WO2025171623A1

WO2025171623A1 - Resource mapping in context of sbfd

Info

Publication number: WO2025171623A1
Application number: PCT/CN2024/077317
Authority: WO
Inventors: Jie Gao; Nhat-Quang NHAN; Roberto Maldonado; Youngsoo Yuk; Jing Yuan Sun
Original assignee: Nokia Shanghai Bell Co Ltd; Nokia Solutions and Networks Oy; Nokia Technologies Oy
Current assignee: Nokia Shanghai Bell Co Ltd; Nokia Solutions and Networks Oy; Nokia Technologies Oy
Priority date: 2024-02-16
Filing date: 2024-02-16
Publication date: 2025-08-21
Anticipated expiration: 2026-08-16

Abstract

Example embodiments of the present disclosure relate to a terminal device, a network device, methods, apparatuses and a computer readable storage medium for resource mapping in the context of SBFD. A terminal device receives a configuration from a network device, where the configuration indicates discontinuous first and second downlink subbands. The terminal device receives a DCI which includes an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule, then a downlink resource for downlink data may be determined. As such, the overhead can be reduced and the downlink resources may be used more efficiently.

Description

RESOURCE MAPPING IN CONTEXT OF SBFD

FIELD

Example embodiments of the present disclosure generally relate to the field of telecommunication and in particular, to a terminal device, a network device, methods, apparatuses and a computer readable storage medium for a resource mapping in context of subband non-overlapping full duplex (SBFD) .

BACKGROUND

Recently the third generation partnership project (3GPP) has agreed to initiate a study item on SBFD. SBFD allows simultaneous downlink (DL) and uplink (UL) transmissions on different physical resource blocks (PRBs) or subbands within an unpaired wideband new radio (NR) cell.

To enable frequency diversity for physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) , 3GPP the fifth generation (5G) NR introduced a concept called virtual resource blocks to physical resource blocks (VRB-to-PRB) mapping. This concept also helps solving the drawback of resource allocation (RA) type 1 in terms of not supporting non-contiguous allocated resources. In addition, it also helps spreading the code-blocks across different frequency locations, thus one can avoid decoding failure of only one code block repeatedly, which could decrease decoding rate of the whole message. In case SBFD is considered, details of the VRB-to-PRB mapping should be studied.

SUMMARY

In general, example embodiments of the present disclosure provide a solution for resource mapping in context of SBFD.

In a first aspect, there is provided a terminal device. The terminal device comprises at least one processor and at least one memory storing instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the terminal device at least to: receive, from a network device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; receive, from the network device, downlink control information (DCI) comprising an indication indicating a symmetric frequency domain resource allocation (FDRA) mapping rule; determine, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of physical resources blocks (PRB) and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and receive, from the network device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In a second aspect, there is provided a network device. The network device comprises at least one processor and at least one memory storing instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the network device at least to: transmit, to a terminal device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; transmit, to the terminal device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule; determine, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRBs and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and transmit, to the terminal device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In a third aspect, there is provided a method performed by a terminal device. The method comprises: receiving, at a terminal device from a network device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; receiving, from the network device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule; determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRBs and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and receiving, from the network device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In a fourth aspect, there is provided a method performed by a network device. The method comprises: transmitting, at a network device to a terminal device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; transmitting, to the terminal device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule; determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRB and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and transmitting, to the terminal device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In a fifth aspect, there is provided an apparatus. The apparatus comprises: means for receiving, at a terminal device from a network device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; means for receiving, from the network device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule; means for determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRBs and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and means for receiving, from the network device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In a sixth aspect, there is provided an apparatus. The apparatus comprises: means for transmitting, at a network device to a terminal device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; means for transmitting, to the terminal device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule; means for determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRB and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and means for transmitting, to the terminal device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In a seventh aspect, there is provided a terminal device. The terminal device comprises: receiving circuitry configured to receive, from a network device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; receiving circuitry configured to receive, from the network device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule; determining circuitry configured to determine, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRBs and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and receiving circuitry configured to receive, from the network device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In an eighth aspect, there is provided a network device. The network device comprises: transmitting circuitry configured to transmit, to a terminal device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; transmitting circuitry configured to transmit, to the terminal device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule; determining circuitry configured to determine, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRB and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and transmitting circuitry configured to transmit, to the terminal device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In a ninth aspect, there is provided a non-transitory computer readable medium comprising program instructions for causing an apparatus to perform at least the method in the third or fourth aspect.

In a tenth aspect, there is provided a computer program or computer program product comprising instructions, which, when executed by an apparatus, cause the apparatus at least to perform the method in the third or fourth aspect.

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

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

FIGS. 1A-1C illustrate schematic diagrams of FDD, TDD, and FDU respectively;

FIG. 2A illustrates an example diagram of SBFD slots and non-SBFD slots;

FIG. 2B illustrates an example of UE to UE CLI over frequency in SBFD;

FIG. 3A illustrate a schematic diagram of an example of RA type 0 of FDRA for PUSCH;

FIG. 3B illustrate a schematic diagram of an example of RA type 1 of FDRA for PUSCH;

FIG. 4 illustrates an example of VRB-to-PRB mapping for 20 bundles;

FIG. 5 illustrates an example of a network environment in which some example embodiments of the present disclosure may be implemented;

FIG. 6 illustrates an example of a process flow in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 7A illustrates an example mapping between VRBs and PRBs in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 7B illustrates an example mapping between VRB bundles and PRB bundles in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 8 illustrates an example mapping between VRBs and PRBs in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

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

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

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

FIG. 12 illustrates a block diagram of an example of a computer readable medium in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure.

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

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. The disclosure described herein can be implemented in various manners other than the ones described below.

In the following description and claims, unless defined otherwise, all technical and scientific terms used herein have the same meaning as commonly understood by one of 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. As used herein, “at least one of the following: <a list of two or more elements> ” and “at least one of <a list of two or more elements>” and similar wording, where the list of two or more elements are joined by “and” or “or” , mean at least any one of the elements, or at least any two or more of the elements, or at least all the elements.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

As used herein, the term “communication network” refers to a network following any suitable communication standards, such as Long Term Evolution (LTE) , LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) , New Radio (NR) , Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA) , High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA) , 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) , the sixth generation (6G) communication protocols, and/or any other protocols either currently known or to be developed in the future. 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 “network device” refers to a node in a communication network via which a terminal device accesses the network and receives services therefrom. The network device may refer to a base station (BS) or an access point (AP) , for example, a node B (NodeB or NB) , an evolved NodeB (eNodeB or eNB) , a new radio (NR) NB (also referred to as a gNB) , a Remote Radio Unit (RRU) , a radio header (RH) , a remote radio head (RRH) , an integrated access and backhaul (IAB) node, a relay, a low power node such as a femto, a pico, and so forth, depending on the applied terminology and technology.

