IP Library Granted Patent US 9,935,742
Granted Patent B2
US 9,935,742 · App. 14/867,089 · Granted Apr 3, 2018

Adaptive HARQ for half duplex operation for battery and antenna constrained devices

Inventors: Tarik Tabet (Los Gatos, CA); Syed Aon Mujtaba (Santa Clara, CA)
Assignee: Apple Inc.
H04L1/1812H04L1/1822H04L1/1825H04L1/1854H04L1/1896H04L5/006H04L5/0055H04L5/16H04W72/042H04W72/0413H04W76/048H04W88/08
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Quick Facts
Patent No.
US 9,935,742
App. No.
14/867,089
Granted
Apr 3, 2018
Kind
B2
Abstract

A user equipment (UE) implements improved communication methods which enable uplink (UL) transmissions consistent with an UL timeline. The UE may have a transmit duty cycle and may transmit acknowledge/negative acknowledge messages to a base station according to the transmit duty cycle. Additionally, the UE may be configured to determine signal-to-interference-plus noise ratio (SINR) between the UE and the base station and compare SINR to a threshold. The UE may transmit redundancy versions of data in consecutive sub-frames with a duty cycle of two transmissions per X+1 sub-frames if SINR is equal or above the threshold and redundancy versions using a duty cycle of one transmission per X sub-frames if SINR is below the threshold. Further, the UE may be configured to communicate a number of UL HARQ processes supported by the UE, receive first information in a first sub-frame, and send second information X sub-frames after the first sub-frame.

Claims (65)

1. A user equipment device (UE), comprising:

at least one antenna;

at least one radio, wherein the at least one radio is configured to perform cellular communication using at least one radio access technology (RAT);

one or more processors coupled to the at least one radio, wherein the one or more processors and the at least one radio are configured to perform voice and/or data communications;

wherein the one or more processors are configured to cause the UE to:

communicate, to a base station, a number of uplink (UL) hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) processes supported by the UE;

receive first information from the base station in at least a first sub-frame, wherein the first information corresponds to at least a first downlink (DL) HARQ process, wherein a number of DL HARQ processes depends upon the number of UL HARQ processes supported by the UE, wherein if DL channel conditions are below a first threshold, the first information comprises a plurality of redundancy versions of first data associated with the first DL HARQ process, and wherein the plurality of redundancy versions are received in consecutive sub-frames; and

transmit second information to the base station X sub-frames after the first sub-frame, wherein the second information comprises a first acknowledgement/negative acknowledgment (ACK/NACK) associated with the first DL HARQ process, wherein X is less than or equal to 12.

2. The UE of claim 1 ,

wherein to communicate the number of UL HARQ processes supported by the UE, the one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to:

transmit a first message to the base station, wherein the first message comprises the number of UL HARQ processes supported by the UE.

3. The UE of claim 1 ,

wherein to communicate the number of UL HARQ processes supported by the UE, the one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to:

determine, based on at least one metric, the number of UL HARQ processes supported by the UE; and

transmit the number of UL HARQ processes supported by the UE to the base station.

4. The UE of claim 1 ,

wherein the number of UL HARQ processes supported by the UE are equal to the number of DL HARQ processes.

5. The UE of claim 1 ,

wherein the number of UL HARQ processes supported by the UE are not equal to the number of DL HARQ processes.

6. The UE of claim 1 ,

wherein the number of DL HARQ processes are further dependent upon DL channel conditions.

7. The UE of claim 1 ,

wherein if the DL channel conditions are above the first threshold, the first information comprises a plurality of DL HARQ processes, wherein to receive the first information, the one or more processors are further configured to cause the UE to receive the plurality of DL HARQ processes in consecutive sub-frames;

wherein the one or more processors are configured to cause the UE to:

transmit an ACK/NACK corresponding to each DL HARQ process, wherein each corresponding ACK/NACK is sent X sub-frames after a sub-frame in which each DL HARQ process was received.

