WO2025160858A1

WO2025160858A1 - Systems and methods for capacity expansion of physical uplink shared channel (pusch) transmission

Info

Publication number: WO2025160858A1
Application number: PCT/CN2024/075089
Authority: WO
Inventors: Junli Li; Nan Zhang; Ziyang Li; Fangyu CUI; Wei Cao; Yachao YIN
Original assignee: ZTE Corp
Current assignee: ZTE Corp
Priority date: 2024-01-31
Filing date: 2024-01-31
Publication date: 2025-08-07
Anticipated expiration: 2026-07-31

Abstract

Presented are systems and methods for capacity expansion of a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission. A wireless communication device may determine a resource configuration to perform a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission. The resource configuration may comprise at least one of: one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission, or a sequence configuration. The wireless communication device may perform the PUSCH transmission according to the resource configuration.

Description

SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR CAPACITY EXPANSION OF PHYSICAL UPLINK SHARED CHANNEL (PUSCH) TRANSMISSION

TECHNICAL FIELD

The disclosure relates generally to wireless communications, including but not limited to systems and methods for capacity expansion of a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission.

BACKGROUND

The standardization organization Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) is currently in the process of specifying a new Radio Interface called 5G New Radio (5G NR) as well as a Next Generation Packet Core Network (NG-CN or NGC) . The 5G NR will have three main components: a 5G Access Network (5G-AN) , a 5G Core Network (5GC) , and a User Equipment (UE) . In order to facilitate the enablement of different data services and requirements, the elements of the 5GC, also called Network Functions, have been simplified with some of them being software based, and some being hardware based, so that they could be adapted according to need. Communication via satellite is one of the typical scenarios of the non-terrestrial networks in 3GPP standardization.

SUMMARY

The example embodiments disclosed herein are directed to solving the issues relating to one or more of the problems presented in the prior art, as well as providing additional features that will become readily apparent by reference to the following detailed description when taken in conjunction with the accompany drawings. In accordance with various embodiments, example systems, methods, devices and computer program products are disclosed herein. It is understood, however, that these embodiments are presented by way of example and are not limiting, and it will be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art who read the present disclosure that various modifications to the disclosed embodiments can be made while remaining within the scope of this disclosure.

At least one aspect is directed to a system, method, apparatus, or a computer-readable medium of the following. A wireless communication device (e.g., a user equipment (UE) ) may determine (e.g., receive, identify, select, establish) a resource configuration to perform a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission. The resource configuration may comprise at least one of: one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission, or a sequence configuration. The wireless communication device may perform the PUSCH transmission according to the resource configuration. In some embodiments, the wireless communication device may receive the resource configuration to perform the PUSCH transmission from a wireless communication node (e.g., a base station (BS) ) . The one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission may comprise at least one of: a format of the PUSCH transmission; a repetition number indicating a plurality of repetitions of the PUSCH transmission; a redundancy version (RV) ; a subcarrier spacing; a number of uplink (UL) resource units; a number of consecutive slots in an uplink resource unit; a number of demodulation reference signal (DMRS) symbols in a slots; a number of repetitions of consecutive slots in an uplink resource unit; or a number of single carrier frequency division multiplexing access (SC-FDMA) symbols in an uplink slot.

In some embodiments, the number of repetitions of consecutive slots in the uplink resource unit can be determined by at least one of: the number being 1 when the number of UL resource units is 1; or the number being a minimum value between a first factor and 4 when the number of UL resource units is larger than 1, wherein the first factor is the repetition number divided by 2 and rounded up. In some embodiments, the number of consecutive slots in the uplink resource units can be determined by at least one of: the number being 1 when the subcarrier spacing is 3.75kHz; or the number being 2 when the subcarrier spacing is 15kHz.

In some embodiments, the sequence configuration may comprise an indication of at least one of: a sequence type; a sequence length; a sequence number; or a sequence index. The sequence type may include at least one of: an orthogonal cover code or a non-orthogonal cover code. The orthogonal cover code can be based on at least one of: a discrete Fourier Transform (DFT) sequence, a Walsh sequence, a Zadoff Chu (ZC) sequence, or a Hadamard sequence.

In some embodiments, the sequence length can be determined according to the one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission via at least one of: a number of scheduled UL resource units multiplied by a number of consecutive slots in an UL resource unit and then multiplied by (anumber of SC-FDMA symbols in an uplink slot-the number of DMRS symbols in a slot) ; the number of scheduled UL resource units multiplied by the number of consecutive slots in the UL resource unit and then multiplied by the number of DMRS symbols in the slot; the number of consecutive subcarriers in a frequency domain in the scheduled UL resource units; the repetition number; the repetition number divided by a length of redundant reversion; or the repetition number divided by the number of repetition of consecutive slots in the uplink resource unit. In some embodiment, the sequence length can be determined according to a first indication configured by a high layer signaling, wherein the first indication is at least one of: a second indication indicating the sequence length; a third indication indicating a first scaling factor of the number of repetition, wherein the sequence length can be determined according to the 1 divided by the first scaling factor; a fourth indication indicating a second scaling factor of the number of repetition, wherein the sequence length can be determined according to the repetition number multiplied by the second scaling factor; a fifth indication indicating the sequence type which indicates the sequence length. For example, “Type-1” may refer to orthogonal cover code (OCC) -2 which implicitly indicates the sequence length LLength is 2, “Type-2” may refer to OCC-4 which implicitly indicates the sequence length LLength is 4, “Type-3” may refer to OOC-8 which implicitly indicates the sequence length LLength is 8.

In some embodiments, the sequence number can be determined according to at least one of: the sequence length, a high layer signaling, or a DCI for scheduling PUSCH transmission. The sequence index can be determined according to at least one of: a sequence index indicated in a downlink control information (DCI) scheduling RAR message or a random access response (RAR) message that is used for PRACH transmission; a sequence index that is used for PRACH transmission; a sequence index that is used for calculation of random access radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI) ; a sequence index indicated in the DCI scheduling RAR message or the RAR message; a sequence index corresponding to a placement order of multiple random access preamble identifiers (RAPIDs) which corresponds to multiple UEs; a sequence index corresponding to a placement order of multiple RAR messages which corresponds to multiple UEs; a sequence index indicated in DCI scheduling PUSCH transmission; a sequence index looped sequentially in a sequence index set corresponding to the sequence length or the sequence number; a sequence index looped sequentially in a sequence index set corresponding to the sequence length or the sequence number; or a sequence index configured by a high layer signaling.

In some embodiments, the wireless communication device may determine a sequence set corresponding to the sequence length. The wireless communication device may determine a specific sequence according to the sequence index and the sequence set. The wireless communication device may apply the sequence to the PUSCH transmission. Applying the sequence may comprise applying the sequence to one or more units of PUSCH transmission, wherein the one or more units comprise at least one of: one or more symbols; one or more symbol groups, wherein a plurality of symbols within a symbol group can be multiple repeated transmissions of a symbol; one or more subcarriers, wherein a plurality of subcarriers are multiple repeated transmission of a subcarrier; one or more subcarrier groups, wherein a plurality of subcarrier group can be multiple repeated transmission of a subcarrier group; one or more repetitions; one or more repetition groups; or one or more resource elements. In some embodiments, applying the sequence may comprise using/applying/activating a scheme for applying the sequence. The scheme of applying the sequence may comprise at least one of: applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of symbols within a plurality of resource units, wherein the applying may comprise each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of symbols within the plurality of resource units; applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of symbols within a symbol group, wherein the applying may comprise each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of symbols within the symbol group; applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of consecutive subcarriers within a plurality of symbols, wherein the applying may comprise each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of subcarriers within the plurality of symbols; applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of subcarriers groups within a plurality of symbols, wherein the applying may comprise each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of symbols within the plurality of resource units; applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of repetitions, wherein the applying may comprise each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of repetitions; applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of resource elements having a first same position across repetition, and applying, by the wireless communication device, another sequence across a plurality of resource elements having a second same position across repetition, wherein the applying may comprise each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the resource elements having a first same position across repetition and each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the resource elements having a second same position across repetition; applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of repetition groups, wherein the applying may comprise each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of the repetition groups; applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of resource elements having first same position across repetition group, and applying, by the wireless communication device, another sequence across a plurality of resource elements having second same position across repetition group, wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the resource elements having a first same position across repetition group and each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the resource elements having a second same position across repetition group; applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of repetitions within a repetition group, wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of the repetitions within a repetition group; or applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of resource elements having first same position across repetition within a repetition group, and applying, by the wireless communication device, another sequence across a plurality of resource elements having second same position across repetition within a repetition group, wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of resource elements having a first same position across repetitions within the repetition group and each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of resource elements having a second same position across repetitions within the repetition group.

