodiments, the terminal device transmits, to the network device, feedback information indicating that the indication in the DCI is ignored.

In some example embodiments, the search space set configuration is associated with a plurality of measurement gap configurations comprising the measurement gap configuration, where the DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of measurement gap configurations.

In some example embodiments, a different search space set configuration is further configured associated with a different measurement gap configuration.

FIG. 8 illustrates a flowchart of an example method 800 implemented at a network device in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. For the purpose of discussion, the network device which may perform the method 800 can be the network device 120 mentioned above.

At block 810, the network device transmits, to at least one terminal device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, where the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration. At block 820, the network device transmits, to the at least one terminal device, a DCI based on the search space set configuration, where the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped. At block 830, the network device performs communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In some example embodiments, the DCI comprises at least one of: a downlink scheduling DCI dedicated to one of the at least one terminal device, an uplink scheduling DCI dedicated to one of the at least one terminal device, or a group common DCI for a plurality of terminal devices which comprises the at least one terminal device.

In some example embodiments, the DCI comprises the group common DCI and the group common DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of terminal devices respectively.

In some example embodiments, the indication comprises a bit with a first value indicating to the at least one terminal device to skip the one or more measurement gaps after a reception of the DCI.

In some example embodiments, the network device configures, to the at least one terminal device, a number of the one or more measurement gaps or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are.

In some example embodiments, the network device transmits, to the at least one terminal device, a further DCI comprises a bit with a second value indicating to the at least one terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps after a reception of the further DCI, where the one or more measurement gaps are between the reception of the DCI and the reception of the further DCI.

In some example embodiments, the network device determines the one or more measurement gaps based on the time duration, wherein a start time of each of the one or more measurement gaps is within the time duration.

In some example embodiments, the network device starts a counter based on the number of the one or more measurement gaps after transmitting the DCI; or starts a timer based on the time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are after transmitting the DCI.

In some example embodiments, if an exception condition associated with a specific measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps is met, the network device ceases skipping for the specific measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, a plurality of DCIs has been transmitted to the at least one terminal device, and the DCI is a latest one in the plurality of DCIs.

In some example embodiments, the network device transmits, to one of the at least one terminal device, a further DCI within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, wherein the further DCI indicates to the at least one terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps.

In some example embodiments, the network device receives, from the one of the at least one terminal device, feedback information indicating that the indication in the DCI is ignored due to at least one of: a trigger event for a measurement report is met, a measurement report has been transmitted from the one of the at least one terminal device, or a last measurement result indicates that a channel quality a serving cell of the one of the at least one terminal device is lower than or not larger than a threshold.

FIG. 9 illustrates a flowchart of an example method 900 implemented at a terminal device in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. For the purpose of discussion, the terminal device which may perform the method 900 can be the terminal device 110 mentioned above.

At block 910, the terminal device receives, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps. At 920, the terminal device receives, from the network device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of CG transmissions or a plurality of SPS transmissions. At 930, in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, the terminal device skips the first measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the first measurement gap is overlapped with a second measurement gap which is not skipped and a start time of the first measurement gap is earlier than a start time of the second measurement gap, and the terminal device stops performing a reception or a transmission in part of the first measurement gap which is overlapped with the second measurement gap.

FIG. 10 illustrates a flowchart of an example method 1000 implemented at a network device in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. For the purpose of discussion, the network device which may perform the method 1000 can be the network device 120 mentioned above.

At block 1010, the network device transmits, to a terminal device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps. At block 1020, the network device transmits, to the terminal device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of CG transmissions or a plurality of SPS transmissions. At block 1020, in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, the network device skips the first measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the first measurement gap is overlapped with a second measurement gap which is not skipped and a start time of the first measurement gap is earlier than a start time of the second measurement gap, and the network device stops performing a reception or a transmission in part of the first measurement gap which is overlapped with the second measurement gap.

Details of some embodiments according to the present disclosure have been described with reference to FIGS. 1-10. Now an example implementation of the terminal device and the network device will be discussed below.

