Methods and devices for radio communications

This application is a continuation of PCT application No. PCT/US2017/067466, filed on Dec. 20, 2017, and incorporated herein by reference in its entirety, which claimed priority to U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 62/440,501, filed Dec. 30, 2016, and incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.

Various aspects relate generally to methods and devices for radio communications.

End-to-end communication networks may include radio communications networks as well as wireline communication networks. Radio communication networks may include network access nodes (e.g., base stations, access points, etc.), and terminal devices (e.g., mobile phones, tablets, laptops, computers, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, wearables, implantable devices, machine-type communication devices, etc.), and vehicles (e.g., cars, trucks, buses, bicycles, robots, motorbikes, trains, ships, submarines, drones, airplanes, balloons, satellites, spacecraft, etc.) and may provide a radio access network for such terminal devices to communicate with other terminal devices or access various networks via the network access nodes. For example, cellular radio communication networks may provide a system of cellular base stations that serve terminal devices within an area to provide communication to other terminal devices or radio access to applications and services such as voice, text, multimedia, Internet, etc., while short-range radio access networks such as Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) networks may provide a system of WLAN access points (APs) that may provide access to other terminal devices within the WLAN network or other networks such as a cellular network or a wireline communication networks.

In the drawings, like reference characters generally refer to the same parts throughout the different views. The drawings are not necessarily to scale. Instead, the drawings generally emphasize one or more features. In the following description, various aspects of the disclosure are described with reference to the following drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 shows an exemplary radio communication system including terminal devices, terminal devices also acting as access nodes, wireless links and standards, network access nodes, servers, gateways/interchanges and backbone infrastructures in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 2 shows a network scenario including terminal devices and network access nodes related to an exemplary discovery information scheme such as common discovery channel scheme in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 3 shows an internal configuration of an exemplary terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 4 shows an internal configuration of an exemplary common discovery module in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 5 shows a method for performing radio access communications using an exemplary common discovery channel scheme in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 6 shows a first internal configuration of an exemplary network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 7 shows an exemplary method of providing discovery signals on a common discovery channel scheme in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 8 shows a first exemplary network scenario with an external database for storing discovery information in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 9 shows a second exemplary network scenario with an external database for storing discovery information in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 10 shows an exemplary method of performing radio communications in connection with a common discovery channel scheme in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 11 shows an exemplary network scenario including terminal devices and network access nodes related to a forwarding and common monitoring scheme in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 12 shows a second exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 13 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications in connection with a forwarding and common monitoring scheme in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 14 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications in connection with a forwarding and common monitoring scheme in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 15 shows an exemplary radio communication network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 16 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 17 shows a first exemplary time-frequency resource grid for radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 18 shows an exemplary transport-to-physical channel mapping in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 19 shows a second exemplary time-frequency resource grid for radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 20 shows an exemplary network scenario for a radio communication network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 21 shows a third exemplary time-frequency resource grid for radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 22 shows a fourth exemplary time-frequency resource grid for radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 23 shows an exemplary method related to selecting between available channel instances in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 24 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device with a low power radio access system in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 25 shows an exemplary method related to providing multiple channel instances in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 26 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 27 shows an exemplary method for providing channel configuration information to requesting terminal devices in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 28 shows an exemplary message sequence chart related to a procedure for selecting and attaching to a channel instance in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 29 shows an exemplary method for operating a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 30 shows an exemplary method for operating one or more network access nodes in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 31 shows an exemplary method for selecting a random access transmission power in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 32 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a physical layer processing module using modularization in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 33 shows an exemplary message sequence chart related to a procedure for arranging a scheduling setting for a modularized physical layer processing module in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 34 shows an exemplary method for operating a communication module arrangement in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 35 shows a first exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 36 shows a second exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 37 shows a third exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 38 shows a fourth exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 39 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a receiver module and transmitter module in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 40 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a receiver module in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 41 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a receiver module for a demodulator application in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 42 shows an exemplary illustration of operation of a control module in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 43 shows a method of operating a communication system in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 44 shows an exemplary radio communication network that illustrates a data bearer in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 45 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in a reception setting in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 46 shows a first mapping of data from different data bearers to different receiver modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 47 shows a second mapping of data from different data bearers to different receiver modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 48 shows a third mapping of data from different data bearers to different receiver modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 49 shows a fourth mapping of data from different data bearers to different receiver modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 50 shows a fifth mapping of data from different data bearers to different receiver modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 51 shows an exemplary distribution of data across different carriers of a carrier aggregation scheme in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 52 shows a sixth mapping of data from different data bearers to different receiver modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 53 shows a seventh mapping of data from different data bearers to different receiver modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIGS. 54 A and 54 B show various exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in a transmission setting in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 55 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 56 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 57 shows a first exemplary depiction of a relationship between radio resource allocation and power consumption in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 58 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 59 shows a second exemplary depiction of a relationship between radio resource allocation and power consumption in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 60 shows an exemplary depiction of a network node that performs processing in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 61 shows an exemplary method of operating a network processor in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 62 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 63 shows various exemplary charts illustrating retransmission notification turnaround times in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 64 shows an exemplary method of operating a network processing module in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 65 shows a first exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 66 shows an exemplary internal depiction of a control module for a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 67 shows various exemplary transmission and reception schedules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 68 shows a second exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIGS. 69 A and 69 B show various transmission and reception schedules using discontinuous transmission and/or reception in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 70 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 71 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 72 shows an exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects using a network access node;

FIG. 73 shows an exemplary message sequence chart illustrating connection continuity services using a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 74 shows an exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects using an edge computing server;

FIG. 75 shows an exemplary message sequence chart illustrating connection continuity services using an edge computing server in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 76 shows an exemplary method of performing radio communications at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 77 shows an exemplary method of performing radio communication at a network processing component in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 78 shows an exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 79 shows an exemplary message sequence chart illustrating connection continuity services for a group of terminal devices in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 80 shows an exemplary method for performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 81 shows an exemplary method for performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 82 shows an exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 83 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 84 shows an exemplary internal configuration of an autonomous moving device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 85 shows an exemplary message sequence chart related to a procedure for selecting sensitivity levels for navigation sensors at autonomous moving devices in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 86 shows an exemplary network scenario using an external sensor network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 87 shows an exemplary network scenario using multiple network access nodes with respective cells in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 88 shows an exemplary network scenario using planned routes of autonomous moving devices in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 89 shows an exemplary network scenario using a master autonomous moving device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 90 shows an exemplary method of operating a moving device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 91 shows an exemplary radio communication network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 92 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 93 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 94 shows an exemplary depiction of uses for context information at different platforms of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 95 shows a road travel scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 96 shows an exemplary implementation of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 97 shows an exemplary method at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 98 shows an exemplary depiction of network scan timing results in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 99 shows an exemplary application in a road travel scenario with multiple network access nodes in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 100 shows an exemplary method of controlling radio activity based on a historical sequence of radio conditions and other context information in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 101 shows an exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 102 shows an exemplary implementation of a terminal device and network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 103 shows an exemplary configuration of terminal device prediction and decision modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 104 shows an exemplary configuration of network access node prediction and decision modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 105 shows an exemplary message sequence chart detailing interaction between terminal device and network access node prediction and decision modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 106 shows an exemplary method making spectrum allocation decisions in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 107 shows an exemplary implementation of a cloud-based infrastructure in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 108 shows an exemplary internal configuration of local and cloud prediction and decision modules in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 109 shows various exemplary message formats for crowdsourcing context information in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 110 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 111 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 112 shows an exemplary network scenario for managing an IoT network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 113 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a gateway device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 114 shows an exemplary method at an IoT node to perform radio measurements and detect networks in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 115 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a baseband modem for an IoT node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 116 shows an exemplary method at a gateway device to collect radio measurements and reconfigure a wireless network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 117 shows an exemplary method of managing a wireless multi-hop network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 118 shows an exemplary method of performing radio communications according to some aspects;

FIG. 119 shows an exemplary scenario for beamsteering with vehicular targets in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 120 shows an exemplary internal configuration of control module for a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 121 shows an exemplary method of performing beamsteering for vehicular targets in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 122 shows an exemplary scenario in which a vehicle can block another vehicle in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 123 shows an exemplary scenario for radio access technology switching in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 124 shows an exemplary scenario with aerial drones in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 125 shows an exemplary method of performing radio communications according to some aspects;

FIG. 126 shows an exemplary network architecture in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 127 shows an exemplary positioning of network access nodes for distributing radio environmental map (REM) data storage in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 128 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a distributed REM server in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 129 shows an exemplary message sequence chart illustrating a request-response mechanism for REM data in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 130 shows an exemplary table related to a two-dimension framework for requesting REM data based on device capabilities and context information detail level in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 131 shows a first exemplary method for managing REM data in a distributed manner in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 132 shows a second exemplary method for managing REM data in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 133 shows an exemplary plot of bursty traffic periods in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 134 shows an exemplary method for triggering semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) based on predicted user traffic patterns in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 135 shows an exemplary method of controlling scheduling decisions based on detection of non-compliant terminal device behavior in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 136 shows an exemplary radio communication network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 137 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 138 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 139 shows an exemplary end-to-end network architecture in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 140 shows an exemplary end-to-end network architecture with network slicing in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 141 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 142 shows an exemplary message sequence chart illustrating a message exchange between a terminal device and a core network for network slice selection in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 143 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 144 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 145 shows a third exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 146 shows an exemplary end-to-end network architecture with an edge computing server and charging server in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 147 shows an exemplary internal configuration of an edge computing server in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 148 shows an exemplary message sequence chart illustrating a message exchange between a terminal device, edge computing server, and charging server in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 149 shows a first exemplary method of managing a data stream in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 150 shows a second exemplary method of managing a data stream according in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 151 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 152 shows a first exemplary message sequence chart illustrating a message exchange between a terminal device and a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 153 shows a second exemplary message sequence chart illustrating a message exchange between a terminal device and a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 154 shows a third exemplary message sequence chart illustrating a message exchange between a terminal device and a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 155 shows an exemplary priority curve illustrating a service disabling priority in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 156 shows an exemplary message sequence chart illustrating progressive service disablement in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 157 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 158 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 159 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 160 shows an exemplary method of detecting and responding to thermal-constrained scenarios with throttling at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 161 shows an exemplary method of detecting and responding to power-constrained scenarios with throttling at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 162 shows an exemplary method of detecting and responding to thermal-constrained and/or power-constrained scenarios with throttling at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 163 shows an exemplary configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 164 shows an exemplary method of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 165 shows an exemplary radio communication network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 166 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 167 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 168 shows an exemplary end-to-end network architecture in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 169 shows an exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 170 shows an exemplary internal configuration of an assisting device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 171 shows an interactional diagram between terminal devices, network access nodes, and assisting device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 172 shows a first exemplary message sequence chart depicting interaction between a terminal device, an assisting device, and a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 173 shows a second exemplary message sequence chart depicting interaction between a terminal device, an assisting device, and a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 174 shows a third exemplary message sequence chart depicting interaction between a terminal device, an assisting device, and a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 175 shows a fourth exemplary message sequence chart depicting interaction between a terminal device, an assisting device, and a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 176 shows a fifth exemplary message sequence chart depicting interaction between a terminal device, an assisting device, and a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 177 shows an exemplary network scenario involving support of multiple terminal devices by an assisting device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 178 shows an exemplary application of an Internet of Things (IoT) setting in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 179 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 180 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications at a communication device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 181 shows a third exemplary method of performing radio communications at a communication device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 182 shows a first exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects of this disclosure;