In some embodiments, the sequence can be applied to the PUSCH transmission when a condition is satisfied. The condition may comprise at least one of: the repetitions of the PUSCH transmission have a same redundancy version (RV) ; the repetitions of the PUSCH transmission have a same initialized value for scrambling sequence generator; a sixth indication indicating applying the sequence to the PUSCH transmission; a seventh indication indicating which applying scheme of sequence is activated; or a criterion related to a signal strength that is satisfied; a criterion related to a frequency offset that is satisfied; a criterion related to a timing offset that is satisfied; a criterion related to a UE movement status that is satisfied. The criterion may comprise at least one of: a measured signal strength (e.g., reference signal received power (RSRP) of a signal, SINR) being higher than a first configured threshold; a measured signal strength being equal to the first configured threshold; a frequency offset being lower than a second configured threshold; a frequency offset being equal to the second configured threshold; a timing offset being higher than a third configured threshold; a timing offset being equal to the third configured threshold; a movement state being higher than a fourth configured threshold; or a movement state being equal to the fourth configured threshold. If only one threshold is configured, the threshold can be used. If multiple thresholds are configured at least one of the multiple thresholds (e.g., minimum threshold, second minimum threshold, or maximum threshold) can be used.

In some embodiments, the wireless communication device may determine whether the length of sequence is associated with one or more thresholds (e.g., if there is only one threshold and a measured signal strength is lower than the first configured threshold, the sequence length is determined as length-1 (e.g., length-1 can equal to zero) , if a measured signal strength is higher than the first configured threshold, the sequence length is determined as length-2; or if there are multiple thresholds and a measured signal strength is higher than the first configured threshold_A, the sequence length is determined as length-1, if a measured signal strength is higher than the first configured threshold_B, the sequence length is determined as length-2; or if there is only one threshold and a frequency offset or timing offset or movement state is higher than the configured threshold, the sequence length is determined as length-1 (e.g., length-1 can equal to zero) , if a frequency offset or timing offset or movement state is lower than the configured threshold, the sequence length is determined as length-2; or if there are multiple thresholds, if a frequency offset or timing offset or movement state is higher than the configured threshold_A, the sequence length is determined as length-1, if a frequency offset or timing offset or movement state is lower than the configured threshold_B, the sequence length is determined as length-2) . In some embodiments, the wireless communication device may update a temporary cell radio network temporary identifier (TC-RNTI) to another cell radio network temporary identifier (C-RNTI) by adding at least one of the sequence index, or offset indicated in a DCI scheduling contention resolution message or contention resolution message.

In some embodiments, a wireless communication node (e.g., a BS, or a gNB) may receive a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission according to a resource configuration a wireless communication device (e.g., a UE) . The resource configuration can be configured by the wireless communication device. The resource configuration may comprise at least one of: one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission, or a sequence configuration.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Various example embodiments of the present solution are described in detail below with reference to the following figures or drawings. The drawings are provided for purposes of illustration only and merely depict example embodiments of the present solution to facilitate the reader's understanding of the present solution. Therefore, the drawings should not be considered limiting of the breadth, scope, or applicability of the present solution. It should be noted that for clarity and ease of illustration, these drawings are not necessarily drawn to scale.

FIG. 1 illustrates an example cellular communication network in which techniques disclosed herein may be implemented, in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure;

FIG. 2 illustrates a block diagram of an example base station and a user equipment device, in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 3 illustrates an example implementation of non-terrestrial networks (NTN) , in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 4 illustrates an example transmission pattern for a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission, in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 5 illustrates an example transmission pattern for a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission, in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 6 illustrates an example transmission pattern for a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission, in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure; and

FIG. 7 illustrates a flow diagram of an example method for capacity expansion of a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission, in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

1. Mobile Communication Technology and Environment

FIG. 1 illustrates an example wireless communication network, and/or system, 100 in which techniques disclosed herein may be implemented, in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure. In the following discussion, the wireless communication network 100 may be any wireless network, such as a cellular network or a narrowband Internet of things (NB-IoT) network, and is herein referred to as “network 100. ” Such an example network 100 includes a base station 102 (hereinafter “BS 102” ; also referred to as wireless communication node) and a user equipment device 104 (hereinafter “UE 104” ; also referred to as wireless communication device) that can communicate with each other via a communication link 110 (e.g., a wireless communication channel) , and a cluster of cells 126, 130, 132, 134, 136, 138 and 140 overlaying a geographical area 101. In FIG. 1, the BS 102 and UE 104 are contained within a respective geographic boundary of cell 126. Each of the other cells 130, 132, 134, 136, 138 and 140 may include at least one base station operating at its allocated bandwidth to provide adequate radio coverage to its intended users.

For example, the BS 102 may operate at an allocated channel transmission bandwidth to provide adequate coverage to the UE 104. The BS 102 and the UE 104 may communicate via a downlink radio frame 118, and an uplink radio frame 124 respectively. Each radio frame 118/124 may be further divided into sub-frames 120/127 which may include data symbols 122/128. In the present disclosure, the BS 102 and UE 104 are described herein as non-limiting examples of “communication nodes, ” generally, which can practice the methods disclosed herein. Such communication nodes may be capable of wireless and/or wired communications, in accordance with various embodiments of the present solution.

FIG. 2 illustrates a block diagram of an example wireless communication system 200 for transmitting and receiving wireless communication signals (e.g., OFDM/OFDMA signals) in accordance with some embodiments of the present solution. The system 200 may include components and elements configured to support known or conventional operating features that need not be described in detail herein. In one illustrative embodiment, system 200 can be used to communicate (e.g., transmit and receive) data symbols in a wireless communication environment such as the wireless communication environment 100 of FIG. 1, as described above.

System 200 generally includes a base station 202 (hereinafter “BS 202” ) and a user equipment device 204 (hereinafter “UE 204” ) . The BS 202 includes a BS (base station) transceiver module 210, a BS antenna 212, a BS processor module 214, a BS memory module 216, and a network communication module 218, each module being coupled and interconnected with one another as necessary via a data communication bus 220. The UE 204 includes a UE (user equipment) transceiver module 230, a UE antenna 232, a UE memory module 234, and a UE processor module 236, each module being coupled and interconnected with one another as necessary via a data communication bus 240. The BS 202 communicates with the UE 204 via a communication channel 250, which can be any wireless channel or other medium suitable for transmission of data as described herein.

As would be understood by persons of ordinary skill in the art, system 200 may further include any number of modules other than the modules shown in FIG. 2. Those skilled in the art will understand that the various illustrative blocks, modules, circuits, and processing logic described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented in hardware, computer-readable software, firmware, or any practical combination thereof. To clearly illustrate this interchangeability and compatibility of hardware, firmware, and software, various illustrative components, blocks, modules, circuits, and steps are described generally in terms of their functionality. Whether such functionality is implemented as hardware, firmware, or software can depend upon the particular application and design constraints imposed on the overall system. Those familiar with the concepts described herein may implement such functionality in a suitable manner for each particular application, but such implementation decisions should not be interpreted as limiting the scope of the present disclosure.

In accordance with some embodiments, the UE transceiver 230 may be referred to herein as an "uplink" transceiver 230 that includes a radio frequency (RF) transmitter and a RF receiver each comprising circuitry that is coupled to the antenna 232. A duplex switch (not shown) may alternatively couple the uplink transmitter or receiver to the uplink antenna in time duplex fashion. Similarly, in accordance with some embodiments, the BS transceiver 210 may be referred to herein as a "downlink" transceiver 210 that includes a RF transmitter and a RF receiver each comprising circuity that is coupled to the antenna 212. A downlink duplex switch may alternatively couple the downlink transmitter or receiver to the downlink antenna 212 in time duplex fashion. The operations of the two transceiver modules 210 and 230 may be coordinated in time such that the uplink receiver circuitry is coupled to the uplink antenna 232 for reception of transmissions over the wireless transmission link 250 at the same time that the downlink transmitter is coupled to the downlink antenna 212. Conversely, the operations of the two transceivers 210 and 230 may be coordinated in time such that the downlink receiver is coupled to the downlink antenna 212 for reception of transmissions over the wireless transmission link 250 at the same time that the uplink transmitter is coupled to the uplink antenna 232. In some embodiments, there is close time synchronization with a minimal guard time between changes in duplex direction.

