COMMUNICATION IN UNLICENSED SPECTRUM

• US 20160227416A1
• Filed: 01/29/2015
• Published: 08/04/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 01/29/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Malikie Innovations Limited (Key Patent Innovations Limited)
• Original Assignee: Blackberry Limited
• Inventors: Suzuki, Takashi, Vutukuri, Eswar, Cai, Zhijun, Kreuzer, Werner Karl
• Granted Patent: US 10,397,794 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 16/14 Spectrum sharing arrangements between different networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/0453 Resources in frequency domain, e.g. a carrier in FDMA
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/1215 for collaboration of different radio technologies
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 74/004 in the uplink, i.e. towards network
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/12 WLAN [Wireless Local Area Networks]

Abstract

A wireless access network node receives assistance information from a user equipment (UE) or other wireless access network node, the assistance information comprising information indicating one or more channels of an unlicensed spectrum to use or avoid. Responsive to the assistance information, the wireless access network node selects at least a first channel of the unlicensed spectrum for communicating data of the UE.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving, by a first wireless access network node, assistance information from one or more network entities, the assistance information comprising information indicating one or more channels of an unlicensed spectrum to use or avoid; and

responsive to the assistance information, selecting, by the wireless access network node, at least a first channel of the unlicensed spectrum for communicating data with a user equipment (UE).

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the selected at least the first channel is in addition to a second channel that is part of a licensed spectrum used to communicate data of the UE.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving the assistance information comprises receiving the assistance information comprising an indication of a channel in which a primary use entity has been detected.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving the assistance information comprises receiving the assistance information comprising information regarding a number of Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) access points or Long-Term Evolution) LTE enhanced NodeBs detected on a particular channel.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving the assistance information from the one or more network entities comprises receiving the assistance information from the UE, the assistance information comprising information regarding at least one channel reserved by the UE to use for another access technology or due to a hardware restriction caused by use of a further channel used by another access technology.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing a secondary cell on the first channel;

receiving, from the UE, the assistance information comprising a channel quality report including information regarding a quality of the first channel, wherein receiving the channel quality report comprises receiving the channel quality report containing an indicator of a problem concerning the secondary cell.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the indicator in the channel quality report is a selected one of a plurality of values that correspond to respective different problems concerning the secondary cell, wherein the different problems comprise one or more of:

a detection of presence of a primary use entity on the first channel or a detection of presence of another strong interference source on the first channel.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

sending, by the first wireless access network node to the UE, a configuration message to configure measurement of one or more channels of the unlicensed spectrum; and

receiving, by the first wireless access network node from the UE, the assistance information comprising a response to the configuration message accepting or rejecting measurement of the one or more channels.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving, by the first wireless access network node from the UE, the assistance information comprising a measurement report that includes at least one from among;

information relating to detection of a primary use entity on a channel of the unlicensed spectrum;

information relating to interference from a source on a channel of the unlicensed spectrum;

information regarding a number of Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) access points on a channel of the unlicensed spectrum;

information regarding a number of neighbor Long-Term Evolution (LTE) enhanced NodeBs on a channel of the unlicensed spectrum.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

sending, by the first wireless access network node to the UE, a configuration message to add at least one secondary cell on at least the first channel of the unlicensed spectrum; and

receiving, by the first wireless access network node from the UE, the assistance information comprising a response to the configuration message, accepting or rejecting at least one of the at least one secondary cell.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein receiving the response comprises receiving information identifying a cause for each of the at least one of the at least one secondary cell accepted or rejected by the UE.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving, by the first wireless access network node from the UE, information indicating support or lack of support for simultaneous Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) operation and Long-Term Evolution in unlicensed spectrum (LTE-U) operation.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the information identifies at least one frequency region in which simultaneous Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) operation and Long-Term Evolution in unlicensed spectrum (LTE-U) operation are supported.

14. The method of claim 12, wherein the information identifies different channels in a frequency region for respective simultaneous Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) operation and Long-Term Evolution in unlicensed spectrum (LTE-U) operation.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the information further identifies a frequency separation between the different channels for the respective Local Area Network (WLAN) operation and Long-Term Evolution in unlicensed spectrum (LTE-U) operation, wherein the frequency separation comprises a separation between edges of channels used for WLAN and LTE-U operations, or a distance between center frequencies of the channels used for WLAN and LTE-U operations.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving the assistance information from the one or more network entities comprises wirelessly receiving, by the first wireless access network node from a second wireless access network node, the assistance information comprising information relating to the second wireless access network node

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the assistance information is selected from among:

utilization of channels by the second wireless access network node in the unlicensed spectrum, output power of the second wireless access network node, a measurement of a channel used by the second wireless access network node, detection of a primary use entity in a channel of the unlicensed spectrum, an indication of interference, information regarding Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) access points, information regarding Long-Term Evolution (LTE) enhanced NodeBs, a configuration of channels used by the second wireless access network node, information of current traffic served by the second wireless access network node, and a scheduled change of channels for operation.

18. The method of claim 16, further comprising wirelessly sending, by the first wireless access node to the second wireless access network node, information relating to the first wireless access network node for use by the second wireless access network node to select at least one channel in the unlicensed spectrum.

19. The method of claim 16, further comprising performing ProSe direct discovery by the first wireless access network node with the second wireless access network node, and performing ProSe direct communication with the second wireless access network node to receive the information relating to the second wireless access network node.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the ProSe direct discovery uses a ProSe application identifier and an allowed range.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein the ProSe direct communication uses a ProSe user equipment (UE) identifier and a ProSe Layer 2 Group identifier, the ProSe UE identifier set to a layer 2 identifier of the second wireless access network node, and the ProSe Layer 2 Group identifier set to one of a Long-Term Evolution in unlicensed spectrum (LTE-U) enhanced nodeB (eNB) Group identifier, a Wireless Local Access Network (WLAN) access point group identifier and the ProSe Layer 2 Group identifier defined for both the LTE-U eNBs and WLAN APs.

22. The method of claim 19, wherein a ProSe user equipment (UE) identifier is assigned to the first and the second wireless access node, and the second wireless access network node sends the information relating to the second wireless access network node to the ProSe UE identifier assigned to the first wireless access network node and the first wireless access network node sends the information relating to the first wireless access network node to the ProSe UE identifier assigned to the second wireless access network node.

23. A first wireless access network node comprising:

a communication interface to wirelessly receive assistance information from one or more network entities, the assistance information comprising information indicating one or more channels of an unlicensed spectrum to use or avoid; and

at least one processor configured to, responsive to the assistance information, select at least a first channel of the unlicensed spectrum for communicating data with a user equipment (UE).

24. A method comprising:

sending, by user equipment (UE) to a wireless access network node, assistance information comprising information indicating one or more channels of an unlicensed spectrum to use or avoid, the assistance information to cause the wireless access network node to select at least a first channel of the unlicensed spectrum for communicating data of the UE.