FIG. 183 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a vehicle network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 184 shows a first exemplary message sequence chart illustrating prediction and pre-loading of target data for a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 185 shows a second exemplary message sequence chart illustrating prediction and pre-loading of target data for a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 186 shows a second exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 187 shows an exemplary network scenario depicting terminal device and network access node connections in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 188 shows a third exemplary message sequence chart illustrating prediction and pre-loading of target data for a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 189 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications at a local network access node of a vehicle in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 190 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications at a local network access node of a vehicle in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 191 shows an exemplary radio communication network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 192 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 193 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 194 shows an exemplary network scenario involving roadside network access nodes and vehicles or vehicular terminal devices in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 195 shows an exemplary illustration of a MapReduce framework in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 196 shows an exemplary illustration of a coded MapReduce framework in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 197 shows an exemplary network scenario involving groups of vehicles or vehicular terminal devices in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 198 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a vehicular terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 199 shows a first exemplary method of wireless distributed computation in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 200 shows a second exemplary method of wireless distributed computation in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 201 shows a progressive network scenario for a terminal device to connect to a network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 202 shows an exemplary logical, transport, and physical channel mapping scheme in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 203 shows an exemplary method for connecting to a network using a direct link in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 204 shows an exemplary internal configuration for a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 205 shows an exemplary method for telemetry aid over a direct link in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 206 shows a first exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 207 shows a second exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 208 shows a first exemplary time chart illustrating a procedure for direct link sharing in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 209 shows a third exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 210 shows a second exemplary time chart illustrating a procedure for direct link sharing in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 211 shows an exemplary network scenario related to the use of device knowledge history (DKH) classes in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 212 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 213 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 214 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 215 shows a third exemplary method of performing radio communications at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 216 shows an exemplary radio communication network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 217 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 218 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 219 shows an exemplary end-to-end network architecture in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 220 shows a first exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 221 shows a second exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 222 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a vehicular terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 223 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 224 shows an exemplary message sequence chart detailing the use of sidelink channels for vehicular communication links in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 225 shows an exemplary method of performing radio communications at a vehicular terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 226 shows an exemplary method of organizing vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) or vehicle-to-network (V2N) communications for a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 227 shows an exemplary method of terminal device management of device-to-device communication in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 228 shows an exemplary method of network management of device-to-device communication in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 229 shows an exemplary network scenario related to serving a floating cell with a directional antenna beam in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 230 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 231 shows an exemplary internal configuration of an anchor aerial device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 232 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a secondary aerial device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 233 shows an exemplary time-frequency radio resource allocation in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 234 shows an exemplary method for controlling a floating cell at an anchor aerial device of the floating cell in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 235 shows an exemplary method of operating a secondary aerial device in a floating cell including a plurality of vehicles or aerial terminal devices in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 236 shows an exemplary method of operating a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 237 shows an exemplary method for network management of a floating cell in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 238 shows an exemplary method of anchor drone operation within a floating cell in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 239 shows an exemplary method of operating a secondary drone within a floating cell in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 240 shows an exemplary network scenario that illustrates deployment of a mobile infrastructure node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 241 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a mobile infrastructure node with an autonomous driving system in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 242 shows an exemplary method of activating a mobile infrastructure node as a dynamic mobile infrastructure in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 243 shows an exemplar method of operating a mobile infrastructure node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 244 shows an exemplary method of operating a vehicle as a mobile infrastructure node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 245 shows an exemplary network scenario involving deployment of a mobile infrastructure node in response to a critical network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 246 shows an exemplary configuration of a processing module of a mobile infrastructure node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 247 shows an exemplary message sequence chart illustrating activation and operation of a mobile infrastructure node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 248 shows an exemplary network scenario involving deployment of multiple mobile infrastructure nodes in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 249 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a mobile infrastructure node with an autonomous driving system in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 250 shows an exemplary method of providing network connectivity to an area impacted by network overload or outage at a mobile infrastructure node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 251 shows an exemplary method of coordinating one or more mobile infrastructure nodes to respond to network connectivity disruptions in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 252 shows an exemplary network scenario involving a cluster of terminal devices that utilize the same identity in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 253 shows an exemplary internal configuration of a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 254 shows an exemplary network scenario illustrating downlink communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 255 shows an exemplary network scenario illustrating uplink communications in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 256 shows an exemplary method for terminal device communication in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 257 shows an exemplary method for managing a leader terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 258 shows an exemplary method for terminal device communication in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 259 shows a first exemplary method of performing radio communications at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 260 shows a second exemplary method of performing radio communications at a terminal device in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 261 shows an exemplary network scenario in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 262 shows an exemplary time-frequency radio resource allocation related to a contention-based access mode in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 263 shows an exemplary time-frequency radio resource allocation related to a scheduled-based access mode in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 264 shows an exemplary group resource block in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 265 shows an exemplary network scenario involving group resource block configuration forwarding in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 266 shows an exemplary network scenario involving operation of a group leader in an out of coverage situation in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 267 shows an exemplary method for provisioning radio network resources according to application requirements in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 268 shows an exemplary method for provisioning radio network resources according to application requirements in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 269 shows an exemplary network scenario involving a mobile cloud network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 270 shows an exemplary message sequence chart for setting up a temporary hierarchical network by a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 271 shows an exemplary method for communication within a hierarchical network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 272 shows an exemplary method for communication in a hierarchical network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 273 shows an exemplary network scenario involving a mobile cloud network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 274 shows an exemplary message sequence chart for dynamically changing a hierarchical network by a network access node in accordance with some aspects;

FIGS. 275 and 276 show exemplary network scenarios that illustrate the effect of a hierarchical change on a mobile cloud network in accordance with some aspects;

FIG. 277 shows an exemplary method for dynamic communication within a hierarchical network in accordance with some aspects; and

FIG. 278 shows an exemplary method for dynamic communication over a radio access network in accordance with some aspects.

The following detailed description refers to the accompanying drawings that show, by way of illustration, specific details and aspects in which the aspects of this disclosure may be practiced.

The word “exemplary” is used herein to mean “serving as an example, instance, or illustration”. Any aspect or design described herein as “exemplary” is not necessarily to be construed as preferred or advantageous over other aspects or designs.

The words “plurality” and “multiple” in the description and the claims expressly refer to a quantity greater than one. The terms “group (of)”, “set [of]”, “collection (of)”, “series (of)”, “sequence (of)”, “grouping (of)”, etc., and the like in the description and in the claims, if any, refer to a quantity equal to or greater than one—for example, one or more. Any term expressed in plural form that does not expressly state “plurality” or “multiple” refers to a quantity equal to or greater than one. The terms “proper subset”, “reduced subset”, and “lesser subset” refer to a subset of a set that is not equal to the set—for example, a subset of a set that contains fewer elements than the set.

As used herein, the term “software” refers to any type of executable instruction or set of instructions, including embedded data in the software. Software can also encompass firmware. Software can create, delete or modify software, e.g., through a machine learning process.

A “module” as used herein is understood as any kind of functionality-implementing entity, which may include hardware-defined modules such as special-purpose hardware, software-defined modules such as a processor executing software or firmware, and mixed modules that include both hardware-defined and software-defined components. A module may thus be an analog circuit or component, digital circuit, mixed-signal circuit or component, logic circuit, processor, microprocessor, Central Processing Unit (CPU), application processor, Graphics Processing Unit (GPU), Digital Signal Processor (DSP), Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), integrated circuit, discrete circuit, Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), etc., or any combination thereof. Any other kind of implementation of the respective functions which will be described below in further detail may also be understood as a “module”. It is understood that any two (or more) of the modules detailed herein may be realized as a single module with substantially equivalent functionality, and conversely that any single module detailed herein may be realized as two (or more) separate modules with substantially equivalent functionality. Additionally, references to a “module” may refer to two or more modules that collectively form a single module.

As used herein, the terms “circuit” and “circuitry” can include software-defined circuitry, hardware-defined circuitry, and mixed hardware-defined and software-defined circuitry.

As used herein, “memory” may be understood as a non-transitory computer-readable medium in which data or information can be stored for retrieval. Memory may be used by, included in, integrated or associated with a module. References to “memory” included herein may thus be understood as referring to volatile or non-volatile memory, including random access memory (RAM), read-only memory (ROM), flash memory, magnetoresistive random access memory (MRAM), phase random access memory (PRAM), spin transfer torque random access memory (STT MRAM), solid-state storage, 3-dimensional memory, 3-dimensional crosspoint memory, NAND memory, magnetic tape, hard disk drive, optical drive, etc., or any combination thereof. Furthermore, it is appreciated that registers, shift registers, processor registers, data buffers, etc., are also embraced herein by the term memory. It is appreciated that a single component referred to as “memory” or “a memory” may be implemented as more than one different type of memory, and thus may refer to a collective component comprising one or more types of memory. It is readily understood that any single memory component may be separated into multiple collectively equivalent memory components, and vice versa. Furthermore, while memory may be depicted as separate from one or more other components (such as in the drawings), it is understood that memory may be integrated within another component, such as on a common integrated chip.

Various aspects described herein can utilize any radio communication technology, including but not limited to a Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) radio communication technology, a General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) radio communication technology, an Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE) radio communication technology, and/or a Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) radio communication technology, for example Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), Freedom of Multimedia Access (FOMA), 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE), 3GPP Long Term Evolution Advanced (LTE Advanced), Code division multiple access 2000 (CDMA2000), Cellular Digital Packet Data (CDPD), Mobitex, Third Generation (3G), Circuit Switched Data (CSD), High-Speed Circuit-Switched Data (HSCSD), Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (Third Generation) (UMTS (3G)), Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System) (W-CDMA (UMTS)), High Speed Packet Access (HSPA), High-Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA), High-Speed Uplink Packet Access (HSUPA), High Speed Packet Access Plus (HSPA+), Universal Mobile Telecommunications System-Time-Division Duplex (UMTS-TDD), Time Division-Code Division Multiple Access (TD-CDMA), Time Division-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access (TD-CDMA), 3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 8 (Pre-4th Generation) (3GPP Rel. 8 (Pre-4G)), 3GPP Rel. 9 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 9), 3GPP Rel. 10 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 10), 3GPP Rel. 11 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 11), 3GPP Rel. 12 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 12), 3GPP Rel. 13 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 13), 3GPP Rel. 14 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 14), 3GPP Rel. 15 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 15), 3GPP Rel. 16 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 16), 3GPP Rel. 17 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 17), 3GPP Rel. 18 (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 18), 3GPP 5G, 3GPP LTE Extra, LTE-Advanced Pro, LTE Licensed-Assisted Access (LM), MuLTEfire, UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access (UTRA), Evolved UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access (E-UTRA), Long Term Evolution Advanced (4th Generation) (LTE Advanced (4G)), cdmaOne (2G), Code division multiple access 2000 (Third generation) (CDMA2000 (3G)), Evolution-Data Optimized or Evolution-Data Only (EV-DO), Advanced Mobile Phone System (1st Generation) (AMPS (1G)), Total Access Communication System/Extended Total Access Communication System (TACS/ETACS), Digital AMPS (2nd Generation) (D-AMPS (2G)), Push-to-talk (PTT), Mobile Telephone System (MTS), Improved Mobile Telephone System (IMTS), Advanced Mobile Telephone System (AMTS), OLT (Norwegian for Offentlig Landmobil Telefoni, Public Land Mobile Telephony), MTD (Swedish abbreviation for Mobiltelefonisystem D, or Mobile telephony system D), Public Automated Land Mobile (Autotel/PALM), ARP (Finnish for Autoradiopuhelin, “car radio phone”), NMT (Nordic Mobile Telephony), High capacity version of NTT (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone) (Hicap), Cellular Digital Packet Data (CDPD), Mobitex, DataTAC, Integrated Digital Enhanced Network (iDEN), Personal Digital Cellular (PDC), Circuit Switched Data (CSD), Personal Handy-phone System (PHS), Wideband Integrated Digital Enhanced Network (WiDEN), iBurst, Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA), also referred to as 3GPP Generic Access Network, or GAN standard, Zigbee, Bluetooth®, Wireless Gigabit Alliance (WiGig) standard, mmWave standards in general (wireless systems operating at 10-300 GHz and above such as WiGig, IEEE 802.11ad, IEEE 802.11ay, etc.), technologies operating above 300 GHz and THz bands, (3GPP/LTE based or IEEE 802.11p and other) Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle-to-X (V2X) and Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) and Infrastructure-to-Vehicle (I2V) communication technologies, 3GPP cellular V2X, DSRC (Dedicated Short Range Communications) communication systems such as Intelligent-Transport-Systems and others, etc. These aspects can be applied in the context of any spectrum management scheme including dedicated licensed spectrum, unlicensed spectrum, (licensed) shared spectrum (such as Licensed Shared Access (LSA) in 2.3-2.4 GHz, 3.4-3.6 GHz, 3.6-3.8 GHz and further frequencies and Spectrum Access System (SAS) in 3.55-3.7 GHz and further frequencies). Applicable spectrum bands can also include IMT (International Mobile Telecommunications) spectrum (including 450-470 MHz, 790-960 MHz, 1710-2025 MHz, 2110-2200 MHz, 2300-2400 MHz, 2500-2690 MHz, 698-790 MHz, 610-790 MHz, 3400-3600 MHz, etc), IMT-advanced spectrum, IMT-2020 spectrum (expected to include 3600-3800 MHz, 3.5 GHz bands, 700 MHz bands, bands within the 24.25-86 GHz range, etc.), spectrum made available under FCC's “Spectrum Frontier” 5G initiative (including 27.5-28.35 GHz, 29.1-29.25 GHz, 31-31.3 GHz, 37-38.6 GHz, 38.6-40 GHz, 42-42.5 GHz, 57-64 GHz, 71-76 GHz, 81-86 GHz and 92-94 GHz, etc.), Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) band spectrum (5.9 GHz, typically 5.85-5.925 GHz), and future bands including 94-300 GHz and above. Furthermore, the scheme can be used on a secondary basis on bands such as the TV White Space bands (typically below 790 MHz) where in particular the 400 MHz and 700 MHz bands are promising candidates. Besides cellular applications, specific applications for vertical markets may be addressed such as PMSE (Program Making and Special Events), medical, health, surgery, automotive, low-latency, drones, etc. applications, etc. Additionally, a hierarchical application of the scheme is possible, such as by introducing a hierarchical prioritization of usage for different types of users (e.g., low/medium/high priority, etc.), based on a prioritized access to the spectrum e.g., with highest priority to tier-1 users, followed by tier-2, then tier-3, etc. users, etc. Various aspects can also be applied to different OFDM flavors (Cyclic Prefix OFDM (CP-OFDM), Single Carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA), Single Carrier OFDM (SC-OFDM), filter bank-based multicarrier (FBMC), OFDMA, etc.) and in particular 3GPP NR (New Radio) by allocating the OFDM carrier data bit vectors to the corresponding symbol resources. These aspects can also be applied to any of a Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) context, a Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) context, an Infrastructure-to-Vehicle (I2V) context, or a Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) context, e.g., in a DSRC or LTE V2X context, etc.