The UE transceiver 230 and the base station transceiver 210 are configured to communicate via the wireless data communication link 250, and cooperate with a suitably configured RF antenna arrangement 212/232 that can support a particular wireless communication protocol and modulation scheme. In some illustrative embodiments, the UE transceiver 210 and the base station transceiver 210 are configured to support industry standards such as the Long Term Evolution (LTE) and emerging 5G standards, and the like. It is understood, however, that the present disclosure is not necessarily limited in application to a particular standard and associated protocols. Rather, the UE transceiver 230 and the base station transceiver 210 may be configured to support alternate, or additional, wireless data communication protocols, including future standards or variations thereof.

In accordance with various embodiments, the BS 202 may be an evolved node B (eNB) , a serving eNB, a target eNB, a femto station, or a pico station, for example. In some embodiments, the UE 204 may be embodied in various types of user devices such as a mobile phone, a smart phone, a personal digital assistant (PDA) , tablet, laptop computer, wearable computing device, etc. The processor modules 214 and 236 may be implemented, or realized, with a general purpose processor, a content addressable memory, a digital signal processor, an application specific integrated circuit, a field programmable gate array, any suitable programmable logic device, discrete gate or transistor logic, discrete hardware components, or any combination thereof, designed to perform the functions described herein. In this manner, a processor may be realized as a microprocessor, a controller, a microcontroller, a state machine, or the like. A processor may also be implemented as a combination of computing devices, e.g., a combination of a digital signal processor and a microprocessor, a plurality of microprocessors, one or more microprocessors in conjunction with a digital signal processor core, or any other such configuration.

Furthermore, the steps of a method or algorithm described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be embodied directly in hardware, in firmware, in a software module executed by processor modules 214 and 236, respectively, or in any practical combination thereof. The memory modules 216 and 234 may be realized as RAM memory, flash memory, ROM memory, EPROM memory, EEPROM memory, registers, a hard disk, a removable disk, a CD-ROM, or any other form of storage medium known in the art. In this regard, memory modules 216 and 234 may be coupled to the processor modules 210 and 230, respectively, such that the processors modules 210 and 230 can read information from, and write information to, memory modules 216 and 234, respectively. The memory modules 216 and 234 may also be integrated into their respective processor modules 210 and 230. In some embodiments, the memory modules 216 and 234 may each include a cache memory for storing temporary variables or other intermediate information during execution of instructions to be executed by processor modules 210 and 230, respectively. Memory modules 216 and 234 may also each include non-volatile memory for storing instructions to be executed by the processor modules 210 and 230, respectively.

The network communication module 218 generally represents the hardware, software, firmware, processing logic, and/or other components of the base station 202 that enable bi-directional communication between base station transceiver 210 and other network components and communication nodes configured to communication with the base station 202. For example, network communication module 218 may be configured to support internet or WiMAX traffic. In a typical deployment, without limitation, network communication module 218 provides an 802.3 Ethernet interface such that base station transceiver 210 can communicate with a conventional Ethernet based computer network. In this manner, the network communication module 218 may include a physical interface for connection to the computer network (e.g., Mobile Switching Center (MSC) ) . The terms “configured for, ” “configured to” and conjugations thereof, as used herein with respect to a specified operation or function, refer to a device, component, circuit, structure, machine, signal, etc., that is physically constructed, programmed, formatted and/or arranged to perform the specified operation or function.

The Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) Model (referred to herein as, “open system interconnection model” ) is a conceptual and logical layout that defines network communication used by systems (e.g., wireless communication device, wireless communication node) open to interconnection and communication with other systems. The model is broken into seven subcomponents, or layers, each of which represents a conceptual collection of services provided to the layers above and below it. The OSI Model also defines a logical network and effectively describes computer packet transfer by using different layer protocols. The OSI Model may also be referred to as the seven-layer OSI Model or the seven-layer model. In some embodiments, a first layer may be a physical layer. In some embodiments, a second layer may be a Medium Access Control (MAC) layer. In some embodiments, a third layer may be a Radio Link Control (RLC) layer. In some embodiments, a fourth layer may be a Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP) layer. In some embodiments, a fifth layer may be a Radio Resource Control (RRC) layer. In some embodiments, a sixth layer may be a Non Access Stratum (NAS) layer or an Internet Protocol (IP) layer, and the seventh layer being the other layer.

Various example embodiments of the present solution are described below with reference to the accompanying figures to enable a person of ordinary skill in the art to make and use the present solution. As would be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art, after reading the present disclosure, various changes or modifications to the examples described herein can be made without departing from the scope of the present solution. Thus, the present solution is not limited to the example embodiments and applications described and illustrated herein. Additionally, the specific order or hierarchy of steps in the methods disclosed herein are merely example approaches. Based upon design preferences, the specific order or hierarchy of steps of the disclosed methods or processes can be re-arranged while remaining within the scope of the present solution. Thus, those of ordinary skill in the art will understand that the methods and techniques disclosed herein present various steps or acts in a sample order, and the present solution is not limited to the specific order or hierarchy presented unless expressly stated otherwise.

2. Systems and Methods for Capacity Expansion of a Physical Uplink Shared Channel (PUSCH) Transmission

To address the challenges posed by limited resources and a larger number of user equipments (UEs) , one approach is to enhance uplink capacity. With the adoption of non-terrestrial networks (NTN) , satellite communication systems may serve a broader and more diverse range of UEs due to their extensive coverage. Enhancements for uplink (UL) coverage can be as part of new radio (NR) NTN enhancements, including techniques like repetitions. Additionally, for certain use cases like internet of things (IoT) , repetitions can be employed/supported to extend uplink coverage.

While the frequency of narrowband (NB) -IoT UE-initiated random access is low, physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) capacity may not be a primary concern for NB-IoT. Consequently, for single-tone transmissions, NB-IoT may not allow the multiplexing of multiple UEs on the same tone, limiting capacity in power-limited scenarios. Moreover, NB-IoT NTN deployments may reveal a pressing need to support massive capacity, encompassing various UE types, including lower-cost devices and wearables. Therefore, the capacity analysis of NTN UL systems may have their limitations. In this disclosure, the methods to expand capacity of PUSCH in terrestrial network (TN) /non-terrestrial network (NTN) systems are described.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example implementation of non-terrestrial networks (NTN) , in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. An example structure of transparent NTN is illustrated in FIG. 3. The link between a UE and a satellite can be a service link. The link between a BS and a satellite can be a feeder link and can be common for all UEs within the same cell.

Narrowband Physical Uplink Shared Channel (NPUSCH) ) design

NPUSCH Format 1 can be used/employed for UL data transmission and may use/utilize the same turbo code as used in LTE for error correction. NPUSCH Format 2 can be used/employed for signaling HARQ feedback for NPDSCH and may use a repetition code for error correction. Resource units can be used to describe the mapping of the NPUSCH to resource elements. A resource unit can be defined assingle carrier frequency division multiplexing access (SC-FDMA) symbols in the time domain andconsecutive subcarriers in the frequency domain, wherecan be given by Tables 1 and 2 for frame structure types 1 and 2, respectively.

Table 1: Supported combinations ofandfor frame structure type 1.

Table 2: Supported combinations offor frame structure type 2.

For the Msg3 NPUSCH in initial access, the resource to be used on the uplink can be configured by the narrowband random access response grant, e.g., Nr-bit UL grant in higher layer for the physical layer. The field includes at least one of: uplink subcarrier spacing, subcarrier indication field, scheduling delay field, Msg3 repetition number, MCS index indicating TBS, modulation, or number of RUs for Msg3. The redundancy version for the first transmission of Msg3 can be 0.

