Enhanced common downlink control channels

• US 9,198,181 B2
• Filed: 07/10/2012
• Issued: 11/24/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 03/19/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Malikie Innovations Limited (Key Patent Innovations Limited)
• Original Assignee: Blackberry Limited
• Inventors: Blankenship, Yufei Wu, Xu, Hua, Gao, Shiwei
• Primary Examiner(s): BLANTON, JOHN D
• Application Number:
  US13/545,548
• Publication Number:
  US 20130242882A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,232 Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1861 Physical mapping arrangements for ACK signaling see also H04L5/0053
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/001 the frequencies being arranged in component carriers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0023 Time-frequency-space
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0037 Inter-user or inter-terminal allocation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0039 Frequency-contiguous, i.e. with no allocation of frequencies for one user or terminal between the frequencies allocated to another
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0041 Frequency-non-contiguous
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0053 Allocation of signaling, i.e. of overhead other than pilot signals
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0082 at predetermined intervals
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/0094 Indication of how sub-channels of the path are allocated
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/0453 Resources in frequency domain, e.g. a carrier in FDMA
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/23 in the downlink direction of a wireless link, i.e. towards a terminal

Abstract

A method is provided for communication in a wireless telecommunication system. The method comprises designating, by a network element, a first set of time-frequency resources for transmitting a first set of downlink control channels for a plurality of UEs, wherein the first set of time-frequency resources is known to the plurality of UEs, and wherein the first set of time-frequency resources varies from a first time interval to a second time interval. The method further comprises mapping, by the network element, a first downlink control channel to the first set of time-frequency resources. The method further comprises transmitting, by the network element, the first downlink control channel together with a downlink data channel in a frequency-division multiplexing manner.

Claims

1. A method for communication in a wireless telecommunication system, the method comprising:

designating, by a network element, a first set of time-frequency resources for transmitting a first set of downlink control channels for a plurality of user equipment (UEs), wherein the first set of time-frequency resources is known to the plurality of UEs, and wherein the first set of time-frequency resources varies from a first time interval to a second time interval, wherein the first set of time-frequency resources comprise at least one of consecutive or distributed resources designated for an enhanced physical downlink control channel (E-PDCCH);

mapping, by the network element, a first region of the E-PDCCH to the first set of time-frequency resources; and

transmitting, by the network element, the E-PDCCH in a subframe comprising a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) and a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH), wherein the E-PDCCH is transmitted simultaneously with the PDSCH in a frequency-division multiplexing manner such that the E-PDCCH occupies different resource blocks (RBs) than the PDSCH,

wherein resource allocation configuration of the first set of time-frequency resources is dynamically signaled through an enhanced physical control format indicator channel (E-PCFICH) that is transmitted earlier in time than the E-PDCCH.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the first set of downlink control channels carry downlink control information (DCI) common to a plurality of UEs.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein a DCI in the first region of the E-PDCCH carries information associated with a system information radio network temporary identifier (SI-RNTI).

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the DCI in the first region of the E-PDCCH carries the same scheduling information that is carried on a legacy control region in the PDCCH of the same subframe for a plurality of UEs, wherein the DCI is transmitted with its cyclic redundancy check (CRC) bits scrambled by the system information radio network temporary identifier (SI-RNTI).

5. The method of claim 2, wherein a DCI in the first region of the E-PDCCH carries information associated with a paging radio network temporary identifier (P-RNTI).

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the first region of the E-PDCCH carries information specific to a single UE.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the first region of the E-PDCCH includes downlink control information (DCI) associated with a cell radio network temporary identifier (C-RNTI).

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

mapping a second region of the E-PDCCH to the first set of time-frequency resources, wherein DCls within the first and the second regions are cross-interleaved and distributed over the first set of time-frequency resources, the first and second regions defining a common search space and a UE-specific search space,

wherein the E-PDCCH occupies a pair of non-adjacent RBs spanning two slots of the subframe, each RB in the pair allocating resource elements (REs) shared by the common search space and the UE-specific search space.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

designating a second set of time-frequency resources for at least a second region of the E-PDCCH, wherein the second region is a localized transmission region that is exclusively for a UE-specific search space, and wherein the first region of the E-PDCCH is a distributed region in which consecutive available time-frequency resources are allocated for the UE-specific search space and a common search space in the E-PDCCH.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein separate RBs are allocated to the first and the second sets of time-frequency resources such that resource elements (REs) in the first region of the E-PDCCH do not overlap with REs in the second region of the E-PDCCH.