The term “base station” used in reference to an access node of a mobile communication network may be understood as a macro base station (such as, for example, for cellular communications), micro/pico/femto base station, Node B, evolved NodeB (eNB), Home eNodeB, Remote Radio Head (RRH), relay point, access point (AP, such as, for example, for Wi-Fi, WLAN, WiGig, millimeter Wave (mmWave), etc.) etc. As used herein, a “cell” in the setting of telecommunications may be understood as an area (e.g., a public place) or space (e.g., multi-story building or airspace) served by a base station or access point. The base station may be mobile, e.g., installed in a vehicle, and the covered area or space may move accordingly. Accordingly, a cell may be covered by a set of co-located transmit and receive antennas, each of which also able to cover and serve a specific sector of the cell. A base station or access point may serve one or more cells, where each cell is characterized by a distinct communication channel or standard (e.g., a base station offering 2G, 3G and LTE services). Macro-, micro-, femto-, pico-cells may have different cell sizes and ranges, and may be static or dynamic (e.g., a cell installed in a drone or balloon) or change its characteristic dynamically (for example, from macrocell to picocell, from static deployment to dynamic deployment, from omnidirectional to directional, from broadcast to narrowcast). Communication channels may be narrowband or broadband. Communication channels may also use carrier aggregation across radio communication technologies and standards, or flexibly adapt bandwidth to communication needs. In addition, terminal devices can include or act as base stations or access points or relays or other network access nodes.

For purposes of this disclosure, radio communication technologies or standards may be classified as one of a Short Range radio communication technology or Cellular Wide Area radio communication technology. Further, radio communication technologies or standards may be classified as person to person, person to machine, machine to person, machine to machine, device to device, point-to-point, one-to-many, broadcast, peer-to-peer, full-duplex, half-duplex, omnidirectional, beamformed, beam-formed, and/or directional. Further, radio communication technologies or standards may be classified as using electromagnetic or light waves or a combination thereof.

Short Range radio communication technologies include, for example, Bluetooth, WLAN (e.g., according to any IEEE 802.11 standard), WiGig (e.g., according to any IEEE 802.11 standard), millimeter Wave and other similar radio communication technologies.

Cellular Wide Area radio communication technologies include, for example, Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM), Code Division Multiple Access 2000 (CDMA2000), Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), Long Term Evolution (LTE), Long Term Evolution Advanced (LTE-A), General Packet Radio Service (GPRS), Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO), Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE), High Speed Packet Access (HSPA; including High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA), High Speed Uplink Packet Access (HSUPA), HSDPA Plus (HSDPA+), and HSUPA Plus (HSUPA+)), Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMax), 5G (e.g., millimeter Wave (mmWave), 3GPP New Radio (NR)), next generation cellular standards like 6G, and other similar radio communication technologies. Cellular Wide Area radio communication technologies also include “small cells” of such technologies, such as microcells, femtocells, and picocells. Cellular Wide Area radio communication technologies may be generally referred to herein as “cellular” communication technologies. Furthermore, as used herein the term GSM refers to both circuit- and packet-switched GSM, for example, including GPRS, EDGE, and any other related GSM technologies. Likewise, the term UMTS refers to both circuit- and packet-switched GSM, for example, including HSPA, HSDPA/HSUPA, HSDPA+/HSUPA+, and any other related UMTS technologies. Further communication technologies include Line of sight (LiFi) communication technology. It is understood that exemplary scenarios detailed herein are demonstrative in nature, and accordingly may be similarly applied to various other mobile communication technologies, both existing and not yet formulated, particularly in cases where such mobile communication technologies share similar features as disclosed regarding the following examples.

The term “network” as utilized herein, for example, in reference to a communication network such as a mobile communication network, encompasses both an access section of a network (e.g., a radio access network (RAN) section) and a core section of a network (e.g., a core network section), but also, for an end-to-end system, encompasses mobile (including peer-to-peer, device to device, and/or machine to machine communications), access, backhaul, server, backbone and gateway/interchange elements to other networks of the same or different type. The term “radio idle mode” or “radio idle state” used herein in reference to a mobile terminal refers to a radio control state in which the mobile terminal is not allocated at least one dedicated communication channel of a mobile communication network. The term “radio connected mode” or “radio connected state” used in reference to a mobile terminal refers to a radio control state in which the mobile terminal is allocated at least one dedicated uplink communication channel of a mobile communication network. The uplink communication channel may be a physical channel or a virtual channel. Idle or connection mode can be connection-switched or packet-switched.

The term “terminal devices” includes, for example, mobile phones, tablets, laptops, computers, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, wearables, implantable devices, machine-type communication devices, etc., and vehicles e.g., cars, trucks, buses, bicycles, robots, motorbikes, trains, ships, submarines, drones, airplanes, balloons, satellites, spacecraft, etc. Vehicles can be autonomously controlled, semi-autonomously controlled, or under control of a person, e.g., according to one of the SAE J3016 levels of driving automation. The level of driving automation may be selected based on past, current and estimated future conditions of the vehicle, other vehicles, traffic, persons, or the environment.

Unless explicitly specified, the term “transmit” encompasses both direct (point-to-point) and indirect transmission (via one or more intermediary points), from terminal devices to network access or relay nodes, from terminal devices to terminal devices, from network access or relay nodes to backbone. Similarly, the term “receive” encompasses both direct and indirect reception between terminal devices, network access and relay nodes and backbone. The term “communicate” encompasses one or both of transmitting and receiving, for example, unidirectional or bidirectional communication in one or both of the incoming and outgoing directions. Additionally, the terms “transmit”, “receive”, “communicate”, and other similar terms encompass both physical transmission (e.g., the transmission of radio signals) and logical transmission (e.g., the transmission of logical data over a software-level connection). For example, a processor may transmit or receive data in the form of radio signals with another processor, where the physical transmission and reception is handled by radio-layer components such as RF transceivers and antennas and the logical transmission and reception is performed by the processor. The term “calculate” encompasses both direct calculations via a mathematical expression/formula/relationship and indirect calculations via lookup or hash tables and other indexing or searching operations.

FIG. 1 shows an exemplary depiction of communication network 100 according to some aspects. As shown in FIG. 1 , communication network 100 may be an end-to-end network spanning from radio access network 102 to backbone networks 132 and 142 . Backbone networks 132 and 142 may be realized as predominantly wireline networks. Network access nodes 120 - 126 may a radio access network and may wirelessly transmit and receive data with terminal devices 104 - 116 to provide radio access connections to terminal devices 104 - 116 . Terminal devices 104 - 116 may utilize the radio access connections provided by radio access network 102 to exchange data on end-to-end connections with servers in backbone networks 132 and 142 . The radio access connections between terminal devices 104 - 116 and network access nodes 120 - 126 may be implemented according to one or more radio access technologies, where each terminal device may transmit and receive data with a corresponding network access node according to the protocols of a particular radio access technology that governs the radio access connection. In some aspects, one or more of terminal devices 104 - 116 may utilize licensed spectrum or unlicensed spectrum for the radio access connections. In some aspects, one or more of terminal devices 104 - 116 may directly communicate with one another according to any of a variety of different device-to-device (D2D) communication protocols.

As shown in FIG. 1 , in some aspects terminal devices such as terminal devices 106 - 110 may rely on a forwarding link provided by terminal device 104 , where terminal device 104 may act as a gateway or relay between terminal devices 106 - 110 and network access node 120 . In some aspects, terminal devices 106 - 110 may be configured according to a mesh or multi-hop network and may communicate with terminal device 104 via one or more other terminal devices. The configuration of terminal devices, e.g., a mesh or multi-hop configuration, may change dynamically e.g., according to terminal or user requirements, the current radio or network environment, the availability or performance of applications and services, or the cost of communications or access.

In some aspects, terminal devices such as terminal device 116 may utilize relay node 118 to transmit and/or receive data with network access node 126 , where relay node 118 may perform relay transmission between terminal devices 116 and network access node 126 , e.g., with a simple repeating scheme or a more complex processing and forwarding scheme. The relay may also be a realized as a series of relays, or use opportunistic relaying, where a the best or approximately best relay or series of relays at a given moment in time or time interval is used.

In some aspects, network access nodes such as network access node 124 and 126 may interface with core network 130 , which may provide routing, control, and management functions that govern both radio access connections and core network and backhaul connections. As shown in FIG. 1 , core network 130 may interface with backbone network 142 , and may perform network gateway functions to manage the transfer of data between network access nodes 124 and 126 and the various servers of backbone network 142 . In some aspects, network access nodes 124 and 126 may be directly connected with each other via a direct interface, which may be wired or wireless. In some aspects, network access nodes such as network access nodes 120 may interface directly with backbone network 132 . In some aspects, network access nodes such as network access node 122 may interface with backbone network 132 via router 128 .

Backbone networks 132 and 142 may contain various different internet and external servers in servers 134 - 138 and 144 - 148 . Terminal devices 104 - 116 may transmit and receive data with servers 134 - 138 and 144 - 148 on logical software-level connections that rely on the radio access network and other intermediate interfaces for lower layer transport. Terminal devices 104 - 116 may therefore utilize communication network 100 as an end-to-end network to transmit and receive data, which may include internet and application data in addition to other types of user-plane data. In some aspects backbone networks 132 and 142 may interface via gateways 140 and 150 , which may be connected at interchange 152 .

1 Common Channel

Reception or transmission of discovery and control information may be an important part of wireless network activity for terminal devices or network access nodes. Terminal devices may reduce operating power and increase operating time and performance by intelligently finding or scanning the radio environment for network access nodes and standards or other terminal devices. Terminal devices can scan for discovery information in order to detect and identify available communication technologies and standards, parameters of these available communication technologies and standards, and proximate network access nodes or other terminal devices. In another aspect, there may be a known or from time to time published schedule, specifying one or more access technologies or standards, or specifying one or more channels, which may be scanned with priority to reduce scan efforts. In yet another aspect, discovery or control information may be communicated as payload or as part of the payload of channels, e.g., as a web or internet or cloud service, also using preferred or advertised channels, to reduce scan efforts. After identifying the presence of proximate network access nodes or other terminal devices via reception of such discovery information, terminal devices may be able to establish a wireless connection with a selected network access node or other terminal device in order to exchange data and/or pursue other radio interactions with network access nodes or other terminal devices such as radio measurement or reception of broadcast information. The selection of a network access node or other terminal may be based on terminal or user requirements, past, present and anticipated future radio and environment conditions, the availability or performance of applications and services, or the cost of communications or access.

In order to ensure that both incoming and outgoing data is received and transmitted properly with a selected network access node or other terminal device e.g., according to a wireless standard or a proprietary standard, or a mix thereof, a terminal device may also receive control information that provides control information or parameters. The control parameters can include, for example, time and frequency scheduling information, coding/modulation schemes, power control information, paging information, retransmission information, connection/mobility information, and/or other such information that defines how and when data is to be transmitted and received. Terminal devices may then use the control parameters to control data transmission and reception with the network access node or other terminal device, thus enabling the terminal device to successfully exchange user and other data traffic with the network access node or other terminal device over the wireless connection. The network access node may interface with an underlying communication network (e.g., a core network) that may provide a terminal device with data including voice, multimedia (e.g., audio/video/image), internet and/or other web-browsing data, etc., or provide access to other applications and services, e.g., using cloud technologies.

Therefore, in order to effectively operate on wireless communication networks, it may be important that terminal devices properly receive, transmit and interpret both discovery and control information. To this end, it may be desirable that terminal devices receive the discovery and control information on proper frequency resources at correct times (for example, in accordance with scheduling parameters) and demodulate and decode the received discovery and control information according to the modulation and coding schemes (for example, in accordance with formatting parameters) to recover the original data, or keep the effort of finding the discovery and control information low.

The procedure to receive and interpret such information according to the corresponding scheduling and formatting parameters may be defined by specific protocols associated with the radio access technology employed by the wireless communications network. For example, a first wireless network may utilize a first radio access technology (RAT, such as, for example, a 3GPP radio access technology, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth), which may have a specific wireless access protocol that defines the scheduling and format for discovery information, control information, and user traffic data transmission and reception. Network access nodes and terminal devices operating on the first wireless network may thus follow the wireless protocols of the first radio access technology in order to properly transmit and receive wireless data on the first wireless network.

Each radio access technology may define different scheduling and format parameters for discovery and control information. For example, a second radio access technology may specify different scheduling and format parameters for discovery and control information (in addition to for user data traffic) from the first radio access technology. Accordingly, a terminal device may utilize a different reception procedure to receive discovery and control information for the first wireless network than for the second wireless network; examples include receiving different discovery signals/waveforms, receiving discovery and control information with different timing, receiving discovery and control information in different formats, receiving discovery and control information on different channels and/or using different frequency resources, etc.

The present disclosure relates to a terminal device that is configured to operate on a plurality of radio access technologies. A terminal device configured to operate on a plurality of radio access technologies (e.g., the first and second RATs) can be configured in accordance with the wireless protocols of both the first and second RATs (and likewise for operation on additional RATs). For example, LTE network access nodes (e.g., eNodeBs) may transmit discovery and control information in a different format (including the type/contents of information, modulation and coding scheme, data rates, etc.) with different time and frequency scheduling (including periodicity, center frequency, bandwidth, duration, etc.) than Wi-Fi network access nodes (e.g., WLAN APs). Consequently, a terminal device designed for both LTE and Wi-Fi operation may operate according to the specific LTE protocols in order to properly receive LTE discovery and control information and may also operate according to the specific Wi-Fi protocols in order to properly receive Wi-Fi discovery and control information. Terminal devices configured to operate on further radio access networks, such as UMTS, GSM, Bluetooth, may likewise be configured to transmit and receive radio signals according to the corresponding individual access protocols. In some aspects, terminal devices may have dedicated hardware and/or software component for each supported radio access technology.