In some example embodiments, a terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: receive, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration; receive, from the network device, a DCI based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and perform communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In some example embodiments, the DCI comprises the group common DCI and the group common DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of terminal devices respectively, and the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: determine, from the plurality of fields, a field corresponding to the terminal device, wherein the field comprises the indication.

In some example embodiments, the group common DCI is transmitted with a CRC scrambled by a specific radio RNTI.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to:receive, from the network device, a further DCI comprises a bit with a second value indicating to the terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps after a reception of the further DCI, wherein the one or more measurement gaps are between the reception of the DCI and the reception of the further DCI.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: determine the one or more measurement gaps based on the time duration, wherein a start time of each of the one or more measurement gaps is within the time duration.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: start a counter based on the number of the one or more measurement gaps after receiving the DCI; or start a timer based on the time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are after receiving the DCI.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: in accordance with a determination that the counter or the timer is not expired at a start time of a measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps, skip the measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to:in accordance with a determination that an exception condition associated with a specific measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps is met, cease skipping for the specific measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: receive, from the network device, a further DCI within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, wherein the further DCI indicates to the terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: start a further timer, within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, after a time duration indicated by the DCI or after receiving a scheduling DCI within the certain measurement gap; and in accordance with a determination that the further timer is expired within the certain measurement gap, stop skipping a remaining part of the certain measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: in accordance with a determination that at least one of the following conditions is met, ignore the indication in the DCI: a trigger event for a measurement report is met, a measurement report has been transmitted from the terminal device, or a last measurement result indicates that a channel quality a serving cell of the terminal device is lower than or not larger than a threshold.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: transmit, to the network device, feedback information indicating that the indication in the DCI is ignored.

In some example embodiments, the search space set configuration is associated with a plurality of measurement gap configurations comprising the measurement gap configuration, wherein the DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of measurement gap configurations.

In some example embodiments, a network device comprises circuitry configured to: transmit, to at least one terminal device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration; transmit, to the at least one terminal device, a DCI based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and perform communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In some example embodiments, the network device comprises circuitry configured to: configure, to the at least one terminal device, a number of the one or more measurement gaps or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are.

In some example embodiments, the network device comprises circuitry configured to:transmit, to the at least one terminal device, a further DCI comprises a bit with a second value indicating to the at least one terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps after a reception of the further DCI, wherein the one or more measurement gaps are between the reception of the DCI and the reception of the further DCI.

In some example embodiments, the network device comprises circuitry configured to: determine the one or more measurement gaps based on the time duration, wherein a start time of each of the one or more measurement gaps is within the time duration.

In some example embodiments, the network device comprises circuitry configured to: start a counter based on the number of the one or more measurement gaps after transmitting the DCI; or start a timer based on the time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are after transmitting the DCI.

In some example embodiments, the network device comprises circuitry configured to: in accordance with a determination that an exception condition associated with a specific measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps is met, cease skipping for the specific measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the network device comprises circuitry configured to: transmit, to one of the at least one terminal device, a further DCI within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, wherein the further DCI indicates to the at least one terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps.

In some example embodiments, the network device comprises circuitry configured to: receive, from the one of the at least one terminal device, feedback information indicating that the indication in the DCI is ignored due to at least one of: a trigger event for a measurement report is met, a measurement report has been transmitted from the one of the at least one terminal device, or a last measurement result indicates that a channel quality a serving cell of the one of the at least one terminal device is lower than or not larger than a threshold.

In some example embodiments, a terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: receive, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps; receive, from the network device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of CG transmissions or a plurality of SPS transmissions; and in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, skip the first measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the first measurement gap is overlapped with a second measurement gap which is not skipped and a start time of the first measurement gap is earlier than a start time of the second measurement gap, and wherein the terminal device comprises circuitry configured to: stop performing a reception or a transmission in part of the first measurement gap which is overlapped with the second measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, a network device comprises circuitry configured to: transmit, to a terminal device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps; transmit, to the terminal device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of CG transmissions or a plurality of SPS transmissions; and in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, skip the first measurement gap.

