Method of signalling in an integrated access and backhaul network

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12096350-B2
Application number	US-202318135251-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 17, 2023
Priority date	Jun 29, 2020
Publication date	Sep 17, 2024
Grant date	Sep 17, 2024

Abstract

The present invention relates to a method of signalling in an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) network. The method comprises signalling information related to multiplexing capability and supported modes of operation from the child IAB node to the parent IAB node. An active mode of operation is determined at the child IAB node. The configuration to operate in the active mode of operation is signalled to the child IAB node. Timing Advance (TA) for each active mode of operation, guard information for each active mode of operation are signalled as configuration for the active mode of operation. Further, the method comprises signalling exchanges for fallback from one mode of operation to another at child IAB nodes.

First claim

We claim:

1. A method of signaling in an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) network, the method comprising:
reporting, by at least one child IAB node, information to any one or more of a Central Unit (CU) of a donor node or a parent IAB node, wherein the information includes any one or more of a multiplexing capability or supported modes of operation of the at least one child IAB node; and
receiving, by the at least one child IAB node, at least one configuration for operating in an active mode from the any one or more of the CU of the donor node or the parent IAB node, wherein the at least one configuration includes any one or more of timing information or guard information.

2. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the multiplexing capability of the at least one child IAB node includes any one or more of Time Division Multiplexing (TDM), Code Division Multiplexing (CDM), Frequency Division Multiplexing (FDM), FDM with Half Duplexing Constraint (HDC), Space Division Multiplexing (SDM), SDM with HDC, or In Band Full Duplexing (IBFD).

3. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the supported modes of operation of the at least one child IAB node includes one or more of TDM, Simultaneous Reception at a Distributed Unit (DU) and a Mobile Terminal (MT) (SRxDM), Simultaneous Transmission at DU and MT (STxDM), DU receive and MT transmit (DURx_MTTx), or DU transmit and MT receive (DUTx_MTRx).

4. The method as claimed in claim 3 , wherein the at least one child IAB node sets a transmission time of MT to a transmission time of DU in the STxDM.

5. The method as claimed in claim 3 , wherein the at least one parent IAB node sets a reception time of DU to a reception time of MT in the SRxDM.

6. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the reporting is performed by one of:
a DU of the child IAB node to the CU of the donor node through an F1-application protocol (F1_AP) interface,
a MT of the child IAB node to a DU of the parent IAB node connected to the parent IAB node, and
the DU of the child IAB node to the CU of the donor node via the F1-AP interface, wherein the CU of the donor node forwards the information including any one or more of the multiplexing capability or the supported modes of operation to the DU of the parent IAB node via the F1-AP interface.

7. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the active mode is at least one mode from the supported modes of operation of the at least one child IAB node.

8. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the active mode of the at least one child IAB node is determined by one of the CU of the donor node, the parent IAB node and the child IAB node.

9. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the active mode of operation is determined by the at least one child IAB node by any one or more of:
explicit signaling from one of the donor node and the parent IAB node, or
implicitly based on any one or more of a resource configuration of a MT and DU of the at least one child IAB node, multiplexing capability of the at least one child IAB node, supported modes of the at least one child IAB node, timing information or guard information.

10. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the configuration comprises the active mode of the at least one child IAB node in a time resource.

11. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the timing information comprises one or more of a timing advance (TA) value and an offset.

12. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the timing information comprises an offset value when the parent IAB node sets a reception time of a DU to a reception time of a MT.

13. The method as claimed in claim 11 , wherein the child IAB node applies the at least one offset to the TA value.

14. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the timing information depends on any one or more of:
an active mode of operation of any one or more of the child IAB node or the parent IAB node,
reception time of parent IAB node, or
transmission time of at least one child IAB node.

15. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the guard information comprises at least one guard symbol, wherein the at least one guard symbol depends on timing of at least one of transmission and reception of any one or more of the parent IAB node or the child IAB node.

16. The method as claimed in claim 1 , comprises
requesting, by the at least one child IAB node, a desired active mode of operation to at least one of parent node and CU of donor node,
receiving, by the at least one child IAB node, a switching grant from at least one of parent node and CU of donor node; and
switching, by the at least one child IAB node, to the desired active mode.

17. The method as claimed in claim 16 , wherein the switching grant is any one or more of the active mode of operation or configuration for operating in the active mode of operation.

18. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the multiplexing capability comprises IBFD capability of at least one of MT and DU of the child IAB node.

19. The method as claimed in claim 18 , wherein the IBFD capability comprises simultaneous transmission and reception.

20. The method as claimed in claim 1 , wherein at least one configuration comprises scheduling for measuring interference.

21. The method as claimed in claim 20 , wherein scheduling is in response to a request from at least one child IAB node.

22. The method as claimed in claim 20 , wherein the scheduling is one of periodic and aperiodic and is in terms of at least one of absolute time, number of slots, number of symbols, number of subframes, and number of frames.

23. The method as claimed in claim 1 , comprises at least one of
receiving, by at least one child IAB node, an information required for association from a plurality of IAB nodes,
performing, by at least one child IAB node, initial access with at least one IAB node from the plurality of IAB node, based on the information; and
establishing a connection with at least one parent IAB node from the plurality of IAB nodes.

24. The method as claimed in claim 23 , wherein the information comprises at least one of:
at least one of, hop order, at least one multiplexing capability, number of child IAB nodes associated, outage probability, interference, and load of the parent IAB node, and
a joint metric calculated by the parent IAB node based on at least one of, the hop order, the at least one multiplexing capability, the number of child IAB nodes associated, the outage probability, interference and load of the parent IAB node.

25. The method as claimed in claim 1 , comprises at least two parent IAB nodes exchanging resource configuration of one of User Equipment (UE) and child IAB node when the one of UE and child IAB node simultaneously connects with the two parent nodes.

Assignees

• Centre Of Excellence In Wireless Tech
• Indian Inst Tech Madras

Inventors

• Dey Priyanka
• Maya Deepak Padmanabhan
• Ramya Thirunageswaram Ramachandran
• Mohandoss Chandrasekaran
• Masal Abhijeet Abhimanyu
• Kaimalettu Sunil
• Milleth Jeniston Deviraj Klutto
• Ramamurthi Bhaskar

Classifications

• H04W24/08

  Testing, {supervising or monitoring} using real traffic · CPC title

• H04W76/10

  Connection setup · CPC title

• H04W24/02

  Arrangements for optimising operational condition · CPC title

• H04L5/1438

  Negotiation of transmission parameters prior to communication (modified according to link quality H04L1/0001) · CPC title

• H04W48/16

  Discovering, processing access restriction or access information · CPC title