Grant-less uplink transmission for new radio

• US 10,631,319 B2
• Filed: 06/15/2017
• Issued: 04/21/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 06/15/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: InterDigital Patent Holdings, Inc. (InterDigital, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Convida Wireless LLC
• Inventors: Li, Qing, Zhang, Guodong, Adjakple, Pascal M., Iyer, Lakshmi R., Tsai, Allan Y., Zhang, Qian, Chen, Wei, Murray, Joseph M., Xu, Tianyi
• Primary Examiner(s): Shah, Saumit
• Application Number:
  US15/624,354
• Publication Number:
  US 20170367110A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,041 Days
• Field of Search: None
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1887 Scheduling and prioritising arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0007 the frequencies being orthogonal, e.g. OFDM(A), DMT
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/70 Services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/1268 of uplink data flows
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/566 of the information or information source or recipient
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 74/08 Non-scheduled access, e.g. ALOHA hybrid access H04W74/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 74/0816 with collision avoidance

Abstract

Current approaches to transmitting uplink data in a network often require resources to be granted. In an example, a node or apparatus may configure a plurality of devices to operate in a grant-less mode in accordance with a respective grant-less access allocation, such that, when the plurality of devices transmit messages uplink in the network, the messages are transmitted using frequency resources defined by the respective grant-less access allocation, and the plurality of devices transmit the messages without being granted access to transmit the messages, so as to operate in the grant-less mode.

Claims

1. An apparatus comprising a processor, a memory, and communication circuitry, the apparatus being connected to an access network via its communication circuitry, the apparatus further comprising computer-executable instructions stored in the memory of the apparatus which, when executed by the processor of the apparatus, cause the apparatus to perform operations comprising:

receiving a grant-less configuration that includes a first grant-less access allocation and/or a second grant-less access allocation, the first and second grant-less access allocations defining first and second time and frequency resources, respectively;

transmitting a message uplink in the access network using the first time and frequency resources defined by the first grant-less access allocation, so as to make a grant-less transmission in accordance with the grant-less configuration;

when a transmission redundancy value is greater than one, transmitting the message again uplink to the access network using the first and/or second time and frequency resources defined by the first and/or second grant-less access allocation, respectively.

2. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, wherein the first and second grant-less configurations are received via a static configuration carried on dedicated Radio Resource Control message sent to the apparatus.

3. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, the first and second grant-less access allocations are received via a dynamic indication carried on a downlink control channel from the access network.

4. The apparatus as recited in claim 3, wherein an activation indication and a deactivation indication are also received on the downlink control channel from the access network.

5. The apparatus as recited in claim 3, wherein the downlink control channel is a dedicated control channel.

6. The apparatus as recited in claim 3, wherein the downlink control channel is scrambled with a grant-less identifier.

7. The apparatus as recited in claim 6, wherein the grant-less identifier is from the access network.

8. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, wherein the first and second grant-less allocations comprise a respective time interval during which a specific access allocation scheme is applied.

9. The apparatus as recited in claim 8, wherein the time intervals each comprise one or more respective contention spaces available for selection for a grant-less transmission.

10. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, wherein the grant-less configuration further comprises the transmission redundancy value and a redundancy version associated with the transmission redundancy value.

11. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, wherein the grant-less configuration further comprises a modulation and coding scheme, and/or a frequency hopping scheme.

12. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, the apparatus further comprising computer-executable instructions stored in the memory of the apparatus which, when executed by the processor of the apparatus, cause the apparatus to perform further operations comprising:

transmitting an uplink grant-less transmission that includes a front-load reference signal that is allocated at a first symbol of the uplink grant-less transmission.

13. The apparatus as recited in claim 12, wherein the front-load reference signal further comprises a grant-less identifier.

14. An apparatus comprising a processor, memory, and communication circuitry, the apparatus being connected to a user equipment via its communication circuitry, the apparatus further comprising computer-executable instructions stored in the memory of the apparatus which, when executed by the processor of the apparatus, cause the apparatus to perform operations comprising:

sending a grant-less configuration that includes a first grant-less access allocation and/or a second grant-less allocation, the first and second grant-less access allocation defining first and second time and frequency resources, respectively;

receiving a message uplink from a user equipment at the first time and frequency resources defined by the first grant-less access allocation; and

when a transmission redundancy value is greater than one, receiving the message again at the first and/or second time and frequency resources.

15. The apparatus as recited in claim 14, wherein the grant-less configuration is sent on a dedicated Radio Resource Control channel to the user equipment.

16. The apparatus as recited in claim 14, wherein first and second grant-less access allocations are sent on one or more downlink control channels to the user equipment.

17. The apparatus as recited in claim 16, wherein the first and second grant-less access allocations are activated and/or deactivated on the one or more downlink control channels.

18. The apparatus as recited in claim 17, the apparatus further comprising computer-executable instructions stored in the memory of the apparatus which, when executed by the processor of the apparatus, cause the apparatus to perform further operations comprising:

sending a grant-less identifier, such that the downlink control channel is scrambled with the grant-less identifier.

19. A method performed by a user equipment (UE) for grant-less transmission to an access network, the method comprising:

receiving a grant-less configuration that includes a first grant-less access allocation and/or a second grant-less allocation, the first and second grant-less access allocations defining first and second time and frequency resources, respectively;

transmitting a message uplink to the access network using the first time and frequency resources defined by the first grant-less access allocation, so as to make a grant-less transmission in accordance with the grant-less configuration; and

when a transmission redundancy value is greater than one, transmitting the message again uplink to the access network using the first and/or second time and frequency resources defined by the first and/or second grant-less access allocations, respectively.