WO2025236410A1

WO2025236410A1 - Method, apparatus and system for generalized uplink control information transmission

Info

Publication number: WO2025236410A1
Application number: PCT/CN2024/106734
Authority: WO
Inventors: Hua Xu; Jianglei Ma; Huazi ZHANG
Original assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Current assignee: Huawei Technologies Co Ltd
Priority date: 2024-05-15
Filing date: 2024-07-22
Publication date: 2025-11-20
Anticipated expiration: 2026-11-15

Abstract

The present application relates to communication methods and communication apparatuses. An example method includes transmitting downlink control information (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), wherein the DCI comprises an indication, wherein the indication indicates that the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.

Description

METHOD, APPARATUS AND SYSTEM FOR GENERALIZED UPLINK CONTROL INFORMATION TRANSMISSION

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims the benefit of U. S. Provisional Application Serial No. 63/647,760 filed on May 15, 2024, the entire contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The application relates generally to wireless communications. Particularly, it relates to a method, apparatus, and system for control information transmission.

BACKGROUND

Wireless communications system such as fourth generation (4G) system (for example, Long-Term Evolution (LTE) system) , fifth generation (5G) system (for example, New Radio (NR) system) have been deployed to provide various types of applications, such as message, voice, video, and other data.

SUMMARY

One or more implementations of the present application provide communication methods and communication apparatuses. The techniques described in the application can improve the performance of UCI transmission.

According to a first aspect, a method is provided. The method includes transmitting downlink control information (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) . The DCI comprises an indication, wherein the indication indicates that the DCI is for scheduling UCI transmission on PUSCH.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the PUSCH carries the UCI transmission without carrying data.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the indication includes a first field, and the first field indicates one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to one piece of UCI included in the UCI transmission.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the indication comprises a scrambling mask applied on a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) of the DCI.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the scrambling mask is based on a radio network temporary identifier (RNTI) associated with a UCI transmission on PUSCH.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the DCI indicates a spatial resource allocation for the UCI transmission on PUSCH.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the DCI indicates at least one of the following: a frequency resource allocation, a time duration allocation, a time offset, a carrier allocation, a coding scheme, a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) , aperiodic channel state information (CSI) feedback information, or a power control parameter.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the DCI comprises first DCI and second DCI, wherein the first DCI indicates a presence of the second DCI.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the first DCI and the second DCI are located in a same control resource set (CORESET) .

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the first DCI and the second DCI are located in different CORESETs.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the first DCI is located in a CORESET, and the second DCI is located in a non-CORESET resource.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the method further includes receiving the UCI transmission on the PUSCH.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, the method further includes receiving a UCI indication on the PUSCH. The UCI indication indicates one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to one piece of UCI received on the PUSCH.

With reference to the first aspect, in some implementations, a CRC of the UCI is scrambled by a scrambling mask that indicates a UCI transmission on the PUSCH.

According to a second aspect, a method is provided. The method includes receiving downlink control information (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication, wherein the indication indicates that the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the PUSCH carries the UCI transmission without carrying data.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the indication includes a first field, and the first field indicates one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to one piece of UCI included in the UCI transmission.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the indication comprises a scrambling mask applied on a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) of the DCI.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the scrambling mask is based on a radio network temporary identifier (RNTI) associated with a UCI transmission on PUSCH.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the DCI indicates a spatial resource allocation for the UCI transmission on PUSCH.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the DCI indicates at least one of the following: a frequency resource allocation, a time duration allocation, a time offset, a carrier allocation, a coding scheme, a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) , aperiodic channel state information (CSI) feedback information, or a power control parameter.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the DCI comprises first DCI and second DCI, wherein the first DCI indicates a presence of the second DCI.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the first DCI and the second DCI are located in a same control resource set (CORESET) .

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the first DCI and the second DCI are located in different CORESETs.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the first DCI is located in a CORESET, and the second DCI is located in a non-CORESET resource.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the method further includes transmitting the UCI transmission on the PUSCH.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, the method further includes transmitting a UCI indication on the PUSCH. The UCI indication indicates one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to one piece of UCI transmitted on the PUSCH.

With reference to the second aspect, in some implementations, a CRC of the UCI is scrambled by a scrambling mask that indicates a UCI transmission on the PUSCH.

According to a third aspect, a communication apparatus is provided. The communication apparatus is configured to perform the method according to the first aspect or one or more implementations of the first aspect, or the second aspect or one or more implementations of the second aspect.

With reference to the third aspect, in some implementations, the communication apparatus includes a transmitting unit, configured to transmit a downlink control indication (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication that indicates the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.

With reference to the third aspect, in some implementations, the communication apparatus includes a receiving unit, configured to receive a downlink control indication (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication that indicates the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.

With reference to the third aspect, in some implementations, the communication apparatus includes an interface circuit. The interface circuit is configured to transmit a downlink control indication (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication that indicates the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.

With reference to the third aspect, in some implementations, the communication apparatus includes an interface circuit. The interface circuit is configured to receive a downlink control indication (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication that indicates the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.

In some of those implementations, the interface circuit includes one or more transceivers.

According to a fourth aspect, an apparatus is provided. The apparatus includes one or more processors and one or more memories. The one or more memories store instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the apparatus to perform the method according to the first aspect or one or more implementations of the first aspect, or the second aspect or one or more implementations of the second aspect.

According to a fifth aspect, a communication system is provided. The communication system includes a first communication apparatus configured to perform the method according to the first aspect or one or more implementations of the first aspect. The communication system further includes a second communication apparatus configured to perform the method according to the second aspect or one or more implementations of the second aspect.

According to a sixth aspect, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium is provided. The non-transitory computer-readable storage has instructions stored thereon which, when executed by an apparatus, cause the apparatus to perform the method according to the first aspect or one or more implementations of the first aspect, or the second aspect or one or more implementations of the second aspect.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 shows a schematic illustration of an example communication system.

FIG. 2 illustrates another example communication system.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example of an apparatus wirelessly communicating with at least one of two apparatuses in a communication system.

FIG. 4 illustrates an example of units or modules in a device or apparatus.

FIG. 5 illustrates an example calculation process for timing advance (TA) .

FIG. 6 illustrates one example of DCI transmission.

FIG. 7 illustrates additional examples of DCI transmission.

FIG. 8 illustrates one example of two DCI operation.

FIG. 9 illustrates examples of coding schemes for PUSCH carrying UCI and data.

FIG. 10 illustrates an example of UCI indication on PUSCH.

FIG. 11 illustrates an example UCI transmission.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

In wireless communication system, for example, 3rd generation partnership project (3GPP) 4th generation (4G) and 5th generation (5G) system, the uplink control information (UCI) can be carried by physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) while uplink data can be carried by physical uplink share channel (PUSCH) . The PUSCH is scheduled by downlink control information (DCI) . PUCCH can be scheduled by combination of semi-static signal such as radio resource control (RRC) signal and dynamic signal such as DCI and is in general separately transmitted from PUSCH. When both UCI and data needs to be transmitted, UCI can be transmitted along with data on a PUSCH, to reduce uplink peak-to-average -power ratio (PAPR) , i.e., UCI carried by PUCCH will be piggyback onto PUSCH and transmitted along with the data.

To support different requirements of different type of UCI, which include e.g., hybrid automatic repeat request acknowledgement (HARQ-ACK) , service request (SR) , and channel state information (CSI) , different formats of PUCCH are specified. For example, in a 5G new radio (NR) system, some formats of PUCCH specified are referred as short PUCCH which occupies 1-2 OFDM symbols, while other formats of PUCCH specified are referred as long PUCCH, which occupies more than 4 OFDM symbols. The short PUCCH is mainly used for carrying UCI for more latency sensitive service such as ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC) services, while long PUCCH is mainly used for carrying UCI for other services with less latency sensitive requirement but can support larger cell coverage and/or larger UCI payload. The UCI and the data are scheduled/commissioned in different way. Using various formats of PUCCH may meet different requirements and needs for different UCIs, but to support them lead to more complexity in both UE and network side.

There are many PUCCH formats (e.g., PUCCH formats 0-5) in 5G NR to support different type of UCI and different payloads. That make it more difficult to support. In 5G NR, the PUCCH resource allocation is indicated in DCI from a set of configured PUCCH resources pool. That is also lack of flexibility and not fully exploit the richness of the resource dimension including the spatial dimension in new scenario such as Tera-bits-MIMO (T-MIMO) and may also cause more collisions. In 5G NR, there may be an alternative to piggyback the UCI onto a PUSCH even without data transmitted, however, the UCI transmission on PUSCH may still need to follow the piggyback design which may lack of flexibility, because there is no DCI format that is designed to schedule a UCI transmission on PUSCH without data. In addition, the CSI feedback such as aperiodic CSI feedback and other type of new uplink feedback may require more flexible design for resource allocation and triggering, which is not available in 5G NR.

In the present disclosure, to simplify PUCCH transmission, and reduce the complexity at both UE and network in order to support current PUCCH transmission, a generalized way of transmitting UCI on PUSCH is provided. To be more specific, instead of transmitting UCI on PUCCH separately and supporting so many PUCCH formats, the UCI can be transmitted on PUSCH in a simpler way. When there is only UCI needs to be transmitted, a PUSCH carrying UCI only information can be scheduled and transmitted. With this change, there is no need to support separate PUCCH including various its formats. It should be noted that the UCI above-mentioned may not limit to the UCI specified in 5G NR only. It could be extended to other types of uplink feedback information from the UE to the network or from one UE to the other UE (s) such as feedback data from more emerging applications such as artificial intelligence (AI) , Integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) etc.

In some implementations, a new DCI format can be signed. The new DCI format can be used to schedule UCI only transmission on PUSCH, i.e., UCI transmission on PUSCH without data. It is noted that in this disclosure, descriptions related to UCI only transmission on PUSCH can also apply to UCI transmission on PUSCH without data.

In some implementations, the transmission and reception of PDCCH scheduling UCI transmission can be designed.

In some implementations, channel coding for PUSCH carrying UCI can be designed.

In some implementations, indication of PUSCH carrying UCI information can be designed.

The details of one or more implementations of the subject matter of this present disclosure are set forth in the accompanying drawings and the description below. Other features, aspects, and advantages of the subject matter will become apparent from the description, the drawings, and/or the claims.