Each NPUSCH codeword can be mapped to one or more than one resource units, N_RU. Each of which can be transmittedtimes, which can be configured by a higher layer signaling (e.g., Msg3 repetition number field in UL grant of RAR) or repetition number field in corresponding DCI (e.g., format N0) , and represents the number of NPUSCH repetitions. Meanwhile, in order to improve uplink soft coverage and ensure data transmission quality, after mapping to N_slots slots, the N_slots slots can be repeatedadditional times, before continuing the following slot mapping, where:

From the formula, for the 15 kHz subcarrier spacing, after mapping the code word on a pair of slots, the pair of slots are repeatedtimes before the mapping of the code word continues. In case of 3.75 kHz transmission, the mapping can be done on a single slot before repeating.

For example, for the Msg3 NPUSCH, when Msg3 repetition number field I_Repindicates 4 repetitions, modulation coding scheme (MCS) index indicating transport block size (TBS) , modulation, and number of resource units (RUs) for Msg3 indicates 4 RUs, uplink subcarrier spacing indicates 15kHz, subcarrier indication field indicating allocated subcarriers are 12. FIG. 4 shows an example PUSCH transmission of a TB configured on 12 subcarriers, 4 RUs, and 4 repetitions. The first pair of slots 1, 2 can be repeated additional times before the mapping continues to the second pair of slots 3, 4. After 16 slots, the full code word is repeated two times and the scrambling is reinitialized and the redundancy version is updated, wherein the procedure can be repeated once to complete four repetitions of the TB in total.

The repeated slots can, just as in case of the narrowband physical downlink control channel (NPDCCH) and narrowband physical downlink shared channel (NPDSCH) , allow for coherent combining for received power estimation and for frequency offset estimation. It also allows a base station to attempt decoding of the code word before the transmission has completed. The example shown in FIG. 4 supports decoding of the full code word already after 16 slots, and the example shown in FIG. 5 supports decoding of the full code word already after 8 slots.

For the NPUSCH configured with single subcarrier, if the subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, according to the formula, it can be inferred that after each NPUSCH codeword is mapped to one or more than one resource units, each of which shall be transmittedtimes. That is to say, after mapping to each slots, the code word can be repeatedtimes. FIG. 5 shows an example transmission of a TB configured on 1 subcarrier, 4 RUs, and 1 repetitions. FIG. 5 illustrates an example PUSCH F1 transmission configured with 1 subcarrier, 4 RUs and 1 repetition. Similarly, FIG. 6 shows an example NPUSCH F2 transmission with the same configuration. FIG. 6 illustrates an example PUSCH F2 transmission configured with 1 subcarrier, 4 RUs and 1 repetition.

In the initial access, multiplexing sequence can be used to increase the PRACH/NPRACH capacity, the overall success probability of RACH access cannot increase without enhancing other channels, but it can cause a greater possibility of access conflicts. Meanwhile, considering the limited resources because of repetition, the allocated Msg3/normal NPUSCH/PUSCH uplink resources can be same. In order to improve the channel capacity of (N) PUSCH and further increase the success probability of RACH, multiple UEs can be multiplexed in the same time-frequency resource using a sequence. Specifically, the following methods for sequence configuration can be considered. In the following disclosure, “A*B” represents A multiplied by B; “A/B” represents A divided by B.

Implementation Example 1: Sequence configuration

The sequence configuration may include at least of: a sequence type, a sequence length, a sequence number, or a sequence index.

For sequence type: The sequence can be/include (or based on) at least orthogonal cover code, or non-orthogonal cover code. The orthogonal cover code can be based on at least one of: a discrete Fourier Transform (DFT) sequence, a Walsh sequence, a Zadoff Chu (ZC) sequence, or a Hadamard sequence. If more than one sequence types can be used for PUSCH multiplexing, the specific sequence type can be configured by a higher layer signaling or DCI scheduling PUSCH. The sequence type can be configured by at least one of following methods.

- A field indicating the sequence type, for example, “1” may indicate “OCC” , “2” may indicate “non-OCC” , or “1” may indicate “sequence based on DFT” , “2” may indicate “walsh sequence” , etc. Besides the sequence type can also be configured along with sequence index defined below.

For sequence length: The sequence length L_Length can be determined according to the parameters for PUSCH configuration (or resource configuration) , for example, the network can implicitly indicate the sequence length L_Length through the parameters for PUSCH channel and the network/UE determine the sequence length L_Length based on the parameters of PUSCH configuration, or the UE can autonomously determine the sequence length L_Length based on the parameters for PUSCH channel. Take the parameters for IoT case as an example, the L_Length can be determined by at least one of the following methods.

- The sequence length for datacan be determined according to the number of scheduled UL resource units (e.g., N_RU>=1) , the number of consecutive slots in an UL resource unit for NB-IoT and the number of SC-FDMA symbols in an uplink slot, for example, the sequence length for DMRScan be determined by the number of scheduled UL resource units, the number of consecutive slots in an UL resource unit and the number of SC-FDMA symbols in an uplink slot, for example, Besides, when configuring PUSCH transmission parameters, the configured parameters can satisfy the condition that the parameters, such as are greater than or equal to the detected number of preambles. The sequence can be identical between different repetitions.

- The sequence length for datacan be determined according to the number of scheduled UL resource unit (s) (e.g., N_RU>=1) , the number of consecutive slots in an UL resource unit for NB-IoT and the number of SC-FDMA symbols in an uplink slot, for example, DMRS sequence may no longer use additional sequence for scrambling. Besides, when configuring NPUSCH transmission parameters, the configured parameters can satisfy the condition that the parameters, such asare greater than or equal to the detected number of preambles. The sequence can be identical between different repetitions.

- The sequence length for data symbols and DMRS symbols or only for data symbols L_Length can be, for example, determined according to the number of consecutive subcarriers in the frequency domain in the scheduled UL resource units, Besides, when configuring PUSCH transmission parameters, the configured parameters can satisfy the condition that the parameters, such asare greater than or equal to the detected number of preambles, the number of the enhanced RARIDs, the number of MAC RARs corresponding to a same RAPID, or the number of detected preambles indicated in DCI scheduling RAR. The sequence can be identical between different repetitions.

- The sequence length L_Length for data symbols and DMRS symbols or only for data symbols can be, for example, determined according to the number of repetitionWhen configuring PUSCH transmission parameters, the configured parameters can satisfy that the parameters, such asare greater than or equal to the detected number of preambles. Besides, at least one of the following conditions should be satisfied:

■ same RV can be applied for each repetition; or

■ same initialized value for scrambling sequence generator can be applied for each repetition.

- The sequence length L_Length for data and DMRS symbols or only for data symbols can be, for example, determined according to the number of repetition/the length of redundant reversion (e.g., [0 2], or [0 2 3 1] ) , Besides, at least one of the following conditions can be satisfied:

■ same initialized/initial value for scrambling sequence generator can be applied for each repetition.

- The sequence length L_Length for data and DMRS symbols or only for data symbols can be, for example, determined according to the number of repetitionBesides, at least one of the above conditions should be satisfied.

The sequence length L_Length can be determined according to a defined/existing field which can be configured via at least a higher layer signaling, or a DCI scheduling (N) PUSCH.

- The field may indicate the sequence length L_Length. L_Length can be at least one of {2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, etc} . The granularity of L_Length can be symbol-level, UL resource units-level, scheduled UL resource units-level, repetition unit-level, or subcarrier-level, repetition group-level. If repetition (group) -level, at least one of the above conditions can be satisfied.

- The field indicating the sequence length L_Length, the repetition can be divided into repetition groups (e.g., the number of NPUSCH repetitions per attempt/the sequence length L_Length, the number of PUSCH repetitions per attempt /the sequence length L_Length) , different RVs can be used within a repetition group (e.g., legacy behavior) . Besides, at least one of the following conditions can be satisfied: same initialized value for scrambling sequence generator can be applied for each repetition.

- The field indicating the scaling factor (e.g., scalingFactor) of the number of repetition and the sequence length L_Length can be determined according to the 1/scalingFactor, the repetition can be divided into repetition groups includes multiple repetition (e.g., the number of NPUSCH repetitions per attempt *scalingFactor) . Beside, at least one of the above conditions can be satisfied.

- The field indicating the scaling factor (e.g., scalingFactor) of the number of repetition and the sequence length L_Length can be determined according to the*scalingFactor. The repetition can be divided into repetition groups which include multiple repetitions (e.g., the number of NPUSCH repetitions per attempt*scalingFactor) , besides at least one of the following conditions can be satisfied.