8. An apparatus comprising:

a memory; and

a processing element in communication with the memory, wherein the processing element is configured to:

communicate, to a base station, a number of supported uplink (UL) hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) processes;

receive first information from the base station in at least a first sub-frame, wherein the first information corresponds to at least a first downlink (DL) HARQ process, wherein a number of DL HARQ processes depends upon the number of supported UL HARQ processes, wherein if DL channel conditions are below a first threshold, the first information comprises a plurality of redundancy versions of first data associated with the first DL HARQ process, and wherein the plurality of redundancy versions are received in consecutive sub-frames; and

generate instructions to transmit second information to the base station X sub-frames after the first sub-frame, wherein the second information comprises a first acknowledgement/negative acknowledgment (ACK/NACK) associated with the first DL HARQ process, wherein X is less than or equal to 12.

9. The apparatus of claim 8 ,

wherein to communicate the number of supported UL HARQ processes, the processing element is further configured to:

generate instructions to transmit a first message to the base station, wherein the first message comprises the number of supported UL HARQ processes.

10. The apparatus of claim 8 ,

wherein to communicate the number of supported UL HARQ processes, the processing element is further configured to:

determine, based on at least one metric, the number of supported UL HARQ processes; and

generate instructions to transmit the number of supported UL HARQ processes to the base station.

11. The apparatus of claim 8 ,

wherein the number of supported UL HARQ processes are equal to the number of DL HARQ processes.

12. The apparatus of claim 8 ,

wherein the number of supported UL HARQ processes are not equal to the number of DL HARQ processes.

13. The apparatus of claim 8 ,

wherein the number of DL HARQ processes are further dependent upon DL channel conditions.

14. The apparatus of claim 8 ,

wherein if the DL channel conditions are above the first threshold, the first information comprises a plurality of DL HARQ processes, wherein to receive the first information, the processing element is further configured to receive the plurality of DL HARQ processes in consecutive sub-frames;

wherein the processing element is configured to:

generate instructions to transmit an ACK/NACK corresponding to each DL HARQ process, wherein each corresponding ACK/NACK is sent X sub-frames after a sub-frame in which each DL HARQ process was received.

15. A non-transitory computer readable memory medium storing program instructions executable by at least one processor of a user equipment device (UE) to:

communicate, to a base station, a number of supported uplink (UL) hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) processes;

receive first information from the base station in at least a first sub-frame, wherein the first information corresponds to at least a first downlink (DL) HARQ process, wherein a number of DL HARQ processes depends upon the number of supported UL HARQ processes, wherein if DL channel conditions are below a first threshold, the first information comprises a plurality of redundancy versions of first data associated with the first DL HARQ process, and wherein the plurality of redundancy versions are received in consecutive sub-frames; and

generate instructions to transmit second information to the base station X sub-frames after the first sub-frame, wherein the second information comprises a first acknowledgement/negative acknowledgment (ACK/NACK) associated with the first DL HARQ process, wherein X is less than or equal to 12.

16. The non-transitory computer readable memory medium of claim 15 ,

wherein to communicate the number of supported UL HARQ processes, the program instructions are further executable to:

generate instructions to transmit a first message to the base station, wherein the first message comprises the number of supported UL HARQ processes.

17. The non-transitory computer readable memory medium of claim 15 ,

wherein to communicate the number of supported UL HARQ processes, the program instructions are further executable to:

determine, based on at least one metric, the number of supported UL HARQ processes; and

generate instructions to transmit the number of supported UL HARQ processes to the base station.

18. The non-transitory computer readable memory medium of claim 15 ,

wherein the number of DL HARQ processes are further dependent upon DL channel conditions.

19. The non-transitory computer readable memory medium of claim 15 ,

wherein the number of supported UL HARQ processes are equal to the number of DL HARQ processes.

20. The non-transitory computer readable memory medium of claim 15 ,

wherein the number of supported UL HARQ processes are not equal to the number of DL HARQ processes.

Assignments (1)
ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST Recorded Sep 28, 2015
From: TABET, TARIK; MUJTABA, SYED AON
To: APPLE INC.
Reel/Frame 036665/0849 →
Continuity (3)
Provisional Application 62066282 · Oct 20, 2014
Provisional Application 62069787 · Oct 28, 2014
Related Publication 20160112181A1 · Apr 21, 2016