In some example embodiments, the first measurement gap is overlapped with a second measurement gap which is not skipped and a start time of the first measurement gap is earlier than a start time of the second measurement gap, and the network device comprises circuitry configured to: stop performing a reception or a transmission in part of the first measurement gap which is overlapped with the second measurement gap.

FIG. 11 illustrates a simplified block diagram of a device 1100 that is suitable for implementing embodiments of the present disclosure. The device 1100 can be considered as a further example implementation of the terminal device and the network device as described above. Accordingly, the device 1100 can be implemented at or as at least a part of the terminal device or the network device.

As shown, the device 1100 includes a processor 1110, a memory 1120 coupled to the processor 1110, a suitable transceiver 1140 coupled to the processor 1110, and a communication interface coupled to the transceiver 1140. The memory 1120 stores at least a part of a program 1130. The transceiver 1140 may be for bidirectional communications or a unidirectional communication based on requirements. The transceiver 1140 may include at least one of a transmitter and a receiver. The transmitter and the receiver may be functional modules or physical entities. The transceiver 1140 has at least one antenna to facilitate communication, though in practice an Access Node mentioned in this application may have several ones. The communication interface may represent any interface that is necessary for communication with other network elements, such as X2/Xn interface for bidirectional communications between eNBs/gNBs, S1/NG interface for communication between a Mobility Management Entity (MME) /Access and Mobility Management Function (AMF) /SGW/UPF and the eNB/gNB, Un interface for communication between the eNB/gNB and a relay node (RN) , or Uu interface for communication between the eNB/gNB and a terminal device.

The program 1130 is assumed to include program instructions that, when executed by the associated processor 1110, enable the device 1100 to operate in accordance with the embodiments of the present disclosure, as discussed herein with reference to FIGS. 1-10. The embodiments herein may be implemented by computer software executable by the processor 1110 of the device 1100, or by hardware, or by a combination of software and hardware. The processor 1110 may be configured to implement various embodiments of the present disclosure. Furthermore, a combination of the processor 1110 and memory 1120 may form processing means 1150 adapted to implement various embodiments of the present disclosure.

The memory 1120 may be of any type suitable to the local technical network and may be implemented using any suitable data storage technology, such as a non-transitory computer readable storage medium, semiconductor-based memory devices, magnetic memory devices and systems, optical memory devices and systems, fixed memory and removable memory, as non-limiting examples. While only one memory 1120 is shown in the device 1100, there may be several physically distinct memory modules in the device 1100. The processor 1110 may be of any type suitable to the local technical network, and may include one or more of general purpose computers, special purpose computers, microprocessors, digital signal processors (DSPs) and processors based on multicore processor architecture, as non-limiting examples. The device 1100 may have multiple processors, such as an application specific integrated circuit chip that is slaved in time to a clock which synchronizes the main processor.

In summary, embodiments of the present disclosure may provide the following solutions.