In some aspects, a terminal device can be configured to omit the periodic scanning of the radio environment for available network access nodes, other terminal devices, and communication technologies and standards. This allows the terminal device to reduce operating power consumption and increase operating time and performance by omitting the periodic scanning of the radio environment for available network access nodes, other terminal devices, and communication technologies and standards. Instead, of performing periodic comprehensive scans of the radio environment, a terminal device can be configured scan dedicated discovery or control channels. In some aspects, dedicated discovery or control channels may be provided by network access nodes or other terminal devices. In other aspects, network access nodes or other terminal devices may advertise which discovery or control channels should be used by the terminal device.

Alternatively or additionally, in some aspects, network access nodes or other terminal devices can act as a proxy, relaying discovery or control information on a dedicated channel. For example, a resourceful other terminal device relaying discovery or control information via low power short range communication, such as Bluetooth or 802.15.4 Low Energy (LE), to a proximate terminal device.

FIG. 2 shows an exemplary wireless network configuration in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIG. 2 , terminal devices 200 and 202 may interact with one or more network access nodes, including network access nodes 210 - 230 . In some aspects, network access nodes 210 and 212 may be network access nodes for a first radio access technology (RAT) and network access nodes 214 - 230 may be network access nodes for a second RAT. Furthermore, in some aspects network access nodes 210 and 212 may be located at a cell site or radio tower (or a similar network broadcast point) that contain cells of additional radio access technologies. For example, one or more cells of a third RAT, a fourth RAT, and/or a fifth RAT may be located at a cell site with network access node 210 and/or 212 . In an exemplary scenario, network access node 210 may be an LTE network access node and may be co-located with any one or more of UMTS, GSM, mmWave, 5G, Wi-Fi/WLAN, and/or Bluetooth. Although aspects detailed below may refer radio access networks, aspects provided below can use any other combinations of radio access networks, and network access nodes 210 - 212 and 214 - 230 may analogously utilize any type of radio access technology in compliance with the radio access networks. For example, aspects provided below can use LTE-Advanced and Wi-Fi/WLAN.

Terminal device 200 and terminal device 202 may be any type of terminal device such as a cellular phone, user equipment, tablet, laptop, personal computer, wearable, multimedia playback and/or other handheld electronic device, consumer/home/office/commercial appliance, vehicle, or any type of electronic devices capable of wireless communications.

In some aspects, terminal devices 200 and 202 may be configured to operate in accordance with a plurality of radio access networks, such as both LTE and Wi-Fi access networks. Consequently, terminal devices 200 and 202 may include hardware and/or software specifically configured to transmit and receive wireless signals according to each respective access protocol. Without loss of generality, terminal devices 200 (and/or 202 ) may also be configured to support other radio access technologies, such as other cellular, short-range, and/or metropolitan area radio access technologies. For example, in an exemplary configuration terminal device 200 may be configured to support LTE, UMTS (both circuit- and packet-switched), GSM (both circuit- and packet-switched), and Wi-Fi. In another exemplary configuration, terminal device 200 may additionally or alternatively be configured to support 5G and mmWave radio access technologies.

FIG. 3 shows an exemplary internal configuration of terminal device 200 in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIG. 3 , terminal device 200 may include antenna system 302 , communication system 304 including communication modules 306 a - 306 e and controller 308 , data source 310 , memory 312 , and data sink 314 . Although not explicitly shown in FIG. 3 , terminal device 200 may include one or more additional hardware, software, and/or firmware components (such as processors/microprocessors, controllers/microcontrollers, other specialty or generic hardware/processors/circuits, etc.), peripheral device(s), memory, power supply, external device interface(s), subscriber identify module(s) (SIMs), user input/output devices (display(s), keypad(s), touchscreen(s), speaker(s), external button(s), camera(s), microphone(s), etc.), etc.

In an abridged operational overview, terminal device 200 may transmit and receive radio signals on one or more radio access networks. Controller 308 may direct such communication functionality of terminal device 200 according to the radio access protocols associated with each radio access network and may execute control over antenna system 302 in order to transmit and receive radio signals according to the formatting and scheduling parameters defined by each access protocol.

Terminal device 200 may transmit and receive radio signals with antenna system 302 , which may be an antenna array including multiple antennas and may additionally include analog antenna combination and/or beamforming circuitry. The antennas of antenna system 302 may be individually assigned or commonly shared between one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 e . For example, one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 e may have a unique dedicated antenna while other of communication modules 306 a - 306 e may share a common antenna.

Controller 308 may maintain RAT connections via communication modules 306 a - 306 d by providing and receiving upper-layer uplink and downlink data in addition to controlling the transmission and reception of such data via communication modules 306 a - 306 d as radio signals. Communication modules 306 a - 306 d may transmit and receive radio signals via antenna system 302 according to their respective radio access technology and may be responsible for the corresponding RF- and PHY-level processing. In some aspects, first communication module 306 a may be assigned to a first RAT, second communication module 306 b may be assigned to a second RAT, third communication module 306 c may be assigned to a second RAT, and fourth communication module 306 d may be assigned to a fourth RAT. As further detailed below, common discovery module 306 e may be configured to perform common discovery channel monitoring and processing.

In the receive path, communication modules 306 a - 306 d may receive analog radio frequency signals from antenna system 302 and perform analog and digital RF front-end processing on the analog radio frequency signals to produce digital baseband samples (e.g., In-Phase/Quadrature (IQ) samples). Communication modules 306 a - 306 d may accordingly include analog and/or digital reception components including amplifiers (e.g., a Low Noise Amplifier (LNA)), filters, RF demodulators (e.g., an RF IQ demodulator), and analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) to convert the received radio frequency signals to digital baseband samples. Following the RF demodulation, communication modules 306 a - 306 d may perform PHY layer reception processing on the digital baseband samples including one or more of error detection, forward error correction decoding, channel decoding and de-interleaving, physical channel demodulation, physical channel de-mapping, radio measurement and search, frequency and time synchronization, antenna diversity processing, rate matching, retransmission processing. In some aspects, communication modules 306 a - 306 d can include hardware accelerators that can be assigned such processing-intensive tasks. Communication modules 306 a - 306 d may also provide the resulting digital data streams to controller 308 for further processing according to the associate radio access protocols.

Although shown as single components in FIG. 3 , communication modules 306 a - 306 d may each be realized as separate RF and PHY modules including the respective RF and PHY components and functionality. Furthermore, one or more of such RF and PHY modules of multiple of communication modules 306 a - 306 d may be integrated into a common component, such as, for example, a common RF front-end module that is shared between multiple radio access technologies. Such variations are thus recognized as offering similar functionality and are within the scope of this disclosure.

In the transmit path, communication modules 306 a - 306 d may receive digital data streams from controller 308 and perform PHY layer transmit processing including one or more of error detection, forward error correction encoding, channel coding and interleaving, physical channel modulation, physical channel mapping, antenna diversity processing, rate matching, power control and weighting, and/or retransmission processing to produce digital baseband samples. Communication modules 306 a - 306 d may then perform analog and digital RF front-end processing on the digital baseband samples to produce analog radio frequency signals to provide to antenna system 302 for wireless transmission. Communication modules 306 a - 306 d may thus also include analog and/or digital transmission components including amplifiers (e.g., a Power Amplifier (PA), filters, RF modulators (e.g., an RF IQ modulator), and digital-to-analog converters (DACs) to mix the digital baseband samples to produce the analog radio frequency signals for wireless transmission by antenna system 302 .

In some aspects, one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d may be structurally realized as hardware-defined modules, for example, as one or more dedicated hardware circuits or FPGAs. In some aspects, one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d may be structurally realized as software-defined modules, for example, as one or more processors executing program code defining arithmetic, control, and I/O instructions (e.g., software and/or firmware) stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium. In some aspects, one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d may be structurally realized as a combination of hardware-defined modules and software-defined modules.

Although not explicitly shown in FIG. 3 , communication modules 306 a - 306 d may include a controller, such as a processor, configured to control the various hardware and/or software processing components of communication modules 306 a - 306 d in accordance with physical layer control logic defined by the communications protocol for the relevant radio access technologies.

While communication modules 306 a - 306 d may be responsible for RF and PHY processing according to the respective radio access protocols, controller 308 may be responsible for upper-layer control and may be embodied as a processor configured to execute protocol stack software code that directs controller 308 to operate according to the associated radio access protocol logic. Controller 308 may direct upper-layer control over communication modules 306 a - 306 d in addition to providing uplink data for transmission and receiving downlink data for further processing.

Although depicted as a single component in FIG. 3 , controller 308 may be realized as multiple separate controllers each tasked with execution of protocol stack logic for one or more communication modules 306 a - 306 d , such as, for example, a dedicated controller for each of communication modules 306 a - 306 d . Controller 308 may be responsible for controlling antenna system 302 and communication modules 306 a - 306 d in accordance with the communication protocols of supported radio access technology, and accordingly may represent the Access Stratum and Non-Access Stratum (NAS) (also encompassing Layer 2 and Layer 3) of supported radio access technology.

As shown in FIG. 3 , terminal device 200 may also include data source 310 , memory 312 , and data sink 314 , where data source 310 may include sources of communication data above controller 308 (e.g., above the NAS/Layer 3) and data sink 314 may include destinations of communication data above controller 308 (e.g., above the NAS/Layer 3). Such may include, for example, an application processor of terminal device 200 , which may be configured to execute various applications and/or programs of terminal device 200 at an application layer of terminal device 200 , such as, for example, an Operating System (OS), a User Interface (UI) for supporting user interaction with terminal device 200 , and/or various user applications. The application processor may interface with controller 308 (as data source 310 /data sink 314 ) as an application layer to transmit and receive user data, such as voice data, audio/video/image data, messaging data, application data, and basic Internet/web access data, over the radio network connection(s) provided by communication system 304 . Data source 310 and data sink 314 may additionally represent various user input/output devices of terminal device 200 , such as display(s), keypad(s), touchscreen(s), speaker(s), external button(s), camera(s), and microphone(s), which may allow a user of terminal device 200 to control various communication functions of terminal device 200 associated with user data.

Memory 312 includes a memory component of terminal device 200 , such as, for example, a hard drive or another such memory device. Although not explicitly depicted in FIG. 3 , various other components of terminal device 200 shown in FIG. 3 may include integrated permanent and non-permanent memory components. These components can be used, for example, for storing software program code and/or buffering data.

1.1 Common Channel #1

In an exemplary network scenario such as depicted in FIG. 2 , terminal device 200 may identify proximate wireless networks (e.g., one or more of network access nodes 210 - 230 ) by scanning for discovery signals broadcasted by network access nodes. In many conventional communication scenarios, each network access node may broadcast its corresponding discovery signal on a specific discovery channel (e.g., a radio frequency channel, which may be a single- or multi-carrier frequency channel depending on the corresponding radio access technology) according to RAT-specific scheduling and formatting parameters. For example, each radio access technology may define a specific discovery signal (e.g., with a specific coding and modulation format) that is broadcast on specific time-frequency resources (e.g., a specific carriers or subcarriers at specific time periods). For example, network access nodes 210 and 212 may broadcast discovery signals of the first RAT on one or more discovery channels for the first RAT (which may or may not be the same physical frequency channel, e.g., different cells of the first RAT may utilize different discovery channels) while network access nodes 214 - 230 may broadcast discovery signals of the second RAT on one or more discovery channels for the second RAT (which may or may not be the same physical frequency channel).

Depending on the specific RAT protocols, a RAT-specific discovery channel may overlap with the RAT-specific operating channel. For example, in an exemplary Wi-Fi setting, a Wi-Fi network access node may broadcast Wi-Fi discovery signals such as beacons on the Wi-Fi operating channel. Accordingly, the Wi-Fi operating channel may also function as the discovery channel, which terminal devices may monitor to detect beacons (Wi-Fi discovery signals) to detect Wi-Fi network access nodes. In an exemplary LTE setting, an LTE network access node may broadcast LTE discovery signals such as Primary Synchronization Sequences (PSSs) and Secondary Synchronization Sequences (SSSs) on a set of central subcarriers of the LTE operating channel (and may broadcast other LTE discovery signals such as Master Information Blocks (MIBs) and System Information Blocks (SIBs) on generally any subcarrier of the LTE operating channel). In other RATs, the discovery channel may be allocated separately from the operating channel. This disclosure covers all such cases, and accordingly RAT-specific discovery channels may be the same as the RAT-specific operating channel in frequency, may overlap with the RAT-specific operating channel in frequency, and/or may be allocated separately from the RAT-specific operating channel in frequency. Terminal devices may therefore perform discovery for a given RAT by monitoring radio signals on the RAT-specific discovery channel, which may or may not overlap with the RAT-specific operating channel. Furthermore, there may be a predefined set of operating channels for certain RATs (e.g., LTE center frequencies specified by the 3GPP, Wi-Fi operating channels specified by IEEE, etc.). Accordingly, in some aspects where the discovery channel overlaps with the operating channel, a terminal device may scan discovery channels by iterating through the predefined set of different operating channels and performing discovery, such as, for example, by iterating through one or more LTE center frequencies to detect LTE discovery signals or iterating through one or more Wi-Fi operating channels to detect Wi-Fi discovery signals.