Referring to FIG. 1, as an illustrative example, a simplified schematic illustration of a communication system is provided. The communication system 100 may comprise a radio access network 120. The radio access network (RAN) 120 may be a next generation radio access network, or a legacy (e.g., 5th generation (5G) , 4th generation (4G) , 3rd generation (3G) or 2nd generation (2G) ) radio access network, The RAN 120 may be a network using other radio access technology. In some implementations, a further network radio access refers to a next generation air interface of standards which may comprise both terrestrial networks (TNs) and non-terrestrial networks (NTNs) , and more details will be described below. One or more communication electronic device (ED) 110a, 110b, 110c, 110d, 110e, 110f, 110g, 110h, 110i, 110j (generically referred to as 110) may be interconnected to one another or connected to one or more network nodes 170a, 170b (generically referred to as 170) in the RAN 120. A core network (CN) 130 may be a part of the communication system and may be dependent or independent of the radio access technology used in the communication system 100. The communication system 100 may also comprise a public switched telephone network (PSTN) 140, the internet 150, and other networks 160.

In general, the communication system 100 enables communication of multiple wireless or wired elements. The communication system 100 may provide content, such as voice, data, video, and/or text, via broadcast, multicast, groupcast, unicast, etc. The communication system 100 may operate by sharing resources, such as carrier spectrum bandwidth, among its constituent elements.

The communication system 100 may provide a wide range of communication services and applications including enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB) services, ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC) services, massive machine type communication (mMTC) services, integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) , immersive communication, massive communication, hyper reliable and low-latency communication, ubiquitous connectivity, integrated AI and communication, and other services that can be provided by a future generation communication system. The communication system 100 may provide other services and applications such as earth monitoring, remote sensing, passive sensing and positioning, navigation and tracking, autonomous delivery and mobility, etc.

The communication system 100 may include a terrestrial communication system (or network) and/or a non-terrestrial communication system (or network) . The communication system 100 may provide a high degree of availability and robustness through a joint operation of a terrestrial communication system and a non-terrestrial communication system. For example, integrating a non-terrestrial communication system (or components thereof) into a terrestrial communication system can result in a heterogeneous network comprising multiple layers. The heterogeneous network may achieve better overall performance through efficient multi-link joint operation, more flexible functionality sharing, and faster physical layer link switching between terrestrial networks and non-terrestrial networks. The terrestrial communication system and the non-terrestrial communication system could be considered sub-systems of the communication system 100.

FIG. 2 illustrates another example for communication system 100. As described earlier, the communication system 100 may include ED 110a, 110b, 110c, 110d (generically referred to as ED 110) , RAN 120a, 120b, and one or more of a CN 130, a PSTN 140, the internet 150, and other networks 160. In addition, the communication system 100 may also include a non-terrestrial network (NTN) 120c. The RANs 120a, 120b may include respective network nodes 170a, 170b such as base stations 170a, 170b, which may be generically referred to as terrestrial network (TN) devices or terrestrial transmit and receive points (T-TRPs) 170a, 170b (generically referred to as 170) . As referred to herein, the terms “TRP” and “base station” may be used interchangeably unless explicitly noted otherwise in a given example or section. For brevity, this disclosure may primarily refer to base station; however, absent an explicit limitation, references to TRP are merely non-limiting instances of interchangeable use. The T-TRPs 170a, 170b may be base stations mounted on a building or tower. In one implementation, the NTN 120c includes a RAN node such as base station 172, which may be generically referred to as an NTN device, a non-terrestrial node, a non-terrestrial network device, a non-terrestrial base station, or a non-terrestrial transmit and receive point (NT-TRP) 172.

In some implementations, the NT-TRP 172 is not attached to the ground, for example, in the case of an airborne base station. An airborne base station may be implemented using communication equipment supported or carried by a flying device. For example, a flying device may include an airborne platform (e.g., a blimp or an airship) , balloon, drone (e.g., quadcopter) , and other types of aerial vehicles. In some implementations, an airborne base station may be supported or carried by an unmanned aerial system (UAS) or an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) , such as a drone. An airborne base station may be a moveable or mobile base station that can be flexibly deployed in different locations to meet network demand. A satellite base station is another example of a non-terrestrial base station. A satellite base station may be implemented using communication equipment supported or carried by a satellite. A satellite base station may also be referred to as an orbiting base station. High altitude platforms are yet another example of a non-terrestrial base station, including international mobile telecommunication base stations.

As referred to herein, and unless specified otherwise, a “TRP” may also refer to a T-TRP or a NT-TRP, a “T-TRP” may also refer to a “TN TRP” , and a “NT-TRP” may also refer to a “NTN TRP” . The NTN 120c may be considered to be a radio access network (RAN) , with operational aspects in common with the RANs 120a, 120b. The NTN 120c may include at least one NTN device and at least one corresponding terrestrial network device, the at least one NTN device may function as a transport layer device and the at least one corresponding terrestrial network device may function as a RAN node, which communicates with the ED 110 via the non-terrestrial network device. In addition, there may be a NTN gateway in the ground (i.e., referred as a terrestrial network device) also function as a transport layer device to communicate with both the NTN device and the RAN node. The RAN node may communicate with the ED 110 via the NTN device and the NTN gateway. In some implementations, the NTN gateway and the RAN node may be located in the same device.

A base station (also referred to TRP as stated above) 170 may be a network element in radio access network responsible for radio transmission and reception in one or more cells to or from the user equipment. Base station 170 may be known by other names in some implementations, such as a base transceiver station (BTS) , a radio base station, a network node, a network device, a device on the network side, a transmit/receive node, a Node B, an evolved NodeB (eNodeB or eNB) , a Home eNodeB, a next Generation NodeB (gNB) , a transmission point (TP) , a site controller, an access point (AP) , a wireless router, a relay station, a terrestrial node, a terrestrial network device, a terrestrial base station, a positioning node, among other possibilities. The base station 170 may be a macro base station (BS) , a pico BS, a relay node, a donor node, or the like, or combinations thereof. When a base station 170 performs (or is configured to perform) a method described herein, it may be interpreted as the base station, one or more modules (or units) in the base station, a circuit or chip, or a combination thereof, may perform the method. For example, the circuit or chip may include a modem chip, also referred to as a baseband chip, a system on chip (SoC) including a modem core, system in package (SIP) ) , and the like, and may be responsible for one or more communication functions in the base station.

The EDs 110a-110d and TRPs 170a-170b, 172 are examples of communication equipment that can be configured to implement some or all of the operations and/or embodiments described herein. The T-TRP 170a forms part of the RAN 120a, which may include other TRPs, and/or other devices. Also, the TRP 170b forms part of the RAN 120b, which may include other TRPs, and/or devices. Each TRP 170a, 170b may transmit and/or receive wireless signals within a particular geographic region or area, sometimes referred to as a “cell” or “coverage area” . The TRPs 170a-170b may be responsible for allocating and /or configuring resources and transmission and/or reception in a set of cells. A cell may be a Radio network object that can be uniquely identified from a cell identification that is broadcasted over a geographical region or area from base stations associated with the cell. A cell can be either FDD or TDD mode. A cell may also refer to the carrier frequencies within the DL/UL carrier bandwidth resources of a single standalone carrier or a component carrier in a carrier aggregation mode. A cell may be further divided into cell sectors, and a base station 170a-170b may, for example, employ multiple transceivers to provide service to multiple sectors. In some implementations, there may be established pico or femto cells where the radio access technology supports such. In some implementations, multiple transceivers could be used for each cell, for example, using multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) technology. The number of RAN 120a-120b shown is exemplary only. Any number of RAN may be contemplated when devising the communication system 100.

Any base station may be a single element, as shown, or multiple elements, distributed in the corresponding RAN, or otherwise. In some implementations, a plurality of RAN nodes coordinate to assist the ED 110 in implementing radio access, and different RAN nodes separately implement different functions of the base station. For example, the RAN node may be a central unit (CU) , a distributed unit (DU) , a CU-control plane (CP) , a CU-user plane (UP) , or a radio unit (RU) etc. The CU and the DU may be separately deployed, or may be included in a same element (i.e., a baseband unit (BBU) ) . The RU may be included in a radio frequency device or a radio frequency unit (i.e., a remote radio unit (RRU) , an active antenna unit (AAU) , or a remote radio head (RRH) ) . In different systems, the CU (or the CU-CP and the CU-UP) , the DU, or the RU may also have different names, but a person skilled in the art may understand meanings thereof. For example, in an open radio access network (ORAN) system, a CU may also be referred to as an open CU (O-CU) , a DU may also be referred to as an open DU (O-DU) , and a CU-CP may also be referred to as an open CU-CP (O-CU-CP) . The CU-UP may also be referred to as an open CU-UP (O-CU-UP) , and the RU may also be referred to as an open RU (O-RU) . Any one of the CU (or the CU-CP, the CU-UP) , the DU, and the RU may be implemented by using a software module, a hardware module, or a combination of a software module and a hardware module.

Further, communication (s) between different devices/apparatuses in various embodiments of this application may refer to direct communication between different devices/apparatuses (that is, no forwarding is required by another device/apparatuses) , or may refer to communication (s) between different devices/apparatuses via another device/apparatus (that is, forwarding is required by another device/apparatus) . Alternatively, it may refer to that a functional unit inside the device/apparatus uses another functional unit in the device/apparatus to communicate with another device/apparatus. In other words, "sending (or transmitting) information to. (an ED or a base station) " in this application may be understood as that a destination endpoint of the information is an ED or a base station. It may include sending/transmitting information directly or indirectly to an ED or a base station. Similarly, "receiving information from. . . (an ED or a base station) " may be understood as that a source endpoint of the information is an ED or a base station, and may include directly or indirectly receiving information from an ED or a base station. Necessary processing such as format conversion, digital-to-analog conversion, amplification, and filtering may be performed on the information between the source endpoint that sends the information and the destination endpoint. However, the destination endpoint may understand valid information from the source endpoint. Similar descriptions in this application may be understood similarly. Details are not described herein again. In the present disclosure, the terms "send" and "transmit" may be used interchangeably in embodiments of this application.

The ED 110 is used to connect persons, objects, machines, etc. The ED 110 may be widely used in various scenarios including, for example, cellular communications, device-to-device (D2D) , vehicle to everything (V2X) , peer-to-peer (P2P) , machine-to-machine (M2M) , MTC, internet of things (IoT) , virtual reality (VR) , augmented reality (AR) , mixed reality (MR) , metaverse, digital twin, industrial control, self-driving, remote medical, smart grid, smart furniture, smart office, smart wearable, smart transportation, smart city, drones, robots, remote sensing, passive sensing, positioning, navigation and tracking, autonomous delivery and mobility, etc.

