Sensor based beam tracking for wireless communication

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10523281-B2
Application number	US-201615377897-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 13, 2016
Priority date	Jun 10, 2016
Publication date	Dec 31, 2019
Grant date	Dec 31, 2019

Abstract

Some aspects of the present disclosure provide systems and methods for utilizing information from inbuilt sensors of a wireless apparatus along with radio frequency (RF) measurements to assist and/or trigger a beam tracking operation. Some aspects of the present disclosure provide systems and methods for utilizing information available from inbuilt sensors of a wireless apparatus and RF measurements along with historical mobility information to assist a mobility operation such as an initial beam search, a neighbor beam search, and handovers.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of wireless communication operable at a wireless apparatus, comprising:
communicating with a network utilizing one or more beams;
collecting sensor information from one or more sensors of the wireless apparatus;
determining one or more radio frequency (RF) measurements of the one or more beams;
determining whether a sensor-assisted beam tracking event (SBT Event) is triggered based on a learning algorithm utilizing the sensor information and the RF measurements; and
performing a beam tracking operation when the SBT Event is triggered, the beam tracking operation comprising:
transmitting a request to the network for one or more beam-tracking reference signals; and
reconfiguring an antenna array of the wireless apparatus based on the one or more beam-tracking reference signals to switch from a first subset of antennas to a second subset of antennas of the antenna array to track the one or more beams.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the determining the triggering of the SBT Event comprises:
determining

h
θ

⁡

(
x
)

=

1

1
+

exp
⁡

(

-

θ
T

⁢
x

)

,

 wherein θ is a learned weights matrix of a model and x is sensor data corresponding to the sensor information; and
if h θ (x)>0, triggering the SBT Event.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the one or more sensors comprises at least one of an accelerometer, a gyroscope, a satellite navigation receiver, or a magnetometer.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the communicating comprises:
communicating with a serving base station utilizing a first beam; and
communicating with a neighbor base station utilizing a second beam different from the first beam.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the one or more beams comprise millimeter wave (mmWave) beams.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the determining the triggering of the SBT Event comprises:
determining a change in at least one of a location, an orientation, a displacement, or a shadowing of the wireless apparatus based on at least one of the sensor information or the RF measurements.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
storing information comprising the sensor information and the RF measurements, and
utilizing the stored information to configure an antenna array to facilitate at least one of an initial beam search, a neighbor beam search, or a handover.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the learning algorithm is based on logistic regression or a support vector machine.

9. A method of wireless communication operable at a wireless apparatus, comprising:
storing mobility history comprising previous mobility information with associated sensor information and radio frequency (RF) measurements of one or more beams, the previous mobility information comprising at least one of a cell search result, a beam search result, a handover history, or radio link failure information;
collecting current sensor information from one or more sensors of the wireless apparatus;
determining current RF measurements of one or more beams;
determining a correlation between the mobility history, and the current sensor information and current RF measurements, the correlation indicating a difference between a current position and historical positions of the wireless apparatus derived from the mobility history; and
streamlining a mobility operation based on the correlation.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the streamlining the mobility operation comprises:
establishing an initial configuration based on the correlation; and
performing at least one of a beam search, a neighbor beam search, or a handover based on the initial configuration.

11. The method of claim 9 , further comprising:
reconfiguring an antenna array of the wireless apparatus to track one or more millimeter wave (mmWave) beams based on the correlation.

12. The method of claim 9 , wherein the one or more sensors comprise at least one of an accelerometer, a gyroscope, a satellite navigation receiver, or a magnetometer.

13. The method of claim 9 , further comprising:
partitioning the mobility history into a plurality of clusters utilizing a data clustering method,
wherein the streamlining the mobility operation is further based on a proximity of the current sensor information and current RF measurements, to one or more of the plurality of clusters.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein the data clustering method comprises at least one of a K-means clustering method or a Gaussian mixture model method.

15. A wireless apparatus, comprising:
a communication interface configured to communicate with a network utilizing one or more beams;
a memory stored with executable code;
one or more sensors; and
a processor operatively coupled with the communication interface, the one or more sensors, and the memory,
wherein the processor is configured by the executable code to:
collect sensor information from the one or more sensors;
determine one or more radio frequency (RF) measurements of the one or more beams;
determine whether a sensor-assisted beam tracking event (SBT Event) is triggered based on a learning algorithm utilizing the sensor information and the RF measurements; and
perform a beam tracking operation when the SBT Event is triggered, the beam tracking operation comprising:
transmitting a request to the network for one or more beam-tracking reference signals; and
reconfiguring an antenna array of the wireless apparatus based on the one or more beam-tracking reference signals to switch from a first subset of antennas to a second subset of antennas of the antenna array to track the one or more beams.

16. The wireless apparatus of claim 15 , wherein the processor is further configured to determine the triggering of the SBT Event by:
determining

h
θ

⁡

(
x
)

=

1

1
+

exp
⁡

(

-

θ
T

Assignees

• Qualcomm Inc

Inventors

• John Wilson Makesh Pravin
• Nagaraja Sumeeth
• Luo Tao
• Akkarakaran Sony

Classifications

• H04B7/0408 Primary

  using two or more beams, i.e. beam diversity · CPC title

• H04W88/02

  Terminal devices · CPC title

• H04B7/0691

  using subgroups of transmit antennas · CPC title

• H04W88/08

  Access point devices · CPC title

• H04B17/318

  Received signal strength · CPC title