In many conventional radio communication scenarios, terminal device 200 may therefore monitor the one or more discovery channels to discover network access nodes of various RATs. For example, in order to discover network access nodes of the first RAT, terminal device 200 may monitor discovery channels of the first RAT for discovery signals (where, as indicated above, the discovery channels may or may not overlap with the operating channel of the first RAT). In some aspects, discovery signals for particular radio access technologies may be defined by a specific standard or protocol, such as a particular signal format and/or a specific transmission schedule. Terminal device 200 may therefore discover cells of the first RAT by scanning for discovery signals on the discovery channels of the first RAT. Terminal device 200 may therefore attempt to discover network access nodes of the first RAT by monitoring radio signals according to the specifics of the first RAT (such as the signal format and scheduling of the discovery signal, discovery channel frequencies, etc., which may be standardized or defined in a protocol for the first RAT). In doing so, terminal device 200 may receive and identify discovery signals that are broadcasted by network access nodes 210 and 212 and subsequently identify, or ‘discover’, network access nodes 210 and 212 . Likewise, terminal device 200 may attempt to discover network access nodes of the second RAT by monitoring radio signals according to the specifics of the second RAT (such as the signal format and scheduling of the discovery signal, discovery channel frequencies, etc., which may be standardized or defined in a protocol for the first RAT). Terminal device 200 may therefore similarly discover network access nodes 214 - 230 . As noted above, in some aspects network access nodes 210 and 212 may additionally provide carriers for a third RAT and/or a fourth RAT, which terminal device 200 may also discover by monitoring radio signals according to the third and fourth RATs, respectively.

As introduced above, communication modules 306 a - 306 d may be responsible for RF- and PHY-level signal processing of the respective radio access technology. Accordingly, controller 308 may maintain a different radio access connection via one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d by utilizing communication modules 306 a - 306 d to transmit and receive data. Controller 308 may maintain certain radio access connections independently from one another and may maintain other radio access connections in cooperation with other radio access connections.

For example, in some aspects controller 308 may maintain radio access connections for first communication module 306 a (a first RAT connection), second communication module 306 b (a second RAT connection), third communication module 306 c (a third RAT connection), and fourth communication module 306 d (a fourth RAT connection) in conjunction with one another, such as in accordance with a master/slave-RAT system. Conversely, in some aspects controller 308 may maintain the fourth RAT connection for fourth communication module 306 d substantially separate from the cellular RAT connections of first communication module 306 a , second communication module 306 b , and third communication module 306 c , e.g., not as part of the same master/slave RAT system.

Controller 308 may handle the RAT connections of each of communication modules 306 a - 306 d according to the corresponding radio access protocols, which may include the triggering of discovery procedures. Controller 308 may trigger discovery procedures separately at each of communication modules 306 a - 306 d , the specific timing of which may depend on the particular radio access technologies and the current status of the RAT connection. Accordingly, at any given time, there may be some, none, or all of communication modules 306 a - 306 d that perform discovery.

For example, during an initial power-on operation of terminal device 200 , controller 308 may trigger discovery for communication modules 306 a - 306 d as each RAT connection may be attempting to connect to a suitable network access node. In some aspects, controller 308 may manage the RAT connections according to a prioritized hierarchy, such as where controller 308 may prioritize the first RAT over the second and third RATs. For example, controller 308 may operate the first, second, and third RATs in a master/slave RAT system, where one RAT is primarily active (e.g., the master RAT) and the other RATs (e.g., slave RATs) are idle. Controller 308 may therefore attempt to maintain the first RAT in the master RAT and may fall back to the second or third RAT when there are no viable cells of the first RAT available. Accordingly, in some aspects controller 308 may trigger discovery for communication module 306 a following initial power-on and, if no cells of the first RAT are found, proceed to trigger discovery for the second or third RAT. In an exemplary scenario, the first RAT may be e.g., LTE and the second and third RATs may be ‘legacy’ RATs such as UMTS or GSM.

After RAT connections are established, controller 308 may periodically trigger discovery at one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d based on the current radio access status of the respective RAT connections. For example, controller 308 may establish a first RAT connection with a cell of the first RAT via first communication module 306 a that was discovered during initial discovery. However, if the first RAT connection becomes poor (e.g., weak signal strength or low signal quality, or when the radio link fails and should be reestablished), controller 308 may trigger a fresh discovery procedure at first communication module 306 a in order to detect other proximate cells of the first RAT to measure and potentially switch to (either via handover or reselection) another cell of the first RAT. The controller 308 may also trigger inter-RAT discovery by triggering a new discovery procedure at second communication module 306 b and/or third communication module 306 c . Depending on the individual status of RAT connections of one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d , zero or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d may perform discovery procedures at any given time.

As each of communication modules 306 a - 306 d may be tasked with discovering a different type of radio access network (which may each have a unique discovery signal in terms of both scheduling and format), communication modules 306 a - 306 d may perform RAT-specific processing on received radio signals in order to properly perform discovery. For example, as each radio access technology may broadcast a unique discovery signal on a unique discovery channel, communication modules 306 a - 306 d may scan different discovery channels and utilize different discovery signal detection techniques (depending on the respective target discovery signal, e.g., the signal format and/or scheduling) in order to discover proximate network access nodes for each respective radio access technology. For example, first communication module 306 a may capture radio signals on different frequency bands and perform different signal processing for detection of discovery signals of the first RAT than fourth communication module 306 d for detection of discovery signals of the fourth RAT; such may likewise hold for second communication module 306 b and third communication module 306 c.

As discovery procedures may involve the detection of previously unknown network access nodes, time synchronization information of the network access nodes is likely not available during discovery. Accordingly, terminal device 200 may not have specific knowledge of when discovery signals for each radio access technology will be broadcast. For example, in an exemplary setting where the first radio access technology is LTE, when attempting to discover LTE cells, first communication module 306 a may not have any timing reference point that indicates when PSS and SSS sequences and MIBs/SIBs will be broadcast by LTE cells. Communication modules 306 a - 306 d may face similar scenarios for various different radio access technologies. Consequently, communication modules 306 a - 306 d may continuously scan the corresponding discovery channels in order to effectively detect discovery signals, depending on which of communication modules 306 a - 306 d are currently tasked with performing discovery (which may in turn depend on the current status of the ongoing communication connection for each communication module.) Each of communication modules 306 a - 306 d that perform discovery at a given point in time may therefore be actively powered on and perform active reception processing on their respectively assigned frequency bands in order to discover potential network access nodes.

Communication modules 306 a - 306 d may perform constant reception and processing or may only perform periodic reception and processing depending on the targeted radio access technology. Regardless, the frequent operation of communication modules 306 a - 306 d (in addition to the respective antennas of antenna system 302 ) may have a considerable power penalty for terminal device 200 . Unfortunately, such power penalty may be unavoidable as communication modules 306 a - 306 d generally need to operate continuously to discover nearby wireless networks. The power penalty may be particularly aggravated where terminal device 200 is battery-powered due to the heavy battery drain associated with regular operation of communication modules 306 a - 306 d.

Accordingly, in order to reduce the power penalty associated with monitoring potential nearby wireless networks, terminal device 200 may utilize common discovery module 306 e to perform discovery in place of communication modules 306 a - 306 d . Common discovery module 306 e may then monitor a common discovery channel to discover proximate wireless networks and network access nodes, regardless of the type of the radio access technology used by the wireless networks. Instead of operating multiple of communication modules 306 a - 306 d to discover proximate wireless networks for each radio access technology, terminal device 200 may utilize common discovery module 306 e to monitor the common discovery channel to detect discovery signals for proximate wireless networks. In some aspects, the common discovery channel may include discovery signals that contain discovery information for network access nodes of multiple different radio access technologies.

In some aspects, network access nodes may cooperate in order to ensure that the network access nodes are represented on the common discovery channel. As further detailed below, such may involve either a centralized discovery broadcast architecture or a distributed discovery broadcast architecture, both of which may result in broadcast of discovery signals on the common discovery channel that indicate the presence of proximate wireless networks. Accordingly, as the proximate wireless networks are all represented on the common discovery channel, terminal device 200 may utilize the common discovery module to monitor the common discovery channel without needing to constantly operate communication modules 306 a - 306 d . Such may markedly reduce power consumption at terminal device 200 without sacrificing effective discovery of proximate networks.

Accordingly, controller 308 may utilize communication modules 306 a - 306 d to maintain separate RAT connections according to their respective RATs. As previously detailed, the RAT connections at communication modules 306 a - 306 d may call for discovery procedures according to the specific radio access protocols and the current status of each RAT connection. Controller 308 may thus monitor the status of the RAT connections to determine whether discovery should be triggered at any one or more communication modules 306 a - 306 d.

In some aspects, controller 308 may trigger discovery at any one or more communication modules 306 a - 306 d during initial power-on procedures, following loss of coverage, and/or upon detection of poor radio measurements (low signal power or poor signal quality). Such discovery triggering criteria may vary according to the specific radio access protocols of each RAT connection.

In some aspects, instead of triggering discovery at communication modules 306 a - 306 d when necessary, controller 308 may instead trigger discovery at common discovery module 306 e . Common discovery module 306 e may then scan a common discovery channel to detect network access nodes for one or more of the radio access technologies of communication modules 306 a - 306 d . Terminal device 200 may thus considerably reduce power expenditure as communication modules 306 a - 306 d may be powered down or enter a sleep state during discovery procedures.

In some aspects, common discovery module 306 e includes only RF- and PHY-reception components (as detailed above regarding communication modules 306 a - 306 d ) related to reception and detection of discovery signals. FIG. 4 shows an exemplary internal configuration of common discovery module 306 e in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIG. 4 , common discovery module 306 e may include configurable RF module 402 and digital processing module 404 . In some aspects, configurable RF module 402 may include analog and/or digital reception components including amplifiers (e.g., an LNA), filters, an RF demodulator (e.g., an RF IQ demodulator), and an ADC to convert the received radio frequency signals to digital baseband samples. Configurable RF module 402 may be configured to scan different RF channels (e.g., by frequency) and produce baseband samples to provide to digital processing module 404 . Digital processing module 404 may then perform PHY-layer reception processing to process and evaluate the baseband samples. In some aspects, digital processing module 404 may be software-configurable and may include a controller and one or more dedicated hardware circuits, which may each be dedicated to performing a specific processing task as assigned by the controller (e.g., hardware accelerators). Digital processing module 404 may process baseband samples received from configurable RF module 402 , for example as part of discovery. Digital processing module 404 may provide discovery results to controller 308 .

As common discovery module 306 e may only be employed for discovery of radio access technologies, common discovery module 306 e may not maintain a full bidirectional RAT connection. Common discovery module 306 e may therefore also be designed as a low-power receiver. In some aspects, common discovery module 306 e may operate at a significantly lower power, and may be continuously kept active while still saving power compared to regular discovery scanning procedures (e.g., by communication modules 306 a - 306 d ).

In some aspects, common discovery module 306 e may be implemented in as a hardware-defined module, for example, one or more dedicated hardware circuits or FPGAs. In some aspects, common discovery module 306 e may be implemented as a software-defined module, for example, as one or more processors executing program code that defines arithmetic, control, and I/O instructions (e.g., software and/or firmware) stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium. In some aspects, common discovery module 306 e may be implemented as a combination of hardware-defined and software-defined components.

FIG. 5 shows method 500 outlining the common discovery procedure executed by terminal device 200 in accordance with some aspects.

As shown in FIG. 5 , controller 308 may perform radio communications in 510 according to the radio access protocols of one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d and may thus support the underlying RAT connections for one or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d.

At 520 , controller 308 may determine whether to trigger discovery at any of communication modules 306 a - 306 d . In some aspects, discovery can be triggered, for example, during initial power-on procedures, following loss of coverage, and/or upon detection of poor radio measurements (low signal power or poor signal quality).

When controller 308 determines that discovery should not be triggered for any of communication modules 306 a - 306 d , controller 308 may return to 510 to continue performing conventional radio communications with communication modules 306 a - 306 d . In some aspects, controller 308 may keep common discovery module 306 e active and continuously operate common discovery module 306 e independent of communication modules 306 a - 306 d . Controller 308 may therefore continue collecting discovery results from common discovery module 306 e , even during conventional radio communication operation of communication modules 306 a - 306 d.

When controller 308 determines that discovery should be triggered for one or more communication modules 306 a - 306 d , controller 308 may trigger discovery at common discovery module 306 e in 530 . In some aspects, controller 308 can trigger discovery at common discovery module 306 e by activating common discovery module 306 e and commanding common discovery module 306 e to perform discovery.

