Method and apparatus for harmonizing uplink grants

1 . A method, comprising:

determining a priority of at least one uplink grant at a user equipment (UE) configured to utilize resource allocations for both New Radio Industrial Internet of Things (NR-IIOT) and 5G new radio on unlicensed spectrum (NR-U), the priority determined, in part, based on priorities of a plurality of logical channels each carrying different data for uplink transmission and whether a Medium Access Control (MAC) Packet Data Unit (PDU) within each logical channel of the plurality of logical channels is an initial transmission MAC PDU or one of a re-transmission MAC PDU or a MAC PDU of a logical channel that is in an urgent state;

determining whether the highest priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the re-transmission MAC PDU and the logical channels that can be multiplexed in the initial transmission MAC PDU to be transmitted on the uplink grant resource are lower than a threshold;

responsive to the highest priorities of all MAC PDUs being lower than the threshold, prioritizing retransmissions before initial transmissions, wherein the priority of the uplink grant is determined by a highest priority among priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmission MAC PDU;

responsive to the UE being allocated overlapped uplink grant resources, determining a prioritized uplink grant resource among the overlapped uplink grant resources, in part based on which one of the overlapped uplink grant resources is assigned to the MAC PDU of a logical channel that is prioritized for uplink transmission from among the plurality of logical channels; and

transmitting the MAC PDU multiplexed within an uplink transmission corresponding to the prioritized uplink grant resource.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein

if a retransmission can be transmitted on the uplink grant and the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmission MAC PDU is higher than the highest priority among the priorities of the logical channels with data available that can be multiplexed in the initial transmission MAC PDU to be transmitted on the uplink grant resource, the priority of the uplink grant is determined by the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels with data available that are multiplexed in the retransmitted MAC PDU; and

if the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmission MAC PDU is equal to or lower than the highest priority among the priorities of the logical channels with data available that are multiplexed in the initial transmission MAC PDU to be transmitted on the uplink grant, the priority of the uplink grant is determined by the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels with data available that can be multiplexed in the initial transmission MAC PDU to be transmitted on the uplink grant.

3 . An apparatus comprising:

a non-transitory computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions;

a receiving circuitry;

a transmitting circuitry;

the apparatus configured to utilize resource allocations for both New Radio Industrial Internet of Things (NR-IIoT) and 5G new radio on unlicensed spectrum (NR-U); and

a processor coupled to the non-transitory computer-readable medium, the receiving circuitry and the transmitting circuitry, wherein the computer-executable instructions cause configure the processor to cause the apparatus to:

determine a priority of at least one uplink grant, the priority determined, in part, based on priorities of a plurality of logical channels each carrying different data for uplink transmission and whether a Medium Access Control (MAC) Packet Data Unit (PDU) within each logical channel of the plurality of logical channels is an initial transmission MAC PDU or one of a re-transmission MAC PDU or a MAC PDU of a logical channel that is in an urgent state;

determine whether the highest priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the re-transmission MAC PDU and the logical channels that can be multiplexed in the initial transmission MAC PDU to be transmitted on the uplink grant resource are lower than a threshold;

responsive to the highest priorities of all MAC PDUs being lower than the threshold, prioritize retransmissions before initial transmissions, wherein the priority of the uplink grant is determined by a highest priority among priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmission MAC PDU;

responsive to the apparatus being allocated overlapped uplink grant resources, determine a prioritized uplink grant among the overlapped uplink grant resources, in part based on which one of the overlapped uplink grant resources is assigned to the MAC PDU of a logical channel that is prioritized for uplink transmission from among the plurality of logical channels; and

transmit the MAC PDU multiplexed within an uplink transmission corresponding to the prioritized uplink grant resource.

4 . The apparatus of claim 3 , wherein if a retransmission can be transmitted on the uplink grant and the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmission MAC PDU is higher than the highest priority among the priorities of the logical channels with data available that can be multiplexed in the initial transmission MAC PDU to be transmitted on the uplink grant, the priority of the uplink grant is determined by the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels with data available that are multiplexed in the retransmitted MAC PDU.

