Multi-hop wireless communications system and method
First Claim
1. A multi-hop wireless communications system comprising a plurality of relay equipments and a destination equipment, in which uplink signals may be relayed from at least one source equipment towards the destination equipment via at least one of said plurality of relay equipments, corresponding downlink signals may be relayed from the destination equipment towards the at least one source equipment via at least one of said plurality of relay equipments, and the destination equipment comprises an adaptive antenna array arranged to transmit said corresponding downlink signals,wherein each of said plurality of relay equipments measures the quality of uplink signals received from the at least one source equipment and measures the quality of downlink signals received at the relay equipment from the destination equipment and selects, based on the quality of the received uplink signals and the quality of the received downlink signals forming duplex communication with the uplink signals, an uplink signal to relay, andwherein, responsive to a determination of received signal strength of each selected uplink signal at the destination equipment, the adaptive antenna array is arranged to form a beam pattern, whereby to preferentially receive uplink signals from and preferentially transmit downlink signals towards at least one of said plurality of relay equipments that relays one of the selected uplink signals determined to have the strongest received signal strength at the destination equipment.
8 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A multi-hop wireless, for example cellular, communications system is provided comprising a source equipment which may be one of a base station or an end user terminal for transmitting signals towards a destination equipment which may be the other of a base station or an end user terminal via at least one relay equipment. The relay equipment receives a plurality of signals transmitted from one or more source equipments of the system and from this plurality of signals selects a signal to relay. In this way the decision about which relays are included in which communication paths in the system is distributed to the relay equipments of the system, thus reducing the signalling overhead as compared with link state protocols which are typically used for routing in such multi-hop systems.
-
Citations
21 Claims
-
1. A multi-hop wireless communications system comprising a plurality of relay equipments and a destination equipment, in which uplink signals may be relayed from at least one source equipment towards the destination equipment via at least one of said plurality of relay equipments, corresponding downlink signals may be relayed from the destination equipment towards the at least one source equipment via at least one of said plurality of relay equipments, and the destination equipment comprises an adaptive antenna array arranged to transmit said corresponding downlink signals,
wherein each of said plurality of relay equipments measures the quality of uplink signals received from the at least one source equipment and measures the quality of downlink signals received at the relay equipment from the destination equipment and selects, based on the quality of the received uplink signals and the quality of the received downlink signals forming duplex communication with the uplink signals, an uplink signal to relay, and wherein, responsive to a determination of received signal strength of each selected uplink signal at the destination equipment, the adaptive antenna array is arranged to form a beam pattern, whereby to preferentially receive uplink signals from and preferentially transmit downlink signals towards at least one of said plurality of relay equipments that relays one of the selected uplink signals determined to have the strongest received signal strength at the destination equipment.
-
12. A method in a multi-hop wireless communications system of relaying an uplink signal from at least one source equipment towards a destination equipment and relaying a corresponding downlink signal from the destination equipment to the at least one source equipment via at least one relay equipment, wherein the communications system comprises a plurality of relay equipments and the destination equipment, and the destination equipment comprises an adaptive antenna array, the method comprising the steps of:
-
each of said plurality of relay equipments receiving a plurality of uplink signals from the at least one source equipment and receiving downlink signals from the destination equipment, each of said plurality of relay equipments measuring the quality of the uplink and downlink signals it receives and selecting, based on the quality of the received uplink signals and the quality of the received downlink signals forming duplex communication with the uplink signals, an uplink signal to relay; and using the adaptive antenna array at the destination equipment to form a beam pattern in response to a determination of received signal strength of each selected uplink signal at the destination equipment, whereby to preferentially receive uplink signals from and to preferentially transmit downlink signals towards one of the relay equipments that relays one of the selected uplink signals determined to have the strongest received signal strength at the destination equipment. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21)
-
Specification