11. A network element comprising:

a processor configured such that the network element;

designates a first set of time-frequency resources for transmitting a first set of downlink control channels for a plurality of user equipment (UEs), wherein the first set of time-frequency resources is known to the plurality of UEs, and wherein the first set of time-frequency resources varies from a first time interval to a second time interval;

maps a first region of an enhanced physical downlink control channel (E-PDCCH) to the first set of time-frequency resources; and

transmits the E-PDCCH in a subframe comprising a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) and a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH), wherein the E-PDCCH is transmitted simultaneously with the PDSCH in a frequency-division multiplexing manner such that the E-PDCCH occupies different resource blocks (RBs) than the PDSCH,

wherein the first set of time-frequency resources comprise at least one of consecutive or distributed resources designated for the E-PDCCH,

wherein resource allocation configuration of the first set of time-frequency resources is dynamically signaled through an enhanced physical control format indicator channel (E-PCFICH) that is transmitted earlier in time than the E-PDCCH.

12. The network element of claim 11, wherein the first set of time-frequency resources occupies a first pair of RBs and a second set of time-frequency resources occupies a second pair of RBs, each RB in the first and second pairs comprising a known subset of the total resources used to transmit the E-PDCCH in the subframe, and wherein the first pair of RBs comprise resource elements (REs) allocated only for a common search space in the E-PDCCH and the second pair of RBs comprise REs allocated only for a UE-specific search space in the E-PDCCH.

13. The network element of claim 11, wherein the first set of time-frequency resources is allocated to a distributed region in the E-PDCCH which is used to transmit downlink control information (DCI) common to at least one UE.

14. The network element of claim 11, wherein the network element informs the UEs to detect a common search space in the first region of the E-PDCCH.

15. The network element of claim 11, wherein the first set of time-frequency resources define a common search space that is present in every subframe in which an enhanced physical downlink control channel (E-PDCCH) is present.

16. A method for communication in a wireless telecommunication system, the method comprising:

mapping, by a network element, an enhanced physical downlink control channel (E-PDCCH) that carries downlink scheduling information to a user equipment (UE) to indicate a downlink data transmission over a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) to the UE, into a plurality of enhanced control channel elements (eCCEs), wherein each eCCE consists of a number of predefined resource elements (REs) in a resource block (RB) pair, wherein the RB pair containing the plurality of eCCEs is signaled to the UE semi-statically using radio resource control (RRC) signaling; and

linking, by the network element, a resource index of a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) to an index of one of the plurality of eCCEs, wherein the PUCCH is provided for transmitting, by the UE, back to the network element, a positive acknowledgement (ACK) or a negative acknowledgement (NACK) about a decoding status of the PDSCH.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the eCCEs are a subset of a set of eCCEs which are consecutively indexed and configured for possible E-PDCCH transmission to the UE.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the eCCEs are arranged in multiple regions of the E-PDCCH, and wherein the E-PDCCH is multiplexed with the PDSCH.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein an offset value is associated with each set of eCCEs.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the offset values are signaled to the UE semi-statically using higher layer signaling.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein the resource index of the PUCCH is obtained by adding the index of one of the eCCEs to the offset value.

22. A network element comprising:

a processor configured such that the network element maps an enhanced physical downlink control channel (E-PDCCH) that carries downlink scheduling information to a user equipment (UE) to indicate a downlink data transmission over a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) to the UE, into a plurality of enhanced control channel elements (eCCEs), wherein each eCCE consists of a number of predefined resource elements (REs) in a resource block (RB) pair, wherein the RB pair containing the plurality of eCCEs is signaled to the UE semi-statically using radio resource control (RRC) signaling; and

the processor further configured such that the network element links a resource index of a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) to an index of one of the plurality of eCCEs, wherein the PUCCH is provided for transmitting, by the UE, back to the network element, a positive acknowledgement (ACK) or a negative acknowledgement (NACK) about a decoding status of the PDSCH.

23. The network element of claim 22, wherein one of the plurality of eCCEs is the eCCE with the smallest index value.

24. The network element of claim 22, wherein one of the plurality of eCCEs is the eCCE with the largest index value.