Reference signal detection for reducing control decoding complexity

1. A method for reducing physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) decoding complexity at a user equipment (UE) in a wireless communication network, comprising:

monitoring multiple control resource sets (CRSs) in a subframe to receive from a base station a set of candidate demodulation reference signal (DMRS) sequences each associated with a PDCCH carried in the subframe, each CRS carrying one of the candidate DMRS sequences and the respective associated PDCCH;

calculating a correlation-based quality metric for each of the received candidate DMRS sequences indicating a correlation between the respective candidate DMRS sequence and a local DMRS sequence;

when one of the quality metrics for each of the plurality of candidate DMRS sequences is greater than a threshold, determining the PDCCH associated with the candidate DMRS sequence corresponding to the one of the quality metrics is intended for the UE, and performing a PDCCH decoding process to decode the PDCCH intended for the UE; and

when none of the quality metrics for each of the plurality of candidate DMRS sequences is greater than the threshold, determining there is no PDCCH intended for the UE present in the subframe.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

receiving a DMRS sequence allocation configuration; and

generating the local DMRS sequence according to the DMRS sequence allocation.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the local or candidate DMRS sequences are UE-specific, or UE group-specific.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the local or candidate DMRS sequences are members of a set of orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal sequences that are orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal across connected UEs in a cell of the base station.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the local or candidate DMRS sequences are members of a set of orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal sequences that are orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal across connected UEs in a cell of the base station and PDCCH aggregation levels.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the performing the PDCCH decoding process includes:

performing the PDCCH decoding process to decode the PDCCH intended for the UE based on an aggregation level indicated by the local DMRS sequence.

7. A method for reducing physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) decoding complexity in a wireless communication network, comprising:

transmitting, from a base station, a subframe including multiple control resource sets (CRSs) each carrying a candidate DMRS sequence allocated to a UE and a PDCCH intended for the UE,

wherein the candidate DMRS sequence allocated to the UE is one of a set of orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal sequences that are orthogonal across UEs and PDCCH aggregation levels, and

the candidate DMRS sequence allocated to the UE indicates the PDCCH intended for the UE is present in the subframe such that the UE can determine whether the PDCCH intended for the UE is present in the subframe by detecting the candidate DMRS sequence allocated to the UE.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the candidate DMRS sequences in the multiple CRSs are members of the set of orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal sequences that are orthogonal across connected UEs in a cell of the base station and PDCCH aggregation levels.

9. The method of claim 7 , further comprising:

transmitting a DMRS sequence allocation configuration to the UE indicating the candidate DMRS sequence allocated to the UE.

10. A method for reducing physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) decoding complexity at a user equipment (UE) in a wireless communication network, comprising:

monitoring multiple control resource sets (CRSs) in a subframe to receive from a base station a set of candidate demodulation reference signal (DMRS) sequences each associated with a PDCCH carried in the subframe, each CRS carrying one of the candidate DMRS sequences and the respective associated PDCCH, each of the candidate DMRS sequences being associated with at least one of UEs served by the base station such that the respective UE can determine a presence of the respective PDCCH intended for the respective UE by detecting a presence of the respective candidate DMRS;

calculating a correlation-based quality metric indicating a correlation between the respective candidate DMRS sequence and a local DMRS sequence for each of the received candidate DMRS sequences;

ranking the correlation-based quality metrics according to values of the correlation-based quality metrics; and

decoding PDCCHs that are associated with a predetermined number of the received candidate DMRS sequences that have highest ranked quality metric values.

11. The method of claim 10 , further comprising:

receiving a DMRS sequence allocation configuration; and

generating the local DMRS sequence according to the DMRS sequence allocation.

12. The method of claim 10 , wherein the local or candidate DMRS sequences are UE-specific, or UE group-specific.

13. The method of claim 10 , wherein the local DMRS sequence or the set of candidate DMRS sequences are members of a set of orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal sequences that are orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal across the UEs served by the base station.

14. The method of claim 10 , wherein the local DMRS sequence or the set of candidate DMRS sequences are members of a set of orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal sequences that are orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal across the UEs served by the base station and PDCCH aggregation levels.

15. The method of claim 14 , wherein the decoding the PDCCHs includes:

decoding the PDCCHs that are associated with the predetermined number of the received candidate DMRS sequences based on an aggregation level indicated by the local DMRS sequence.

16. A method for reducing physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) decoding complexity at a user equipment (UE) in a wireless communication network, comprising:

receiving from a base station a candidate demodulation reference signal (DMRS) sequence that is carried in a subframe and associated with a PDCCH carried in the subframe;

calculating a correlation-based quality metric indicating a correlation between the received candidate DMRS sequence and a local DMRS sequence, wherein the candidate DMRS sequence or the local DMRS sequence is one of a set of orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal sequences that are orthogonal or quasi-orthogonal across connected UEs in a cell of the base station and PDCCH aggregation levels; and

when the quality metric is greater than a threshold, determining the PDCCH associated with the candidate DMRS sequence is intended for the UE, and performing a PDCCH decoding process to decode the PDCCH intended for the UE based on an aggregation level indicated by the local DMRS sequence.