Each ED 110 represents any suitable end user device for wireless operation and may include such devices (or may be referred to but not limited to) as a user equipment (UE) or a user device or a terminal device, a wireless transmit/receive unit (WTRU) , a mobile station, a fixed or mobile subscriber unit, a cellular telephone, a station (STA) , a MTC device, a personal digital assistant (PDA) , a smartphone, a laptop, a computer, a tablet, a wireless sensor, a consumer electronics device, a smart book, a vehicle, a car, a truck, a bus, a train, or an IoT device, wearable devices (such as a watch, a pair of glasses, head mounted equipment, etc. ) , an industrial device, or an apparatus in (e.g. module, modem, or chip) or comprising the forgoing devices, among other possibilities. Future generation EDs 110 may be referred to using other terms. When an ED 110 performs (or is configured to perform) a method described herein, it may be interpreted as the ED, one or more module (or units) in the ED, a circuit or chip, or a combination thereof, may perform the method. For example, the circuit or chip may include a modem chip, also referred to as a baseband chip, a system on chip (SoC) including a modem core, or system in package (SIP) ) , and the like, and may be responsible for one or more communication functions in the ED.

Each ED 110 connected to TRPs 170a-170b, and/or TRPs 172 can be dynamically or semi-statically turned-on (i.e., established, activated, or enabled) , turned-off (i.e., released, deactivated, or disabled) and/or configured in response to one of more of: connection availability and connection necessity.

Any ED 110 may be alternatively or additionally configured to interface, access, or communicate with any TRPs 170a, 170b and 172, the Internet 150, the CN 130, the PSTN 140, the other networks 160, or any combination of the preceding. In some examples, ED 110a may communicate an uplink (UL) and/or downlink (DL) transmission over a terrestrial air interface 190a with station-TRP 170a. In some examples, the EDs 110a, 110b, 110c, and 110d may also communicate directly with one another via one or more sidelink (SL) air interfaces 190b. In some examples, ED 110d may communicate an UL and/or DL transmission over a non-terrestrial air interface 190c with NT-TRP 172.

An air interface (e.g., 190a, 190b, 190c) generally includes a number of components and associated parameters that collectively specify how a transmission is to be sent and/or received over a wireless communications link between two or more communicating devices such as ED and base station. For example, an air interface may include one or more components defining the waveform (s) , frame structure (s) , multiple access scheme (s) , protocol (s) , coding scheme (s) and/or modulation scheme (s) for conveying information (e.g., data) over a wireless communications link. The air interfaces 190a and 190b may use similar communication technology, such as any suitable radio access technology.

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

The TRPs 170a-170b, 172 may communicate with one another over one or more air interfaces 190e, 190f using wireless communication links (e.g., radio frequency (RF) , microwave, infrared (IR) , etc. ) or wired communication links. The air interfaces 190e, 190f may utilize any suitable radio access technology, and may be substantially similar to the air interfaces 190a, 190c over which the EDs 110a-110d communicate with one or more of the TRP 170a-170b, 172 or they may be substantially different. For example, the communication system 100 may implement one or more channel access methods, such as code division multiple access (CDMA) , time division multiple access (TDMA) , frequency division multiple access (FDMA) , orthogonal FDMA (OFDMA) , or single-carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA)

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

In addition, the communication system 100 may comprise a sensing agent (not shown) to manage the sensed data from ED 110 and/or any one of TRPs 170 a-170b, 172. In one implementation, the sensing agent may be part of any one of TRPs 170 a-b, 172. In another implementation, the sensing agent is a separate node that can communicate with the CN 130 and/or the RAN 120 (e.g., any one of TRPs 170 a-b, 172) .

FIG. 3 illustrates an example of an apparatus 310 wirelessly communicating with apparatus 320 in a communication system (e.g., the communication system 100) . The apparatus 310 may be an electronic device (e.g., ED 110) . The apparatus 320 may be a network node (e.g., network node 170) such as T-TRP 170 or a NT-TRP 172. Although there is only one apparatus 310, and one apparatus 320 shown in the figure, the number of apparatus 310 and/or 320 could be one or more. For example, one ED 110 may be served by only one T-TRP 170 (or one NT-TRP 172) , by more than one T-TRP 170 (or more than one NT-TRP 172) . One ED 110 may be served by one or more T-TRP 170 and one or more NT-TRP172. Similarly, one T-TRP 170 (or one NT-TRP172) may serve one or more ED 110.

Apparatus 310 includes at least one processor 210. Only one processor 210 is illustrated to avoid congestion in the drawing. The apparatus 310 may further include a transmitter 201 and a receiver 203 coupled to one or more antennas 204. Only one antenna 204 is illustrated to avoid congestion in the drawing. One, some, or all of the antennas 204 may alternatively be panels. The transmitter 201 and the receiver 203 may be integrated, e.g., as a transceiver. The transceiver is configured to modulate data or other content for transmission by at least one antenna 204 or network interface controller (NIC) . The transceiver is also configured to demodulate data or other content received by the at least one antenna 204. Each transceiver includes any suitable structure for generating signals for wireless or wired transmission and/or processing signals received wirelessly or by wire. Each antenna 204 includes any suitable structure for transmitting and/or receiving wireless or wired signals. The apparatus 310 may include at least one memory 208. Only the transmitter 201, receiver 203, processor 210, memory 208, and antenna 204 is illustrated for simplicity, but the apparatus 310 may include one or more other components. In present disclosure, the transceiver (or transmitter 201 and/or receiver203) may be viewed as an interface circuit.

The memory 208 stores instructions used to perform operations described herein. The memory 208 may also stores data used, generated, or collected by the apparatus 310. For example, the memory 208 could store software instructions or modules configured to implement some or all of the functionality and/or embodiments described herein and that are executed by one or more processor 210.

The apparatus 310 may further include one or more input/output devices (not shown) or interfaces. The input/output devices or interfaces permit interaction with a user or other devices in the network. Each input/output device or interface includes any suitable structure for providing information to or receiving information from a user, and/or for network interface communications. Suitable structures include, for example, a speaker, microphone, keypad, keyboard, display, touch screen, etc.

The processor 210 may perform (or control the apparatus 310 to perform) operations (or methods) described herein as being performed by the apparatus 310. For example, the processor 210 performs or controls the apparatus 310 to perform receiving transport blocks (TBs) , using a resource for decoding of one of the received TBs, releasing the resource for decoding of another of the received TBs, and/or receiving configuration information configuring a resource. In detail, the operation may include those operations related to preparing a transmission for UL transmission to the apparatus 320; those operations related to processing DL transmissions received from the apparatus 320; and those operations related to processing SL transmission to and from another apparatus 310. Processing operations related to preparing a transmission for UL transmission may include operations such as encoding, modulating, transmit beamforming, and generating symbols for transmission. Processing operations related to processing DL transmissions may include operations such as receive beamforming, demodulating and decoding received symbols. Processing operations related to processing SL transmissions may include operations such as transmit/receive beamforming, modulating/demodulating and encoding/decoding symbols. Depending upon the embodiment, a DL transmission may be received by the receiver 203, possibly using receive beamforming, and the processor 210 may extract signaling from the DL transmission (e.g., by detecting and/or decoding the signaling) . An example of signaling may be a reference signal transmitted by the apparatus 320. In some implementations, the processor 210 implements the transmit beamforming and/or the receive beamforming based on the indication of beam direction, e.g., beam angle information (BAI) , received from the apparatus 320. In some implementations, the processor 210 may perform operations relating to network access (e.g., initial access) and/or downlink synchronization, such as operations relating to detecting a synchronization sequence, decoding and obtaining the system information, etc. In some implementations, the processor 210 may perform channel estimation, e.g., using a reference signal received from the apparatus 320.

Although not illustrated, the processor 210 may form part of the transmitter 201 and/or part of the receiver 203. Although not illustrated, the memory 208 may form part of the processor 210.

The processor 210, the processing components of the transmitter 201, and the processing components of the receiver 203 may each be implemented by the same or different one or more processors that are configured to execute instructions stored in a memory (e.g., in the memory 208) .

The apparatus 320 includes one or more processors 260 (only one processor 260 is illustrated to in the figure) . The apparatus 320 may further include at least one transmitter 252 and at least one receiver 254 coupled to one or more antennas 256. Only one antenna 256 is illustrated to avoid congestion in the drawing. One, some, or all of the antennas 256 may alternatively be panels. The transmitter 252 and the receiver 254 may be integrated as a transceiver. The apparatus 320 may further include at least one memory 258. The apparatus 320 may further include scheduler 253. Only the transmitter 252, receiver 254, processor 260, memory 258, antenna 256 and scheduler 253 are illustrated for simplicity, but the apparatus 320 may include one or more other components. In present disclosure, the transceiver (or transmitter 252 and/or receiver254) may be viewed as an interface circuit.

In some implementations, the parts of the apparatus 320 may be distributed. For example, some of the modules of the apparatus 320 may be located remote from the equipment that houses the antennas 256 for the apparatus 320 (thereby also can be viewed as one of more nodes) , and may be coupled to the equipment that houses the antennas 256 over a communication link (not shown) sometimes known as front haul, such as common public radio interface (CPRI) . Therefore, in some implementations, the term apparatus 320 may also refer to nodes on the network side that perform processing operations, such as determining the location of the apparatus 310, resource allocation (scheduling) , message generation, and encoding/decoding, and that are not necessarily part of the equipment that houses the antennas 256 of the apparatus 320. The nodes may also be coupled to other apparatus 320s. In some implementations, the apparatus 320 may actually be a plurality of nodes that are operating together to serve the apparatus 310, e.g., through the use of coordinated multipoint transmissions, or the use of ORAN system as described above in the application.

The processor 260 performs operations including those related to: preparing a transmission for DL transmission to the apparatus 310, processing an UL transmission received from the apparatus 310, preparing a transmission for backhaul transmission to another apparatus 320, and processing a transmission received over backhaul from another apparatus 320. Processing operations related to preparing a transmission for DL or backhaul transmission may include operations such as encoding, modulating, precoding (e.g., multiple input multiple output (MIMO) precoding) , transmit beamforming, and generating symbols for transmission. Processing operations related to processing received transmissions in the UL or over backhaul may include operations such as receive beamforming, demodulating received symbols, and decoding received symbols. The processor 260 may also perform operations relating to network access (e.g., initial access) and/or DL synchronization, such as generating the content of synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) , generating the system information, etc. In some implementations, the processor 260 also generates an indication of beam direction, e.g., BAI, which may be scheduled for transmission by a scheduler 253 which will be described below. In some implementations, the processor 276 implements the transmit beamforming and/or receive beamforming based on beam direction information (e.g., BAI) received from another apparatus 320. The processor 260 performs other network side processing operations described herein, such as determining the location of the apparatus 310, determining where to deploy another apparatus 320, etc. In some implementations, the processor 260 may generate signaling, e.g., to configure one or more parameters of the apparatus 310 and/or one or more parameters of another apparatus 320. Any signaling generated by the processor 260 is sent by the transmitter 252. In some implementations, the apparatus 320 implements physical layer processing. In some implementations, the apparatus 320 may implement higher layer functions such as functions at the medium access control (MAC) or radio link control (RLC) layer in addition to physical layer processing. The apparatus 320 may further comprise scheduler 253 coupled to the processor 260 or integrated in the processor 260. The scheduler 253 may be included within or operated separately from the apparatus 320a. The scheduler 253 may schedule UL, DL, SL, and/or backhaul transmissions, including issuing scheduling grants and/or configuring scheduling-free (e.g., “configured grant” ) resources.

