Communication system, apparatus and method for antenna array control

1. A wireless cellular communication system comprising a network element operably coupled to an antenna array that is capable of receiving concurrently wireless communication signals on a common carrier frequency from more than one remote wireless communication unit, wherein the antenna array comprises a plurality of radiating elements and where the network element comprises:

first beam-former logic arranged to create a radiation pattern that comprises a sector beam by at least one first radiating element of the plurality of radiating elements; and

second beam-former logic arranged to create a radiation pattern that comprises a major portion of at least one sub-sector beam within the sector beam by

at least one second radiating element of the plurality of radiating elements such that the at least one sub-sector beam and the sector beam are of a common polarization on the common carrier frequency;

such that the first beam-former logic and second beam-former logic simultaneously process wireless communication signals emanating from more than one remote wireless communication unit using both the sector beam and the at least one sub-sector beam.

2. The wireless communication system of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of radiating antenna elements comprise a co-located fulcrum of beam creation.

3. The wireless communication system of claim 1 , wherein the at least one sub-sector beam is created such that it has a narrower horizontal or vertical azimuth angular radiation pattern than the created sector beam.

4. The wireless communication system of claim 1 , wherein the antenna array comprises an active antenna array supporting dedicated signal processing per antenna array element.

5. The wireless communication system of claim 1 , wherein the at least one first radiating element of the plurality of radiating elements and the at least one second radiating element of the plurality of radiating elements comprise the same radiating elements.

6. The wireless communication system of claim 5 , wherein the network element comprises or is operably coupled to maximally ratio combining logic arranged to respectively combine signals received on the sector beam and combine signals received on the at least one sub-sector beam for each uplink channel.

7. The wireless communication system of claim 6 , wherein the maximally ratio combining logic applies at least one from a group consisting of:

different proportionality constants to signals from each rake receiver output path; and

a weighting on each remote wireless communication unit signal on each receiver path associated with the sector beam created by the first beam-former logic and the at least one sub-sector beam created by the second beam-former logic.

8. The wireless communication system of claim 5 , wherein the network element further comprises allocation logic arranged to allocate rake receiver fingers of the plurality of rake receivers to received signals according to at least one from a group of:

spreading factor of the received signal; and

transmit power control, TPC, of the received signal.

9. The wireless communication system of claim 8 , wherein the allocation logic is arranged to first allocate receiver fingers of the plurality of rake receivers to received signals according to at least one from a group of:

a lowest spreading factor of the received signal; and

a highest transmit power control, TPC, of the received signal.

10. The wireless communication system of claim 1 , wherein the network element comprises or is operably coupled to rake receiver logic comprising a plurality of rake receivers operably coupled to beam-former signal processing logic comprising at least the first beam-former logic and second beam-former logic and arranged to separately receive signals associated with the sector beam and the at least one sub-sector beam.

11. The wireless communication system of claim 10 , wherein a first number of the plurality of rake receivers associated with processing the sector beam is greater than a second number of the plurality of rake receivers associated with processing the at least one sub-sector beam.

12. The wireless communication system of claim 11 , wherein the beam-former signal processing logic processing the sector beam and the at least one sub-sector beam comprises diversity logic arranged to utilize polarization diversity to one or more of the sector beam and the at least one sub-sector beam.

13. The wireless communication system of claim 12 , wherein the network element comprises allocation logic arranged to selectively allocate at least one remote communication unit in a communication path that employs polarization diversity.

14. The wireless communication system of claim 10 , wherein the network element comprises or is operably coupled to multi-user detector logic operably coupled to the plurality of rake receivers, and arranged to minimize signal interference on a plurality of remote communication units based on the plurality of outputs from the rake receiver logic.

15. The wireless communication system of claim 10 , wherein the beam-former signal processing logic comprising extrapolation logic to create a virtual antenna signal from two or more antenna signals and apply the virtual antenna signal in creating a sector beam-form and/or sub-sector beam-form.

16. The wireless communication system of claim 1 , wherein the wireless communication system is a 3 rd Generation Partnership Project wideband code division multiple access, WCDMA, cellular communication system and wherein the network element comprises control channel logic arranged to process at least one from a group of: dedicated physical control channel, DPCCH, information on each path, and dedicated physical data channel, DPDCH, information on each path to determine a weighting to be applied to each receiver path.

17. The wireless communication system of claim 1 , wherein the major portion of the at least one sub-sector beam within the sector beam comprises at least 80% of the at least one sub-sector beam.

18. The wireless communication system of claim 1 , wherein the wireless communication system comprises a wireless serving communication unit within the Earth's atmosphere and the remote wireless communication unit comprises a geo-stationary or orbiting satellite.

19. A network element coupled to an antenna array of a wireless cellular communication system and for processing beam-forming signals of antenna elements in an antenna array, the network element comprising:

logic arranged to receive concurrently wireless communication signals on a common carrier frequency from more than one remote wireless communication unit via a plurality of antenna elements;

a plurality of rake receivers arranged to receive the wireless signals wherein a first set of received signals is received from first beam-forming logic associated with a sector beam and a second set of received signals is received from at least one second beam-forming logic associated with creating a major portion of the at least one sub-sector beam within the sector beam wherein the at least one sub-sector beam and the sector beam are of a common polarization on the common carrier frequency; and

logic for separately and simultaneously processing wireless communication signals emanating from more than one remote wireless communication unit output from the plurality of rake receivers associated with the sector beam and the at least one sub-sector beam.

20. A method for controlling antenna elements in an antenna array of a wireless cellular communication system that comprises a network element operably coupled to the antenna array for communicating with a remote wireless communication unit, the method comprising the steps of:

configuring a first radiating element of the antenna array by first beam-former logic to create a radiation pattern that comprises a sector beam;

configuring at least one second radiating element of the antenna array by second beam-former logic to create a major portion of at least one sub-sector beam within the sector beam wherein the at least one sub-sector beam and the sector beam are of a common polarization on a common carrier frequency; and

simultaneously processing wireless communication signals emanating from more than one remote wireless communication unit using both the sector beam and the at least one sub-sector beam.

21. A method for controlling antenna elements as in claim 20 , wherein the method is embodied in a non-transitory tangible computer program product comprising executable program code for controlling antenna elements in an antenna array of a wireless cellular communication system that comprises a network element operably coupled to the antenna array for communicating with a remote wireless communication unit.

22. A method for processing beam-forming signals of antenna elements in an antenna array of a wireless cellular communication system that comprises a network element operably coupled to the antenna array for communicating with a remote wireless communication unit, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving a first signal at an at least one first radiating element of a plurality of radiating elements of the antenna array;

creating by first beam-former logic a radiation pattern that comprises a sector beam;

receiving a second signal at an at least one second radiating element of the plurality of radiating elements;

creating by first beam-former logic a radiation pattern that comprises a major portion of at least one sub-sector beam located within the sector beam by at least one second radiating element of the plurality of radiating elements wherein the at least one sub-sector beam and the sector beam use the same carrier frequency;

applying signals received at the plurality of antenna elements to a plurality of rake receivers; and

separately processing signals output from the plurality of rake receivers associated with the sector beam and the at least one sub-sector beam.

23. A method for processing beam-forming signals as in claim 22 , wherein the method is embodied in a non-transitory tangible computer program product comprising executable program code stored thereon for processing beam-forming signals of antenna elements in an antenna array of a wireless cellular communication system that comprises a network element operably coupled to the antenna array for communicating with a remote wireless communication unit.