The present disclosure provides a terminal device, comprising at least one processor configured to cause the terminal device at least to: receive, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration; receive, from the network device, a DCI based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and perform communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, an association of the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration comprises at least one of: a periodicity of search space occasions indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a measurement gap repetition period of measurement gaps indicated by the measurement gap configuration, a start time of a search space occasion indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a start time of a measurement gap indicated by the measurement gap configuration, or the search space set configuration is configured to indicate the one or more measurement gaps to be skipped.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, an association of the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration comprises at least one of: the search space occasion starts from a time offset before the start time of the measurement gap.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the DCI comprises at least one of: a downlink scheduling DCI dedicated to the terminal device, an uplink scheduling DCI dedicated to the terminal device, or a group common DCI for a plurality of terminal devices which comprises the terminal device.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the DCI comprises the group common DCI and the group common DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of terminal devices respectively, and wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: determine, from the plurality of fields, a field corresponding to the terminal device, wherein the field comprises the indication.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the group common DCI is transmitted with a CRC scrambled by a specific RNTI.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the DCI comprises at least one of: a first field comprising at least one bit indicating whether to skip the one or more measurement gaps or not, or a second field comprising at least one bit indicating a type of the DCI.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the indication comprises a bit with a first value indicating to the terminal device to skip the one or more measurement gaps after a reception of the DCI.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, a number of the one or more measurement gaps or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps locate is preconfigured.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: receive, from the network device, a further DCI comprises a bit with a second value indicating to the terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps after a reception of the further DCI, wherein the one or more measurement gaps are between the reception of the DCI and the reception of the further DCI.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the indication comprises a plurality of bits indicating one of: a number of the one or more measurement gaps to be skipped, or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: determine the one or more measurement gaps based on the time duration, wherein a start time of each of the one or more measurement gaps is within the time duration.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: start a counter based on the number of the one or more measurement gaps after receiving the DCI; or start a timer based on the time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are after receiving the DCI.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: in accordance with a determination that the counter or the timer is not expired at a start time of a measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps, skip the measurement gap.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the indication comprises a bitmap, and wherein the bitmap comprises one or more bits corresponding to the one or more measurement gaps respectively.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, a first bit in the one or more bits has a first value indicating that a corresponding measurement gap is to be skipped, or a second bit in the one or more bits has a second value indicating that a corresponding gap is not to be skipped.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: in accordance with a determination that an exception condition associated with a specific measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps is met, cease skipping for the specific measurement gap.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the exception condition associated with the specific measurement gap comprises at least one of: a repetition period of the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a period threshold, a measurement gap configuration for the specific measurement gap configures that the specific measurement gap is not allowed for skipping, or a number of consecutive measurement gaps with a same measurement gap configuration being skipped before the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a number threshold.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, a plurality of DCIs has been received by the terminal device, and the DCI is a latest one in the plurality of DCIs.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: receive, from the network device, a further DCI within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, wherein the further DCI indicates to the terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: start a further timer, within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, after a time duration indicated by the DCI or after receiving a scheduling DCI within the certain measurement gap; and in accordance with a determination that the further timer is expired within the certain measurement gap, stop skipping a remaining part of the certain measurement gap.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: in accordance with a determination that at least one of the following conditions is met, ignore the indication in the DCI: a trigger event for a measurement report is met, a measurement report has been transmitted from the terminal device, or a last measurement result indicates that a channel quality a serving cell of the terminal device is lower than or not larger than a threshold.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: transmit, to the network device, feedback information indicating that the indication in the DCI is ignored.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the search space set configuration is associated with a plurality of measurement gap configurations comprising the measurement gap configuration, wherein the DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of measurement gap configurations.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, a different search space set configuration is further configured associated with a different measurement gap configuration.