The apparatus 320a may further includes a memory 258 storing instructions used to perform operations described herein. The memory 258 may also stores data used, generated, or collected by the apparatus 320a. For example, the memory 258 could store software instructions or modules configured to implement some or all of the functionality and/or embodiments described herein and that are executed by the processor 260.

Although not illustrated, the processor 260 may form part of the transmitter 252 and/or part of the receiver 254. Also, although not illustrated, the processor 260 may implement the scheduler 253. Although not illustrated, the memory 258 may form part of the processor 260.

The processor 260, the scheduler 253, the processing components of the transmitter 252, and the processing components of the receiver 254 may each be implemented by the same or different one or more processors that are configured to execute instructions stored in a memory, e.g., in the memory 258.

The apparatus 320 and/or the apparatus 310 may include other components, but these have been omitted for the sake of clarity.

Note that “signaling” , as used herein, may alternatively be called control signaling, control message, control information, or message for simplicity. Signaling between a base station (e.g., the TRP 170a-b, 172) and a UE or sensing device (e.g., ED 110) , or signaling between a different UE or sensing device (e.g., between ED 110a and ED110b) may be carried in physical layer signaling (also called as dynamic signaling) , which is transmitted in a physical layer control channel. For DL, the physical layer signaling may be known as downlink control information (DCI) which is transmitted in a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) . For UL, the physical layer signaling may be known as uplink control information (UCI) which is transmitted in a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) . For SL, signaling between different UEs or sensing devices (e.g., between ED 110a and ED110b) may be known as SL control information (SCI) which is transmitted in a physical sidelink control channel (PSCCH) . Signaling may be carried in a higher layer (e.g., higher than physical layer) signaling, which is transmitted in a physical layer data channel, e.g. in a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) for downlink signaling, in a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) for uplink signaling, and in a physical sidelink shared channel (PSSCH) for SL signaling. Higher layer signaling may also be called static signaling, or semi-static signaling. Higher layer signaling may be radio resource control (RRC) protocol signaling or media access control -control element (MAC-CE) signaling. Signaling may be included in a combination of physical layer signaling and higher layer signaling.

It should be noted that in present application, “information” , when different from “message” , may be carried in one single message, or be carried in more than one separate message.

FIG. 4 illustrates an example of an apparatus 410. The apparatus 410 may be a communication device or an apparatus implemented in a communication device such as ED 110 or TRPs 170a-170b, 172. For example, the apparatus implemented in a communication device may be an integrated circuit, which in some contexts may be known by other colloquial names, such as chip, modem, modem chip, baseband chip, or baseband processor. In some implementations, one or more integrated circuits can be packaged into a system-on-chip, a system-in-package, or a multi-chip module. The apparatus may comprise one or more integrated circuits or comprise one or more integrated circuits and other discrete components. In some implementations, the apparatus 410 may be a module in ED 110, or apparatus 310. In some implementations, the apparatus 410 may be a module in one of TRPs 170a-170b, 172, or apparatus 320.

In an example, the apparatus 410 may include one or more processors/processor cores 411, and an interface circuit 412. The apparatus 410 may further include a memory 413. The one or more processors/processor cores 411 are configured to process signals and execute one or more communication protocols. The memory 413 is configured to store at least a part of corresponding computer program instructions and/or data. In an example, the one or more processors (or processor cores) 411 execute the computer program instructions stored in the memory 413 to implement related operations (for example, inputting, outputting, receiving, and transmitting) in the foregoing method embodiments. In some implementations, the memory 413 being configured to store the corresponding computer program instructions and/or data may mean that the memory 413 is configured to store all of the corresponding computer program instructions and/or data for execution by the one or more processors/processor cores 411. In some implementations, the memory 413 being configured to store the corresponding computer program instructions and/or data may mean that the memory 413 is configured to store a part of the corresponding computer program instructions and/or data. For example, the part of the corresponding computer program instructions and/or data include computer program instructions and/or data that need to be currently executed by the one or more processors/processor cores 411. Thus, the memory 413 may store different parts of computer program instructions and/or data for a plurality of times for the one or more processors (or processor cores) 411 to perform related operations in the foregoing method embodiments. As a communication interface, the interface circuit 412 is configured to implement communication with another component. For example, the interface circuit 412 may communicate a signal with other apparatus/system such as a radio frequency processing apparatus, or processor system. Optionally, to reduce a load of the processor core, a baseband signal processing circuit 414 may be also disposed to implement processing of at least a part of baseband signals, including signal demodulation, modulation, encoding, decoding, or the like.

Apparatus 410 may be processor 210 (or 260) in apparatus 310 (or 320) , in some scenario, or included in processor 210 (or 260) in apparatus 310 (or 320) in some scenario. apparatus 410 may be or include a baseband chip. In some implementations, the apparatus 410 may be independently packaged into a chip. In some implementations, the apparatus 310 (or 320) includes different types of chips. The apparatus 410 may be packaged into a processor chip (for example, a SoC chip or an SIP chip) with the different types of chips. In some implementations, the apparatus 410 may be packaged into a chip with some or all of circuits of a radio frequency processing system that may further included in the apparatus 310 (or 320) .

FIG. 5 illustrates example of apparatus 510. Apparatus 510 may include corresponding modules or units configured to implement methods and/or embodiments described herein. In some implementations, the apparatus 510 includes a processing unit 512 and a communication unit 513. Optionally, the apparatus 510 may further include a storage unit 514 configured to store apparatus program code (or instructions) and/or data.

The apparatus 510 may be an ED side apparatus, for example, an ED or a module in an ED, or a circuit or a chip responsible for a communication function in an ED. In some implementations, apparatus 510 may be implemented as apparatus 310, accordingly, the processing unit 512 is implemented as processor 210, the communication unit 513 is implemented as transmitter 201 and/or receiver 203, and the storage unit 511 is implemented as memory 208.

The apparatus 510 may be a base station side apparatus, for example, a base station or a module in a base station, or a circuit or a chip responsible for a communication function in a base station. In some implementations, apparatus 510 may be implemented as apparatus 320, accordingly, the processing unit 512 is implemented as processor 260 (the scheduler 253 may also be included) , the communication unit 513 is implemented as transmitter 252 and/or receiver 254, and the storage unit 511 is implemented as memory 258.

In some implementations, when the apparatus 510 is an ED 110 or a module in an ED 110, a function of the apparatus 510 may be implemented by one or more processors. Specifically, the processor may include a modem chip, or a system on chip SoC chip or an SIP chip that includes a modem core. A function of the communication unit 513 may be implemented by a transceiver circuit.

In some implementations, when the apparatus 510 is a circuit or a chip that is responsible for a communication function in a ED 110, for example, a modem chip, a system on chip SoC chip or an SIP chip that includes a modem core, a function of the processing unit 512 may be implemented by a circuit system that is in the chip and that includes one or more processors or processor cores. A function of the communication unit 513 may be implemented by an interface circuit or a data transceiver circuit on the foregoing chip.

It may be understood that division into the units in the foregoing apparatus is merely logical function division. Each function may correspond to one functional unit, or two or more functions may be integrated into one functional unit. In actual implementation, all or some of the units may be integrated into one physical entity, or may be distributed in different physical entities. In addition, the foregoing functional units may be implemented in a form of hardware, may be implemented in a form of software, or may be implemented in a form of a combination of hardware and software. Whether a function is performed in a form of hardware or software depends on particular applications and design constraint conditions of the technical solutions. A person skilled in the art may use different methods to implement the described functions for each particular application, but it should not be considered that the implementation goes beyond the scope of this application.

In an example, a functional unit in any one of the foregoing apparatuses may be configured as one or more integrated circuits for implementing the foregoing methods, for example, one or more application-specific integrated circuits (application-specific integrated circuits, ASICs) , one or more central processing units (central processing units, CPUs) , one or more microprocessors (microcontroller units, MCUs) , one or more digital signal processors (digital signal processors, DSP) , one or more field programmable gate arrays (field programmable gate arrays, FPGAs) , or a combination of at least two of these integrated circuit forms.

In an example, the storage unit 901 may include a random access memory, a flash memory, a read-only memory, a programmable read-only memory, an electrically erasable programmable memory, and/or a register.

A processor, a processor system, a application processor, a baseband processor, a processor circuit, or a processor core may be collectively referred to as a processor. The processor may include one or a combination of a central processing unit (central processing unit, CPU) , a digital signal processor (digital signal processor, DSP) , a microprocessor (microprocessor unit, MPU) , a microcontroller (microcontroller unit, MCU) , a graphics processing unit (graphics processing unit, GPU) , a field programmable gate array (field programmable gate array, FPGA) , an artificial intelligence processor (artificial intelligence processor, AI processor) , or a neural network processing unit (neural network processing unit, NPU) .

The memory may include one or more of the following storage media: a random access memory (random access memory, RAM) , a static random access memory (static RAM, SRAM) , a dynamic random access memory (dynamic RAM, DRAM) , a phase-change memory (phase-change memory, PCM) , a resistive random access memory (resistive RAM, ReRAM) , a magnetoresistive random access memory (magnetoresistive RAM, MRAM) , a ferroelectric random access memory (ferroelectric RAM, FRAM) , a cache (cache) , a register (register) , a read-only memory (read-only memory, ROM) , a flash memory (flash memory) , an erasable programmable read-only memory (erasable programmable ROM, EPROM) , a hard disk (hard disk) , and the like. In an example, the computer program instructions used to execute the foregoing embodiments may be stored in a non-volatile memory, for example, at least a part of the memory 1060 (for example, one or more of a ROM, a flash memory, an EPROM, or a hard disk) . When the terminal runs, a part or all of corresponding computer program instructions may be loaded to a memory that has a higher transmission speed with the processor, for example, at least a part of the memory 1036 and/or the memory 10312 (for example, one or more of a RAM, an SRAM, a DRAM, a PCM, a RERAM, an MRAM, a FRAM, a cache (cache) , or a register) , so that the processor executes the computer program instructions to perform the steps in the method embodiments in the present disclosure.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Wireless communication may occur over an occupied bandwidth. The occupied bandwidth may be defined as the width of a frequency band such that, below the lower and above the upper frequency limits, the mean powers emitted are each equal to a specified percentage □/2of the total mean transmitted power, for example, the value of □/2 isis taken as 0.5%.