■ Same initialized/initial value for scrambling sequence generator can be applied for each repetition within a repetition group.

- The field indicating the sequence length L_Length, the consecutive subcarriers in the frequency domain can be divided into subcarrier groups which include multiple subcarriers (e.g., the number of consecutive subcarriers in the frequency domain/the sequence length L_Length) .

- The field indicating the sequence type may implicitly indicate the sequence length L_Length, e.g., “Type-1” refers to OCC-2 which implicitly indicates the sequence length L_Length is 2, “Type-2” refers to OCC-4 which implicitly indicates the sequence length L_Length is 4, “Type-3” refers to OOC-8 which implicitly indicates the sequence length L_Length is 8. The granularity of L_Length can be symbol-level, UL resource units-level, scheduled UL resource units-level, repetition unit-level, subcarrier-level, or repetition group-level. If repetition (group) -level, at least one of the above conditions can be satisfied.

For the number of sequence (e.g., bitwidth, used to indicate the sequence index) , it can be determined according to at least one of following.

- The number of sequence can be determined according to configured parameter, e.g., the sequence length L_Length , then the bitwidth for sequence index indication can be

- The number of sequence can be configured by a high layer signaling or DCI scheduling PUSCH (i.e., new field, or re-interpret existing field) , e.g., for 8, the bitwidth for sequence index indication can be 3 bits and the corresponding sequence length can be greater than or equal to 8.

For sequence index: The sequence index used for PUSCH can be determined by the following method.

- Same with the sequence index indicated in DCI scheduling RAR or RAR and used for preamble. For example, new data indicator or HARQ-ACK resource can be reserved in DCI scrambled with a RA-RNTI or reserved field in RAR.

- Implicitly indicated by the sequence index used for preamble.

■ Sequence index for NPUSCH can be equal to the sequence index used for preamble, one to one mapping.

■ The sequence index for preamble corresponds to multiple sequence index for NPUSCH, one to multiple mapping, for example, sequence index 1 for preamble may correspond to 2 sequence indexes for NPUSCH, e.g., (1, 4) , the sequence index for each UE can be randomly selected or selected using association with UE ID (e.g., international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI) , RNTI, the relationship can be mod (UE ID, L_Length) , etc) by the UE.

- Same with the sequence index used for the calculation of RA-RNTI.

- Indicated in DCI scheduling RAR or RAR (sequence index for NPUSCH and can be different with sequence index for preamble) . For example, new data indicator or HARQ-ACK resource can be reserved in DCI scrambled with a RA-RNTI or reserved field in RAR.

- Mapped sequentially with the placement of multiple RAPID or multiple RARs corresponding to the multiple UEs. For example, if the network detects the preambles with index 1, 3, and 4 and sets/places the corresponding RAPIDs or RARs sequentially, the sequence indexes for NPUSCH corresponding to RAPIDs or RARs can be 1, 2 and 3, respectively.

- Configured by a higher layer signaling or a DCI scheduling PUSCH. For example, the existing field, such as remaining bits field set to one, state (s) in subcarrier indication/resource assignment/modulation and coding scheme/repetition number/DCI subframe repetition number in DCI, or a new defined field.

- a sequence index is a function of the DMRS port index and/or sequence length, for example, sequence index is equal to mod (DMRS port index, sequence length) .

- a sequence index is a function of DMRS port index, C-RNTI, and/or sequence length.

- a sequence index is a function of C-RNTI and/or sequence length.

- a sequence index is a function of the DMRS port index, UE ID, and/or sequence length.

- a sequence index is a function of UE ID and/or sequence length, for example, sequence index =mod(UE ID, sequence length) .

- a sequence index is a function of the DMRS port index, for example, sequence index = mod (DMRS port index, sequence length) . In some implementations, the association between DMRS port index and sequence index is pre-defined, e.g., via a table as shown in Table 3, when DMRS port index is determined, the associated sequence index is determined according to the association relationship.

Table 1: association relationship between DMRS port index and sequence index.

- a sequence index is a function of C-RNTI.

- a sequence index is a function of the DMRS port index, redundancy version, and/or sequence length.

- a sequence index is a function of the DMRS port index and/or redundancy version.

Besides, the sequence index can be configured along with the sequence length. And the sequence index can be used for DMRS sequence generation.

Whether to apply the sequence to PUSCH can be indicated by the above signaling, or by a high-level signaling or DCI signaling. For example, when the sequence type, the sequence length, or the sequence number are configured, it may indicate apply the sequence to PUSCH. Alternatively, when signaling is configured as enabled by network side through the high-level signaling or DCI signaling, it may indicate apply the sequence to PUSCH.

Multiple application schemes can be defined in Example 2, and the specific scheme can also be configured by the network side through signaling. For example, when the indicator indicates "1" , it may indicate that the scheme of case-1-a is applied; when the indicator indicates "2" , it may indicate that the scheme of case-2-a is applied.

Implementation Example 2: Sequence application

The sequence can be multiplexed to signal at different resource level of PUSCH, such as symbols-level, subcarrier-level, repetition-level, repetition group-level, etc. Specifically, the following methods for sequence multiplexing can be considered.

Example-1: The multiplexing can consider sequence across symbols.

Case-1: The UE can apply the sequence to the PUSCH across symbols within scheduled UL resource units to extend the capacity, and the sequence can be identical between different repetitions in scheduled UL resource units. The IoT case can be an example.

Case-1-a: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, then or configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The data signal x_i in the i^th repetition can be multiplied by the sequence w_n according to x_seq=w_n*x_i, where x_i is data signal in the i^th repetitionAnd w_n is the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding toThe DMRS signal xx_i in the i^th repetition can be scrambled with the sequence ww_n according to xx_seq=ww_n*xx_i, where xx_i is DMRS signal in each repetition, And ww_m can be the m^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding toThe sequence index can be n, m which are configured via at least one of above methods.

Case-1-b: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, then or configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The data signal x_i in the i^th repetition can be multiplied by the sequence w_n according to x_seq=w_n*x_i, where x_i can be data signal in each repetition,And w_n can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding toThe sequence index can be n, configured via at least one of above methods. The DMRS signal may not apply sequence.

Case-1-c: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, then or configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The PUSCH signal can be applied to resource elements in increasing order of first the subcarrier index k, then the symbol index l, starting with the first slot in the assigned resource unit. After mapping to each symbol, the symbol can be repeated L_Length -1 additional times before continuing the mapping of the signal to the following symbol. That is to say, the signal can be divided intosymbol groups, each symbol group may include repeated L_Length symbols. The data signal x_i in the i^th symbol group can be multiplied by the sequence w_n according to x_seq, _i=w_n*x_i, where x_i can be data signal in each symbol group, And w_n can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding to L_Length. The sequence index can be n, configured via at least one of above methods. The DMRS signal may not apply sequence multiplexing.

Case-1-d: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, then L_Length =4 or configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The PUSCH signal can be applied to resource elements in increasing order of first the subcarrier index k, then the symbol index l, starting with the first slot in the assigned resource unit. After mapping to each symbol, the symbol can be repeated L_Length -1 additional times before continuing the mapping of the signal to the following symbol. That is to say, the signal can be divided intosymbol groups, each symbol group may include repeated L_Length symbols. The data signal x_i in the i^th symbol group can be multiplied by the sequence w_n according to x_seq, _i=w_n*x_i, where x_i can be data signal in each symbol group, And w_n can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding to L_Length. The sequence index can be n configured via at least one of above methods. The DMRS signal may not apply sequence multiplexing. Aftersymbols, the full signal has been repeated L_Lengthtimes and the above procedure can be then repeatedtimes to complete repetitions of the TB in total.

Example-2: The multiplexing can consider sequence across subcarrier (s) within symbols.

Case-2: The UE can apply the sequence to the PUSCH across subcarriers of consecutive subcarriers within symbols to extend the capacity, and the sequence can be identical between different repetitions.

Case-2-a: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, then or configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The PUSCH block including data and DMRS x_i in the i^th repetition can be block-wise spread with the sequence w_n according to x_seq, _o=w_n, _o*x_i, where x_i can be data signal in each subcarrier of the i^th repetition, And w_n can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding tow_n, _o can be the o^th sequence value belong to the o^th subcarrier, The sequence index can be n configured via at least one of above methods.