The present disclosure provides a network device, comprising at least one processor configured to cause the network device at least to: transmit, to at least one terminal device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration; transmit, to the at least one terminal device, a DCI based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and perform communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, an association of the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration comprises at least one of: a periodicity of search space occasions indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a measurement gap repetition period of measurement gaps indicated by the measurement gap configuration, a start time of a search space occasion indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a start time of a measurement gap indicated by the measurement gap configuration, or the search space set configuration is configured to indicate the one or more measurement gaps to be skipped.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, an association of the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration comprises at least one of: the search space occasion starts from a time offset before the start time of the measurement gap.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the DCI comprises at least one of: a downlink scheduling DCI dedicated to one of the at least one terminal device, an uplink scheduling DCI dedicated to one of the at least one terminal device, or a group common DCI for a plurality of terminal devices which comprises the at least one terminal device.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the DCI comprises the group common DCI and the group common DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of terminal devices respectively.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the group common DCI is transmitted with a CRC scrambled by a specific RNTI.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the DCI comprises at least one of: a first field comprising at least one bit indicating whether to skip the one or more measurement gaps or not, or a second field comprising at least one bit indicating a type of the DCI.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the indication comprises a bit with a first value indicating to the at least one terminal device to skip the one or more measurement gaps after a reception of the DCI.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the network device to: configure, to the at least one terminal device, a number of the one or more measurement gaps or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the network device to: transmit, to the at least one terminal device, a further DCI comprises a bit with a second value indicating to the at least one terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps after a reception of the further DCI, wherein the one or more measurement gaps are between the reception of the DCI and the reception of the further DCI.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the indication comprises a plurality of bits indicating one of: a number of the one or more measurement gaps to be skipped, or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the network device to: determine the one or more measurement gaps based on the time duration, wherein a start time of each of the one or more measurement gaps is within the time duration.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the network device to: start a counter based on the number of the one or more measurement gaps after transmitting the DCI; or start a timer based on the time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are after transmitting the DCI.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the indication comprises a bitmap, and wherein the bitmap comprises one or more bits corresponding to the one or more measurement gaps respectively.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, a first bit in the one or more bits has a first value indicating that a corresponding measurement gap is to be skipped, or a second bit in the one or more bits has a second value indicating that a corresponding gap is not to be skipped.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the network device to: in accordance with a determination that an exception condition associated with a specific measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps is met, cease skipping for the specific measurement gap.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the exception condition associated with the specific measurement gap comprises at least one of: a repetition period of the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a period threshold, a measurement gap configuration for the specific measurement gap configures that the specific measurement gap is not allowed for skipping, or a number of consecutive measurement gaps with a same measurement gap configuration being skipped before the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a number threshold.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, a plurality of DCIs has been transmitted to the at least one terminal device, and the DCI is a latest one in the plurality of DCIs.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the network device to: transmit, to one of the at least one terminal device, a further DCI within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, wherein the further DCI indicates to the at least one terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the at least one processor is further configured to cause the network device to: receive, from the one of the at least one terminal device, feedback information indicating that the indication in the DCI is ignored due to at least one of: a trigger event for a measurement report is met, a measurement report has been transmitted from the one of the at least one terminal device, or a last measurement result indicates that a channel quality a serving cell of the one of the at least one terminal device is lower than or not larger than a threshold.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the search space set configuration is associated with a plurality of measurement gap configurations comprising the measurement gap configuration, wherein the DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of measurement gap configurations.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, a different search space set configuration is further configured associated with a different measurement gap configuration.

The present disclosure provides a terminal device, comprising at least one processor configured to cause the terminal device at least to: receive, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps; receive, from the network device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of CG transmissions or a plurality of SPS transmissions; and in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, skip the first measurement gap.

In one embodiment, the terminal device as above, the first measurement gap is overlapped with a second measurement gap which is not skipped and a start time of the first measurement gap is earlier than a start time of the second measurement gap, and wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to: stop performing a reception or a transmission in part of the first measurement gap which is overlapped with the second measurement gap.

The present disclosure provides a network device, comprising at least one processor configured to cause the network device at least to: transmit, to a terminal device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps; transmit, to the terminal device, a DCI indicating time domain resources for a plurality of CG transmissions or a plurality of SPS transmissions; and in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, skip the first measurement gap.

In one embodiment, the network device as above, the first measurement gap is overlapped with a second measurement gap which is not skipped and a start time of the first measurement gap is earlier than a start time of the second measurement gap, and wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the network device to: stop performing a reception or a transmission in part of the first measurement gap which is overlapped with the second measurement gap.

The present disclosure provides a method of communication, comprising the operations implemented at the terminal device discussed above. The present disclosure provides a method of communication, comprising the operations implemented at the network device discussed above.

The present disclosure provides a terminal device, comprising: a processor; and a memory storing computer program codes; the memory and the computer program codes configured to, with the processor, cause the terminal device to perform the method implemented at the terminal device discussed above.