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

Multiple input multiple-output technology (sometimes simply referred to as “MIMO” ) allows an antenna array having multiple antennas to perform enhanced signal transmissions and receptions, which can result in higher data transmission rates. The above ED 110 and T-TRP 170, and/or NT-TRP may use MIMO to communicate over physical layer wireless resources. MIMO utilizes multiple antennas at a transmit apparatus and/or receive apparatus to transmit and/or receive data in a same physical layer resource block over multiple parallel wireless signals. MIMO may involve beamforming parallel wireless signals for reliable multipath transmission of data in the resource block. MIMO may involve bonding parallel wireless signals that transport different data, effectively increasing the data rate of the data carried in a resource block.

In recent years, a MIMO wireless communication system with the above T-TRP 170 and/or NT-TRP 172 configured with a large number of antennas (known as a large-scale MIMO or massive MIMO, for example) has gained wide attention from academia and industry. In the large-scale MIMO system, the T-TRP 170 and/or NT-TRP 172 are generally configured with more than ten antennas (such as 128 or 256 antennas) , and serve dozens of the ED 110 (such as 40 devices) . By having a large number of antennas, the T-TRP 170 and/or NT-TRP 172 can increase the degree of spatial freedom of wireless communications, improve data transmission rate, spectrum efficiency and power efficiency, and minimize or largely eliminate the interference between cells. Using the degree of spatial freedom provided by the large number of antennas, the T-TRP 170 and/or NT-TRP 172 of each cell can communicate with many ED 110 in the cell on a same frequency resource at a same time (that is, on a same time-frequency resource) , thus greatly increasing the spectrum efficiency of the system. By having a large number of antennas, the T-TRP 170 and/or NT-TRP 172 also enable each user to have better spatial directivity for uplink and downlink transmission. This can further result in a reduction of transmission power at one or more of the T-TRP 170, the NT-TRP 172, and the ED 110, thus improving overall power efficiency in the system.

MIMO technology may include single-user MIMO (SU-MIMO) , where signals on multiple spatial layers are transmitted to a same ED, and multiple-user MIMO (MU-MIMO) , where multiple spatial layers are transmitted to multiple EDs.

A 400 MHz system bandwidth in the 10～13GHz range is envisioned as a promising mid-band for wide-area coverage and capacity improvement in future systems. In 10～13GHz with 400MHz, it is possible to deploy a ～1000 transmit/receive (Tx/Rx) antenna array at the base station (BS) side and a ～30 Tx/Rx antenna array at the user equipment (UE) side, which is far larger than the existing 5G antenna array scale. MIMO will be a key technology for 10～13GHz to improve single user-MIMO (SU-MIMO) peak rate with ～20 layers transmission and network peak throughput with ～300 layers multiple-user MIMO (MU-MIMO) layer transmission, and can reach a Tera-bits level system throughput, thus it could also be referred as Tera-bits MIMO (T-MIMO) . How to support such multi-layer SU-MIMO/MU-MIMO transmission is a challenging problem including pilot design and channel state information (CSI) acquisition. The use of ultra-high reference signal (RS) overhead and ultra-high algorithm complexity would result in bottlenecks.

But on the other hand, such super large scale of antennas at both base station (BS) and UE side would result in very rich multi-spatial layers. These rich multi-spatial layers would not only improve the performance of data transmission but also be used to improve the control signal transmission in both downlink and uplink directions between the BS and the UE. It could also be used in other links such as sidelink between UE and UE wherever applicable.

The control signal transmission is very critical in the wireless system. It takes the role of scheduling data transmission and feedback of the outcome of the data transmission as well as other information such as channel measurements, service request etc. Any error or miss-detection of the control signal would lead to the mis-detection or miss-decoding of the data transmission it schedules. Error in feedback would also lead to the wrong behavior at the BS or transmitter side which could impact the UE and system performance. Therefore, very low error rate is tolerable for control signal transmission, much lower than that of the data transmission. For data channel, the HARQ process is implemented to allow re-transmission and hybrid combining of original and re-transmission of the same data to counterattack the channel impairment and improve the robustness of the system performance. However, for the control channel, there is no such mechanism in place to improve its performance. The other challenge for the control signal (or control channel) transmission is that there is no prior knowledge for the receiver side (e.g., UE) to know exactly when and where the control signal would be transmitted, thus, the receiver side (e.g., , UE) could only reply on searching for and blind decoding of the control signal without prior knowledge on payload/code rate of the control signal, resulting in more complexity in detecting and decoding it. Overall, the control signal transmission and decoding is more challenging than data transmission whereas its role is very critical to the overall system. Therefore, more resources and effort is required for control signal transmission to guarantee it has robust/reliable performance. In future system, many new techniques and applications could emerge including AI and ISAC. More information could be exchanged between the network and UEs. Some of them could be received and interpreted in lower layer of RAN and could be viewed as extended uplink critical information

The capacity of control signal is also a key factor for the wireless system. It is directly related to the overall capacity of the system as more capacity of control signal is, the more data transmission can be scheduled and more feedback information can be conveyed, which will lead to improved overall system capacity.

In summary, the control signal is critical to the wireless system, and its reliability/robustness/capacity would direct impact the whole system performance. In 5G NR, the control signal in PHY layer is transmitted on single spatial layer over a time-frequency resource set (or blocks) in both downlink and uplink, and the set of time-frequency resources could normally be shared by a number of UE (s) to balance the performance and overhead. That could limit the capacity and reliability of the control signal transmission.

For T-MIMO scenario, as larger number of antennas will be used in both BS and NE side, more spatial layers with good channel quality could be present, that opens a new dimension (spatial) to improving the performance. Control signal transmission could also benefit from availability of rich spatial multi-layers. If multi-spatial layers can be used for control signal transmission in both uplink (as UCI) and downlink (as DCI) between BS and UE or in sidelink (SL) between two UE (s) , it will provide more resources for the control signal as compared with single layer in 5G NR. That would not only increase the reliability/robustness of the control signal transmission (e.g., by allocating more resources and using lower coding rate) , but also increase the capacity of the control signal (more resources can accommodate more UE (s) for control signals and with larger payloads) .

As discussed previously, to simplify PUCCH transmission, a generalized way of transmitting UCI on PUSCH is provided in the present disclosure. To be more specific, instead of transmitting UCI on PUCCH separately, the UCI can also be transmitted on PUSCH. When there is only UCI needs to be transmitted, a PUSCH carrying UCI only information (without carrying data) will be scheduled and transmitted.

In some implementations, the new DCI format scheduling UCI only transmission on PUSCH can be designed. The new DCI format can be used to schedulethe UCI only transmission on PUSCH.

The new DCI format may include at least one piece of the following information. In some implementations, the DCI can include one or more bit fields, and each bit field can be used to transmit one piece or a combination of multiple pieces of the following information:

1) UCI indication: This is the indication of UCI scheduled in the PUSCH. For example, this indication can be set to one or more bits that indicates the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH without data. In some cases, the indication can also be used to indicate one or more types of UCI. Different types of UCI can be scheduled in the same PUSCH. For example, HARQ-ACK and CSI can be both scheduled in the same PUSCH. The HARQ-ACK in this disclosure can refer to either an acknowledgement (ACK) or a negative acknowledgement (NACK) . For SR, as it is initiated by the UE, it can be transmitted in separate format. A bit field or a bit map can be used to indicate such information. For example, a two-bit bit field could be used with “00” indicate HARQ-ACK only; “01” indicate CSI only; “10” indicate HARQ-ACK plus CSI; “11” indicates HARQ-ACK plus CSI part 1 or CSI part 2. In an alternative example, a bit map of 4 bits can be used, with each bit indicates one or more type (s) of UCI or feedback, for example “0001” indicate HARQ-ACK only; “0010” indicate CSI only; “0011” indicate CSI plus HARQ-ACK etc. In some cases, the DCI can include two UCI indication fields, one indicates that the DCI is for scheduling UCI transmission without data on PUSCH, the other indicates one or more UCI types, where each of the one or more UCI types corresponds to one piece of UCI included in the UCI transmission without data on PUSCH that is scheduled by the DCI. Alternatively or in combination, the DCI includes one UCI indication field that indicates the one or more type of the UCI included in the UCI transmission without data on PUSCH that is scheduled by the DCI, and by including this field indicating the types of UCI, the UE can understand that this DCI is for scheduling UCI transmission without data on PUSCH.

It is noted that if CSI is indicated as one type of UCI being scheduled, the DCI will trigger aperiodic CSI feedback report. Periodic CSI feedback can be abandoned for power saving of UE as its information may be outdated and not beneficial. Alternatively or in combination, whether the UE is refrained from transmitting the periodic CSI when the CSI is indicated as one type of UCI being scheduled can be specified in a standards protocol or configured by using higher layer signaling such as RRC or MAC-CE. The configuration can be performed by using cell-common, group-common, or user equipment (UE) specific signaling.

It is also noted that other new types of UCI or uplink feedback information can be defined and indicated by the UCI indication. These new feedbacks can include feedbacks for artificial intelligence (AI) or integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) in future system.

Additionally or alternatively, the UCI indication can be implemented by using a scrambling mask. For example, a new radio network temporary identifier (RNTI) can be defined for scheduling UCI transmission without data on PUSCH. This new RNTI is different from other existing RNTIs, e.g., C-RNTI, RA-RNTI, and etc. that are defined for other purposes. This new RNTI can be used as the scrambling mask for scrambling at least a portion of the DCI, e.g., the cyclic redundancy check (CRC) portion of the DCI that schedules the UCI transmission without data on PUSCH (e.g., PUSCH carrying UCI only) . The new RNTI can be referred to as “uci-RNTI” or “uc-RNTI” . In one example, the scrambling can be performed by using XOR operation. Thus, by descrambling and decoding the DCI with such a scrambling mask, the UE can understand that this DCI is for scheduling UCI transmission without data on PUSCH.

2) The frequency resource allocation (RA) : This can be similar as the RA for PUSCH scheduling for data, which can bring more flexible resource allocation and provide benefit on frequency diversity. As the payload of the UCI would be smaller as compared with data, a simplified version of RA could be used. For example, the number of physical resource block (PRB) can be limited for UCI only scheduling, and/or the bandwidth of UCI only transmission can be limited. Such limitation could be semi-statically configured by using higher layer signaling such as RRC or MAC CE. The configuration can be performed by using cell-common, group-common, or user equipment (UE) specific signaling.