Case-2-b: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, thenor configured by high layer signaling or DCI signaling. The PUSCH block including data signal x_i in the i^th repetition can be block-wise spread with the sequence w_n according to x_seq, _o=w_n, _o*x_i, where x_i can be data signal in each subcarrier of the i^th repetition, x_i in each subcarrier of the repetition is same. And w_n can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding tow_n, _o is the o^th sequence value belong to the o^th subcarrier, The sequence index can be n, configured via at least one of above methods. The DMRS signal may not apply sequence multiplexing.

Case-3: The UE can apply the sequence to the PUSCH across subcarrier groups of consecutive subcarriers within symbols to extend the capacity, and the sequence can be identical between different repetitions.

Case-3-a: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, L_Length =2 (high layer signaling or DCI signaling) , then the consecutive subcarriers in the frequency domain can be divided into subcarrier groups (e.g., the number of consecutive subcarriers in the frequency domain/the length of sequence L_Length =2) . The PUSCH block including data and DMRS or only data x_i in the i^th repetition can be block-wise spread with the sequence w_n according to x_seq, _o=w_n, _o*x_i, where x_i can be signal in the i^th repetition,x_i in each subcarrier group of the repetition is same. And w_n can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding to L_Length , w_n, _o can be the o^th sequence value belong to the o^th subcarrier group, o=1, . . ., L_Length, e.g., assuming =4, L_Length=2, UEs can be multiplexed over subcarrier group 1 and subcarrier group 2 by using sequence (e.g., [1, 1] , [1, -1] ) . The sequence index can be n, configured via at least one of above methods.

Example-3: The multiplexing can consider sequence across repetition.

Case-4: The UE can apply the sequence to the PUSCH across repetition to extend the capacity. The sequence can be identical between different repetition.

Case-4-a: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, thenor configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The PUSCH block including data and DMRS or only data x_i in the i^th repetition can be multiplied by the sequence w_n according to x_seq, _i=w_n (i) *x_i, where x_i can be signal in i^th repetition, And w_n can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding to L_Length. w_n (i) can be the i^th sequence value belonging to the i^th repetition in the w_n. The sequence index can be n, configured via at least one of above methods. Besides, at least one of the above conditions for each repetition should be satisfied.

Case-4-b: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, thenor configured by high layer signaling or DCI signaling. The PUSCH block including data and DMRS or only data x_i, _o in the i^th repetition and o^th subcarrier can be multiplied by the sequence w_n, _o according to x_seq, _i, _o=w_n, _o (i) *x_i, _o, where x_i, _o can be signal in the o^th subcarrier of the i^th repetition, n can be the first sequence index belonging to 1^st subcarrier, and the sequence indexes for other subcarriers can be sequentially looped in the sequence index set {1, . . ., n, . . ., L_Length} . The sequence index can be configured via at least one of above methods. And w_n, _o can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set belonging to o^th subcarrier, w_n,o (i) can be the i^th sequence value belonging to the i^th repetition in the w_n, _o. Besides, at least one of the above conditions for each repetition can be satisfied.

Case-5: The UE can apply the sequence to the PUSCH across repetition group to extend the capacity. The sequence can be identical within a repetition group.

Case-5-a: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, then or 1/scalingFactor configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The PUSCH block including data and DMRS or only data x_i in the i^th repetition group can be multiplied by the sequence w_n according to x_seq, _i=w_n (i) *x_i, where x_i can be signal in the i^th repetition group, i=1, . . ., L_Length. And w_n can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding to L_Length. w_n (i) can be the i^th sequence value belonging to the i^th repetition group in the w_n, e.g., assumingL_occLength=2, UEs can be multiplexed over repetition group 1 and repetition group 2 by using sequence (e.g., [1, 1] , [1, -1] ) . Besides, at least one of the above conditions for each repetition can be satisfied. The sequence index can be n, configured via at least one of above methods.

Case-5-b: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, then or 1/scalingFactor configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The PUSCH block including data and DMRS or only data x_i, _o in the i^th repetition group and o^th subcarrier can be multiplied by the sequence w_n, _o according to x_seq, _i, _o=w_n, _o (i) *x_i, _o, where x_i, _o can be signal in the o^th subcarrier of the i^th repetition group, n can be the first sequence index belonging to 1^st subcarrier, and the sequence indexes for other subcarriers can be sequentially looped in the sequence index set {1, . . ., n, . . ., L_Length} . The sequence index can be configured via at least one of above methods. And w_n, _o can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set which belongs to o^th subcarrier, w_n, _o (i) can be the i^th sequence value belonging to the i^th repetition group in the w_n, _o. Besides, at least one of the above conditions for each repetition can be satisfied.

Case-6: The UE can apply the sequence to the PUSCH across repetitions within a repetition group to extend the capacity. The sequence can be identical between different repetition groups and the sequence can be identical within a repetition.

Case-6-a: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, then configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The PUSCH block including data and DMRS or only data x_i in the i^th repetition within a repetition group can be multiplied by the sequence w_n according to x_seq, _i=w_n (i) *x_i, where x_i can signal in the i^th repetition within a repetition group, i=1, . . ., L_Length. And w_n can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set corresponding to L_Length, w_n (i) can be the i^th sequence value belonging to the i^th repetition within a repetition group in the w_n. Besides, at least one of the above conditions for each repetition can be satisfied. The sequence index can be n, configured via at least one of above methods.

Case-6-b: When subcarrier spacing is 15kHz, N_RU=1, then configured by a high layer signaling or a DCI signaling. The PUSCH block including data and DMRS or only data x_i in the i^th repetition within a repetition group and o^th subcarrier can be multiplied by the sequence w_n, _o according to x_seq, _i, _o=w_n, _o (i) *x_i, _o, where x_i, _o can be signal in the o^th subcarrier of the i^th repetition within a repetition group,n can be the first sequence index belonging to 1^st subcarrier, and the sequence indexes for other subcarriers can be sequentially looped in the sequence index set {1, . . ., n, . . ., L_Length} . The sequence index can be configured via at least one of above methods. And w_n, _o can be the n^th sequence in the sequence set belonging to o^th subcarrier, w_n, _o (i) can be the i^th sequence belonging to the i^th repetition within a repetition group in the w_n, _o. Besides, at least one of the above conditions for each repetition can be satisfied.

Specifically, the following methods for RACH procedure can be considered.

Implementation Example 3: RACH procedure enhancement

Case-1: The UE can determine the sequence set for applying sequence to signal based on at least one of the methods in the implementation examples-1 and 2, and then may search for the corresponding sequence in the sequence set according to the sequence index for PUSCH, and may use the corresponding sequence to PUSCH separately. The base station may detect PUSCH with different sequence corresponding to sequence indexes and may send corresponding Msg4. After successful detection, the UE may complete random access.

Case-2: The UE can determine the sequence set for applying sequence to signal based on at least one of the methods in the implementation examples-1 and 2, and then search for the corresponding sequence in the sequence set according to the sequence index for PUSCH, and may use the corresponding sequence to PUSCH separately. The base station may detect PUSCH with different sequence corresponding to sequence indexes and may use different TC-RNTI scrambling CRC, and may send corresponding Msg4. After successful detection, the UE may complete random access.

Case-3: The UE can determine the sequence set for applying sequence to signal based on at least one of the methods in the implementation examples-1 and 2, and then may search for the corresponding sequence in the sequence set according to the sequence index for PUSCH, and may use the corresponding sequence to PUSCH separately. The base station may detect PUSCH with different sequence corresponding to sequence indexes, and may send corresponding Msg4. For the corresponding contention resolution message, it can be a Msg4. Multiple UEs may confirm successful access by comparing identity information in Msg3 and Msg4, and may upgrade TC-RNTI to a new RNTI by offsetting the sequence index for PUSCH or preamble; or it can be enhanced Msg4 and TC-RNTI offsets can be carried in DCI scheduling contention resolution or contention resolution message. Multiple UEs may confirm successful access by comparing identity information in Msg3 and Msg4, and may update TC-RNTI to a new RNTI through an offset. Offset can reuse existing fields or define new fields. After successful detection, the UE may complete random access.

Case-4: The UE can determine the sequence set for applying sequence to signal based on at least one of the methods in the implementation examples-1 and 2, and then may search for the corresponding sequence in the sequence set according to the sequence index for PUSCH, and may use the corresponding sequence to PUSCH separately. The base station may detect PUSCH with different sequence corresponding to sequence indexes and may send corresponding Msg4. After successful detection, the UE may complete random access.