The present disclosure provides a network device, comprising: a processor; and a memory storing computer program codes; the memory and the computer program codes configured to, with the processor, cause the network device to perform the method implemented at the network device discussed above.

The present disclosure provides a computer readable medium having instructions stored thereon, the instructions, when executed by a processor of an apparatus, causing the apparatus to perform the method implemented at a terminal device or a network device discussed above.

Generally, various embodiments of the present disclosure may be implemented in hardware or special purpose circuits, software, logic or any combination thereof. Some aspects may be implemented in hardware, while other aspects may be implemented in firmware or software which may be executed by a controller, microprocessor or other computing device. While various aspects of embodiments of the present disclosure are illustrated and described as block diagrams, flowcharts, or using some other pictorial representation, it will be appreciated that the blocks, apparatus, systems, techniques or methods described herein may be implemented in, as non-limiting examples, hardware, software, firmware, special purpose circuits or logic, general purpose hardware or controller or other computing devices, or some combination thereof.

The present disclosure also provides at least one computer program product tangibly stored on a non-transitory computer readable storage medium. The computer program product includes computer-executable instructions, such as those included in program modules, being executed in a device on a target real or virtual processor, to carry out the process or method as described above. Generally, program modules include routines, programs, libraries, objects, classes, components, data structures, or the like that perform particular tasks or implement particular abstract data types. The functionality of the program modules may be combined or split between program modules as desired in various embodiments. Machine-executable instructions for program modules may be executed within a local or distributed device. In a distributed device, program modules may be located in both local and remote storage media.

Program code for carrying out methods of the present disclosure may be written in any combination of one or more programming languages. These program codes may be provided to a processor or controller of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, or other programmable data processing apparatus, such that the program codes, when executed by the processor or controller, cause the functions/operations specified in the flowcharts and/or block diagrams to be implemented. The program code may execute entirely on a machine, partly on the machine, as a stand-alone software package, partly on the machine and partly on a remote machine or entirely on the remote machine or server.

The above program code may be embodied on a machine readable medium, which may be any tangible medium that may contain, or store a program for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device. The machine readable medium may be a machine readable signal medium or a machine readable storage medium. A machine readable medium may include but not limited to an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus, or device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing. More specific examples of the machine readable storage medium would include an electrical connection having one or more wires, a portable computer diskette, a hard disk, a random access memory (RAM) , a read-only memory (ROM) , an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory) , an optical fiber, a portable compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM) , an optical storage device, a magnetic storage device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing.

Further, while operations are depicted in a particular order, this should not be understood as requiring that such operations be performed in the particular order shown or in sequential order, or that all illustrated operations be performed, to achieve desirable results. In certain circumstances, multitasking and parallel processing may be advantageous. Likewise, while several specific implementation details are contained in the above discussions, these should not be construed as limitations on the scope of the present disclosure, but rather as descriptions of features that may be specific to particular embodiments. Certain features that are described in the context of separate embodiments may also be implemented in combination in a single embodiment. Conversely, various features that are described in the context of a single embodiment may also be implemented in multiple embodiments separately or in any suitable sub-combination.

Although the present disclosure has been described in language specific to structural features and/or methodological acts, it is to be understood that the present disclosure defined in the appended claims is not necessarily limited to the specific features or acts described above. Rather, the specific features and acts described above are disclosed as example forms of implementing the claims.

Claims

A terminal device comprising at least one processor configured to cause the terminal device to:

receive, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration;

receive, from the network device, downlink control information (DCI) based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and

perform communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein an association of the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration comprises at least one of:

a periodicity of search space occasions indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a measurement gap repetition period of measurement gaps indicated by the measurement gap configuration,

a start time of a search space occasion indicated by the search space set configuration is associated with a start time of a measurement gap indicated by the measurement gap configuration, or

the search space set configuration is configured to indicate the one or more measurement gaps to be skipped.
The terminal device of claim 2, wherein an association of the search space set configuration and the measurement gap configuration comprises at least one of:

the search space occasion starts from a time offset before the start time of the measurement gap.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the DCI comprises at least one of:

a downlink scheduling DCI dedicated to the terminal device,

an uplink scheduling DCI dedicated to the terminal device, or

a group common DCI for a plurality of terminal devices which comprises the terminal device.
The terminal device of claim 4, wherein the DCI comprises the group common DCI and the group common DCI comprises a plurality of fields corresponding to the plurality of terminal devices respectively, and wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to:

determine, from the plurality of fields, a field corresponding to the terminal device, wherein the field comprises the indication.
The terminal device of claim 4, wherein the group common DCI is transmitted with a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) scrambled by a specific radio network temporary identity (RNTI) .
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the DCI comprises at least one of:

a first field comprising at least one bit indicating whether to skip the one or more measurement gaps or not, or

a second field comprising at least one bit indicating a type of the DCI.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the indication comprises a bit with a first value indicating to the terminal device to skip the one or more measurement gaps after a reception of the DCI.
The terminal device of claim 8, wherein a number of the one or more measurement gaps or a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps locate is preconfigured.
The terminal device of claim 8, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to:

receive, from the network device, a further DCI comprises a bit with a second value indicating to the terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps after a reception of the further DCI, wherein the one or more measurement gaps are between the reception of the DCI and the reception of the further DCI.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the indication comprises a plurality of bits indicating one of:

a number of the one or more measurement gaps to be skipped, or

a time duration within which the one or more measurement gaps are.
The terminal device of claim 9 or 11, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to:

determine the one or more measurement gaps based on the time duration, wherein a start time of each of the one or more measurement gaps is within the time duration.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the indication comprises a bitmap, and wherein the bitmap comprises one or more bits corresponding to the one or more measurement gaps respectively.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to:

in accordance with a determination that an exception condition associated with a specific measurement gap in the one or more measurement gaps is met, cease skipping for the specific measurement gap.
The terminal device of claim 14, wherein the exception condition associated with the specific measurement gap comprises at least one of:

a repetition period of the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a period threshold,

a measurement gap configuration for the specific measurement gap configures that the specific measurement gap is not allowed for skipping, or

a number of consecutive measurement gaps with a same measurement gap configuration being skipped before the specific measurement gap is larger than or not less than a number threshold.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to:

receive, from the network device, a further DCI within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, wherein the further DCI indicates to the terminal device to stop skipping measurement gaps.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to:

start a further timer, within a certain measurement gap of the one or more measurement gaps, after a time duration indicated by the DCI or after receiving a scheduling DCI within the certain measurement gap; and

in accordance with a determination that the further timer is expired within the certain measurement gap, stop skipping a remaining part of the certain measurement gap.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to cause the terminal device to:

in accordance with a determination that at least one of the following conditions is met, ignore the indication in the DCI:

a trigger event for a measurement report is met,

a measurement report has been transmitted from the terminal device, or

a last measurement result indicates that a channel quality a serving cell of the terminal device is lower than or not larger than a threshold.
A network device comprising at least one processor configured to cause the network device at least to:

transmit, to at least one terminal device, a measurement gap configuration and a search space set configuration, wherein the search space set configuration is associated with the measurement gap configuration;

transmit, to the at least one terminal device, downlink control information (DCI) based on the search space set configuration, wherein the DCI comprises an indication indicating that one or more measurement gaps in the measurement gap configuration associated with the search space set configuration are skipped; and

perform communication based on the DCI by skipping the one or more measurement gaps.
A terminal device comprising at least one processor configured to cause the terminal device to:

receive, from a network device, a measurement gap configuration indicating a plurality of measurement gaps;

receive, from the network device, downlink control information (DCI) indicating time domain resources for a plurality of configured grant (CG) transmissions or a plurality of semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) transmissions; and

in accordance with a determination a time domain resource of a first CG transmission in the plurality of CG transmissions or a first SPS transmission in the plurality of SPS transmissions after the DCI is overlapped with a first measurement gap of the plurality of measurement gaps, skip the first measurement gap.