The term “terminal device” refers to any end device that may be capable of wireless communication. By way of example rather than limitation, a terminal device may also be referred to adapt as a communication device, user equipment (UE) , a Subscriber Station (SS) , a Portable Subscriber Station, a Mobile Station (MS) , or an Access Terminal (AT) . The terminal device may include, but not limited to, a mobile phone, a cellular phone, a smart phone, voice over IP (VoIP) phones, wireless local loop phones, a tablet, a wearable terminal device, a personal digital assistant (PDA) , portable computers, desktop computer, image capture terminal devices such as digital cameras, gaming terminal devices, music storage and playback appliances, vehicle-mounted wireless terminal devices, wireless endpoints, mobile stations, laptop-embedded equipment (LEE) , laptop-mounted equipment (LME) , USB dongles, smart devices, wireless customer-premises equipment (CPE) , an Internet of Things (loT) device, a machine type communication (MTC) device, a watch or other wearable, a head-mounted display (HMD) , a vehicle, a drone, a medical device and applications (e.g., remote surgery) , an industrial device and applications (e.g., a robot and/or other wireless devices operating in an industrial and/or an automated processing chain contexts) , a consumer electronics device, a device operating on commercial and/or industrial wireless networks, and the like. In the following description, the terms “terminal device” , “communication device” , “terminal” , “user equipment” and “UE” may be used interchangeably.

3GPP 5G NR currently supports two duplexing modes: frequency division duplex (FDD) for paired bands and time division duplex (TDD) for unpaired bands. FIGS. 1A-1B illustrate schematic diagrams of FDD and TDD respectively. In TDD, the time domain resource is split between downlink and uplink, and a limited time duration is allocated for the uplink in TDD, which would result in reduced coverage, increased latency, and reduced capacity.

Motivated by this, 3GPP has agreed to initiate a release 18 (R18) study item on the evolution of duplexing operation in NR that addresses the challenges above. One of the objectives of the study item is to allow simultaneous DL and UL transmission on different physical resource blocks (PRBs) /subbands within an unpaired wideband NR cell, which may be called as a subband non-overlapping full duplex (SBFD) .

In the context of the present disclosure, the duplexing scheme of SBFD may also be referred to as a cross-division duplexing (xDD) scheme or a Flexible Duplexing (FDU) scheme. FIG. 1C illustrates schematic diagram 130 of FDU.

Based on the description of SBFD operation shown in FIG. 1C, it can be observed that there are two slots types exist for both DL and UL transmissions: SBFD slots and non-SBFD slots. FIG. 2A illustrates an example diagram 200 of SBFD slots and non-SBFD slots. As shown in FIG. 2A, a DL transmission can be performed within non-SBFD slots 232 and SBFD slots 234, and a UL transmission can be performed within SBFD slots 234 and non-SBFD slots 236. In other words, the non-overlapping DL subbands and UL subband both exist during the SBFD slots 234, the entire band is used for DL transmission during the non-SBFD slots 232, and the entire band is used for UL transmission during the non-SBFD slots 236. In some examples, the non-SBFD slots 232 may also be called as legacy slots or full DL slots, and the non-SBFD slots 236 may also be called as legacy slots or full UL slots.

It is to be noted that SBFD slots and non-SBFD slots are illustrated with reference to FIG. 2A, however, the present disclosure is also applied for SBFD mini-slots and non-SBFD mini-slots, or SBFD symbols and non-SBFD symbols, or other time units which are not listed herein.

In SBFD, there may be cross link interference (CLI) between different UEs. Specifically, DL reception at the UE side might be impacted by the co-channel inter-subband UE-to-UE CLI. This occurs when neighbour UE transmissions over the UL subband that leaks into the DL subbands where other UEs are receiving in DL. The power of the leakage is expected to bedecreased as the frequency gap between the UL allocation and the DL allocation increases. The guardband between DL and UL subbands can help in this regard, however, the guardband size must be kept small to maintain certain spectral efficiency. FIG. 2B illustrates an example of how the UL power is expected to be distributed over the SBFD subbands.

In the context of the present disclosure, the term “SBFD-aware UE” may be used, and at least the operation mode with time and frequency locations of subbands for SBFD operation are known to the SBFD-aware UE. In the context of the present disclosure, the terms SBFD-aware, FDU-aware, SBFD-capable, FDU-capable, or the like may be used interchangeable.

There are mainly two types of frequency domain resource assignment (FDRA) for physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) in 5G NR, namely, resource allocation (RA) type 0 and RA type 1. The network device (such as gNB) configures either type 0 or type 1, or both type 0 and type 1, and indicates RA type to be used for a scheduled PUSCH transmission by the scheduling DCI.

In uplink RA type 0, the resource block assignment information in the scheduling DCI includes a bitmap indicating the Resource Block Groups (RBGs) that are allocated to the scheduled UE, where a RBG is a set of consecutive resource blocks defined by higher layer parameter rbg-Size configured in pusch-Config and the size of the bandwidth part (BWP) . Table 1 illustrates two possible configurations of rbg-Size for each range of BWP size. It is understood that RA type 0 may support indicating non-contiguous PRBs by using a bitmap.

Table 1

FIG. 3A illustrates a schematic diagram 310 of an example of RA type 0 of FDRA for PUSCH. It is assumed that BWP size 312 equals to 20 RBs, and RBG size equals to 4 RBs. The bitmap 314 included in the scheduling DCI may be “11001” in the example shown in FIG. 3A.

RA type 1 indicates FDRA via a starting resource block (may represented by RB_start) and a length in terms of contiguously allocated resource blocks (may represented by L_RBs) . FIG. 3B illustrates a schematic diagram 320 of an example of RA type 1 of FDRA for PUSCH. As show in FIG. 3B, the BWP size 322 equals to 20 RBs, and RB_start 324 and L_RBs (equals to 10 RBs) 326 can be used to indicate the FDRA.