Subsequently, common discovery module 306 e may then proceed to perform discovery by monitoring a common discovery channel (as will be later detailed) for discovery signals that include discovery information for various network access nodes. Common discovery module 306 e may decode any detectable discovery signals to obtain the discovery information included therein and provide the discovery information to controller 308 to complete 530 . There may be certain challenges associated with monitoring the common discovery channel in 530 . For example, as further described below, the network access nodes cooperating with the common discovery channel scheme may operate in a distributed scheme, where multiple network access nodes share the common discovery channel to broadcast their own respective discovery signals, or in a centralized scheme, where a single network access node broadcasts a common discovery signal on the common discovery channel that contains discovery information for other network access nodes. For distributed schemes, the network access nodes may utilize a contention-based mechanism and consequently utilize carrier sensing to detect channel occupancy of the common discovery channel. This may help in avoiding collisions, as a network access node that detects that the common discovery channel is occupied may initiate a backoff procedure before attempting to transmit its discovery signal. In centralized schemes, terminal device 200 may tune common discovery module 306 e to the common discovery channel and decode the discovery information from any common discovery channels that were broadcasted on the common discovery channel. In some aspects, the common discovery channel may utilize a simple modulation scheme in a channel with strong transmission characteristics (e.g., a common discovery channel allocated in sub-GHz frequencies), which may improve reception at terminal devices.

In 540 , controller 308 may then proceed with subsequent (e.g., ‘post-discovery) communication operations for RAT connection of one or more communication modules 306 a - 306 d depending on the network access nodes represented by the obtained discovery information. For example, if the discovery information indicates that viable network access nodes are within range and available for connection, for example, if the discovery information indicates that network access node 216 is available for a RAT connection of the fourth RAT, controller 308 may modify the RAT connection of fourth communication module 306 d to connect with network access node 216 . Through common discovery module 306 e , controller 308 may thus obtain discovery information in 530 without utilizing communication modules 306 a - 306 d.

In some aspects, various options for subsequent communication operations in 540 include unilateral radio interactions with network access nodes, e.g., actions that controller 308 unilaterally performs without reciprocal action from network access nodes. For example, the controller 308 can perform radio measurements on a discovered network access node, and/or receive broadcast information of a discovered network access node. In some aspects, various options for subsequent communication operations in 540 include bilateral radio interactions with network access nodes, e.g., actions that controller 308 performs with reciprocal action from network access nodes. For example, the controller 308 can pursue and potentially establish a bidirectional connection with a discovered network access node.

In some aspects, common discovery module 306 e can be configured to constantly monitor the common discovery channel (as opposed to being explicitly commanded by controller 308 as in 530 ). Upon detection of discovery signals on the common discovery channel, common discovery module 306 e can be configured to report the detected discovery information to controller 308 . Regardless, common discovery module 306 e may perform discovery in place of communication modules 306 a - 306 d , thus allowing terminal device 200 to avoid battery power penalties. Such power savings may particularly be enhanced when multiple of communication modules 306 a - 306 d perform discovery concurrently as terminal device 200 may utilize a single, low-power receiver in common discovery module 306 e instead.

In some aspects, network access nodes of various radio access technologies may cooperate by broadcasting discovery signals on the common discovery channel that are consequently detectable by common discovery module 306 e . Specifically, network access nodes may broadcast discovery information (which would conventionally be broadcast on RAT-specific discovery channels) on the common discovery channel, thus enabling terminal devices to employ a common discovery module to monitor the common discovery channel.

In some aspects, network access nodes may participate in the broadcast of a common discovery channel according to either a centralized or distributed broadcast architecture. Both options may enable terminal devices such as, for example, terminal device 200 to employ common discovery module 306 e according to method 500 to obtain discovery information for network access nodes.

In some aspects, in a centralized broadcast architecture, a single centralized network access node, also referred to as a centralized discovery node, may broadcast discovery signals for one or more other network access nodes, which may either use the same or different radio access technologies as the centralized discovery node. Accordingly, the centralized discovery node may be configured to collect discovery information for one or more other network access nodes and generate a common discovery signal that includes the discovery information for both the centralized and one or more other network access nodes. The centralized discovery node may then broadcast the common discovery signal on the common discovery channel, thus producing a common discovery signal containing discovery information for a group of network access nodes. Common discovery module 306 e may therefore be able to discover all of the group of network access nodes by monitoring the common discovery channel and reading the common discovery signal broadcast by the centralized network access node.

Because common discovery module 306 e is capable of monitoring discovery information of network access nodes associated with a variety of radio access technologies, communication modules 306 a - 306 d of terminal device 200 can remain idle with respect to discovery operations. While controller 308 may still operate communication modules 306 a - 306 d for non-discovery operations, such as conventional radio communication procedures related to reception and transmission of other control and user data, terminal device 200 may nevertheless conserve significant battery power by performing discovery solely at common discovery module 306 e.

In some aspects, in a distributed broadcast architecture, an individual network access node (which may also be a relay node or relay device) may continue to broadcast its own discovery signal according to the radio access technology of the individual network access node. However, as opposed to broadcasting its discovery signal on the unique RAT-specific discovery channel, the network access node may broadcast its discovery signal on the common discovery channel. In order to enable terminal devices to receive the discovery signals with a common discovery module, each network access node may also broadcast its discovery signal using a common format, in other words, as a common discovery signal. Terminal device 200 may therefore employ common discovery module 306 e to monitor the common discovery channel for such common discovery signals broadcasted by individual network access nodes, thus eliminating the need for individual communication modules 306 a - 306 d to actively perform discovery.

Both the centralized and distributed discovery architectures may enable terminal devices such as terminal device 200 to perform discovery with a single common discovery module, thereby considerably reducing power consumption. Such may also simplify discovery procedures as discovery information for multiple network access nodes may be grouped together (either in the same common discovery signal or on the same common discovery channel), which may potentially enable faster detection.

FIG. 2 will now be utilized to describe a centralized discovery architecture in which a single centralized discovery node may assume discovery broadcast responsibilities for one or more other network access nodes. For example, in some aspects network access node 210 may assume discovery broadcast responsibilities for one or more of network access nodes 212 - 230 . In other words, network access node 210 may broadcast a common discovery signal on the common discovery channel that contains discovery information for one or more of network access nodes 212 - 230 . In order to generate the common discovery signal, network access node 210 may first collect discovery information for one or more of network access nodes 212 - 230 . Network access node 210 may employ any of a number of different techniques to collect the required discovery information, including any one or more of radio scanning, terminal report collection, backhaul connections, and an external service (as further detailed below).

FIG. 6 shows an internal configuration of network access node 210 in accordance with some aspects. Network access node 210 may include antenna system 602 , radio system 604 , communication system 606 (including control module 608 and detection module 610 ), and backhaul interface 612 . Network access node 210 may transmit and receive radio signals via antenna system 602 , which may be an antenna array including multiple antennas. Radio system 604 is configured to transmit and/or receive RF signals and perform PHY processing in order (1) to convert outgoing digital data from communication system 606 into analog RF signals for radio transmission through antenna system 602 and (2) to convert incoming analog RF signals received from antenna system 602 into digital data to provide to communication system 606 .

Control module 608 may control the communication functionality of network access node 210 according to the corresponding radio access protocols, which may include exercising control over antenna system 602 and radio system 604 . Each of radio system 504 , control module 508 , and detection module 510 may be structurally realized as hardware-defined modules, e.g., as one or more dedicated hardware circuits or FPGAs, as software-defined modules, e.g., as one or more processors executing program code that define arithmetic, control, and I/O instructions (e.g., software and/or firmware) stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, or as mixed hardware-defined and software-defined module. Backhaul interface 612 may be a wired (e.g., Ethernet, fiber optic, etc.) or wireless (e.g., microwave radio or similar wireless transceiver system) connection point for physical connection configured to transmit and receive data with other network nodes, which may be e.g., a microwave radio transmitter, or a connection point and associated components for a fiber backhaul link.

Network access node 210 may receive external data via backhaul interface 612 , which may include connections to other network access nodes, internet networks, and/or an underlying core network supporting the radio access network provided by network access node 210 (such as, for example, an LTE Evolved Packet Core (EPC)). In some aspects, backhaul interface 612 may interface with internet networks (e.g., via an internet router). In some aspects, backhaul interface 612 may interface with a core network that may provide control functions in addition to routing to internet networks. Backhaul interface 612 may thus provide network access node 210 with a connection to external network connections (either directly or via the core network), which may enable network access node 210 to access external networks such as the Internet. Network access node 210 may thus provide the conventional functionality of network access nodes in radio networks by providing a radio access network to enable served terminal devices to access user data.

As introduced above, network access node 210 may additionally be configured to act as a centralized discovery node by broadcasting a common discovery signal containing discovery information for other network access nodes such as one or more of network access nodes 212 - 230 . FIG. 7 shows method 700 , which details the general procedure performed by a centralized discovery node, such as network access node 210 in accordance with some aspects.

At 710 , network access node 210 can collect discovery information for other network access nodes. At 720 , network access node 210 can generate a common discovery signal with the collected discovery information. At 730 , network access node 210 can broadcast the common discovery signal on the common discovery channel, thus allowing a terminal device such as terminal device 200 to perform discovery for multiple radio access technologies using common discovery module 306 e . Network access node 210 may generate the common discovery signal with a predefined discovery waveform format, which may utilize, for example On/Off Key (OOK), Binary Phase Shift Keying (BPSK), Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM, e.g., 16-QAM, 64-QAM, etc.). In some aspects, the common discovery signal may be a single-carrier waveform, while in other aspects the common discovery signal may be a multi-carrier waveform, such as an OFDM waveform or another type of multi-carrier waveform.

Accordingly, network access node 210 may first collect the discovery information for one or more of network access nodes 212 - 230 in 710 . Network access node 210 can utilize any one or more of a number of different discovery information collection techniques in 710 , including radio scanning, terminal report collection, backhaul connections to other network access nodes, and an external service.

For example, in some aspects network access node 210 can utilize radio scanning in 710 to collect discovery information for other nearby network access nodes. Network access node 210 may therefore include detection module 610 , which may utilize antenna system 602 and radio system 604 to scan the various discovery channels of other radio access technologies in order to detect other network access nodes. Detection module 610 may thus be configured to process signals received on various different discovery channels to detect the presence of network access nodes broadcasting discovery signals on the various different discovery channels.

Although FIG. 6 depicts detection module 610 as utilizing the same antenna system 602 and radio system 604 as employed by network access node 210 for conventional base station radio access communications, in some aspects network access node 210 may alternatively include a separate antenna system and radio system uniquely assigned to detection module 610 for discovery information collection purposes. Detection module 610 can be structurally realized as a hardware-defined module, e.g., as one or more dedicated hardware circuits or FPGAs, as a software-defined module, e.g., as one or more processors executing program code that define arithmetic, control, and I/O instructions (e.g., software and/or firmware) stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, or as a mixed hardware-defined and software-defined module.

In some aspects, detection module 610 is configured to implement analogous discovery signal detection as communication modules 306 a - 306 d . This allows detection module 610 to detect RAT-specific discovery signals by processing received signals according to dedicated radio access protocols and consequently identify the corresponding broadcasting network access nodes.

In some aspects, detection module 610 may utilize antenna system 602 and radio system 604 to scan discovery channels for a plurality of radio access technologies to detect network access nodes on the discovery channels. For example, detection module 610 may utilize antenna system 602 and radio system 604 to scan through one or more LTE discovery channels (e.g., LTE frequency bands for PSS/SSS sequences and MIBs/SIBs) in order to detect proximate LTE cells. Detection module 610 may similarly scan through one or more Wi-Fi discovery channels to detect proximate Wi-Fi APs, one or more UMTS discovery channels to detect UMTS cells, one or more GSM discovery channels to detect GSM cells, and one or more Bluetooth discovery channels to detect Bluetooth devices. Detection module 610 may similarly scan discovery channels for any one or more radio access technologies. In some aspects, detection module 610 may capture signal data for each scanned discovery channel and process the captured signal data according to the discovery signal format of the corresponding radio access technology in order to detect and identify any network access nodes broadcasting discovery signals thereon.

In the exemplary setting of FIG. 7 , in 710 , detection module 610 may identify one or more of network access nodes 212 - 230 during scan of discovery channels for one or more radio access technologies. For example, in an exemplary scenario where network access node 212 is an LTE base station and network access nodes 214 - 230 are Wi-Fi APs, network access node 210 may detect (1) network access node 212 during scan of LTE discovery channels and (2) one or more of network access nodes 214 - 230 during scan of Wi-Fi discovery channels. Detection module 610 may collect certain discovery information from each detected discovery signal, which network access node 210 may subsequently utilize to generate a common discovery signal for broadcast on the common discovery channel that contains discovery information for the detected network access nodes.

In some aspects, detection module 610 may collect both ‘common’ information elements and ‘RAT-specific’ information elements for the one or more network access nodes identified during discovery information collection, where common information elements may include general information associated with the identified network access node (regardless of the specific radio access technology) and RAT-specific information elements may include specific information that is unique to the parameters of the corresponding radio access technology.

For example, common information elements may include:

a. RAT (e.g., LTE/Wi-Fi/UMTS/GSM/etc.) b. Frequency band and center frequency c. Channel bandwidth d. Service provider e. Geographic Location (geopositional information such as GPS coordinates or relative navigational parameters that detail the position of a network access node relative to a terminal device)

RAT-specific information elements may include, for example:

a. for LTE/UMTS/GSM: PLMN ID, Cell ID, maximum data rate, minimum data rate b. for Wi-Fi: Service Set ID (SSID), beacon interval, capability information, frequency-hopping/direct-sequence/contention free parameter sets, traffic indication map, Public/private network, authentication type, capability information, AP location info c. for Bluetooth: Bluetooth address, frequency-hopping information, d. RAT-dependent: radio measurements (signal strength, signal quality, etc.) and other performance metrics (cell loading, energy-per-bit, packet-/block-/bit-error-rates, retransmission metrics, etc.)

while other RATs may demand similar information as RAT-specific information elements.

