Wireless communication system with multiple base stations cooperating to transmit data

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9320042-B2
Application number	US-201013639779-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 9, 2010
Priority date	Apr 9, 2010
Publication date	Apr 19, 2016
Grant date	Apr 19, 2016

Abstract

The present invention is directed to achievement of a data transmission control to cause base stations to cooperate with one another, taking into account efficient use of radio resources. A wireless communication system, which is an aspect of the present invention, includes: a first base station; a second base station connected via a wired network; and a wireless communication terminal that conducts at least one of single data transmission in which a single base station transmits data and cooperative data transmission in which a plurality of base stations cooperate to transmit data. The base stations notify the wireless communication terminal of a condition indicating a case where the cooperative data transmission can be performed. If the communication quality of the propagation path meets the condition, the wireless communication terminal transmits, to the base stations, information that is required for the cooperative data transmission.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A wireless communication system, comprising:
a first base station;
a second base station connected with the first base station through a wired network; and
a wireless communication terminal comprising a signal processing unit configured to select at least one of a single data transmission in which data is transmitted from the first base station and a cooperative data transmission in which the first base station and the second base station cooperate to transmit data,
wherein the first base station includes a signal processing unit configured to:
generate a condition; and
notify the wireless communication terminal of the condition to cause the wireless communication terminal to determine whether the cooperative data transmission to the wireless communication terminal is required, and

the signal processing unit of the wireless communication terminal is further configured to:
compare a communication quality of a propagation path of the wireless communication terminal and the first base station with the condition; and
transmit, based on a result of the comparison, information required for the cooperative data transmission.

2. The wireless communication system according to claim 1 ,
wherein the condition includes a threshold of the communication quality of the propagation path in which the cooperative data transmission is available,
the signal processing unit of the wireless communication terminal is further configured to compare the communication quality of the propagation path of the wireless communication terminal and the first base station with the threshold of the quality of the propagation path included in the condition, and
the signal processing unit of the wireless communication terminal is configured to transmit information required for the cooperative data transmission based on a result of comparison between the communication quality of the propagation path of the wireless communication terminal and the first base station, and the threshold of the quality of the propagation path included in the condition.

3. The wireless communication system according to claim 2 , wherein the information required for the cooperative data transmission is transmitted when it is determined that the communication quality of the propagation path is less than the threshold.

4. The wireless communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the signal processing unit of the first base station is configured to simultaneously notify the condition to a plurality of wireless communication terminals.

5. The wireless communication system according to claim 4 , wherein the signal processing unit of the first base station is configured to simultaneously notify the condition to the plurality of wireless communication terminals via broadcast or multicast transmission.

6. The wireless communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the wireless communication terminal is configured to transmit an allocation request of a communication resource for transmitting the information required for the cooperative data transmission to the first base station,
the first base station is configured to allocate the resource to the wireless communication terminal, and
the signal processing unit of the wireless communication terminal is configured to transmit the information required for the cooperative data transmission by using the allocated resource.

7. The wireless communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the signal processing unit of the wireless communication terminal is configured to transmit the information required for the cooperative data transmission by using a predetermined common resource.

8. The wireless communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the signal processing unit of the first base station is configured to notify a condition including designation of a base station which the first base station cooperates with, selected from among a plurality of designated base stations, and
the wireless communication terminal is configured to notify the first base station of the information required for the cooperative data transmission which includes the base station selected from among the designated second base stations.

9. The wireless communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the information required for the cooperative data transmission includes at least one of a channel matrix, a channel quality at the time of using the mode, the number of ranks of MIMO, and a desired precoding matrix.

10. The wireless communication system according to claim 1 ,
wherein the wireless communication terminal is configured to transmit single data transmission information required for the single data transmission with the first base station to the first base station, and
the first base station is configured to receive the single data transmission information, and set the condition based on the single data transmission information.

11. The wireless communication system according to claim 1 ,
wherein the single data transmission information is propagation path state information indicating a state of the propagation path between the first base station and the wireless communication terminal,
the signal processing unit of the first base station is configured to update the condition based on the propagation path state information from a plurality of wireless communication terminals, and
the signal processing unit of the first base station is configured to notify the updated condition to the wireless communication terminal.

12. A first base station performing a data transmission to a wireless communication terminal, comprising a signal processing unit configured to:
generate a threshold;
notify the wireless communication terminal of the threshold to cause the wireless communication terminal to determine whether a cooperative data transmission to the wireless communication terminal is required; and
perform the cooperative data transmission when receiving a request for the cooperative data transmission form the wireless communication terminal.

13. The first base station according to claim 12 , wherein the signal processing unit is further configured to receive a propagation path state value indicating a state of a propagation path between the wireless communication terminal and the first base station, and determine the threshold based on the propagation path state value.

14. The first base station according to claim 13 ,
wherein the threshold is a threshold of the value indicating the state of the propagation path between the wireless communication terminal and the first base station,
the signal processing unit is further configured to:
refer to the propagation path state value received from the plurality of wireless communication terminals and decrease the threshold when a number of terminals with a propagation path state value less than the threshold reaches a predetermined number,
increase and update the threshold when the number of terminals with the propagation path state value less than the threshold does not reach the predetermined number, and
notify the updated threshold to the wireless communication terminal.

15. The first base station according to claim 12 ,
wherein the signal processing unit is further configured to notify designation of a base station which the first base station cooperates with, among a plurality of second base stations,
the request for the cooperative data transmission includes selection of the designated second base station, and
the signal processing unit is further configured to perform the cooperative data transmission with the base station accordi

Assignees

• Ono Go
• Fujishima Kenzaburo
• Kuwahara Mikio
• Hitachi Ltd

Inventors

• Ono Go
• Fujishima Kenzaburo
• Kuwahara Mikio

Classifications

• H04B7/024 Primary

  Co-operative use of antennas of several sites, e.g. in co-ordinated multipoint or co-operative multiple-input multiple-output [MIMO] systems · CPC title

• H04W72/54 Primary

  based on quality criteria · CPC title

• H04B17/309

  Measuring or estimating channel quality parameters · CPC title

• H04B7/0434

  using multiple eigenmodes · CPC title

• H04W72/08 Primary

  Electricity · mapped topic