It should be understood that one or more features from the above/following implementation examples are not exclusive to the specific implementation examples, but can be combined in any manner (e.g., in any priority and/or order, concurrently or otherwise) .

FIG. 7 illustrates a flow diagram of a method 700 for performing/enhancing PUSCH transmission (s) . The method 700 may be implemented using any one or more of the components and devices detailed herein in conjunction with FIGs. 1–6. In overview, the method 700 may be performed by a wireless communication device (e.g., a UE) , in some embodiments. Additional, fewer, or different operations may be performed in the method 700 depending on the embodiment. At least one aspect of the operations is directed to a system, method, apparatus, or a computer-readable medium.

A wireless communication device (e.g., a user equipment (UE) ) may determine a resource configuration to perform a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission. The resource configuration may comprise at least one of: one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission, or a sequence configuration. The wireless communication device may perform the PUSCH transmission according to the resource configuration. In some embodiments, the wireless communication device may receive the resource configuration to perform the PUSCH transmission from a wireless communication node (e.g., a base station (BS) ) . The one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission may comprise at least one of: a format of the PUSCH transmission; a repetition number indicating a plurality of repetitions of the PUSCH transmission; a redundancy version (RV) ; a subcarrier spacing; a number of uplink (UL) resource units; a number of consecutive slots in an uplink resource unit; a number of demodulation reference signal (DMRS) symbols in a slots; a number of repetitions of consecutive slots in an uplink resource unit; or a number of single carrier frequency division multiplexing access (SC-FDMA) symbols in an uplink slot.

In some embodiments, the sequence length can be determined according to the one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission via at least one of: a number of scheduled UL resource units multiplied by a number of consecutive slots in an UL resource unit and then multiplied by (anumber of SC-FDMA symbols in an uplink slot -the number of DMRS symbols in a slot) ; the number of scheduled UL resource units multiplied by the number of consecutive slots in the UL resource unit and then multiplied by the number of DMRS symbols in the slot; the number of consecutive subcarriers in a frequency domain in the scheduled UL resource units; the repetition number; the repetition number divided by a length of redundant reversion; or the repetition number divided by the number of repetition of consecutive slots in the uplink resource unit. In some embodiment, the sequence length can be determined according to a first indication configured by a high layer signaling, wherein the first indication is at least one of: a second indication indicating the sequence length; a third indication indicating a first scaling factor of the number of repetition, wherein the sequence length can be determined according to the 1 divided by the first scaling factor; a fourth indication indicating a second scaling factor of the number of repetition, wherein the sequence length can be determined according to the repetition number multiplied by the second scaling factor; or a fifth indication indicating the sequence type which indicates the sequence length.

In some embodiments, the sequence to the PUSCH transmission can be applied when a condition is satisfied. The condition may comprise at least one of: the repetitions of the PUSCH transmission have a same redundancy version (RV) ; the repetitions of the PUSCH transmission have a same initialized/initial value for scrambling sequence generator; a sixth indication indicating applying the sequence to the PUSCH transmission; a seventh indication indicating which applying scheme of sequence is activated; or a criterion related to a signal strength that is satisfied; a criterion related to a frequency offset that is satisfied; a criterion related to a timing offset that is satisfied; a criterion related to a UE movement status that is satisfied. The criterion may comprise at least one of: a measured signal strength being higher than a first configured threshold; a measured signal strength being equal to the first configured threshold; a frequency offset being lower than a second configured threshold; a frequency offset being equal to the second configured threshold; a timing offset being higher than a third configured threshold; a timing offset being equal to the third configured threshold; a movement state being higher than a fourth configured threshold; or a movement state being equal to the fourth configured threshold.

While various embodiments of the present solution have been described above, it should be understood that they have been presented by way of example only, and not by way of limitation. Likewise, the various diagrams may depict an example architectural or configuration, which are provided to enable persons of ordinary skill in the art to understand example features and functions of the present solution. Such persons would understand, however, that the solution is not restricted to the illustrated example architectures or configurations, but can be implemented using a variety of alternative architectures and configurations. Additionally, as would be understood by persons of ordinary skill in the art, one or more features of one embodiment can be combined with one or more features of another embodiment described herein. Thus, the breadth and scope of the present disclosure should not be limited by any of the above-described illustrative embodiments.

It is also understood that any reference to an element herein using a designation such as "first, " "second, " and so forth does not generally limit the quantity or order of those elements. Rather, these designations can be used herein as a convenient means of distinguishing between two or more elements or instances of an element. Thus, a reference to first and second elements does not mean that only two elements can be employed, or that the first element must precede the second element in some manner.

Additionally, a person having ordinary skill in the art would understand that information and signals can be represented using any of a variety of different technologies and techniques. For example, data, instructions, commands, information, signals, bits and symbols, for example, which may be referenced in the above description can be represented by voltages, currents, electromagnetic waves, magnetic fields or particles, optical fields or particles, or any combination thereof.

A person of ordinary skill in the art would further appreciate that any of the various illustrative logical blocks, modules, processors, means, circuits, methods and functions described in connection with the aspects disclosed herein can be implemented by electronic hardware (e.g., a digital implementation, an analog implementation, or a combination of the two) , firmware, various forms of program or design code incorporating instructions (which can be referred to herein, for convenience, as "software" or a "software module) , or any combination of these techniques. To clearly illustrate this interchangeability of hardware, firmware and software, various illustrative components, blocks, modules, circuits, and steps have been described above generally in terms of their functionality. Whether such functionality is implemented as hardware, firmware or software, or a combination of these techniques, depends upon the particular application and design constraints imposed on the overall system. Skilled artisans can implement the described functionality in various ways for each particular application, but such implementation decisions do not cause a departure from the scope of the present disclosure.

Furthermore, a person of ordinary skill in the art would understand that various illustrative logical blocks, modules, devices, components and circuits described herein can be implemented within or performed by an integrated circuit (IC) that can include a general purpose processor, a digital signal processor (DSP) , an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) , a field programmable gate array (FPGA) or other programmable logic device, or any combination thereof. The logical blocks, modules, and circuits can further include antennas and/or transceivers to communicate with various components within the network or within the device. A general purpose processor can be a microprocessor, but in the alternative, the processor can be any conventional processor, controller, or state machine. A processor can also be implemented as a combination of computing devices, e.g., a combination of a DSP and a microprocessor, a plurality of microprocessors, one or more microprocessors in conjunction with a DSP core, or any other suitable configuration to perform the functions described herein.

If implemented in software, the functions can be stored as one or more instructions or code on a computer-readable medium. Thus, the steps of a method or algorithm disclosed herein can be implemented as software stored on a computer-readable medium. Computer-readable media includes both computer storage media and communication media including any medium that can be enabled to transfer a computer program or code from one place to another. A storage media can be any available media that can be accessed by a computer. By way of example, and not limitation, such computer-readable media can include RAM, ROM, EEPROM, CD-ROM or other optical disk storage, magnetic disk storage or other magnetic storage devices, or any other medium that can be used to store desired program code in the form of instructions or data structures and that can be accessed by a computer.

In this document, the term "module" as used herein, refers to software, firmware, hardware, and any combination of these elements for performing the associated functions described herein. Additionally, for purpose of discussion, the various modules are described as discrete modules; however, as would be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art, two or more modules may be combined to form a single module that performs the associated functions according embodiments of the present solution.

Additionally, memory or other storage, as well as communication components, may be employed in embodiments of the present solution. It will be appreciated that, for clarity purposes, the above description has described embodiments of the present solution with reference to different functional units and processors. However, it will be apparent that any suitable distribution of functionality between different functional units, processing logic elements or domains may be used without detracting from the present solution. For example, functionality illustrated to be performed by separate processing logic elements, or controllers, may be performed by the same processing logic element, or controller. Hence, references to specific functional units are only references to a suitable means for providing the described functionality, rather than indicative of a strict logical or physical structure or organization.

Various modifications to the embodiments described in this disclosure will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art, and the general principles defined herein can be applied to other embodiments without departing from the scope of this disclosure. Thus, the disclosure is not intended to be limited to the embodiments shown herein, but is to be accorded the widest scope consistent with the novel features and principles disclosed herein, as recited in the claims below.