It is understood that RA type 1 may reduce DCI overhead by avoiding using a bitmap. The resource block assignment information in the scheduling DCI indicates to a scheduled UE a set of contiguously allocated non-interleaved resource blocks within the active BWP of sizeexcept for the case when DCI format 0_0 is decoded in any common search space in which case the size of the initial UL bandwidth partshall be used.

An uplink type 1 resource allocation field includes a resource indication value (RIV) corresponding to a RB_startand a L_RBs. Based on RB_startand L_RBs, RIV is given by:

ifthen

else

where L_RBs≥ 1 and shall not exceed

It is to be noted that FIGS. 3A-3B are illustrated for a FDRA procedure for PUSCH, however similar FDRA procedure is applicable for physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) and the present disclosure will not repeat herein.

While in uplink, 5G NR supports frequency hopping (FH) for PUSCH (either within a slot, i.e., intra-slot FH or across slots, i.e., inter-slot FH) , it is not the case in downlink for PDSCH transmission. In contrast, to enable frequency diversity for PDSCH, 5G NR introduced a concept called virtual resource blocks to physical resource blocks (VRB-to-PRB) mapping. When VRB-to-PRB mapping is applied, the RA type 1 approach explained above is used to indicate the virtual resource blocks (VRBs) before they are mapped to physical resource blocks (PRBs) using the VRB-to-PRB mapping.

There are two types of VRB-to-PRB mapping, namely interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping and non-interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping. For the interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping (which is supported only for RA type 1) , the resource blocks are divided into bundles, where L is the bundle size which can take a value of 2 or 4 resource blocks. VRBs in the interval j∈ {0, 1, …, N_bundle-1} are mapped to physical resource blocks according to the following rules:

○ VRB bundle N_bundle-1 is mapped to PRB bundle N_bundle-1.

○ VRB bundle j∈ {0, 1, …, N_bundle-2} is mapped to PRB bundle f (j) where:

For example, assume thatFIG. 4 illustrates an example of VRB-to-PRB mapping for 20 bundles (N_bundle=20).

For the non-interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping, the VRBs are one-to-one mapped to the PRBs.

When SBFD is configured with a UL subband in the middle of two DL subbands, here referend as DL-UL-DL (DUD) configuration, a discontinuity should be considered for the relevant DL channels and DL signal configurations if the FDRA indication is used.

Example embodiments of the present disclosure provide a solution for resource mapping in the context of SBFD. Especially, a terminal device may receive a configuration from a network device, where the configuration indicates discontinuous first and second downlink subbands. The terminal device receives a DCI which includes an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule, then a downlink resource for downlink data may be determined. Principles and some example embodiments of the present disclosure will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 5 illustrates an example of a network environment 500 in which some example embodiments of the present disclosure may be implemented. The environment 500, which may be a part of a communication network, comprises a terminal device 510 and a network device 520.

The communication environment 500 may comprise any suitable number of devices and cells. In the communication environment 500, the network device 520 can provide services to the terminal device 510, and the network device 520 and the terminal device 510 may communicate data and control information with each other. In some embodiments, the network device 520 and the terminal device 510 may communicate with direct links/channels.

In the system 500, a link from the network device 520 to the terminal device 510 is referred to as a downlink (DL) , while a link from the terminal device 510 to the network device 520 is referred to as an uplink (UL) . In downlink, the network device 520 is a transmitting (TX) device (or a transmitter) and the terminal device 510 is a receiving (RX) device (or a receiver) . In uplink, the terminal device 510 is a transmitting TX device (or a transmitter) and the network device 520 is a RX device (or a receiver) . It is to be understood that the network device 520 may provide one or more serving cells. In some embodiments, the network device 520 can provide multiple cells.

Communications in the network environment 500 may be implemented according to any proper communication protocol (s) , comprising, but not limited to, cellular communication protocols of the first generation (1G) , the second generation (2G) , the third generation (3G) , the fourth generation (4G) , the fifth generation (5G) and the sixth generation (6G) and on the like, wireless local network communication protocols such as Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 and the like, and/or any other protocols currently known or to be developed in the future. Moreover, the communication may utilize any proper wireless communication technology, comprising but not limited to: Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) , Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) , Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) , Frequency Division Duplex (FDD) , Time Division Duplex (TDD) , Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) , Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple (OFDM) , Discrete Fourier Transform spread OFDM (DFT-s-OFDM) and/or any other technologies currently known or to be developed in the future.

It is to be understood that the numbers of devices (i.e., the terminal device 510 and the network device 520) and their connection relationships and types shown in FIG. 5 are only for the purpose of illustration without suggesting any limitation. For example, the environment 500 may include any suitable numbers of devices adapted for implementing embodiments of the present disclosure. For example, while FIG. 5 depicts the terminal device 510 as a mobile phone, the terminal device 510 may be any type of user equipment.

In the present disclosure, a term “symmetrical central position” may be interchangeably used with a symmetrical center, a central position, a center RB, a symmetrical point, etc. which is not limit in this disclosure.

FIG. 6 illustrates an example of a process flow 600 in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure. For the purpose of discussion, the process flow 600 will be described with reference to FIG. 5. The process flow 600 involves a terminal device 510 and a network device 520. It would be appreciated that although the process flow 300 has been described in the network environment 500 of FIG. 5, this process flow may be likewise applied to other communication scenarios.

In the process flow 600, the network device 520 transmits a configuration, such as an SBFD configuration, to the terminal device 510 at 610. The configuration indicates a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband. For example, the first downlink subband may be a lower downlink subband and the second downlink subband may be an upper downlink subband. For example, there may be an uplink subband between the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband.

In some implementations, the configuration may include locations of: the uplink subband, the upper downlink subband, the lower downlink subband, and the SBFD symbols. In some example embodiments, the locations may be represented as PRB indexes.

The first downlink subband includes multiple PRBs, e.g., with PRB indexes from a11 to a12. The second downlink subband includes multiple PRBs, e.g., with PRB indexes from a21 to a22. For ease of description, it may assume that the first downlink subband is the lower downlink subband and the second downlink subband is the upper downlink subband, that is a12<a21. In some examples, a total number of downlink PRBs of a combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband may be represented aswhich meets

It is to be noted that a size of the first downlink subband may be a12-a11+1, a size of the second downlink subband may be a22-a21+1, and the size of the first downlink subband may equal to, smaller than, or larger than the size of the second downlink subband, depending on the configuration by the network device 520.

As one example, a11=0, a12=98, a21=194, a22=272, in this case, PRBs. However, it is to be understood that the total number of downlink PRBs may be an odd number or an even number, the present disclosure does not limit this aspect.

