METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DEVICE-TO-DEVICE COMMUNICATION

• US 20140185495A1
• Filed: 12/27/2012
• Published: 07/03/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 12/27/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google Technology Holdings LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Motorola Mobility LLC (Lenovo Group Ltd.)
• Inventors: Kuchibhotla, Ravi, Love, Robert T., Nimbalker, Ajit, Nory, Ravikiran
• Granted Patent: US 9,143,291 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/281
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1819 with retransmission of additional or different redundancy
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1822 involving configuration of automatic repeat request [ARQ] with parallel processes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1845 Combining techniques, e.g. code combining
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/001 the frequencies being arranged in component carriers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0051 of dedicated pilots, i.e. pilots destined for a single user or terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0094 Indication of how sub-channels of the path are allocated
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/143 for modulated signals H04L5/1469 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/23 in the downlink direction of a wireless link, i.e. towards a terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 76/14 Direct-mode setup
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 8/005 Discovery of network devices, e.g. terminals

Abstract

A first user equipment (UE) receives information regarding a signal configuration from a network entity on a first carrier, and a reference signal from a second UE on a second carrier. The second carrier is associated with a transmission bandwidth configuration and a channel bandwidth. The transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier is contained within the channel bandwidth of the second carrier. The reference signal is within the channel bandwidth of the second carrier and in proximity to an edge of the transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier.

Claims

1. A method in a first user equipment, the method comprising

receiving, in a first carrier, information regarding a signal configuration from a network entity;

receiving, in a second carrier, a reference signal from a second user equipment, the second carrier associated with a transmission bandwidth configuration and a channel bandwidth,

wherein the transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier is contained within the channel bandwidth of the second carrier,

wherein the received reference signal is within the channel bandwidth of the second carrier and in proximity to an edge of the transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier,

determining a link quality of the received reference signal based on the signal configuration; and

reporting the determined link quality to a network entity via the second carrier.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the network entity is a first network entity, the method further comprising:

receiving, in the first carrier, information regarding the signal configuration from a second network entity.

3. The method of claim 1

receiving, in the first carrier, information regarding the signal configuration from the network entity.

4. The method of claim 1

wherein the signal configuration includes information regarding a resource block of the second carrier,

wherein the resource block is within the channel bandwidth of the second carrier and proximate to an edge of the transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier,

the method further comprising receiving the reference signal from the second user equipment on the resource block.

5. The method of claim 1,

wherein the first carrier is within a downlink operating band of a frequency division duplex (FDD) mode operating band, and

wherein the second carrier is within an uplink operating band of the FDD mode operating band.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein reporting the link quality to the network element further comprises

transmitting, within the channel bandwidth of the second carrier, a report regarding the link quality, wherein the report includes information regarding one or more of a Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP), Reference Signal Received Quality (RSRQ), Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI), and a Channel State Information (CSI).

7. The method of claim 1,

wherein the information regarding a signal configuration comprises a location of a resource block on which the first user equipment is receiving the reference signal;

wherein the resource block is outside of the transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier but within the channel bandwidth of the second carrier.

8. The method of claim 1,

wherein the information regarding the signal configuration comprises a location of a resource block on which the first user equipment is receiving the reference signal;

wherein the resource block is in a region of the second carrier, wherein the region is usable for low power transmissions.

9. The method of claim 1,

wherein the resource block is outside of the transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier, and

wherein the resource block is within the channel bandwidth of a third carrier.

10. The method of claim 9 wherein the channel bandwidth of the third carrier that is less than ⅓

of the channel bandwidth of the second carrier.

11. The method of claim 9 wherein the third carrier does not include a synchronization signal.

12. The method of claim 1,

wherein the transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier has edge resource blocks,

wherein the received signal configuration information indicates that the edge resource blocks are available to be used for direct wireless communication.

13. The method of claim 1,

wherein the transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier has edge resource blocks,

wherein the received signal configuration information indicates that a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) is over-provisioned such that the edge resource blocks that are normally used by the PUCCH are available to be used for direct device-to-device communication.

14. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving, in the first carrier, information regarding a resource of a third carrier,

receiving, on the resource of the third carrier, data from the second user equipment.

15. The method of claim 14,

wherein the third carrier has a channel bandwidth and a transmission bandwidth configuration;

wherein the transmission bandwidth configuration of the third carrier is within the channel bandwidth of the third carrier;

wherein the resource of the third carrier is within the channel bandwidth of the third carrier and proximate to an edge of the transmission bandwidth of the third carrier.

16. The method of claim 14, further comprising:

receiving, on the first carrier, information regarding a maximum transmission power limit for communication, on the third carrier, between the first user equipment and the second user equipment.

17. The method of claim 14, further comprising:

determining, from the reference signal, a maximum transmission power limit for communication, on the third carrier, between the first user equipment and the second user equipment.

18. The method of claim 16, wherein the first user equipment limits its overall transmission power level based the maximum transmission power limit.

19. The method of claim 1, wherein the reference signal is a beacon signal specifically defined for D2D discovery.

20. A method in a first user equipment, the method comprising

receiving, from a network entity and on a first carrier, information regarding a signal configuration;

receiving, a reference signal from a second user equipment based on the signal configuration;

wherein the reference signal is received within an aggregated channel bandwidth

wherein the aggregated channel bandwidth includes a second carrier and a third carrier;

wherein the second carrier has a first transmission bandwidth configuration and the third carrier has a second transmission bandwidth configuration, and the first and second transmission bandwidth configurations are contained within the aggregated channel bandwidth;

wherein the reference signal is received outside both the first transmission bandwidth configuration and the second transmission bandwidth configuration.

21. A method in a first user equipment, the method comprising:

receiving, from a network entity and on a first carrier, information regarding a resource of a second carrier;

wherein the resource is within the channel bandwidth of the second carrier but outside the transmission bandwidth configuration of the second carrier,

wherein the first and second carriers are within a licensed spectrum,

and receiving a reference signal from a second user equipment on the resource of the second carrier.

22. The method of claim 21, further comprising camping on a wireless network, wherein the receiving steps are performed after the camping step, but while the first user equipment is still in an idle mode.

23. The method of claim 21, further comprising communicating with the network entity in an active mode, wherein the receiving steps are performed while the first user equipment is in the active mode.

24. The method of claim 21, wherein the information is received in a system information block.

25. A first user equipment comprising:

a transceiver configured to receive, from a network entity and on a first carrier, information regarding a signal configuration;

a memory communicatively linked to the transceiver, the memory being configured to store the signal configuration;

a processor communicatively linked to the memory and to the transceiver, the processor being configured to retrieve the signal configuration from the memory and, using the retrieved signal configuration, control the transceiver to detect a reference signal of a second user equipment on a second carrier.