In some aspects, detection module 610 may obtain such discovery information in 710 by detecting and reading discovery signals from network access nodes on the scanned discovery channels. As each radio access technology may have unique discovery signals (e.g., signal format and/or transmission scheduling), detection module 610 may execute a specific process to obtain the discovery information for each radio access technology.

For example, in an exemplary LTE setting, detection module 610 may obtain a Cell ID of an LTE cell (in the form of Physical Cell Identity (PCI)) by identifying a PSS-SSS sequence pair broadcasted by the LTE cell. Detection module 610 may obtain channel bandwidth by reading the Master Information Block (MIB) messages. Detection module 610 may obtain a PLMN ID for an LTE cell by reading, for example, SIB1 messages. Detection module 610 may accordingly collect such discovery information for one or more detected network access nodes and store (e.g., in a memory; not explicitly shown in FIG. 6 ) the discovery information for later broadcast in the common discovery signal.

Depending on the configuration of detection module 610 , radio system 604 , and antenna system 602 , in some aspects detection module 610 may be configured to perform the discovery channel scans for one or more radio access technologies in sequence or in parallel, for example, by scanning one or more discovery channels for one or more radio access technologies in series or simultaneously.

As introduced above, network access node 210 may utilize additional and/or alternative techniques in 710 to collect discovery information for the other network access nodes. Specifically, in some aspects, network access node 210 may utilize terminal report collection to obtain the discovery information for proximate network access nodes. For example, network access node 210 may request discovery reports from served terminal devices (via control signaling). Consequently, the served terminal devices may perform discovery scans and report discovery information for detected network access nodes back to network access node 210 in the form of measurement reports.

For example, detection module 610 may trigger transmission of control signaling to request measurement reports from terminal devices 200 and 202 . Terminal devices 200 and 202 may then perform discovery channel scans for various radio access technologies (using e.g., communication modules such as communication modules 306 a - 306 d ) to obtain discovery information (e.g., common and RAT-specific information elements) for one or more detected network access nodes and report the discovery information back to network access node 210 . Detection module 610 may receive the reports and collect the discovery information for reported network access nodes. Accordingly, instead of (or in addition to) having detection module 610 actively perform radio scans to discover proximate network access nodes, served terminal devices may perform the discovery scans and report results to network access node 210 .

In some cases, terminal device 200 may discover network access node 216 while terminal device 202 may discover network access nodes 212 , 220 , and 224 as shown in FIG. 2 . Terminal devices 200 and 202 may thus obtain the discovery information (common and RAT-specific information elements) for one or more discovered network access nodes and report the discovery information to network access node 210 in the form of discovery reports. The discovery reports can be received by network access node 210 via antenna system 602 and be processed at detection module 610 . Network access node 210 may thus obtain the discovery information in 710 for the other network access nodes.

Although terminal report collection may involve terminal devices to perform discovery scans (as opposed to radio scanning in 710 in which network access node 210 performs the necessary radio operations and processing), this may still be advantageous and enable battery-power consumption at terminal devices. For example, network access node 210 may instruct a first group of terminal devices to perform discovery on certain radio access technologies (e.g., to scan certain discovery channels) and a second group of terminal devices to perform discovery on other radio access technologies (e.g., to scan other discovery channels). Network access node 210 may then consolidate the discovery information of discovered radio access nodes provided by both groups of terminal devices in 720 and broadcast the consolidated discovery information on the common discovery channel in 730 . Both groups of terminal devices may thus obtain the discovery information from both radio access technologies while only having to individually perform discovery on one radio access technology, thus conserving battery power.

In some aspects, terminal devices may be able to utilize discovery information obtained by other terminal devices as the terminal devices move to different geographic locations. For example, in an exemplary scenario, terminal device 200 may report network access node 216 during terminal report collection while terminal device 202 may report network access nodes 220 and 224 during terminal report collection. As geographic location information may be included in the discovery information, if terminal device 200 moves to a new geographic position that is closer to the geographic locations of network access nodes 220 and 224 , terminal device 200 may rely on discovery information previously received from network access node 210 on the common discovery channel to discover network access nodes 220 and 224 without performing a full discovery procedure. Accordingly, terminal device 200 may receive the discovery information for network access nodes 220 and 224 via common discovery module 306 e and utilize such discovery information in the event that terminal device 200 moves within range of network access nodes 220 and 224 . As previously noted, geographic location information in a discovery signal may include geopositioning information such as GSP coordinates or another ‘absolute’ location of a network access node (e.g., longitude and latitude coordinates) or other information that indicates a relative location of a network access node to terminal device 200 (e.g., a timestamped signal that can be used to derive the distance and/or other information that provides directional information that indicates the direction of a network access node from a terminal device).

Additionally or alternatively, in some aspects network access node 210 may employ backhaul connections to obtain discovery information in 710 for broadcast on the common discovery channel in 730 . In particular, network access node 210 may be connected with other network access nodes either directly or indirectly via backhaul interface 612 (either wireless or wired) and may utilize backhaul interface 612 to receive discovery information from other network access nodes in 710 . For example, network access node 210 may be connected with one or more of network access nodes 212 - 230 via backhaul interface 612 , which may transmit their respective discovery information to network access node 210 in 710 . Network access node 210 may thus consolidate the received discovery information in 720 to generate the common discovery signal and broadcast the common discovery signal in 730 . Detection module 610 may thus interface with backhaul interface 612 in order to receive and consolidate the discovery information.

There exist numerous variations in the use of backhaul links to obtain discovery information. For example, in some aspects, network access node 210 may be directly connected to the other network access nodes via backhaul interface 612 , such as, for example, over an X2 interface with other network access nodes, such as network access node 212 . In some aspects, network access node 210 may additionally be directly connected with network access nodes of other radio access technologies, such as directly connected with WLAN Aps, such as network access nodes 214 - 230 , over an inter-RAT interface through backhaul interface 612 . Network access node 210 may receive the discovery information for other network access nodes via backhaul interface 612 and broadcast a common discovery signal accordingly.

In some aspects, network access node 210 may additionally be able to interface with other centralized discovery nodes (or similarly functioning network access nodes) via backhaul interface 612 . For example, a first centralized discovery node (e.g., network access node 210 ) may collect discovery information for a first plurality of network access nodes discoverable by the first centralized discovery node (e.g., network access nodes 214 - 222 ). A second centralized discovery node (e.g., network access 212 ) may collect discovery information for a second plurality of network access nodes discoverable by the second centralized discovery node (e.g., network access nodes 224 - 230 ). In various aspects, the first and second centralized discovery node may employ a discovery collection technique to collect the discovery information for the respective first and second plurality of network access nodes, such as, for example, one or more of radio scanning, terminal report collection, backhaul connections, or an external service. The first centralized discovery node may then provide the collected discovery information for the first plurality of network access nodes to the second centralized discovery node, and the second centralized discovery node may then provide the collected discovery information for the second plurality of network access nodes to the first centralized discovery node. The first centralized discovery node may then consolidate the resulting ‘combined’ discovery information (for the first and second pluralities of network access nodes) and generate a first common discovery signal. The second centralized discovery node may likewise consolidate the resulting ‘combined’ discovery information (for the first and second pluralities of network access nodes) and generate a second common discovery signal. The first and second centralized discovery nodes may then transmit the respective first and second common discovery signals, thus producing common discovery signals that contain discovery information for network access nodes that are discoverable at different centralized discovery nodes.

Additionally or alternatively, in some aspects network access node 210 may employ an external service to obtain discovery information for other network access nodes in 710 . The external service may function, for example, as a database located in an Internet-accessible network location, such as a cloud internet server, and may provide discovery information to network access node 210 via backhaul interface 612 . Detection module 610 may thus receive discovery information via backhaul interface 612 in 710 and proceed to consolidate the discovery information to generate a common discovery signal in 720 .

For example, in the exemplary setting shown in FIG. 8 , network access node 210 may connect with an external database 800 via backhaul interface 612 . External database 800 may be in an Internet-accessible network location and thus may be accessible by network access node 210 over the Internet via backhaul interface 612 . External database 800 may similarly interface with other network access nodes and may act as a repository for discovery information. For instance, one or more other network access nodes may provide external database 800 with their discovery information. Network access node 210 may then query external database 800 over backhaul interface 612 for discovery information of other network access nodes in 710 , in response to which external database 800 may transmit discovery information to network access node 210 over backhaul interface 612 . Such may thus not require a direct connection between network access node 210 and other network access nodes to obtain discovery information but may use a database manager to maintain and update the discovery information in external database 800 .

In some aspects of radio sensing and terminal report collection, network access node 210 may already implicitly have knowledge that the obtained discovery information pertains to proximate network access nodes. For example, network access node 210 may assume that network access nodes that were discovered during radio sensing and network access nodes reported by terminal devices served by network access node 210 are located relatively proximate to network access node 210 (e.g., on account of their detectability via radio signals).

In certain backhaul link setups, the backhaul connections may be designed such that only proximate network access nodes contain direct backhaul links. For example, each of network access nodes 214 - 222 may have a direct backhaul connection to network access node 210 while other network access nodes located further from network access node 210 may not have a direct backhaul connection to network access node 210 . Backhaul link setups may thus in certain cases implicitly provide information as to the proximity of other network access nodes.

In the case of external database 800 , network access node 210 may not be able to implicitly determine which network access nodes represented in external database 800 are proximate to network access node 210 . As network access node 210 will ultimately broadcast the obtained discovery information as a common discovery signal receivable by proximate terminal devices, network access node 210 may desire to only obtain discovery information for proximate terminal devices.

Accordingly, when querying external database 800 for discovery information, in some aspects network access node 210 may indicate geographic location information for network access node 210 . In response, external database 800 may consequently retrieve discovery information for one or more network access nodes proximate to the indicated geographic location information and provide this discovery information to network access node 210 .

In some aspects, network access node 210 may either specify a single location, e.g., the geographic location of network access node 210 , or a geographic area, e.g., the coverage area of network access node 210 . In response, external database 800 may retrieve discovery information for the corresponding network access nodes and provide the discovery information to network access node 210 . In some aspects, external database 800 can include a hash table (e.g., a distributed hash table) to enable quick identification and retrieval of discovery information based on geographic location inputs.

In some aspects, network access node 210 may employ any of a number of different techniques in 710 to collect discovery information for other network access nodes with detection module 610 . Detection module 610 may consolidate the collected discovery information and provide the discovery information to control module 608 , which may generate a common discovery signal with the collected discovery information in 720 . Such may include encoding the collected discovery information in digital data with a predefined format that is known at both network access node 210 and common discovery module 306 e . Many different such coding schemes may be available and employed in order to generate the common discovery signal.

Regardless of the particular predefined format employed for the common discovery signal, control module 608 may encode the relevant discovery information for one or more of the discovered network access nodes in the common discovery signal, e.g., the common information elements (RAT, frequency band and center frequency, channel bandwidth, service provider, and geographic location) and RAT-specific information elements (depending on the particular RAT). For example, network access node 210 may collect discovery information for network access node 210 and network access nodes 214 - 230 in 710 and may encode the discovery information in a common discovery signal in 720 . Control module 608 may then broadcast the common discovery signal in 730 on the common discovery channel via radio system 604 and antenna system 602 .

In some aspects, the common discovery channel may be predefined in advance in order to enable the centralized network access nodes to know which frequency (or frequencies) to broadcast on the common discovery channel and to enable the common discovery modules at each terminal device to know which frequency (or frequencies) to monitor for the common discovery signal. Any of a variety of different channel formats may be utilized for the common discovery channel, which may either be a single- or multi-carrier channel with specific time-frequency scheduling (e.g., on specific carriers/subcarriers with a specific periodicity or other timing parameters). The common discovery channel may be standardized (e.g., from a standardization body such as the 3GPP, IEEE or other similar entities) and/or defined by regulation in different geographic regions (e.g., for different countries). In some aspects, the communication protocol used for the common discovery channel may be a broadcast protocol, which may not require a handshake or contact from terminal devices for the terminal devices to receive and decode discovery signals on the common discovery channel. This format of the discovery signals on the common discovery channel may enable terminal devices to utilize a simple digital receiver circuit to receive discovery signals and obtain the information encoded thereon. Each terminal device may then be able to undergo its own decision-making process based on its unique needs and capabilities (e.g., which network the terminal device is attempting to connect to).

In some aspects, the common discovery channel may either be a licensed frequency band (e.g., allocated for a specific radio access technology and licensed by an operator, e.g., LTE/UMTS/GSM or other cellular bands) or an unlicensed frequency band (e.g., not allocated for a specific radio access technology and openly available for use; e.g., Wi-Fi and Bluetooth in the Industrial, Science, and Medical (ISM bands). The common discovery channel may alternatively be a unique frequency band that is specifically designated (e.g., by a regulatory body) for authorized entities for broadcasting discovery information.

Furthermore, while certain examples herein may refer to a single common discovery channel, in some aspects, multiple common discovery channels (e.g., each with a different frequency allocation) may be employed. In such aspects, the common discovery modules can be configured to monitor (e.g., in parallel or sequentially) multiple different common discovery channels or, alternatively, multiple common discovery modules can be each dedicated to scan one or more of the common discovery channels. While such may slightly complicate common discovery procedures at common discovery modules, such may alleviate congestion if multiple broadcast nodes (either centralized or distributed discovery nodes) are broadcasting common discovery signals.