Optionally, the configuration may further include a grouping size, which may be represented as N. N is a positive integer, such as an even number. For example, N=2 or N=4. The grouping size (N) may be used to indicates a number of PRBs that a VRB can mapped to. For example, one VRB bundle index is linked to a group of N PRB bundle indexes. However, in some other cases, if the value of N is set as an odd number, then a legacy VRB-to-PRB mapping will be applied.

In the process flow 600, the network device 520 transmits a DCI to the terminal device 510 at 620. The DCI is used for scheduling a PDSCH transmission on SBFD symbols using RA type 1.

In some embodiments, the DCI includes a first indication indicating the RA type 1. In some examples, the first indication may be in a first field of the DCI, such as an FDRA field. In some examples, the first indication may be a resource indication value (RIV) which includes a starting RB (RB_start) and a length (L_RB) in terms of continuous frequency allocation (VRBs) . In some examples, the allocated RBs based on the FDRA field (the starting RB and the length) indicated by the DCI does not exceed a half ofin other words, the terminal device 510 expects that the allocated RBs based on the FDRA field (the starting RB and the length) not to have a bandwidth larger thanin case thatis an even number. In some other examples, the terminal device 510 expects that the allocated RBs based on the FDRA field (the starting RB and the length) not to have a bandwidth larger thanin case thatis an odd number.

In some embodiments, the DCI includes a second indication indicating a mapping rule, e.g. a mirrored mapping rule or a symmetrical mapping rule or a symmetric FDRA mapping rule.

In some embodiments, the DCI includes a third indication indicating a VRB-to-PRB mapping mode, which may be a non-interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode or an interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode.

In the process flow 600, the terminal device 510 determines a downlink resource based on the configuration and the DCI at 630. Specifically, the symmetric FDRA mapping rule will be used for determining the downlink resource. The downlink resource includes a first part of PRBs and a second part of PRBs, where the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs. It is to be noted that the symmetric FDRA mapping rule may directly or indirectly indicate the frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs. In some examples, the frequency relationship may be directly indicated, for example, a number of downlink PRBs from a start of the first downlink subband to a start of the first part of PRBs equals to a number of downlink PRBs from an end of the second part of PRBs to an end of the second downlink subband. In some other examples, the frequency relationship may be indirectly indicated, for example, a frequency relationship between the corresponding symmetrical VRBs (sVRBs) used for calculating/determining of the first and second part of PRBs, respectively, may be indicated (e.g. sVRBs are mirrored using the center frequency) .

As indicated by the configuration, a total number of downlink PRBs is The terminal device 510 may determine multiple VRBs mapped to a combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband. Each VRB is mapped to a PRB. For example, the terminal device 510 may determine a symmetrical central position, e.g. a PRB with an index (a12-a11+a22-a21+2) /2 in case thatis an even number and a11=0. It should be noted that the symmetrical central position may be in the first downlink subband or the second downlink subband.

In some implementations, the multiple VRBs may be indexed in a range from 0 to (a12-a11+a22-a21) /2. In some examples, a mapping between the VRBs and the PRBs may be represented as Table 2 below:

Table 2

In this case, one VRB (or VRB bundle) will be mapped to two PRBs (or two PRB bundles) to allow “mirror image” FDRA. For example, as shown in Table 1, the VRB 0 will map to both PRB a11 and PRB a22. As such, an indication of one VRB (or a set of VRBs) can be used for indicating two PRBs (or two sets of PRBs) .

Reference is made to FIG. 7A, which illustrates an example mapping 700 between VRBs and PRBs in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 7A, a total bandwidth with 273 PRBs includes a lower downlink subband PRB 0-PRB 98, an uplink subband PRB 103-PRB 190, and an upper downlink subband PRB 194-PRB 272. A size of the lower downlink subband (i.e. the first downlink subband) is 99 PRBs, and a size of the upper downlink subband (i.e. the second downlink subband) is 79 PRBs. A total number of downlink PRBs is 178, and the symmetrical central position (e.g. center frequency) is between PRB 88 and PRB 89 in the lower downlink subband. 178 VRBs may be determined which includes a lower part with VRB 0-VRB 88 and an upper part with VRB 88-VRB 0. As shown in the FIG. 7A, the 178 VRBs are one-to-one mapped with the 178 PRBs.

In this case, the FDRA field in the DCI may be regarded to schedule resources at both sides of the subbands, therefore a UL subband interference in DL reception may be reduced. In addition, less bits in the FDRA field can be used for scheduling the downlink resource in SBFD slots.

As one example, the FDRA field in DCI may indicate an allocation of RB 87 and RB 88 which are PRB 87 and PRB 88 in the lower downlink subband. The RB 87 and RB 88 will be mirrored at the center frequency resulting in VRB 87 and VRB 88 and thereof resulting in actual PRB 89 and PRB 90 in the lower downlink subband. Thus, the allocated PRBs are 4 in total, namely PRBs 87, 88, 89, and 90 in the lower downlink subband.

An another example, the FDRA field in DCI may indicate an allocation of RB 78 and RB 79 which are PRB 78 and PRB 79 in the lower downlink subband. The RB 78 and RB 79 will be mirrored at the center frequency resulting in VRB 78 and VRB 79 and thereof resulting in actual PRB 98 in the lower downlink subband and PRB 194 in the upper downlink subband. Thus, the allocated PRBs are 4 in total, namely PRBs 78, 79, and 98 in the lower downlink subband and PRB 194 in the upper downlink subband.

It is to be understood that Table 2 shown above is only for illustration without any limitation, for example, in some other cases, a12-a11 = a22-a21 may meet.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device 510 may determine a first part of VRBs and a second part of VRBs based on the RIV in the DCI. In addition, the terminal device 510 may determine a first part of PRBs and a second part of PRBs based on the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs respectively by using the mapping, such as the mapping shown in Table 2.

In some examples, the first part of VRBs starts from a VRB with a VRB index RB_start, and the second part of VRBs ends at a VRB with a VRB index RB_start.

In some examples, for non-interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode, if N is configured, the first part of VRBs includes multiple VRBs with a quantity of L_RB*N/2 and the multiple VRBs are continuous. The second part of VRBs includes a same number of continuous VRBs. In other words, the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs are symmetrical.