3) The time duration allocation (i.e., RA in time domain) : This information can include information indicating the starting position of the PUSCH that carries UCI without data, the time duration of that carries UCI without data, or both. As the payload of UCI can be smaller as compared with data, the time duration of such PUSCH can be in unit of symbols, e.g., one symbol or a number of symbols. The starting position of such a PUSCH may depend on the time sensitivity of the UCI. For more time sensitive service such as URLLC, the UCI such as HARQ-ACK needs to be sent as early as possible, thus the starting position of such a PUSCH can be indicated at symbol level, for example, a number of symbols. For other types of UCIs, the starting position can be indicated at the slot level, for example, one or a number of slots. It is noted that the above discussions are examples, and other units can be used for the during and/or starting position. In some cases, the starting position of the PUSCH can be indicated in relative to the transmission of the PDCCH carrying the DCI that schedules the PUSCH, to provide enough processing time for the UE. For example, if the starting position in the DCI is set to X symbols, then the UCI transmission without data on PUSCH starts at X symbols from the PDCCH that carries the DCI. For sub-band FD (full-duplex) transmission, the UCI transmission without data on PUSCH can be scheduled and transmitted in assigned (configured) DL slot (s) or symbol (s) to reduce the feedback latency.

4) The spatial resource allocation: In some scenarios, e.g., T-MIMO, there are rich spatial layers presented in the spatial domain. In this case, different transmission layers (spatial domain resources) can be allocated as well. Either one or more transmission layers could be allocated for a PUSCH that transmits UCI transmission without data. A bit field or a bit map can be used to indicate such allocation. For example, a 2-bit bit field can be used with “00” indicates transmission layer #1 is used to transmit a PUSCH that carries UCI without carrying data; “01” indicates transmission layer #2 is used to transmit such a PUSCH, and so on so forth. Alternatively, an 8-bit bit map can be used to indicate one or more transmission layers that are used, with each bit indicating one transmission layer. For example, “00000001” indicates transmission layer #1; “00000011” indicates transmission layer #1 and #2, and “00001110” indicates transmission layer #2, #3 and #4 etc. The bit map can include other number of bits.

The time-frequency-spatial resource allocation for different types of UCI. The above-mentioned RA can be the overall RA for all the UCI. Different types of UCI can also be allocated with different time-frequency-spatial resources within the overall time-frequency resources allocated for the PUSCH carrying the UCI without data. For example, a number of PRBs can be allocated to carry the first type of UCI, while some other PRBs can be allocated to carry another type of UCI. Alternatively, a number of symbols can be allocated to carry the first type of UCI, while other number of symbols can be allocated to carry another type of UCI. Similarly, one or more transmission layer can be allocated to carry the first type of UCI, while one or more other transmission layers can be allocated to carry another type of UCI. The RA for each type of UCI can be indicated together or separately with RA for overall PUSCH.

5) The carrier index for cross-carrier HARQ feedback: The carrier index to indicate cross-carrier HARQ-ACK feedback can be used to support cross-carrier HARQ-ACK feedback. In this case, the HARQ-ACK information for PDSCH transmission on other carrier (s) can be feedback along with its carrier index (indices) to facilitate fast feedback with lower latency.

6) The coding scheme: For UCI, the encoder used can be polar coding. However, the maximum mother code length for polar code may be extended, e.g., to 4096 or 8192. The coding scheme can also be low density parity check (LDPC) , with a dedicated base graph (BG2 or a new BG designed for enhanced reliability) to be specified. Therefore, the DCI can include information to indicate the coding scheme (e.g., polar coding vs LDPC) , and additional information related to the coding scheme (e.g., maximum mother code length or base graph) .

7) The modulation and coding scheme (MCS) for the UCI: Modulation order other than quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK) (or binary phase shift keying (BPSK) ) can be used for UCI. That can provide more flexibility and balance between low error rate and large payload. If there are different types of UCI scheduled in the same PUSCH, different modulation can be applied for different types of UCI. For example, QPSK can be applied for HARQ-ACK, while quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) modulation can be applied for CSI feedback. In general, different MCS can be scheduled to support different UCI performance requirement, that would avoid the use different PUCCH formats as compared with 5G. Alternatively or additionally, same MCS can be used for multiple types of UCI that are included in the same UCI transmission on PUSCH.

8) Aperiodic CSI feedback: The PUSCH can carry aperiodic CSI feedback. The information for aperiodic CSI feedback can include one or more of the following

- Triggering of aperiodic CSI feedback. For example, 1-bit can be used to indicate that the DCI triggers an aperiodic CSI feedback;

- Codebook selection and restriction for feedback (e.g., type I or type II codebook) ;

- CSI resource for measurement and feedback;

- Granularity of CSI feedback in time, frequency, and/or spatial;

- CSI-related or reference signal received power (RSRP) related feedback;

It is noted that some of the above-listed information can be semi-static configured and dynamic selected. For example, a number of configuration set can be specified in a standards protocol or configured by using higher layer signaling such as RRC or MAC-CE. The configuration can be performed by using cell-common, group-common, or user equipment (UE) specific signaling. Each configuration set indicates a configured value of each piece of information listed above and is represented by an index. The DCI can include the index to indicate to the UE which configuration set is to be used.

9) Power control parameter: The uplink power control for PUSCH carrying UCI without data can be different from uplink power control for PUSCH carrying data, and thus the power control parameters, e.g., power offset for transmitting the UCI, can be indicated by the DCI.

It should be understood that as the PUSCH carrying UCI only information may carry one or more types of UCI such as HARQ-ACK and CSI feedback for a particular PUSCH, some of the above-mentioned information related to scheduling a particular type of UCI may or may not be present in a DCI if this type of UCI is not scheduled. For example, if aperiodic CSI feedback is not scheduled, the corresponding information may not be contained in the DCI. But some other information may be common for carrying different types of UCI, for example, the UCI indication, the overall resource allocations for carrying UCI information, and therefore, in some implementations, they would always be present in the DCI.

Furthermore, other information can also be included in the DCI that schedules PUSCH carrying UCI without data. The information simplifies the scheduling and transmission for UCI.

In some implementations, the transmission and reception of PDCCH scheduling UCI transmission is designed.

A separate PDCCH may be used to carry the DCI scheduling PUSCH transmitting UCI without data, and such a PDCCH carrying scheduling information for transmitting UCI without data can be transmitted in different manners.

Option #1: The PDCCH carrying scheduling information for UCI only transmission can be formed and transmitted in a control resource set (CORESET) .

In this case, the PDCCH carrying scheduling information for UCI only transmission can be formed using legacy coding/modulation/transmission scheme and be transmitted in a control resource set (CORESET) . CORESET refers to a resource region that is allocated to transmit PDCCH. In one example, a CORESET can be a set of contiguous or distributed physical resource blocks (PRBs) within which the UE attempts to blindly decode the PDCCH. The CORESET used for the DCI that schedules the UCI transmission without data on PUSCH can be the same or different as that for the PDCCH scheduling the data transmission.

FIG. 6 illustrates one example of DCI transmission. In the illustrated example, a (the second) DCI 604 scheduling UCI only transmission is transmitted in the same CORESET 610 as a (the first) DCI 602 scheduling data transmission. For example, the second DCI 604 schedules an aperiodic CSI feedback transmission. It should be understood that for convenience here a DCI and corresponding PDCCH carrying such DCI is inter-changeable. Therefore, to say a DCI is transmitted in a CORESET is equivalent to say a PDCCH (carrying such DCI) is transmitted in a CORESET.

To reduce the blind decoding (BD) of the PDCCH scheduling UCI, some indications can be carried in DCI scheduling data to indicate information for decoding the DCI scheduling UCI, as the UCI may be associated with the data. For example, for a PDCCH carrying scheduling information for HARQ-ACK, its search space (SS) and/or associated CORESET can be indicated (or partially indicated) by the PDCCH scheduling corresponding PDSCH for data transmission. This is because in this case, the HARQ-ACK feedback is associated with the corresponding data transmission on the PDSCH, and thus the UE would need to decode the PDCCH scheduling the data transmission firstly before it needs to find the corresponding HARQ-ACK resource for the feedback.

FIG. 7 illustrates additional examples of DCI transmission. As shown in FIG. 7, the first DCI 702 is a first PDCCH that schedules the PDSCH carrying data. The first DCI 702 can include the search space (SS) information such as aggregation level (AL) and corresponding PDCCH candidate index for a second DCI 704. The second DCI 704 is a second PDCCH that schedules the UCI only transmission, and in this case, scheduling the HARQ-ACK transmission. In this case, the first DCI 702 and the second DCI 704 are transmitted in the same CORESET 710. Alternatively, the first DCI 702 and the second DCI 704 can be transmitted in different CORESETs, e.g., CORESET 710 and CORESET 720, respectively. In this case, the CORESET information of the second DCI 704 can also be indicated in the first DCI 702. In one example, if SS for the second DCI 704 is PDCCH candidate #3 with AL =4 in a CORESET, such SS information of the second DCI 704 can be indicated in the first DCI 702. That would instruct the UE to know where to decode the second DCI 704 without the need of BD.

It should be understood that such indications in the first DCI 702 can be used to facilitate the decoding in the second DCI 704. The UE may decode the second DCI 704 directly through BD because on some occasions, the first DCI 702 may not be present. For example, when a DCI is used to schedule aperiodic CSI report only, there may not be another DCI to schedule data. As discussed previously, a new scrambling mask may be used on the DCI that schedules UCI transmission without data on PUSCH to differentiate a DCI that schedules data.

In some implementations, the first DCI 702 can carry an indication to indicate that the presence of the second DCI 704 without additional information of the search space (SS) information of the second DCI 704. In this case, if the first DCI 702 indicates that there is a second DCI 704 present, the UE may still need to detect the second DCI 704 through BD. On the other hand, if the first DCI 702 indicates that there is not a second DCI 704 present, the UE may not need to search the second DCI 704 after decoding such a first DCI 702. This approach may save UE processing power in some circumstances without adding too much overhead in DCI that schedules data. Alternatively, such indication can be carried by the first DCI 702 along with the additional information of the search space (SS) information of the second DCI 704 to indicate and facilitate the decoding of DCI 704. Such indication of the presence of the second DCI 704 can be avoided if UE reports its capability of supporting schedules UCI transmission on PUSCH without data to the network, and thus, both the network and UE knows the presence of the second DCI 704.

Option #2: The DCI carrying scheduling information for UCI only transmission can be transmitted as a second stage DCI of a two-stage DCI.

In some cases, multiple DCIs or multiple-stage DCIs can be used to schedule UCI transmission without data on PUSCH.