5 . The apparatus of claim 4 , wherein if the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmission MAC PDU is equal to or lower than the highest priority among the priorities of the logical channels with data available that are multiplexed in the initial transmission MAC PDU to be transmitted on the uplink grant, the priority of the uplink grant is determined by the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels with data available that can be multiplexed in the initial transmission MAC PDU to be transmitted on the uplink grant.

6 . The apparatus of claim 5 , wherein if the highest priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmission MAC PDU and logical channels that can be multiplexed in a MAC PDU to be transmitted as the initial transmission MAC PDU are lower than a threshold, the at least one processor:

prioritizes retransmissions before initial transmissions on the uplink grant, wherein the priority of the uplink grant is determined by the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmission MAC PDU.

7 . The apparatus of claim 5 , wherein if the highest priority among priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmissions MAC PDU and logical channels multiplexed in a MAC PDU to be transmitted as the initial transmission MAC PDU are equal to or greater than the threshold, the priority of the uplink grant is determined by the highest priority among the priorities of the logical channels multiplexed in the retransmission MAC PDU or the logical channels multiplexed or that can be multiplexed in an initial transmission MAC PDU to be transmitted on the uplink grant.

8 . The apparatus of claim 3 , wherein if more than one logical channels enter an urgent state, the at least one processor:

determines Packet Delay Budget (PDB) values among the logical channels entering the urgent state,

wherein the priority of the uplink grant for the data traffic in the logical channel entering the urgent state with the smallest PDB value is determined as the highest priority.

9 . The apparatus of claim 3 , wherein to determine the priority of the at least one uplink grant, the at least one processor:

determines if any logical channel enters an urgent state,

wherein if a logical channel enters the urgent state, the priority of an uplink grant in which the logical channel is multiplexed or can be multiplexed is determined as the highest priority, and

wherein the logical channel can be the equal priority with other logical channels that multiplex in other uplink grants or the different value of the priority of the logical channel comparing with the priority of other logical channels is less than a threshold.

10 . The apparatus of claim 3 , wherein determining the priority of the uplink grant is based on a potential retransmission, and the potential retransmission is determined based on a logical channel with a retransmission timer running before selecting the prioritized uplink grant, and the at least one processor:

determines whether the priority of the logical channel with the retransmission timer running is greater than a threshold.

11 . The apparatus of claim 3 , wherein the at least one processor performs Listen-Before-Talk (LBT) for all available uplink grants before selecting an uplink grant to prioritize among overlapped uplink grants, wherein the available uplink grants comprises configured grants and/or dynamic scheduled grants.

12 . The apparatus of claim 11 , wherein the at least one processor performs Listen-Before-Talk (LBT) for all available uplink grants, wherein the priority of the uplink grant is determined among the uplink grants with LBT success.

13 . The apparatus of claim 3 , wherein the computer-executable instructions cause the processor to:

perform LBT for the prioritized grant and a de-prioritized grant; and

determine whether the prioritized grant is LBT success or LBT failure;

wherein if the prioritized grant is LBT success, the order of the priorities of the overlapped uplink grants remains unchanged; and

in response to the prioritized grant being LBT failure while the de-prioritized grant is LBT success, the prioritized grant is determined as de-prioritized and the de-prioritized grant is determined as prioritized.

14 . The apparatus of claim 13 , wherein transmission on the prioritized grant is allowed to map generated TB(s) internally to different HARQ processes.

15 . The apparatus of claim 3 , wherein the priority of the uplink grant for which only LBT failure MAC CE and no data for logical channels is multiplexed in a MAC PDU is determined as the highest priority.

16 . The apparatus of claim 3 , wherein the priority of the uplink grant for a Scheduling Request (SR) for LBT failure MAC CE is determined as the highest priority.

17 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the determining further comprises:

comparing a priority of each logical channel from among the plurality of logical channels;

identifying a transmission state of the MAC PDU within each logical channel from among the initial transmission, the re-transmission state, and the urgent state; and

determining the prioritized uplink grant based on the logical channel with a highest priority having data multiplexed within an uplink transmission corresponding to the prioritized uplink grant resource.