For instance, if N=4, RB_start=0, L_RB=1. The first part of VRBs may include L_RB*N/2= 2 VRBs. For example, the first part of VRBs includes a first subpart and a second subpart, where the first subpart includes VRB 0, and the second subpart includes VRB 1. According to the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicated by the DCI, the second part of VRBs includes VRB 1 and VRB 0. According to the mapping in Table 2, if a11=0, a12=88, a21=194, and a22=272, it can be determined that the first part of PRBs includes PRB 0 and PRB 1 and the second part of PRBs includes PRB 271 and PRB 272. In other words, the terminal device 510 can determine that the downlink resource includes 4 PRBs: PRB 0, PRB 1, PRB 271, and PRB 272.

For instance, if N=2, RB_start=3, L_RB=4. The first part of VRBs may include L_RB*N/2= 4 VRBs. For example, the first part of VRBs includes VRB 3 to VRB 6, and the second part of VRBs includes VRB 6 to VRB 3 according to the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicated by the DCI. According to the mapping in Table 2, if a11=0, a12=88, a21=194, and a22=272, it can be determined that the first part of PRBs includes PRB 3 to PRB 6 and the second part of PRBs includes PRB 266 to PRB 269. In other words, the terminal device 510 can determine that the downlink resource includes 8 PRBs: PRB 3 to PRB 6 and PRB 266 to PRB 269.

In some other examples, for non-interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode, if N is not configured, the first part of VRBs includes multiple VRBs with a quantity of L_RB and the multiple VRBs are continuous. For example, N may be a default number, i.e. N=2. The second part of VRBs includes a same number of continuous VRBs. In other words, the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs are symmetrical.

For instance, if RB_start=3, L_RB=4, and N is not configured, then N is assumed to be 2. In this case, it can be determined that the first part of VRBs includes VRB 3 to VRB 6, and the second part of VRBs includes VRB 6 to VRB 3 according to the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicated by the DCI. According to the mapping in Table 2, if a11=0, a12=88, a21=194, and a22=272, it can be determined that the first part of PRBs includes PRB 3 to PRB 6 and the second part of PRBs includes PRB 266 to PRB 269. In other words, the terminal device 510 can determine that the downlink resource includes 8 PRBs: PRB 3 to PRB 6 and PRB 266 to PRB 269.

It is to be understood that one VRB may be linked to N PRBs, for example, the RIV in the DCI may indicate one or more VRBs.

In some other examples, for interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode, a bundle size may be further considered. The bundle size may be pre-configured, for example, the bundle size may be given by a high layer parameter vrb-ToPRB-Interleaver. This parameter may indicate that the bundle size is either 2 RBs or 4 RBs. It is to be noted that the bundle size may be some other integer and the present disclosure does not limit this aspect. The terminal device 510 may perform RB bundling and interleaving based on the bundle size. The first part of VRBs includes multiple VRB bundles each with the bundle size. The second part of VRBs includes multiple VRB bundles each with the bundle size.

For instance, if the terminal device 510 is scheduled with 4 RBs with a starting RB 3, and the bundle size is 2 RBs. In some examples, the terminal device 510 may divide (or split) the 4 RBs into 2 bundles. The first part of VRBs includes two VRB bundles, a first VRB bundle (denoted as VRBB #0) includes VRB 3 and VRB 4, and a second VRB bundle (denoted as VRBB #1) includes VRB 5 and VRB 6. According to the mapping shown in Table 2 and after applying the interleaving operation, it can be determined that the first part of PRBs includes two PRB bundles: PRBB#1 including PRB 5 and PRB 6, and PRBB#0 including PRB 3 and PRB 4. Similarly, based on the second part of VRBs, it can be determined that the second part of PRBs includes two PRB bundles: PRB symmetric bundle#1 including PRB 268 and PRB 269, and PRB symmetric bundle #0 including PRB 266 and PRB 267.

Reference is made to FIG. 7B, which illustrates an example mapping 750 between VRB bundles and PRB bundles in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. It is assumed that a bundle size is configured, such as 2, 4, or another value. In this case, each of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband includes multiple PRB bundles, and each PRB bundle has the configured bundle size. As shown in FIG. 7B, the PRB bundle indices include 0-6 and 13-19. According to mapping similar with that in Table 1, a VRB bundle may be mapped to two PRB bundles to allow “mirror image” FDRA. For example, as shown at 752, the VRB bundle 0 will map to both PRB bundle 0 and PRB bundle 19. As such, an indication of a set of VRB bundles (such as 0-4) can be used to indicate two sets of PRB bundles (such as 0-4 and 15-19) .

In some other implementations, the multiple VRBs may be indexed in a range from 0 to (a12-a11+a22-a21+1) . In some examples, a mapping between the VRBs and the PRBs may be represented as Table 3 below:

Table 3

Reference is made to FIG. 8, which illustrates an example mapping 800 between VRBs and PRBs in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 8, a total bandwidth with 273 PRBs includes a lower downlink subband PRB 0-PRB 98, an uplink subband PRB 103-PRB 190, and an upper downlink subband PRB 194-PRB 272. A size of the lower downlink subband (i.e. the first downlink subband) is 99 PRBs, and a size of the upper downlink subband (i.e. the second downlink subband) is 79 PRBs. A total number of downlink PRBs is 178.178 VRBs may be determined which includes VRB 0-VRB 177. As shown in the FIG. 8, the 178 VRBs are one-to-one mapped with the 178 PRBs (PRBs 0-98 and 195-272) .

In some example embodiments, the terminal device 510 may determine a first part of VRBs based on the DCI, and then determine the second part of VRBs according to a symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicated by the DCI. In addition, the terminal device 510 may determine a first part of PRBs and a second part of PRBs based on the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs respectively by using the mapping, such as the mapping shown in Table 3.

In some examples, for non-interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode, the first part of VRBs includes multiple VRBs with a quantity of L_RB*N/2 and the multiple VRBs are continuous, where N is configured as a grouping size or N=2 if not configured.

The terminal device 510 may determine a symmetrical point position, e.g. symmetric_RB, based on equation (4) below:

The terminal device 510 may further determine PRBs, e.g. actual_RB, based on equation (5) or (6) below:

where

For instance, if N=2 (or N is not configured) , RB_start=3, L_RB=4. The first part of VRBs may include L_RB*N/2= 4 VRBs. For example, the first part of VRBs includes VRB 3 to VRB 6, and the second part of VRBs includes VRB 171 to VRB 174 according to the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicated by the DCI. According to the mapping in Table 3, if a11=0, a12=88, a21=194, and a22=272, it can be determined that the first part of PRBs includes PRB 3 to PRB 6 and the second part of PRBs includes PRB 266 to PRB 269. In other words, the terminal device 510 can determine that the downlink resource includes 8 PRBs: PRB 3 to PRB 6 and PRB 266 to PRB 269.

