Apparatus, system and method of communicating via a plurality of antennas

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10524136-B2
Application number	US-201615279010-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 28, 2016
Priority date	Sep 28, 2016
Publication date	Dec 31, 2019
Grant date	Dec 31, 2019

Abstract

Some demonstrative embodiments include apparatuses, devices, systems and methods of communicating via a plurality of antennas. For example, an apparatus may include a plurality of Physical layer (PHY) components including circuitry to process communication of a wireless station over a directional frequency band; a plurality of lower Medium Access Control (MAC) components to control channel access of the plurality of PHY components; a plurality of switch components configured to connect between respective PHY components of the plurality of PHY components and a plurality of antennas of the wireless station; and an upper MAC component configured to determine an antenna allocation of the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHY components, and to control the plurality of switch components to connect the plurality of PHY components to the plurality of antennas according to the antenna allocation.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An apparatus comprising:
a plurality of Physical layers (PHYs) comprising circuitry to process communication of a wireless station over a directional frequency band;
a plurality of lower Medium Access Controllers (MACs) to control channel access of said plurality of PHYs;
a plurality of switches configured to connect between respective PHYs of the plurality of PHYs and a plurality of antennas of said wireless station, a switch of the plurality of switches configured to switch a connection of a respective PHY of the plurality of PHYs from at least one first antenna of the plurality of antennas to at least one second antenna of the plurality of antennas; and
an upper MAC configured to dynamically control the plurality of switches to dynamically allocate the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs, the upper MAC configured to dynamically allocate the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs by determining a count of antennas to be allocated to a particular PHY based at least on a traffic load to be communicated via the antennas to be allocated to the particular PHY, the upper MAC to determine a first antenna allocation of the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs, to control said plurality of switches to connect said plurality of PHYs to said plurality of antennas according to said first antenna allocation, to determine a second antenna allocation of the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs, the second antenna allocation different from the first antenna allocation, and to control said plurality of switches to connect said plurality of PHYs to said plurality of antennas according to said second antenna allocation.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first antenna allocation is to allocate no more than one PHY per antenna.

3. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first antenna allocation is to allocate two or more antennas of the plurality of antennas to a same PHY.

4. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first antenna allocation is to allocate a first count of one or more first antennas of the plurality of antennas to a first PHY of the plurality of PHYs, and a second count of one or more second antennas of the plurality of antennas to a second PHY of the plurality of PHYs, the second count is different from the first count, and wherein the second antenna allocation is to switch an allocation of at least one of the one or more first antennas from the first PHY to the second PHY.

5. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first antenna allocation is to allocate the first antenna to the PHY based at least on a direction covered by the first antenna.

6. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first antenna allocation is to allocate the first antenna to the PHY based at least on a count of antenna sectors of the first antenna, which are beamformed to communicate with one or more wireless stations.

7. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first antenna allocation is to allocate the first antenna to the PHY based at least on a count of wireless stations to be communicated via the first antenna.

8. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first antenna allocation is to allocate a first count of one or more first antennas of the plurality of antennas to a first PHY of the plurality of PHYs, and a second count of one or more second antennas of the plurality of antennas to a second PHY of the plurality of PHYs, the second count is greater than the first count, and wherein a traffic load to be communicated via an antenna of the one or more first antennas is greater than a traffic load to be communicated via an antenna of the one or more second antennas.

9. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first antenna allocation is to allocate the first antenna to the PHY based at least on a Quality of Service (QoS) criterion to communicate with one or more wireless stations via the first antenna.

10. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein the QoS criterion comprises at least a delay constraint to communicate with the one or more wireless stations via the first antenna.

11. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the upper MAC is configured to update the first antenna allocation based at least on a beamforming procedure between said wireless station and at least one other wireless station.

12. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first antenna allocation comprises a connection of the PHY with the first antenna, and the second antenna allocation comprises a connection of the PHY with the second antenna.

13. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the switch is able to connect the PHY to any antenna of the plurality of antennas.

14. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein a count of the plurality of PHYs is less than a count of the plurality of antennas.

15. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the wireless station comprises an Access Point (AP).

16. The apparatus of claim 1 comprising a memory and a processor.

17. A system of wireless communication comprising a wireless station, the wireless station comprising:
a plurality of antennas;
a memory;
a processor;
a plurality of Physical layers (PHYs) comprising circuitry to process communication over a directional frequency band;
a plurality of lower Medium Access Controllers (MACs) to control channel access of said plurality of PHYs;
a plurality of switches configured to connect between respective PHYs of the plurality of PHYs and the plurality of antennas, a switch of the plurality of switches configured to switch a connection of a respective PHY of the plurality of PHYs from at least one first antenna of the plurality of antennas to at least one second antenna of the plurality of antennas; and
an upper MAC configured to dynamically control the plurality of switches to dynamically allocate the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs, the upper MAC configured to dynamically allocate the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs by determining a count of antennas to be allocated to a particular PHY based at least on a traffic load to be communicated via the antennas to be allocated to the particular PHY, the upper MAC to determine a first antenna allocation of the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs, to control said plurality of switches to connect said plurality of PHYs to said plurality of antennas according to said first antenna allocation, to determine a second antenna allocation of the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs, the second antenna allocation different from the first antenna allocation, and to control said plurality of switches to connect said plurality of PHYs to said plurality of antennas according to said second antenna allocation.

18. The system of claim 17 , wherein the first antenna allocation is to allocate two or more antennas of the plurality of antennas to a same PHY.

19. A method to be performed at a wireless station, the method comprising:
operating a plurality of Physical layers (PHYs) to communicate over a directional frequency band;
operating a plurality of lower Medium Access Controllers (MACs) to control channel access of said plurality of PHYs; and
dynamically controlling a plurality of switches to dynamically allocate a plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs by determining a count of antennas to be allocated to a particular PHY based at least on a traffic load to be communicated via the antennas to be allocated to the particular PHY, herein dynamically controlling the plurality of switches comprises:
determining a first antenna allocation of the plurality of antennas to the plurality of PHYs;
contro

Assignees

• Intel Ip Corp

Inventors

• Yang Ou
• Trainin Solomon B
• Cordeiro Carlos
• Ghosh Chittabrata

Classifications

• H04W16/28 Primary

  using beam steering · CPC title

• H04B7/0602 Primary

  using antenna switching (H04B7/0686 takes precedence; antenna beam directivity switching H01Q3/24) · CPC title