MULTI-USER RESOURCE ALLOCATION AND MEDIUM ACCESS CONTROL (MAC) OVERHEAD REDUCTION FOR MOBILE WORLDWIDE INTEROPERABILITY FOR MICROWAVE ACCESS (WiMAX) SYSTEMS

• US 20090040970A1
• Filed: 08/09/2007
• Published: 02/12/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 08/09/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Intel Corporation
• Original Assignee: Intel Corporation
• Inventors: AHMADI, SASSAN, YANG, XIANGYING, VENKATACHALAM, MUTHAIAH
• Granted Patent: US 8,693,406 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/329
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/2612 Arrangements for wireless medium access control, e.g. by allocating physical layer transmission capacity H04B7/2615 - H04B7/2643 take precedence; provision for broadband connection H04Q11/0478

Abstract

Various embodiments are directed to multi-user resource allocation capable of significantly reducing MAC header overhead and scheduling delay for small payload applications, such as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and interactive gaming and to increase the capacity of such applications. In various implementations, multi-user resource allocation may be used in mobile Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) systems designed to operate in accordance with the Institute for Electronic and Electrical Engineers (IEEE) standards such as the 802.16e-2005 standard and/or the evolving IEEE 802.16m standard as well as Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP), 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE), and/or 3GPP2 Ultra Mobile Broadband (UMB) standards.

Claims

1. An apparatus comprising:

a wireless device to categorize a mobile station in a multi-user group according to one or more of a requested modulation and coding scheme (MCS), reported channel condition, or scheduling consideration, to assign a multi-user Medium Access Protocol Information Element (MU-MAP_IE) to the multi-user group, and to encapsulate a plurality of user data payloads using the same MCS into a multi-user packet data structure to be transmitted over a downlink transport connection to the mobile station.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, the wireless device to establish one or more transport connections to mobile stations included in the multi-user group and to assign an m-bit compact connection identifier (CCID) value to each transport connection, the m-bit CCID value having a fewer number of bits than a connection identifier (CID) for a Generic MAC Header (GMH).

3. The apparatus of claim 1, the MU-MAP_IE comprising an associated CCID value for the mobile station.

4. The apparatus of claim 3, the mobile station to detect the MU-MAP_IE and use the associated CCID value to locate an assigned user data payload in the multi-user packet data structure.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, the wireless device to operate in accordance with one or more Institute for Electronic and Electrical Engineers (IEEE) standards, Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) standards, 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE) standards, and 3GPP2 Ultra Mobile Broadband (UMB) standards.

6. The apparatus of claim 5, wherein the IEEE 802.16 standards comprise one or more of IEEE 802.16e-2005 and IEEE 802.16m.

7. A system comprising the apparatus of claim 1 coupled to an antenna.

8. A multi-user packet data structure stored on a computer-readable medium to reduce medium access control (MAC) overhead and scheduling delay, the multi-user packet data structure comprising:

a multi-user payload field to include a plurality of user data payloads assigned to mobile stations of a multi-user group, each of the plurality of user data payloads to use a common modulation and coding scheme (MCS); and

a multi-user media access control (MAC) header structure including a plurality of packet information fields corresponding to the plurality of user data payloads.

9. The multi-user packet data structure of claim 8, the multi-user payload field to include 8 user data payloads.

10. The multi-user packet data structure of claim 8, the user data payloads comprising Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) data.

11. The multi-user packet data structure of claim 8, the user data payloads comprising interactive gaming data.

12. The multi-user packet data structure of claim 8, further comprising one of a multi-user frame check sequence (MFCS) field or a multi-user header check sequence (MHCS) field, the MFCS field to include a CRC value calculated for the entire multi-user packet data structure including the multi-user MAC header and all user data payloads included in the multi-user payload field, the MHCS field to include a CRC value calculated for only the multi-user MAC header.

13. The multi-user packet data structure of claim 8, each packet information field comprising a compact connection identifier (CCID) field, the CCID field to include a m-bit CCID value for identifying a transport connection to a mobile station in the multi-user group, the m-bit CCID value having a fewer number of bits than a connection identifier (CID) for a Generic MAC Header (GMH).

14. The multi-user packet data structure of claim 13, each packet information field to include an n-bit packet length value, an encryption control (EC) field to include a 1-bit EC value, a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) indicator field (CI) to include a 1-bit CI value, and a packet information field check sequence (PIFCS) field to include a k-bit PIFCS value, where k>

=0.

15. The multi-user packet data structure of claim 8 comprising an Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) frame.

16. A method comprising:

categorizing a mobile station in a multi-user group according to a requested modulation and coding scheme (MCS);

assigning a multi-user Medium Access Protocol Information Element (MU-MAP_IE) to the multi-user group; and

encapsulating a plurality of user data payloads using a common MCS into a multi-user packet data structure to be transmitted over a transport connection to the mobile station.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

establishing one or more transport connections to mobile stations included in the multi-user group; and

assigning an m-bit compressed connection identifier (CCID) value to each transport connection, the m-bit CCID value having a fewer number of bits than a connection identifier (CID) for a Generic MAC Header (GMH).

18. The method of claim 17, further comprising communicating the MU-MAP_IE to the mobile station, the MU-MAP_IE comprising an associated CCID value for the mobile station.

19. The method of claim 17, further comprising communicating the multi-user packet data structure over the transport connection to the mobile station, the multi-user packet data structure including a multi-user media access control (MAC) header structure including an associated CCID value for the mobile station.

20. An article of manufacture comprising a computer-readable storage medium storing executable computer program instructions that when executed by a computer cause the computer to perform the method of claim 16.