In some other examples, for interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode, a bundle size may be further considered.

For instance, if the terminal device 510 is scheduled with 4 RBs with a starting RB 3, and the bundle size is 2 RBs. In some examples, the terminal device 510 may divide (or split) the 4 RBs into 2 bundles. The first part of VRBs includes two VRB bundles, a first VRB bundle (denoted as VRBB #0) includes VRB 3 and VRB 4, and a second VRB bundle (denoted as VRBB #1) includes VRB 5 and VRB 6. According to the symmetric FDRA mapping rule, the second part of VRBs includes two VRB bundles: VRB symmetric bundle#0 including VRB 173 and VRB 174, and VRB symmetric bundle #1 including VRB 171 and VRB 172.

According to the mapping shown in Table 3 and after applying the interleaving operation, it can be determined that the first part of PRBs includes two PRB bundles: PRBB#1 including PRB 5 and PRB 6, and PRBB#0 including PRB 3 and PRB 4. Similarly, based on the second part of VRBs, it can be determined that the second part of PRBs includes two PRB bundles: PRB symmetric bundle#1 including PRB 268 and PRB 269, and PRB symmetric bundle #0 including PRB 266 and PRB 267.

With reference to FIG. 8, a VRB grid has VRBs 0 to 177, which may be determines based on a combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband. For example, a symmetrical point in the VRB grid is between VRB 88 and VRB 89. The first part of VRBs may be determined on the first half of the VRB grid (VRB span as shown in FIG. 8) . Specifically, the FDRA field in DCI which includes RIV may be used for the VRB span.

In addition, since the DCI indicates a symmetric FDRA mapping rule, i.e. sVRB mapping, the second part of VRBs may be further determined in the sVRB grid as shown in FIG. 8. For example, a VRB-to-sVRB mapping may be applied to determine the second part of VRBs.

In addition, the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs can be determined, e.g. based on the mapping in Table 3. For example, a sVRB-to-PRB mapping may be applied.

This procedure may be denoted as a VRB-to-sVRB-to-PRB mapping procedure, which may be used for both non-interleaved mapping mode and interleaved mapping mode.

In this way, the terminal device 510 may determine the downlink resource which includes the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs. It is to be noted that although some examples illustrated above show that the first part of PRBs is included in the first downlink subband and the second part of PRBs is included in the second downlink subband, the present disclosure does not limit this aspect.

As one example, the symmetrical central position may be located in the first downlink subband, then the first part of PRBs is included in the first downlink subband. In this case, the second part of PRBs may be in the first downlink subband, or be in the second downlink subband, or include at least one PRB in the first downlink subband and at least one PRB in the second downlink subband.

As another example, the symmetrical central position may be located in the second downlink subband, then the second part of PRBs is included in the second downlink subband. In this case, the first part of PRBs may be in the first downlink subband, or be in the second downlink subband, or include at least one PRB in the first downlink subband and at least one PRB in the second downlink subband.

In some embodiments, the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs may include a same number of PRBs, in this case, a total number of PRBs for the downlink resource is an even number.

In some other embodiments, the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs may include different number of PRBs, e.g. in case a total number of downlink PRBs is an odd number and the symmetrical central position is included in the first part of PRBs. In this case, a number of PRBs in the first part of PRBs equal to a number of PRBs in the second part of PRBs plus 1, and a total number of PRBs for the downlink resource is an odd number.

Referring back to FIG. 6, the network device 520 determines the downlink resource at 635. In some implementations, the network device 520 may apply the symmetric FDRA mapping rule to determine the downlink resource. In some implementations, the determination at the network device 520 may be similar with that at the terminal device 510, and thus will not be repeated herein for brevity.

In some example embodiments, the network device 520 may allocate the downlink resource for the terminal device 510, and then generate the DCI accordingly. For example, a half of the downlink resource may be indicated by the DCI and the other half of the downlink resource can be determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule. As such, an overhead may be reduced and the downlink resource may be indicated in a more efficient way. For example, the operation 635 may be performed before the operation 620 in FIG. 6.

In addition, at 640 as shown in FIG. 6, the network device 520 transmits downlink data on the downlink resource to the terminal device 510, and accordingly the terminal device 510 receives the downlink data on the downlink resource. For example, the downlink data may be transmitted over PDSCH.

According to some example embodiments in the present disclosure, the resource allocation for downlink data may be more flexible by using a symmetric FDRA mapping rule. As such, the resource assignment may be performed continuously across VRBs by one RIV in the DCI, therefore, the overhead can be reduced and the downlink resources may be used more efficiently.

FIG. 9 illustrates a flowchart 900 of a method implemented at a terminal device in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure. For the purpose of discussion, the method 900 will be described from the perspective of the terminal device 510 with reference to FIG. 5.

At block 910, the terminal device 510 receives, from a network device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous. At block 920, the terminal device 510 receives, from the network device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule. At block 930, the terminal device 510 determines, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRB and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs. At block 940, the terminal device 510 receives, from the network device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device 510 determines a virtual subband comprising a plurality of continuous VRBs, wherein the virtual subband is mapped to a combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband. In some example embodiments, the terminal device 510 determines a first part of VRBs and a second part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs are symmetric in the virtual subband. In some example embodiments, the terminal device 510 determines, based on a mapping of the virtual subband and the combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband, the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs based on the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs respectively.

In some example embodiments, the DCI further comprises an FDRA field indicating a starting resource block and a length of resource blocks. In some example embodiments, the terminal device 510 determines the first part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein a start of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the starting resource block indicated by the DCI, and a bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the length of resource blocks indicated by the DCI.

In some example embodiments, the DCI further comprises an indication of a VRB-to-PRB mapping mode and the VRB-to-PRB mapping mode is an interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode, and wherein the bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined further based on a pre-configured bundle size.

In some example embodiments, the first part of VRBs comprises a plurality of continuous bundles, and each of the plurality of continuous bundles has the pre-configured bundle size.

In some example embodiments, the DCI further comprises a grouping size which is an even value, and wherein the bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined further based on a half of the grouping size.

In some example embodiments, the first part of VRBs comprises a plurality of continuous subparts, and a number of the plurality of continuous subparts is the half of the grouping size.