FIG. 8 illustrates one example of two-stage DCI operation. In a case where two-stage DCI is supported, the UCI carrying scheduling information for UCI only transmission can be transmitted as the second stage DCI, i.e., a second DCI 804, and indicated by the DCI scheduling corresponding data transmission, which is transmitted as the first stage DCI, i.e., the first DCI 802. The first stage DCI is transmitted using a conventional PDCCH from a conventional CORESET region 810, while the second stage DCI, i.e., the second DCI 804 can be transmitted in a non-CORESET region 820. The non-CORESET region 820 can be a PDSCH region, in this case, the second DCI 804 is transmitted in a different way as the conventional PDCCH.

In some cases, the first DCI 802 can carry resource allocation information of the second DCI 804 and thus the UE can decode the first DCI 802 and then locate the second DCI 804 in the non-CORESET region 820.

In some cases, some of the information discussed previously that may be carried in the new DCI that schedules the UCI transmission without data on PUSCH, e.g., the type of UCI, the RA, and etc., can be included in the first DCI 802, while others can be included in the second DCI 804. This approach can also be applied to examples shown in FIG. 7 between the first DCI 702 and the second DCI 704. In these cases, the first DCI 702 may carry scheduling information of the UCI only transmission in addition to scheduling information of the data transmission.

In some cases, using these options to transmit the DCI carrying scheduling information for UCI only transmission can have the benefits of reusing some of the existing PDCCH or two-stage DCI mechanism and avoid more impact to the specification.

In some implementations, channel coding for PUSCH carrying UCI is designed.

For PUSCH carrying UCI only (or partially UCI, e.g., carrying UCI and data) , there may have several options for channel coding.

For PUSCH carrying UCI only, polar coding can be used. Alternatively, LDPC coding can be used.

For PUSCH carrying UCI and data, different alternatives may be used.

FIG. 9 illustrates examples of coding schemes for PUSCH carrying UCI and data. Alt 1, Using Polar for joint coding of UCI and data, as shown in 910 in FIG. 9. This takes account of the following consideration:

Mixed-traffic coding can be employed for unequal error protection (UEP) of UCI and data respectively. For example, some payload bits can be shared between the UCI TB and data TB, resulting in a coupled TB containing both UCI and data payload bits. The code rate of the TBs can be different, e.g., lower code rate for UCI TB, in order to achieve UEP.

An additional HARQ-less decoding attempt is allowed for UCI, where the UCI and data are jointly encoded, and at the same time self-decodable. For example, the UCI payload is decoded first. If UCI is successfully decoded, the data payload is further decoded. If UCI is not decoded (CRC fails) , then a joint decoding of “UCI+data” can be performed. There is a good chance that the UCI+data can be successfully decoded. Therefore, we say the UCI has an additional HARQ-less decoding opportunity.

Alt 2: Using polar and LDPC for separate coding UCI and data respectively, whereas polar coding for UCI and LDPC coding for data, as shown in 920 in FIG. 9.

Different MCS can be employed for UCI and data respectively, thus provide unequal error protection. For example, the MCS for UCI polar coding is obtained from a separate MCS table, not the MCS table for data.

Separate HARQ processes can be applied for UCI and data

Alt 3: Using LDPC for joint coding of UCI and data, as shown in 930 in FIG. 9.

In this approach, mixed-traffic coding can be employed for unequal error protection, and an additional HARQ-less decoding attempt is allowed for UCI.

Alt 4: Using LDPC for separate coding of UCI and data, whereas an LDPC encoder for UCI and another LDPC encoder for data, as shown in 940 in FIG. 9. This would bring the following benefits:

Different MCS can be employed for UCI and data respectively, thus provide unequal error protection, and separate HARQ processes can be applied for UCI and data respectively

In many cases, the reliability requirements for UCI and data are different. This may be one motivation for applying mixed-traffic coding.

While FIG. 9 illustrates different coding alternatives for PUSCH carrying UCI and data, in some implementations, similar alternatives can be used to transmit different types of UCIs in a UCI only transmission on PUSCH. For example, different types of UCI can be jointly encoded using Polar coding or LDPC coding, they can also be separately coded by using polar coding, LDPC coding, or a combination thereof.

In some implementations, indication of PUSCH carrying UCI information is designed.

When the UCI is carried by PUSCH, there may be a need for the UE and the network to know if the PUSCH is a PUSCH carries UCI without carrying data, or a PUSCH that carries UCI and data. There are two folds for the indications.

First, the network can indicate to the UE that a PUSCH would carry UCI without data, when scheduling such PUSCH.

Second, the UE indicates a PUSCH carrying UCI without data to the network when such a PUSCH is transmitted.

Such indications serve several purposes:

Purpose 1: To enable appropriate encoding for PUSCH carrying UCI without data at UE side (by informing this from the base station to UE) .

Purpose 2: To indicate to the base station that PUSCH contains (PHY layer) UCI without data (by informing this to base station) .

For purpose 1: A number of options may be used as listed in the following:

Option 1: Explicitly indicate this in DCI scheduling UCI, as described above (e.g., UCI indication bit field) . A Bit field or bit map can be used to indicate following information:

- UCI only (e.g., one type of UCI such as HARQ-ACK only, or CSI feedback only, or both of HARQ-ACK and CSI feedback)

- UCI+data

- Other extended UCI

Option 2: Implicitly indicate this by using scrambling mask for DCI scheduling PUSCH for UCI only, as discussed previously.

Option 3: Implicitly indicate this based on the transmission manner of PDCCH carrying UCI only scheduling.

As described above, the UE can know whether an UCI only PUSCH is scheduled if the PDCCH scheduling such PUSCH is indicated by another PDCCH scheduling a PDSCH carrying corresponding data, or it is indicated to be transmitted as a second DCI of a two-stage DCI by the first DCI scheduling the corresponding PDSCH. Accordingly, the first DCI can indicate that the second DCI is for scheduling UCI transmission without data on PUSCH.

For purpose 2: A number of options may be used:

Option 1: Explicitly indicates a PUSCH carrying UCI.

A bit field in PUSCH can be used to indicate that this PUSCH containing UCI for PHY layer. The bit field can include information in terms of UCI type (s) actual carried by the PUSCH. The UCI type being actual carried may not or may be the same as scheduled by the DCI. Actual content of PUSCH may include some other UCI types, which can be scheduled, commissioned, configured by the DCI or other signaling, and a collision occurs when these UCI are to be transmitted. One or a number of information bits can be used for such indication. The indication information bits can be encoded and transmitted on the first one or few symbols of PUSCH for UCI only transmission. The resources that carry such information can be consecutive RE (s) or distributed RE (s) , which can be pre-defined or configured. FIG. 10 illustrates an example of UCI indication on PUSCH. As shown in FIG. 10, the PUSCH 1010 is used to transmit the UCI without data. REs 1012 are used to transmit the UCI indication on PUSCH. While 4 REs 1012 are shown as example, other number of REs can be used. While the REs 1012 are shown to transmit on the first symbol of the PUSCH, other distributions of RE in time or frequency domain can be used. The REs 1012 can be separately coded from the PUSCH 1010. The REs 1012 can carry an indication indicating that the PUSCH 1010 is used to transmit the UCI without data. Alternatively or additionally, the REs 1012 can carry indication indicating one or more UCI types, where each of the one or more UCI types corresponds to one piece of UCI that is transmitted on the PUSCH 1010.

Option 2: Implicitly indicate this using scrambling mask for PUSCH carrying UCI only information.

Similarly to the approach of applying a scrambling mask on DCI to indicate that the DCI is used to schedule UCI only transmission on PUSCH, a specific scrambling mask can also be applied on the CRC of the PUSCH to indicate that the PUSCH is for transmitting UCI only. One way to do this is to introduce a new RNTI that can be used as the scrambling mask for scrambling the PUSCH carrying UCI only transmission. For example, a new RNTI called “uci-RNTI” or “uc-RNTI” can be used. Thus by decoding such PUSCH, the base station would know such PUSCH carrying UCI only transmission. The scrambling mask applied on the PUSCH can be the same or different as the scrambling mask applied on the DCI discussed previously.

Option 3: Implicitly indicate from prior scheduling information.

The base station may know whether the PUSCH is UCI only PUSCH or UCI+data PUSCH from its previous scheduling information. This option is transparent to the UE.

In general, the procedure in this disclosure may include:

Step 1, the base station transmits downlink information to the UE, accordingly, the UE receives the downlink information.

In details, the downlink information may be DCI on a PDCCH. The downlink information schedules the UCI transmission on PUSCH.

The details for the information carried in the DCI and the transmission of the DCI have been described above.

Step 2, the UE transmits the UCI according to the downlink information, on the PUSCH, accordingly, the base station receives the UCI.

The details for the information carried in the PUSCH and the transmission of the PUSCH have been described above.

FIG. 11 illustrates an example UCI transmission. At 1110, a BS 1102 transmits a DCI to the UE 1104. The DCI comprises an indication that indicates that the DCI is for UCI transmission without data on PUSCH or UCI only transmission on PUSCH. In some cases, the indication can indicate one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to one piece of UCI included in the UCI transmission. Alternatively or additionally, the indication can include a scrambling mask applied on a CRC of the DCI, where the scrambling mask is based on a RNTI associated with the UCI only transmission on PUSCH or the UCI transmission without data on PUSCH. The DCI can indicates a spatial resource allocation for the UCI transmission on PUSCH, a frequency resource allocation, a time duration allocation, a time offset, a carrier allocation, a coding scheme, a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) , aperiodic channel state information (CSI) feedback information, a power control parameter, or any combinations thereof. In some cases, the DCI can include a first DCI and a second DCI, where the first DCI indicates a presence of the second DCI. The first DCI and the second DCI can be located in the same or different CORESETs, or in a non-CORESET resource.

At 1120, the UE 1104 transmits the UCI on PUSCH. In some cases, the transmission can include a UCI indication. The indication indicates one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to one piece of UCI transmitted on the PUSCH. In some cases, the CRC of the UCI is scrambled by a scrambling mask that indicates a UCI transmission on the PUSCH.

In the present disclosure, the terms “a” , “an” and “one” are defined to mean “at least one” , that is, these terms do not exclude a plural number of items, unless stated otherwise.

In the present disclosure, terms such as “substantially” , “generally” and “about” , which modify a value, condition or characteristic of a feature of an exemplary embodiment, should be understood to mean that the value, condition or characteristic is defined within tolerances that are acceptable for the proper operation of this exemplary embodiment for its intended application.

In the present disclosure, unless stated otherwise, the terms “connected” and “coupled” , and derivatives and variants thereof, refer herein to any structural or functional connection or coupling, either direct or indirect, between two or more elements. For example, the connection or coupling between the elements can be acoustical, mechanical, optical, electrical, thermal, logical, or any combinations thereof.