Claims

A method comprising:

determining, by a wireless communication device, a resource configuration to perform a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission, wherein the resource configuration comprises at least one of: one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission, or a sequence configuration; and

performing, by the wireless communication device, the PUSCH transmission according to the resource configuration.
The method of claim 1, comprising:

receiving, by the wireless communication device from a wireless communication node, the resource configuration to perform the PUSCH transmission.
The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission comprise an indication of at least one of:

a format of the PUSCH transmission;

a repetition number indicating a plurality of repetitions of the PUSCH transmission;

a redundancy version (RV) ;

a subcarrier spacing;

a number of uplink (UL) resource units;

a number of consecutive slots in an uplink resource unit;

a number of demodulation reference signal (DMRS) symbols in a slots;

a number of repetitions of consecutive slots in an uplink resource unit ; or

a number of single carrier frequency division multiplexing access (SC-FDMA) symbols in an uplink slot.
The method of claim 3, wherein the number of repetitions of consecutive slots in the uplink resource unit is determined by at least one of:

the number being 1 when the number of UL resource units is 1; or

the number being a minimum value between a first factor and 4 when the number of UL resource units is larger than 1, wherein the first factor is the repetition number divided by 2 and rounded up.
The method of claim 3, wherein the number of consecutive slots in the uplink resource units is determined by at least one of:

the number being 1 when the subcarrier spacing is 3.75kHz; or

the number being 2 when the subcarrier spacing is 15kHz.
The method of claim 1, wherein the sequence configuration comprises an indication of at least one of:

a sequence type;

a sequence length;

a sequence number; or

a sequence index.
The method of claim 6, wherein the sequence type includes at least one of: an orthogonal cover code or a non-orthogonal cover code.
The method of claim 7, wherein the orthogonal cover code is based on at least one of: a discrete

Fourier Transform (DFT) sequence, a Walsh sequence, a Zadoff Chu (ZC) sequence, or a Hadamard sequence.
The method of claim 6, wherein the sequence length is determined according to the one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission via at least one of:

a number of scheduled UL resource units multiplied by a number of consecutive slots in an UL resource unit and then multiplied by (anumber of SC-FDMA symbols in an uplink slot minus the number of DMRS symbols in a slot) ;

the number of scheduled UL resource units multiplied by the number of consecutive slots in the UL resource unit and then multiplied by the number of DMRS symbols in the slot;

the number of consecutive subcarriers in a frequency domain in the scheduled UL resource units;

the repetition number;

the repetition number divided by a length of redundant reversion; or

the repetition number divided by the number of repetition of consecutive slots in the uplink resource unit.
The method of claim 6, wherein the sequence length is determined according to a first indication configured by a high layer signaling, wherein the first indication is at least one of:

a second indication indicating the sequence length;

a third indication indicating a first scaling factor of the number of repetition,

wherein the sequence length is determined according to the 1 divided by the first scaling factor;

a fourth indication indicating a second scaling factor of the number of repetition,

wherein the sequence length is determined according to the repetition number multiplied by the second scaling factor;

a fifth indication indicating the sequence type which indicates the sequence length.
The method of claim 6, wherein the sequence number is determined according to at least one of: the sequence length, a high layer signaling, or a DCI for scheduling PUSCH transmission.
The method of claim 6, wherein the sequence index is determined according to at least one of:

a sequence index indicated in a downlink control information (DCI) scheduling RAR message or a random access response (RAR) message that is used for PRACH transmission;

a sequence index that is used for PRACH transmission;

a sequence index that is used for calculation of random access radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI) ;

a sequence index indicated in the DCI scheduling RAR message or the RAR message;

a sequence index corresponding to a placement order of multiple random access preamble identifiers (RAPIDs) which corresponds to multiple UEs;

a sequence index corresponding to a placement order of multiple RAR messages which corresponds to multiple UEs;

a sequence index indicated in DCI scheduling PUSCH transmission;

a sequence index looped sequentially in a sequence index set corresponding to the sequence length or the sequence number;

a sequence index looped sequentially in a sequence index set corresponding to the sequence length or the sequence number;

a sequence index is associated with the information of demodulation reference signal (DMRS) ; or

a sequence index configured by a high layer signaling.
The method of claim 1 or 8, comprising:

determining, by the wireless communication device, a sequence set corresponding to the sequence length;

determining, by the wireless communication device, a specific sequence according to the sequence index and the sequence set, or

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence to the PUSCH transmission.
The method of claim 13, wherein applying the sequence comprises applying the sequence to one or more units of PUSCH transmission, wherein the one or more units comprise at least one of:

one or more symbols;

one or more symbol groups, wherein a plurality of symbols within a symbol group are multiple repeated transmissions of a symbol;

one or more subcarriers, wherein a plurality of subcarriers are multiple repeated transmission of a subcarrier; ;

one or more subcarrier groups, wherein a plurality of subcarrier groups are multiple repeated transmission of a subcarrier group;

one or more repetitions;

one or more repetition groups; or

one or more resource elements.
The method of claim 6, wherein applying the sequence comprises using a scheme for applying the sequence, wherein the scheme of applying the sequence comprises at least one of:

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of symbols within a plurality of resource units,

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of symbols within the plurality of resource units;

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of symbols within a symbol group,

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of symbols within the symbol group;

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of consecutive subcarriers within a plurality of symbols,

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of subcarriers within the plurality of symbols;

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of subcarriers groups within a plurality of symbols,

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of symbols within the plurality of resource units;

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of repetitions,

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of repetitions;

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of resource elements having a first same position across repetition, and applying, by the wireless communication device, another sequence across a plurality of resource elements having a second same position across repetition,

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the resource elements having a first same position across repetition and each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the resource elements having a second same position across repetition;

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of repetition groups,

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of the repetition groups;

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of resource elements having first same position across repetition group, and applying, by the wireless communication device, another sequence across a plurality of resource elements having second same position across repetition group;

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the resource elements having a first same position across repetition group and each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the resource elements having a second same position across repetition group;

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of repetitions within a repetition group,

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of the repetitions within a repetition group; or

applying, by the wireless communication device, the sequence across a plurality of resource elements having first same position across repetition within a repetition group, and applying, by the wireless communication device, another sequence across a plurality of resource elements having second same position across repetition within a repetition group,

wherein the applying comprises each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of resource elements having a first same position across repetitions within the repetition group and each element of the sequence being multiplied by a respective one of the subset of resource elements having a second same position across repetitions within the repetition group.
The method of claim 15, wherein the sequence to the PUSCH transmission is applied when a condition is satisfied, wherein the condition comprises at least one of:

the repetitions of the PUSCH transmission have a same redundancy version (RV) ;

the repetitions of the PUSCH transmission have a same initialized value for scrambling sequence generator;

a sixth indication indicating applying the sequence to the PUSCH transmission;

a seventh indication indicating which applying scheme of sequence is activated;

a criterion related to a signal strength that is satisfied;

a criterion related to a frequency offset that is satisfied;

a criterion related to a timing offset that is satisfied; or

a criterion related to a UE movement status that is satisfied.
The method of claim 16, wherein the criterion comprises at least one of:

a measured signal strength being higher than a first configured threshold;

a measured signal strength being equal to the first configured threshold;

a frequency offset being lower than a second configured threshold;

a frequency offset being equal to the second configured threshold;

a timing offset being lower than a third configured threshold;

a timing offset being equal to the third configured threshold;

a movement state being lower than a fourth configured threshold; or

a movement state being equal to the fourth configured threshold.
The method of claim 9 or 10, comprising:

determining, by the wireless communication device, whether the length of sequence is associated with one or more thresholds.
The method of claim 1, comprising:

updating, by the wireless communication device, a temporary cell radio network temporary identifier (TC-RNTI) to another cell radio network temporary identifier (C-RNTI) by adding at least one of the sequence index, or offset indicated in a DCI scheduling contention resolution message or contention resolution message.
A method comprising:

receiving, by a wireless communication node from a wireless communication device, a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) transmission according to a resource configuration,

wherein the resource configuration is configured by the wireless communication device, and comprises at least one of: one or more parameters for the PUSCH transmission, or a sequence configuration.
A non-transitory computer readable medium storing instructions, which when executed by at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to perform the method of any one of claims 1-20.
An apparatus comprising:

at least one processor configured to perform the method of any one of claims 1-20.