In some example embodiments, each of the plurality of continuous subparts has a same bandwidth which equals to the length of source blocks indicated by the DCI.

In some example embodiments, a bandwidth of the first part of PRBs equals to a bandwidth of the second part of PRBs, or a bandwidth of the first part of PRBs is larger than a bandwidth of the second part of PRBs.

In some example embodiments, the first part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the first downlink subband or in the second downlink subband, or the first part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the first downlink subband and one or more continuous PRBs in the second downlink subband.

In some example embodiments, the second part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the second downlink subband or in the first downlink subband, or the second part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the first downlink subband and one or more continuous PRBs in the second downlink subband.

FIG. 10 illustrates a flowchart 1000 of a method implemented at a network device in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure. For the purpose of discussion, the method 1000 will be described from the perspective of the network device 520 with reference to FIG. 5.

At block 1010, the network device 520 transmits, to a terminal device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous. At block 1020, the network device 520 transmits, to the terminal device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule. At block 1030, the network device 520 determines, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRB and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs. At block 1040, the network device 520 transmits, to the terminal device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In some example embodiments, the network device 520 determines a virtual subband comprising a plurality of continuous VRBs, wherein the virtual subband is mapped to a combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband. In some example embodiments, the network device 520 determines a first part of VRBs and a second part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs are symmetric in the virtual subband. In some example embodiments, the network device 520 determines, based on a mapping of the virtual subband and the combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband, the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs based on the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs respectively.

In some example embodiments, the DCI further comprises an FDRA field indicating a starting resource block and a length of resource blocks. In some example embodiments, the network device 520 determines the first part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein a start of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the starting resource block indicated by the DCI, and a bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the length of resource blocks indicated by the DCI.

In some example embodiments, an apparatus capable of performing the method 900 (for example, the terminal device 510) may comprise means for performing the respective steps of the method 900. The means may be implemented in any suitable form. For example, the means may be implemented in a circuitry or software module.

In some example embodiments, the apparatus comprises: means for receiving, at a terminal device from a network device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; means for receiving, from the network device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule; means for determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRBs and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and means for receiving, from the network device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

In some example embodiments, the apparatus comprises: means for determining a virtual subband comprising a plurality of continuous VRBs, wherein the virtual subband is mapped to a combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband; means for determining a first part of VRBs and a second part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs are symmetric in the virtual subband; and means for determining, based on a mapping of the virtual subband and the combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband, the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs based on the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs respectively.

In some example embodiments, the DCI further comprises an FDRA field indicating a starting resource block and a length of resource blocks, and the apparatus comprises means for determining the first part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein a start of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the starting resource block indicated by the DCI, and a bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the length of resource blocks indicated by the DCI.

In some example embodiments, an apparatus capable of performing the method 1000 (for example, the network device 520) may comprise means for performing the respective steps of the method 1000. The means may be implemented in any suitable form. For example, the means may be implemented in a circuitry or software module.

In some example embodiments, the apparatus comprises: means for transmitting, at a network device to a terminal device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous; means for transmitting, to the terminal device, a DCI comprising an indication indicating a symmetric FDRA mapping rule; means for determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of PRB and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and means for transmitting, to the terminal device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.

FIG. 11 illustrates a simplified block diagram of a device 1100 that is suitable for implementing some example embodiments of the present disclosure. The device 1100 may be provided to implement the communication device, for example the terminal device 510, or the network device 520 as shown in FIG. 5. As shown, the device 1100 includes one or more processors 1110, one or more memories 1120 coupled to the processor 1110, and one or more communication modules 1140 coupled to the processor 1110.

The communication module 1140 is for bidirectional communications. The communication module 1140 has at least one antenna to facilitate communication. The communication interface may represent any interface that is necessary for communication with other network elements.

The processor 1110 may be of any type suitable to the local technical network and may include one or more of the following: 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.

The memory 1120 may include one or more non-volatile memories and one or more volatile memories. Examples of the non-volatile memories include, but are not limited to, a Read Only Memory (ROM) 1124, an electrically programmable read only memory (EPROM) , a flash memory, a hard disk, a compact disc (CD) , a digital video disk (DVD) , and other magnetic storage and/or optical storage. Examples of the volatile memories include, but are not limited to, a random access memory (RAM) 1122 and other volatile memories that will not last in the power-down duration.

A computer program 1130 includes computer executable instructions that are executed by the associated processor 1110. The program 1130 may be stored in the ROM 1124. The processor 1110 may perform any suitable actions and processing by loading the program 1130 into the RAM 1122.

The embodiments of the present disclosure may be implemented by means of the program 1130 so that the device 1100 may perform any process of the disclosure as discussed with reference to FIGS. 6-10. The embodiments of the present disclosure may also be implemented by hardware or by a combination of software and hardware.

In some example embodiments, the program 1130 may be tangibly contained in a computer readable medium which may be included in the device 1100 (such as in the memory 1120) or other storage devices that are accessible by the device 1100. The device 1100 may load the program 1130 from the computer readable medium to the RAM 1122 for execution. The computer readable medium may include any types of tangible non-volatile storage, such as ROM, EPROM, a flash memory, a hard disk, CD, DVD, and the like.

FIG. 12 illustrates a block diagram of an example of a computer readable medium 1200 in accordance with some example embodiments of the present disclosure. The computer readable medium 1200 has the program 1130 stored thereon. It is noted that although the computer readable medium 1200 is depicted in form of CD or DVD in FIG. 12, the computer readable medium 1200 may be in any other form suitable for carry or hold the program 1130.

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 representations, it is to be understood that the block, apparatus, system, technique or method 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 method as described above with reference to any of FIGS. 6-10. 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.

In the context of the present disclosure, the computer program codes or related data may be carried by any suitable carrier to enable the device, apparatus or processor to perform various processes and operations as described above. Examples of the carrier include a signal, computer readable medium, and the like.

The computer readable medium may be a computer readable signal medium or a computer readable storage medium. A computer 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 computer 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. The term “non-transitory, ” as used herein, is a limitation of the medium itself (i.e., tangible, not a signal) as opposed to a limitation on data storage persistency (e.g., RAM vs. ROM) .

