DETECTING AND MITIGATING DRONE INTERFERENCE

1 . An apparatus for a base station, the apparatus comprising:

a radio transceiver; and

processing circuitry configured to

encode a message, for transmission to a user equipment (UE) configured as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), to control the UE to measure received power received from a set of observed cells in a wireless communication network;

receive a report from the UE, responsive to transmission of the message, that includes received power for the set of observed cells;

determine interference power from the UE to a specified cell of the set of observed cells based on the report and further based on reported antenna gain; and

determine whether to support communication of the UE within the wireless communication network based on the determined interference power from the UE.

2 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to:

determine a threshold interference power above which the apparatus will refrain from supporting the UE within the wireless communication network.

3 . The apparatus of claim 2 , wherein the threshold interference power is specified relative to a thermal noise value.

4 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the report received from the UE includes a Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP) measurement.

5 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to provide an uplink (UL) resource grant to the UE to transmit cell-specific reference signals (CRS) to each of the set of observed cells.

6 . The apparatus of claim 1 , further comprising memory, and wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to:

decode antenna gain information received from the UE; and

store antenna gain information in the memory.

7 . An apparatus for a base station, the apparatus comprising:

a radio transceiver configured to receive transmissions from a user equipment (UE) configured as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) and from a number of ground-based UEs; and

processing circuitry configured to

perform interference measurement based on the transmissions to categorize the UAV according to a level of interference generated by the UAV; and

restrict the UAV from operating on Almost Blank Physical Resource (ABPR) blocks based on the level of interference generated by the UAV.

8 . The apparatus of claim 7 , wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to:

categorize the UAV as a strong aggressor if the level of interference generated by the UAV is above a first threshold;

categorize the UAV as a weak aggressor if the level of interference generated by the UAV is below the first threshold and above a second threshold; and

categorize the UAV as a non-aggressor if the level of interference generated by the UAV is below the second threshold.

9 . The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to:

restrict the UAV from operating in the APBR blocks if the UAV is a strong aggressor; and

permit the UAV to operate in the APBR blocks at a reduced transmission power if the UAV is a weak aggressor.

10 . The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to:

schedule a UE to operate within the APBR blocks if the UE is at the cell edge of the cell served by the base station.

11 . The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein the radio transceiver is further configured to transmit information regarding allocation of the APBR blocks to at least one neighboring cell.

12 . An apparatus for a base station, the apparatus comprising:

a radio transceiver configured to communicate with a user equipment (UE) configured as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV); and

processing circuitry configured to

configure the UAV to provide a flight path update report; and

initiate one of a mobility function and an interference mitigation function based on the flight path update report.

13 . The apparatus of claim 12 , wherein the processing circuitry encodes a control message, for transmission to the UAV, to instruct the UAV to provide the flight path update report, and wherein the control message specifies that the UAV should provide the flight path update report upon entering a beam null region of the base station.

14 . The apparatus of claim 12 , wherein the processing circuitry encodes a control message, for transmission to the UAV, to instruct the UAV to provide the flight path update report, and wherein the control message specifies a three-dimensional (3D) a region of interest (ROI) within which the UAV is to provide the flight path update report.

15 . The apparatus of claim 12 , wherein the processing circuitry configures a pair of slope threshold values based on an angle, relative to the horizontal, of a null beam of the apparatus, and wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to instruct the UAV to generate a flight path update report when a ratio of height difference between the base station and the UAV to a two-dimensional distance between the base station and the UAV is between the pair of slope threshold values.

16 . The apparatus of claim 12 , wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to trigger a measurement report responsive to detecting that the UAV has reached an elevation specified in configuration information.

17 . An apparatus for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), the apparatus comprising:

at least one omni-directional antenna and at least one directional antenna; and

processing circuitry coupled to the at least one omni-directional antenna and the at least one directional antenna and configured to

determine a receiving strategy that utilizes one or both of the at least one omni-directional antenna and the at least one directional antenna to measure Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP) of a signal received from a serving cell; and

encode a feedback measurement report based on the RSRP for transmission to the serving cell to trigger a handover process.

18 . The apparatus of claim 17 , wherein the at least one directional antenna is activated only when a signal strength of the signal received from the serving cell falls below a threshold.

19 . The apparatus of claim 18 , wherein the receiving strategy includes adding the RSRP measured by each of the at least one omni-directional antenna and the at least one directional antenna to generate a composite received energy measurement.

20 . The apparatus of claim 18 , wherein the receiving strategy includes adding the RSRP measured by each of the at least one omni-directional antenna and the at least one directional antenna according to a proportion based at least in part upon the vertical distance between the at least one omni-directional antenna and the at least one directional antenna.