PDCCH DESIGN FOR NARROWBAND DEPLOYMENT

• US 20170223725A1
• Filed: 03/26/2015
• Published: 08/03/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 08/01/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Intel IP Corporation (Intel Corporation)
• Inventors: Chatterjee, Debdeep, Xiong, Gang, Han, Seunghee, Fwu, Jong-Kae
• Granted Patent: US 11,083,003 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0007 the frequencies being orthogonal, e.g. OFDM(A), DMT
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0053 Allocation of signaling, i.e. of overhead other than pilot signals
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/70 Services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/044 based on the type of the allocated resource
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/12 Wireless traffic scheduling
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/20 Control channels or signalling for resource management
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/23 in the downlink direction of a wireless link, i.e. towards a terminal

Abstract

Narrowband Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) implementations are discussed. An example Evolved NodeB (eNB) comprises a memory storing instructions, a processor configured to execute the instructions, and a transmitter circuit. The processor is configured to determine at least one of downlink or uplink scheduling for one or more machine-type communication (MTC)-enabled user equipments (UEs); to generate, based at least in part on the determined scheduling, one or more MTC-physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) signals (M-PDCCH signals) associated with the one or more MTC-enabled UEs; and to perform channel coding, multiplexing, and scrambling of the one or more M-PDCCH signals. The transmitter circuit is configured to map the one or more M-PDCCH signals to resource element groups (REGs) in order of increasing subcarrier followed by orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) symbol and to transmit the one or more M-PDCCH signals via a narrowband bandwidth of less than 1.4 MHz.

Claims

1. An Evolved NodeB (eNB), comprising:

a memory storing executable instructions;

a processor configured to execute the executable instructions to at least;

determine at least one of downlink or uplink scheduling for one or more machine-type communication (MTC)-enabled user equipments (UEs);

generate, based at least in part on the determined scheduling, one or more MTC-physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) signals (M-PDCCH signals) associated with the one or more MTC-enabled UEs; and

perform channel coding, multiplexing, and scrambling of the generated one or more M-PDCCH signals; and

a transmitter circuit configured to map the one or more M-PDCCH signals to resource element groups (REGs) in order of increasing subcarrier followed by orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) symbol and to transmit the one or more M-PDCCH signals via a narrowband bandwidth of less than 1.4 MHz.

2. The eNB of claim 1, wherein the at least one of the downlink or uplink scheduling is determined based on association of identities of the one or more MTC-enabled UEs with pre-defined resources.

3. The eNB of claim 1, wherein the one or more M-PDCCH signals comprise MTC downlink control information (M-DCI) messages that indicate, for each MTC-enabled UE, whether a downlink transmission or an uplink transmission is scheduled for resources associated with that MTC-enabled UE.

4. The eNB of claim 1, wherein one of the M-PDCCH signals comprises an MTC downlink control information (M-DCI) message that indicates, for each of a plurality of the MTC-enabled UEs, whether a downlink transmission or an uplink transmission is scheduled for resources associated with that MTC-enabled UE.

5. The eNB of claim 1, wherein the one or more M-PDCCH signals comprise MTC downlink control information (M-DCI) messages, wherein each M-DCI message comprises three bits that indicate a designated modulation and coding scheme (MCS).

6. The eNB of claim 1, wherein performing scrambling of the one or more M-PDCCH signals comprises performing scrambling based on a scrambling seed that is a function of at least a superframe number, a slot number and a cell identity.

7. The eNB of claim 1, wherein performing scrambling of the one or more M-PDCCH signals comprises performing scrambling based on a scrambling seed that is solely a function of a cell identity.

8. A non-transitory machine readable medium comprising instructions that, when executed, cause an Evolved NodeB (eNB) to:

schedule a plurality of machine-type communication (MTC) devices for one or more of an uplink grant or a downlink allocation;

generate at least one MTC downlink control information (M-DCI) message associated with the plurality of MTC devices;

construct one or more MTC-physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) signals (M-PDCCH signals) based on the at least one M-DCI message; and

transmit the one or more M-PDCCH signals in one or more M-PDCCH regions via a narrowband transmission mode.

9. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8, wherein the narrowband transmission mode comprises narrowband transmission via a bandwidth of 1.4 MHz or less.

10. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8, wherein an aggregation level of a first M-PDCCH signal of the one or more M-PDCCH signals is greater than eight.

11. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8, wherein a first M-DCI message of the at least one M-DCI message indicates a designated modulation and coding scheme (MCS) via less than five bits.

12. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8, wherein the instructions, when executed, further cause the eNB to multiplex and scramble the one or more M-PDCCH signals based on a scrambling seed based at least in part on a superframe number.

13. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8, wherein each of the at least one M-DCI messages indicates a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) process number via a number of bits based on a base two logarithm of the HARQ process number.

14. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8, wherein a first MTC device of the MTC devices is scheduled via a localized resource allocation scheme.

15. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8, wherein a first MTC device of the MTC devices is scheduled via a distributed resource allocation scheme.

16. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8, wherein a first M-PDCCH signal of the one or more M-PDCCH signals indicates whether an uplink transmission or downlink transmission is scheduled for each of a plurality of the MTC devices.

17. The non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 8, wherein a user equipment (UE)-specific search space for transmission of the one or more M-PDCCH signals is determined in accordance with a superframe number.

18. A user equipment (UE), comprising:

an antenna port configured to receive a narrowband transmission comprising a set of two or more machine-type communication (MTC)-physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) signals (M-PDCCH signals); and

a processor operably coupled to the antenna port and configured to;

predecode, demodulate, and descramble the plurality of M-PDCCH signals;

attempt blind decoding on a first subset of the plurality of M-PDCCH signals associated with a common search space (CSS), wherein at most one M-PDCCH signal of the first subset of M-PDCCH signals is successfully blind decoded;

attempt blind decoding of a second subset of the plurality of M-PDCCH signals associated with a UE-specific search space (USS)), wherein the attempted blind decoding of the second subset is via a hashing table that is based at least in part on a superframe index; and

identify a M-PDCCH signal associated with the UE among the first subset or the second subset upon successful decoding of the M-PDCCH signal associated with the UE as determined by a lack of a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) error after blind decoding of the M-PDCCH signal associated with the UE.

19. The UE of claim 18, wherein the UE is associated with a cell-radio network temporary identity (C-RNTI), and wherein the processor is configured to determine a scheduled symbol index associated with the UE based at least in part on the C-RNTI.

20. The UE of claim 18, wherein the processor is further configured to determine at least one of a scheduled downlink allocation or a scheduled uplink grant based at least in part on the M-PDCCH signal associated with the UE.

21. The UE of claim 20, wherein the M-PDCCH signal associated with the UE comprises a MTC downlink control information (M-DCI) message, and wherein the processor is configured to determine the at least one of the scheduled downlink allocation or the scheduled uplink grant based at least in part on the M-DCI message.

22. The UE of claim 21, wherein the M-DCI message indicates the at least one of the scheduled downlink allocation or the scheduled uplink grant via a bit associated with the UE and a predetermined resource.

23. The UE of claim 21, wherein the M-DCI message dynamically indicates the at least one of the scheduled downlink allocation or the scheduled uplink grant via a localized resource allocation scheme.

24. The UE of claim 21, wherein the M-DCI message dynamically indicates the at least one of the scheduled downlink allocation or the scheduled uplink grant via a distributed resource allocation scheme.