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 languages 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; and

at least one memory storing instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the terminal device at least to:

receive, from a network device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous;

receive, from the network device, downlink control information (DCI) comprising an indication indicating a symmetric frequency domain resource allocation (FDRA) mapping rule;

determine, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of physical resources blocks (PRB) and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and

receive, from the network device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.
The terminal device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is configured to cause the terminal device to determine the downlink transmission resource by:

determining a virtual subband comprising a plurality of continuous virtual resource blocks (VRB) , wherein the virtual subband is mapped to a combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband;

determining a first part of VRBs and a second part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs are symmetric in the virtual subband; and

determining, based on a mapping of the virtual subband and the combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband, the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs based on the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs respectively.
The terminal device of claim 2, wherein the DCI further comprises an FDRA field indicating a starting resource block and a length of resource blocks, and wherein the at least one processor is configured to cause the terminal device to:

determine the first part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein a start of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the starting resource block indicated by the DCI, and a bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the length of resource blocks indicated by the DCI.
The terminal device of claim 3, wherein the DCI further comprises an indication of a VRB-to-PRB mapping mode and the VRB-to-PRB mapping mode is an interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode, and

wherein the bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined further based on a pre-configured bundle size.
The terminal device of claim 4, wherein the first part of VRBs comprises a plurality of continuous bundles, and each of the plurality of continuous bundles has the pre-configured bundle size.
The terminal device of claim 3, wherein the DCI further comprises a grouping size which is an even value, and wherein the bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined further based on a half of the grouping size.
The terminal device of claim 6, wherein the first part of VRBs comprises a plurality of continuous subparts, and a number of the plurality of continuous subparts is the half of the grouping size.
The terminal device of claim 5 or 7, wherein each of the plurality of continuous subparts has a same bandwidth which equals to the length of source blocks indicated by the DCI.
The terminal device of any of claims 1-8, wherein a bandwidth of the first part of PRBs equals to a bandwidth of the second part of PRBs, or a bandwidth of the first part of PRBs is larger than a bandwidth of the second part of PRBs.
The terminal device of any of claims 1-9, wherein the first part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the first downlink subband or in the second downlink subband, or the first part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the first downlink subband and one or more continuous PRBs in the second downlink subband.
The terminal device of any of claims 1-10, wherein the second part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the second downlink subband or in the first downlink subband, or the second part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the first downlink subband and one or more continuous PRBs in the second downlink subband.
A network device comprising:

at least one processor; and

at least one memory storing instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the network device at least to:

transmit, to a terminal device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous;

transmit, to the terminal device, downlink control information (DCI) comprising an indication indicating a symmetric frequency domain resource allocation (FDRA) mapping rule;

determine, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of physical resources blocks (PRB) and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and

transmit, to the terminal device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.
The network device of claim 12, wherein the at least one processor is configured to cause the network device to determine the downlink transmission resource by:

determining a virtual subband comprising a plurality of continuous virtual resource blocks (VRB) , wherein the virtual subband is mapped to a combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband;

determining a first part of VRBs and a second part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs are symmetric in the virtual subband; and

determining, based on a mapping of the virtual subband and the combination of the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband, the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs based on the first part of VRBs and the second part of VRBs respectively.
The network device of claim 13, wherein the DCI further comprises an FDRA field indicating a starting resource block and a length of resource blocks, and wherein the at least one processor is configured to cause the terminal device to:

determine the first part of VRBs in the virtual subband based on the DCI, wherein a start of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the starting resource block indicated by the DCI, and a bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined based on the length of resource blocks indicated by the DCI.
The network device of claim 14, wherein the DCI further comprises an indication of a VRB-to-PRB mapping mode and the VRB-to-PRB mapping mode is an interleaved VRB-to-PRB mapping mode, and

wherein the bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined further based on a pre-configured bundle size.
The network device of claim 15, wherein the first part of VRBs comprises a plurality of continuous bundles, and each of the plurality of continuous bundles has the pre-configured bundle size.
The network device of claim 14, wherein the DCI further comprises a grouping size which is an even value, and wherein the bandwidth of the first part of VRBs is determined further based on a half of the grouping size.
The network device of claim 17, wherein the first part of VRBs comprises a plurality of continuous subparts, and a number of the plurality of continuous subparts is the half of the grouping size.
The network device of claim 16 or 18, wherein each of the plurality of continuous subparts has a same bandwidth which equals to the length of source blocks indicated by the DCI.
The network device of any of claims 12-19, wherein a bandwidth of the first part of PRBs equals to a bandwidth of the second part of PRBs, or a bandwidth of the first part of PRBs is larger than a bandwidth of the second part of PRBs.
The network device of any of claims 12-20, wherein the first part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the first downlink subband or in the second downlink subband, or the first part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the first downlink subband and one or more continuous PRBs in the second downlink subband.
The network device of any of claims 12-21, wherein the second part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the second downlink subband or in the first downlink subband, or the second part of PRBs comprises one or more continuous PRBs in the first downlink subband and one or more continuous PRBs in the second downlink subband.
A method comprising:

receiving, at a terminal device from a network device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous;

receiving, from the network device, downlink control information (DCI) comprising an indication indicating a symmetric frequency domain resource allocation (FDRA) mapping rule;

determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of physical resources blocks (PRB) and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and

receiving, from the network device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.
A method comprising:

transmitting, at a network device to a terminal device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous;

transmitting, to the terminal device, downlink control information (DCI) comprising an indication indicating a symmetric frequency domain resource allocation (FDRA) mapping rule;

determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of physical resources blocks (PRB) and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and

transmitting, to the terminal device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.
An apparatus comprising:

means for receiving, at a terminal device from a network device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous;

means for receiving, from the network device, downlink control information (DCI) comprising an indication indicating a symmetric frequency domain resource allocation (FDRA) mapping rule;

means for determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of physical resources blocks (PRB) and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and

means for receiving, from the network device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.
An apparatus comprising:

means for transmitting, at a network device to a terminal device, a configuration indicating a first downlink subband and a second downlink subband, wherein the first downlink subband and the second downlink subband are discontinuous;

transmitting, to the terminal device, downlink control information (DCI) comprising an indication indicating a symmetric frequency domain resource allocation (FDRA) mapping rule;

determining, based on the configuration and the DCI, a downlink transmission resource comprising a first part of physical resources blocks (PRB) and a second part of PRBs, wherein the second part of PRBs is determined based on the symmetric FDRA mapping rule indicating a frequency relationship of the first part of PRBs and the second part of PRBs; and

transmitting, to the terminal device, downlink data on the determined downlink transmission resource.
A computer readable medium comprising program instructions for causing an apparatus to perform at least the method of claim 23 or 24.