Methods and apparatus for touch temperature management based on power dissipation history

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9667280-B2
Application number	US-201113239133-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 21, 2011
Priority date	Sep 24, 2010
Publication date	May 30, 2017
Grant date	May 30, 2017

Abstract

Certain aspects of the present disclosure relate to a technique for touch temperature management of a wireless communications device based on power dissipated over time, and possibly internal temperature readings. For example, the information about power dissipated over time can be utilized along with monitored internal temperatures of a device's internal circuitry to reduce transmit power and/or data rates as required in order to keep a surface temperature of the wireless device below a specified limit. A knowledge of how the device's touch temperature varies with the dissipated power and a knowledge of the power dissipation history can be utilized to determine when to reduce the transmit power in order to avoid overheating (e.g., exceeding the touch temperature limit).

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A method for wireless communications, comprising:
monitoring estimated one or more powers dissipated by one or more parts of an apparatus over a period of time;
monitoring one or more temperatures of the one or more parts; and
adjusting at least one Quality of Service (QoS) aspect of the apparatus based on the monitored estimated one or more powers and monitored one or more temperatures of the one or more parts, wherein the adjusting is performed based on a known function between the estimated one or more powers, a duration of time, and a surface temperature of the apparatus.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein adjusting the at least one QoS aspect comprises:
reducing at least one of a transmit power or a data rate of the apparatus.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein:
the data rate comprises a data rate of at least one of a 1×EV-DO (1 times Evolution-Data Optimized), 1×RTT (1 times Radio Transmission Technology), Long Term Evolution (LTE), or Evolved High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA+) wireless communications standard.

4. The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
recovering the data rate to a value before the adjustment, if at least one temperature of at least one of the one or more parts of the apparatus is below a first threshold.

5. The method of claim 2 , wherein reducing the at least one of transmit power or data rate of the apparatus comprises:
adjusting the data rate, if at least one temperature of at least one of the one or more parts of the apparatus is above a first threshold and below a second threshold; and
turning off at least one internal circuit associated with the at least one temperature, if the at least one temperature is above the second threshold.

6. The method of claim 5 , further comprising:
disabling one or more advanced receiver techniques at the apparatus, if the at least one temperature is above the first threshold and below the second threshold.

7. The method of claim 6 , further comprising:
activating a further reduction of the at least one of transmit power or data rate, if the at least one temperature is above the first threshold and below the second threshold for a defined period of time.

8. The method of claim 6 , wherein the one or more advanced receiver techniques comprises at least one of receive diversity, interference cancellation, or a mitigation technique applied on a Central Processing Unit (CPU) of the apparatus.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
monitoring the surface temperature of the apparatus; and
triggering a control mechanism to reduce the surface temperature, if the surface temperature exceeds a threshold level.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the threshold level is based on an ambient temperature associated with the apparatus.

11. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
measuring one or more electrical currents associated with one or more internal circuits of the apparatus, wherein
the one or more temperatures of the one or more parts are based on the one or more electrical currents, and
adjusting the at least one QoS aspect of the apparatus based on the monitored estimated one or more powers and the monitored one or more temperatures of the one or more parts comprises triggering a control mechanism to reduce at least one of a transmit power or a data rate of the apparatus, if any of the one or more electrical currents exceeds a threshold level.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the control mechanism comprises:
limiting the at least one QoS aspect by lowering power dissipation of the one or more internal circuits.

13. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
decreasing at least one of one or more clock frequencies of one or more internal circuits of the apparatus or one or more voltages of the one or more internal circuits, if one or more internal temperatures associated with the one or more internal circuits exceed one or more threshold levels.

14. The method of claim 13 , further comprising:
increasing the one or more clock frequencies of the one or more internal circuits, if the one or more internal temperatures are below one or more other threshold levels.

15. The method of claim 1 , wherein monitoring the estimated one or more powers and the monitored one or more temperatures of the one or more parts comprises:
monitoring a temperature of a power amplifier associated with the apparatus; and
monitoring a temperature of a baseband circuitry of the apparatus, and
wherein the estimated one or more powers dissipated by the one or more parts of the apparatus over the period of time are based on the temperature of power amplifier and the temperature of baseband circuitry.

16. The method of claim 15 , wherein adjusting the at least one QoS aspect comprises:
adjusting a data rate associated with a forward and reverse communication link of the apparatus, if the temperature of the baseband circuitry exceeds a threshold level.

17. The method of claim 15 , wherein adjusting the at least one QoS aspect comprises:
adjusting a data rate associated with a reverse communication link of the apparatus, if the temperature of the power amplifier exceeds a threshold level.

18. The method of claim 15 , further comprising:
determining a relation between the surface temperature of the apparatus and the temperature of power amplifier, and
setting, according to the relation, thresholds related to states of a temperature sensor used for monitoring the temperature of power amplifier.

19. The method of claim 1 , wherein adjusting the at least one QoS aspect comprises:
triggering data throttling on an uplink of the apparatus that lowers at least one of a transmit power or a data rate of the apparatus, if a temperature of a power amplifier associated with the apparatus measured over time exceeds a threshold level, and wherein
the data throttling on the uplink keeps the surface temperature of the apparatus below a defined limit.

20. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
stopping requests for a Reverse Shared Channel (R-SCH), if at least one of the one or more temperatures exceeds a threshold level;
discarding an extended supplemental channel assignment message (ESCAM); and
resuming processing of the R-SCH, if the at least one of the one or more temperatures becomes lower than the threshold level.

21. The method of 1 , further comprising:
transferring execution of one or more functions from the one or more parts to one or more other parts of the apparatus, if the one or more temperatures exceed one or more thresholds.

22. The method of claim 1 , wherein:
monitoring the one or more temperatures of the one or more parts comprises monitoring a temperature of a battery of the apparatus; and
adjusting the at least one QoS aspect of the apparatus based on the one or more temperatures of the one or more parts comprises reducing a charge current of the battery or disabling charging of the battery, if the temperature of the battery exceeds a threshold.

23. An apparatus for wireless communications, comprising:
a first circuit configured to monitor estimated one or more powers dissipated by one or more parts of the apparatus over a period of time and one or more temperatures of the one or more parts; and
a second circuit configured to adjust at least one Quality of Service (QoS) aspect of the apparatus based on the monitored estimated one or more powers and monitored one or more temperatures of the one or more parts, wherein th

Assignees

• Shahidi Reza
• Anderson Jon J
• Mattis Eric S
• Qualcomm Inc

Inventors

• Shahidi Reza
• Anderson Jon J
• Mattis Eric S

Classifications

• H04W52/0251

  using monitoring of local events, e.g. events related to user activity · CPC title

• H04W52/36

  with a discrete range or set of values, e.g. step size, ramping or offsets · CPC title

• Y02B60/50

  Cross-Sectional Technologies · mapped topic

• Y02B60/1275

  Cross-Sectional Technologies · mapped topic

• G06F1/206

  comprising thermal management · CPC title