Method for arranging transmissions on a downlink carrier

1. A method for arranging transmissions on a downlink carrier c, spanning a frequency range F c , in a mobile radio communications system, wherein a bandwidth of F c belongs to a set of predefined channel bandwidths in the mobile radio communications system, and wherein the carrier c comprises a reference signal defined in the mobile radio communications system, the method comprising:

providing a configurable frequency range F RS comprising a set of time-frequency resources for comprising the reference signal of the carrier c;

signaling information associated with a configuration of the frequency range F RS to a receiver in the communications system, such that the carrier c is deployed over a frequency range F that is smaller than F c when:

the frequency range F RS is configured within F and

any other transmissions on the carrier c are arranged to be within F; and

transmitting the reference signal on the carrier c within the frequency range F RS ,

wherein the configuration of the frequency range F RS is signalled to the receiver by signaling positions of the time-frequency resources on which the reference signal is not transmitted, and signaling information on a total bandwidth of carrier c.

2. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the frequency range F c of carrier c is configured to overlap with a frequency range of at least one other carrier.

3. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the carrier c is configured as an aggregated carrier having a control channel on a separate carrier in the communications system.

4. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the bandwidth of F c is a supported bandwidth, from the set of predefined channel bandwidths, being not smaller than the bandwidth of F.

5. The method according to claim 1 , wherein a bandwidth of the frequency range F RS is restricted to a multiple of a smallest time-frequency entity on which a data channel can be mapped in the communications system.

6. The method according to claim 1 , wherein a bandwidth of the frequency range F RS is restricted to a multiple of a smallest time-frequency entity used for signaling downlink resource allocations in the communications system.

7. The method according to claim 1 , wherein a bandwidth of the frequency range F RS is restricted to a multiple of a time-frequency entity used as a reference resource for channel quality reporting in the communications system.

8. The method according to claim 1 , wherein a bandwidth of the frequency range F RS is restricted to a multiple of a bandwidth of an allowed resource allocation of an uplink carrier in the communications system.

9. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the configuration of the frequency range F RS is signalled implicitly to the receiver by:

signaling of time-frequency resources defined as reference resources for channel quality reporting, wherein the frequency range of the time-frequency resources defined as reference resources for channel quality reporting contains the frequency range F RS .

10. The method according to claim 9 , wherein the time-frequency resources defined as reference resources for channel quality reporting is signalled by: signaling of a bitmap, where each bit in the bitmap refers to a time-frequency resource defined as a reference resource for channel quality reporting.

11. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the configuration of the frequency range F RS is signalled to the receiver by one of the following:

signaling the set of time-frequency resources on which the reference signal is transmitted;

signaling the bandwidth of the frequency range F RS , when a position of the reference signal is known to be symmetric around the center frequency of the carrier c;

signaling a half of the bandwidth of the frequency range F RS , when a position of the reference signal is known to be symmetric around the center frequency of the carrier c; and

signaling the bandwidth of the frequency range F RS and an offset value from a predetermined frequency of the carrier c.

12. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the positions of the time-frequency resources on which the reference signals are not transmitted are signalled by:

signaling two values, N 1 and N 2 , representing time-frequency resources on the edges of the carrier c on which the reference signal is not transmitted.

13. The method according to claim 1 , further comprising signaling, to the receiver in the communications system, a non-contiguous configuration of the reference signal within the frequency range F RS by:

signaling of a bitmap, where each bit in the bitmap refers to a time-frequency resource among the set of time-frequency resources utilized or not utilized by the reference signal.

14. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the configuration of the frequency range F RS is signalled to the receiver by signaling, to the receiver in the communications system, both time-frequency resources used as reference resources for channel quality reporting and information directly related to the time-frequency resources of the reference signal.

15. The method according to claim 1 , further comprising configuring the reference signal to use the same time-frequency resources and modulation symbols within a frequency range F c2 within carrier c, c having a bandwidth larger than a bandwidth of the frequency range F c2 , as for a carrier c2 spanning the frequency range F c2 in the communications system.

16. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the reference signal comprises any of CRS and CSI-RS.

17. A Radio base station in a mobile radio communications system comprising:

a transceiver;

a memory;

at least one hardware processor configured to execute instructions stored in the memory to control the at least one hardware processor to:

provide a configurable frequency range F RS comprising a set of time-frequency resources for comprising the reference signal of a downlink carrier c spanning a frequency range Fc in the mobile radio communications system, wherein a bandwidth of F c belongs to a set of predefined channel bandwidths in the mobile radio communications system, and wherein the carrier c comprises a reference signal defined in the mobile radio communications system;

provide information associated with a configuration of the frequency range F RS to the transceiver to be signalled to a receiver in the mobile radio communications system, such that the carrier c is deployed over a frequency range F that is smaller than F c when:

the frequency range F RS is configured within F; and

any other transmissions on the carrier c are arranged to be within F; and

transmit the reference signal on the carrier c within the frequency range F RS ,

wherein the configuration of the frequency range F RS is signalled to the receiver by signaling positions of the time-frequency resources on which the reference signal is not transmitted, and signaling information on a total bandwidth of carrier c.

18. A mobile terminal having means for receiving transmissions from a radio base station on a downlink carrier c, spanning a frequency range F c , in a mobile radio communications system, wherein a bandwidth of F c belongs to a set of predefined channel bandwidths in the mobile radio communications system, and wherein the carrier c comprises a reference signal defined in the mobile radio communications system, the mobile terminal comprising:

a receiver to receive signaling information associated with a configuration of a configurable frequency range F RS comprising a set of time-frequency resources for comprising the reference signal of the carrier c; and

at least one hardware processor configured to set the receiver to receive the reference signal within the frequency range F RS based on the received signalling information,

wherein the configuration of the frequency range F RS is signalled to the receiver by signaling positions of the time-frequency resources on which the reference signal is not transmitted, and signaling information on a total bandwidth of carrier c.

19. The mobile terminal according to claim 18 , further comprising:

a transmitter,

wherein the at least one hardware processor is further configured to measure a signal quality on at least one time-frequency resource of the configurable set of time-frequency resources comprising the reference signal, and to control the transmitter to transmit a signal quality measurement to the radio base station.