In the present disclosure, expressions such as “match” , “matching” and “matched” , including variants and derivatives thereof, are intended to refer herein to a condition in which two or more elements are either the same or within some predetermined tolerance of each other. That is, these terms are meant to encompass not only “exactly” or “identically” matching the two elements but also “substantially” , “approximately” or “subjectively” matching the two or more elements, as well as providing a higher or best match among a plurality of matching possibilities.

In the present disclosure, the expression “based on” is intended to mean “based at least partly on” , that is, this expression can mean “based solely on” or “based partially on” , and so should not be interpreted in a limited manner. More particularly, the expression “based on” could also be understood as meaning “depending on” , “representative of” , “indicative of” , “associated with” or similar expressions.

In the present disclosure, the terms "system" and "network" may be used interchangeably in embodiments of this application. ". At least one" means one or more, and "aplurality of" means two or more. The term "and/or" describes an association relationship of associated objects and indicates that three relationships may exist. For example, A and/or B may indicate the following three cases: Only A exists, both A and B exist, and only B exists, where A and B may be singular or plural. The character "/" usually indicates an "or" relationship between associated objects. "At least one of the following items (pieces) " or a similar expression thereof indicates any combination of these items, including a single item (piece) or any combination of a plurality of items (pieces) . For example, "at least one of A, B, or C" includes A, B, C, A and B, A and C, B and C, or A, B, and C, and "at least one of A, B, and C" may also be understood as including A, B, C, A and B, A and C, B and C, or A, B, and C. In addition, unless otherwise specified, ordinal numbers such as "first" and "second" in embodiments of this application are used to distinguish between a plurality of objects, and are not used to limit a sequence, a time sequence, priorities, or importance of the plurality of objects.

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

A person skilled in the art should understand that embodiments of this application may be provided as a method, an apparatus (or system) , computer-readable storage medium, or a computer program product. Therefore, this application may use a form of a hardware-only embodiment, a software-only embodiment, or an embodiment with a combination of software and hardware. Moreover, this application may use a form of a computer program product that is implemented on one or more computer- usable storage media (including but not limited to a disk memory, an optical memory, and the like) that include computer-usable program code.

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

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

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

It is clearly that a person skilled in the art can make various modifications and variations to this application without departing from the scope of this application. This application is intended to cover these modifications and variations of this application provided that they fall within the scope of protection defined by the following claims and their equivalent technologies. Acronyms and Abbreviations

According to a first aspect, a communication method is described. The method may be applied at a terminal side, for example, a terminal or a module in a terminal, a circuit or a chip (for example, a modem (modem) chip, also referred to as a baseband (baseband) chip, or a system on chip (system on chip, SoC) chip or a system in package (system in package, SIP) chip that includes a modem core) that is responsible for a communication function in a terminal. For example, the method is applied to a terminal.

According to a second aspect, a method may be applied to a network side, for example, a component (for example, a circuit, a chip, or a chip system) in a base station on a network side.

According to a third aspect, a communication apparatus is described. The communication apparatus has a function of implementing the first aspect. For example, the communication apparatus includes a corresponding module, unit, or means (means) for performing operations in the first aspect. The module, unit, or means may be specifically implemented by using software, may be implemented by using hardware, or may be implemented by using software in combination with hardware.

According to a fourth aspect, a communication apparatus is described. The communication apparatus has a function of implementing the second aspect. For example, the communication apparatus includes a corresponding module, unit, or means (means) for performing operations in the second aspect. The module, unit, or means may be specifically implemented by using software, may be implemented by using hardware, or may be implemented by using software in combination with hardware.

According to a fifth aspect, another a communication apparatus is described. The communication apparatus includes a memory and one or more processors. The memory is configured to store a part or all of a necessary computer program or instructions for implementing a function in the first aspect. The one or more processors may execute the computer program or the instructions, and when the computer program or the instructions is/are executed, the communication apparatus is enabled to implement the method in any possible design or implementation of the first aspect.

In some implementations, the communication apparatus may further include an interface circuit, and the processor is configured to communicate with another apparatus or component through the interface circuit.

In some implementations, the communication apparatus may further include the memory.

The communication apparatus may be a terminal, a module in a terminal, or a chip responsible for a communication function in a terminal, for example, a modem chip (also referred to as a baseband chip) or an SoC chip or an SIP chip that includes a modem module.

According to a sixth aspect, another a communication apparatus is described. The communication apparatus includes a memory and one or more processors. The memory is configured to store a part or all of a necessary computer program or instructions for implementing a function in the second aspect. The one or more processors may execute the computer program or the instructions, and when the computer program or the instructions is/are executed, the communication apparatus is enabled to implement the method in any possible design or implementation of the second aspect.

According to a seventh aspect, a communication system is described, the communication system comprises a communication apparatus performing the method of the first aspect and an communication apparatus performing the method of the second aspect.

According to an eighth aspect, a computer-readable storage medium is described. The computer-readable storage medium stores computer-readable instructions, and when a computer reads and executes the computer-readable instructions, the computer is enabled to perform the method in any one of the possible designs of the first aspect to the second aspect.

According to a ninth aspect, this application provides a computer program product. When a computer reads and executes the computer program product, the computer is enabled to perform the method in any one of the possible designs of the first aspect to the second aspect.

According to a tenth aspect, this application provides a method performed by a system comprising at least one of an apparatus in (or at) a UE of the present application, and an apparatus in (or at) a network device of the present application.

This application encompasses various embodiments, including not only method embodiments, but also other embodiments such as apparatus embodiments and embodiments related to non-transitory computer readable storage media. Embodiments may incorporate, individually or in combinations, the features disclosed herein.

Claims

A method comprising:

transmitting downlink control information (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication, wherein the indication indicates that the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The method of claim 1, wherein the PUSCH carries the UCI transmission without carrying data.
The method of claim 1 or 2, wherein the indication comprises a first field, and the first field indicates one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to one piece of UCI included in the UCI transmission.
The method of any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the indication comprises a scrambling mask applied on a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) of the DCI.
The method of claim 4, wherein the scrambling mask is based on a radio network temporary identifier (RNTI) associated with a UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The method of any one of claims 1 to 5, wherein the DCI indicates a spatial resource allocation for the UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The method of any one of claims 1 to 6, wherein the DCI indicates at least one of the following: a frequency resource allocation, a time duration allocation, a time offset, a carrier allocation, a coding scheme, a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) , aperiodic channel state information (CSI) feedback information, or a power control parameter.
The method of any one of claims 1 to 7, wherein the DCI comprises first DCI and second DCI, wherein the first DCI indicates a presence of the second DCI.
The method of any one of claims 1 to 8, wherein the first DCI and the second DCI are transmitted in a same control resource set (CORESET) .
The method of any one of claims 1 to 8, wherein the first DCI and the second DCI are transmitted in different CORESETs.
The method of any one of claims 1 to 8, wherein the first DCI is transmitted in a CORESET, and the second DCI is transmitted in a non-CORESET resource.
The method of any one of claims 1 to 11, further comprising: receiving the UCI transmission on the PUSCH.
The method of claim 12, further comprising: receiving a UCI indication on the PUSCH, wherein the UCI indication indicates one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to one piece of UCI received on the PUSCH.
The method of claim 12, wherein a CRC of the UCI is scrambled by a scrambling mask that indicates a UCI transmission on the PUSCH.
The method of any one of claims 1 to 14, wherein the DCI is transmitted by a first apparatus, and the method further comprises:

receiving, by a second apparatus, the DCI.
A method comprising:

receiving downlink control information (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication, wherein the indication indicates that the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The method of claim 16, wherein the PUSCH carries the UCI transmission without carrying data.
The method of claim 16 or 17, wherein the indication comprises a first field, and the first field indicates one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to one piece of UCI included in the UCI transmission.
The method of any one of claims 16 to 18, wherein the indication comprises a scrambling mask applied on a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) of the DCI.
The method of claim 19, wherein scrambling mask is based on a radio network temporary identifier (RNTI) associated with a UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The method of any one of claims 16 to 20, wherein the DCI indicates a spatial resource allocation for the UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The method of any one of claims 16 to 21, wherein the DCI indicates at least one of the following: a frequency resource allocation, a time duration allocation, a time offset, a carrier allocation, a coding scheme, a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) , aperiodic channel state information (CSI) feedback information, or a power control parameter.
The method of any one of claims 16 to 22, wherein the DCI comprises first DCI and second DCI, wherein the first DCI indicates a presence of the second DCI.
The method of any one of claims 16 to 23, wherein the first DCI and the second DCI are received in a same control resource set (CORESET) .
The method of any one of claims 16 to 23, wherein the first DCI and the second DCI are received in different CORESETs.
The method of any one of claims 16 to 23, wherein the first DCI is received in a CORESET, and the second DCI is received in a non-CORESET resource.
The method of any one of claims 16 to 26, further comprising: transmitting the UCI transmission on the PUSCH.
The method of claim 27, further comprising: transmitting a UCI indication on the PUSCH, wherein the UCI indication indicates one or more UCI types, each of the one or more UCI types corresponding to a UCI transmitted on the PUSCH.
The method of claim 28, wherein a CRC of the UCI is scrambled by a scrambling mask that indicates a UCI transmission on the PUSCH.
A communication apparatus, configured to perform the method according to any one of claims 1 to 14 or 16 to 29.
The communication apparatus of claim 30, comprising:

a transmitting unit, configured to transmit a downlink control indication (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication that indicates the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The communication apparatus of claim 30, comprising:

a receiving unit, configured to receive a downlink control indication (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication that indicates the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The communication apparatus of claim 30, comprising:

an interface circuit, configured to:

transmit a downlink control indication (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication that indicates the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The communication apparatus of claim 30, comprising:

an interface circuit, configured to:

receive a downlink control indication (DCI) that schedules an uplink control information (UCI) transmission on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) , wherein the DCI comprises an indication that indicates the DCI is for UCI transmission on PUSCH.
The communication apparatus of claim 33 or 34, the interface circuit comprises one or more transceivers.
An apparatus comprising:

one or more processors coupled with one or more memories storing instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the apparatus to perform the method of any one of claims 1 to 29.
A communication system, wherein the communication system comprises a first communication apparatus configured to perform the method of any one of claims 1 to 14 and a second communication apparatus configured to perform the method of any one of claims 16 to 29.
A computer-readable storage medium having instructions stored thereon which, when executed by an apparatus, cause the apparatus to perform the method of any one of claims 1 to 14 or 16 to 29.
A computer program product storing instructions which, when executed, cause an apparatus to perform the method of any one of claims 1 to 14 or 16 to 29.