In some aspects, the other network access nodes that are not functioning as the centralized discovery node may not be configured to cooperate. For example, network access node 210 can be configured to perform discovery information collection techniques detailed above to unilaterally obtain discovery information for network access nodes 212 - 230 and broadcast such discovery information on the common discovery channel. Other network access nodes, such as network access nodes 212 - 230 can also broadcast discovery signals on their respective RAT-specific discovery channels. Accordingly, some aspects that use centralized discovery nodes may include some network access nodes that are specifically configured according to these aspects and other network access nodes that are not specifically configured according to these aspects.

Given operation of centralized discovery nodes such as network access node 210 according to these aspects, controller 308 may utilize common discovery module 306 e to scan for common discovery signals on the common discovery channel as previously detailed regarding method 500 in FIG. 5 . Common discovery module 306 e may thus detect the common discovery signal broadcast by network access node 210 and may consequently decode the common discovery signal (according to the same predefined format employed by control module 608 to generate the common discovery signal) to recover the discovery information encoded in the common discovery signal. Common discovery module 306 e may thus obtain the discovery information for network access nodes 210 - 230 and may proceed to report the discovery information to controller 308 (e.g., 530 ). Controller 308 may then proceed with post-discovery radio operations based on the received discovery information (e.g., 540 of method 500 ), which may include, for one or more of the radio access technologies supported by terminal device 200 , unilateral (e.g., performing radio measurements on a discovered network access node, receiving broadcast information of a discovered network access node) and/or bilateral (e.g., pursuing and potentially establishing a bidirectional connection with a discovered network access node) radio interactions with various network access nodes. In some aspects, the specific usage of the discovery information at terminal device 200 may vary between the various radio access technologies and over different scenarios and may be directed by controller 308 . For example, controller 308 may perform unilateral and/or bilateral radio interactions with one or more network access nodes according to the specific protocols of the respective radio access technologies. For example, if network access node 220 is configured according to e.g., Wi-Fi, controller 308 may perform radio measurements, receive broadcast information, establish a connection with, and/or transmit and receive data with network access node 220 according to the Wi-Fi-specific protocols. In another example, if network access node 212 is configured according to e.g., LTE, controller 308 may perform radio measurements, receive broadcast information, establish a connection with, and/or transmit and receive data with network access node 212 according to the LTE-specific protocols. In another example, controller 308 may be managing e.g., an LTE radio connection at e.g., communication modules 306 a . If the LTE radio connection is currently in a radio idle state and controller 308 triggers a transition to a radio connected state, controller 308 may utilize discovery information (e.g., obtained from receipt of the common discovery signal) to identify an LTE network access node and initiate establishment and execution of an LTE radio connection with communication module 306 a according to radio idle state LTE procedures. Controller 308 may similarly execute unilateral and bilateral radio interactions with discovered network access nodes depending on RAT-specific protocols and the current scenario of any RAT connections.

Accordingly, in accordance with some aspects of the common discovery signal framework, terminal device 200 may avoid separately performing discovery with communication modules 306 a - 306 d and may instead perform a common discovery procedure at common discovery module 306 e , thus potentially conserving significant battery power.

In some aspects, geographic location information can be important, in particular in the case of centralized discovery nodes. More specifically, by receiving discovery signals on the common discovery channel, terminal device 200 may be able to avoid having to physically detect (e.g., with reception, processing, and analysis of radio signals) one or more network access nodes during local discovery procedures. Instead, centralized discovery nodes may obtain the discovery information and report the discovery information to terminal device 200 via the common discovery channel. As terminal device 200 may not have physically detected each network access node, terminal device 200 may not actually know whether each network access node is within radio range. Accordingly, in some aspects terminal device 200 may consider geographic location information of the network access nodes in order to ensure that a network access node is actually within range before attempting post-discovery operations with the network access node (such as, for example, attempting to establish a connection or perform radio measurements).

As noted above, in some aspects, a centralized discovery node, such as network access node 210 , may include geographic information as a common information element of discovery information broadcasted on the common discovery channel. For example, network access node 210 may obtain location information in 710 , such as by estimating the geographic location of a network access node (e.g., via radio sensing and location estimation procedures) or by explicitly receiving (e.g., wirelessly or via backhaul interface 612 ) the geographic location of a network access node. In the example of FIG. 2 , network access node 210 may identify the geographic locations of network access node 212 and network access nodes 214 - 230 , which may either be explicit geographic positions (e.g., latitude and longitude) or a general geographic areas or regions. Control module 608 may then encode such geographic location information as discovery information in the common discovery signal, which terminal device 200 may receive and subsequently recover from the common discovery signal at controller 308 .

Accordingly, in some aspects when controller 308 is deciding which network access node to select for further post-discovery radio operations, controller 308 may compare the current geographic location of terminal device 200 (e.g., obtained at a positioning module of terminal device 200 (not explicitly shown in FIG. 3 ) or reported by the network) to the geographic location of the network access nodes reported in the common discovery signal. Controller 308 may then select a network access node from the network access nodes reported in the common discovery signal based on the geographic location information, such as by selecting the most proximate or one of the most proximate reported network access nodes relative to the current geographic location of terminal device 200 .

In some aspects, a centralized discovery node, such as network access node 210 , may alternatively apply power control to transmission of the common discovery signal in 730 in order to reduce the terminal processing overhead involved in comparing geographic locations. For example, network access node 210 may broadcast a low-power common discovery signal that only contains discovery information for network access nodes that are significantly proximate to network access node 210 , for example, within a certain radius. Accordingly, as the common discovery signal is broadcast with low power, only terminal devices that are close to network access node 210 may be able to receive the common discovery signal. Therefore, these terminal devices that are able to receive the common discovery signal will also be located close to the network access nodes reported in the low-power common discovery signal. In such a scenario, the terminal devices may assume that the network access nodes reported in the common discovery signal are geographically proximate and thus may substantially all be eligible for subsequent communication operations, such as, for example, establishing a radio connection. Such power-controlled common discovery signals may act according to radial distance. Additionally or alternatively, in some aspects network access node 210 may utilize sectorized or directional (e.g., with beamsteering) antennas in order to broadcast certain common discovery signals in specific directions where the directional common discovery channels contain discovery information for network access nodes located in the specific direction relative to network access node 210 .

In some scenarios, these techniques may be problematic as terminal devices that are located further away from the centralized discovery node may not be able to receive the low-power common discovery signal. Accordingly, network access node 210 may instead assign different coverage sub-areas (within its overall coverage area) as different ‘zones’, e.g., Zone 1 , Zone 2 , Zone 3 , etc., where each zone implies a certain distance from network access node 210 . When network access node 210 broadcasts the common discovery signal in 730 , network access node 210 may include zone information that indicates the coverage zone in which it is transmitting. Accordingly, terminal devices such as, for example, terminal device 200 may then only examine the network access nodes reported within the current zone of terminal device 200 instead of having to use geographic location information to identify which network access nodes are proximate (e.g., within a predefined radius of the current location of terminal device 200 ). This may alleviate the processing overhead involved in geographic location comparisons at terminal device 200 .

While the description of centralized discovery architectures presented above may focus on a single centralized discovery node, e.g., network access node 210 , in some aspects centralized discovery architectures may include multiple centralized discovery nodes, such as, for example, various centralized discovery nodes that are geographically positioned to serve a specific area. Consequently, terminal devices may receive common discovery signals from multiple centralized discovery nodes.

For example, in an exemplary aspect network access node 210 may be a centralized discovery node responsible for discovery broadcasting of network access nodes within the coverage area of network access node 210 and accordingly may broadcast discovery information for network access nodes 214 - 222 in the common discovery signal. Likewise, network access node 212 may be a centralized discovery node responsible for broadcasting discovery information for network access nodes 224 - 230 . Network access nodes 210 and 212 may therefore both broadcast common discovery signals on the common discovery channel, which may be received by terminal device 200 (which as shown in the exemplary scenario of FIG. 2 may be within the coverage area of network access nodes 210 and 212 ).

Terminal device 200 may therefore receive discovery information from two (or more) centralized discovery nodes and thus may receive multiple sets of network access nodes via the common discovery procedure. Location information (either specific locations or zone regions) for network access node may be important in such scenarios as terminal device 200 may not be located proximate to one or more of network access nodes reported by network access nodes 210 and 212 . Instead, terminal device 200 may only be within range of, for example, network access nodes 220 and 224 as shown in FIG. 2 .

Accordingly, via either specific location information or zone location information, terminal device 200 can be configured to use its own geographic location to identify which network access nodes are within range and proceed to perform subsequent communication procedures accordingly. Additionally, multiple centralized discovery nodes may be deployed in a single frequency network where the centralized discovery nodes concurrently transmit the same discovery signal in a synchronized manner (which may require appropriate coordination between the centralized discovery nodes).

Furthermore, while the examples presented above focus on the use of a cellular access node, for example, network access nodes 210 and/or 212 , as centralized discovery nodes, any type of network access nodes may be equivalently employed as a centralized discovery node regardless of radio access technology. For example, one or more of network access nodes 214 - 230 may additionally or alternatively function as a centralized discovery node. Network access nodes with longer-distance broadcast capabilities such as cellular base stations may be advantageous in some aspects due to the increased broadcast range of common discovery signals.

In some aspects, centralized discovery nodes may or may not serve as conventional network access nodes. For example, in some examples detailed above, network access nodes 210 , 212 , and 214 - 230 were described as being network access nodes (such as base stations or access points) that can provide RAT connections to terminal devices to provide terminal devices with user data traffic. However, in some aspects, centralized discovery nodes may alternatively be deployed specifically for common discovery channel purposes. For example, a third party may deploy one or more centralized discovery nodes that are configured to provide common discovery channel services but not configured to provide other conventional radio access services. Conventional network operators (e.g., mobile network operators (MNOs), public Wi-Fi network providers, etc.) may then be able to license use of the common discovery channel provided by the third party centralized discovery nodes.

In some aspects, the common discovery channel may additionally or alternatively be broadcasted via a distributed discovery architecture. In contrast to centralized discovery architectures where centralized discovery nodes assume the discovery broadcasting responsibilities for one or more other network access nodes, each network access node in a distributed discovery architecture may broadcast a unique discovery signal. However, as opposed to using separate a RAT-specific discovery channel depending on radio access technology, the network access nodes in distributed discovery architectures may each broadcast their respective discovery signals on a common discovery channel. Accordingly, terminal devices may perform discovery with a common discovery module that scans the common discovery channel as previously detailed regarding method 500 of FIG. 5 and consequently avoid having to activate multiple separate communication modules to perform discovery for multiple radio access technologies.

For example, returning to the exemplary setting of FIG. 2 , network access nodes 210 , 212 , and 214 - 230 may act as a distributed discovery node and accordingly broadcast a unique discovery signal on the same common discovery channel that contains the discovery information (common and RAT-specific information elements) of the respective network access node. Accordingly, terminal devices such as terminal device 200 may utilize a single common discovery module, such as common discovery module 306 e , to monitor the common discovery channel and read the respective discovery signals broadcast by each distributed discovery node. Accordingly, terminal device 200 may not have to activate communication modules 306 a - 306 d for discovery and may as a result conserve significant power.

More specifically, network access nodes 210 , 212 , and 214 - 230 may identify its own common and RAT-specific information elements (according to the corresponding radio access technology) and encode this discovery information into a discovery signal (e.g., at a control module such as control module 608 ). In order to simplify decoding at terminal devices, network access nodes 210 , 212 , and 214 - 230 may encode the respective discovery signals with the same predefined format at control module 608 , thus resulting in multiple discovery signals that each contain unique information but are in the same format. Various digital coding and modulation schemes are well-established in the art and any may be employed as the predefined format.

Network access nodes 210 , 212 , and 214 - 230 may then each broadcast their respective discovery signals on the common discovery channel with the predefined discovery signal format, thus enabling terminal devices, such as terminal device 200 , to monitor the common discovery channel and detect discovery signals according to the predefined discovery signal format with common discovery module 306 e as detailed regarding method 500 . As the predefined discovery signal format is known at common discovery module 306 e , common discovery module 306 e may be configured to perform signal processing to both detect discovery signals (e.g., using reference signals or similar techniques) and decode detected discovery signals to recover the original discovery information encoded therein.

Common discovery module 306 e may provide such discovery information to controller 308 , which may proceed to trigger subsequent communication operations with any of communication modules 306 a - 306 d based on the obtained discovery information and current status of each RAT connection.

As multiple of network access nodes 210 , 212 , and 214 - 230 may be broadcasting discovery signals on the common discovery channel, there may be well-defined access rules to minimize the impact of transmission conflicts. For example, if network access node 210 and network access node 216 both broadcast their respective discovery signals on the common discovery channel at overlapping times, the two discovery signals may interfere with each other and complicate detection and decoding of the discovery signals at common discovery module 306 e.

Accordingly, in some aspects, broadcast on the common discovery channel by distributed discovery nodes (including cases where multiple centralized discovery nodes act as distributed discovery nodes to share the same common discovery channel(s)) may be regulated by a set of access rules and broadcast transmission restrictions, such as maximum transmit power, maximum duty cycle, maximum single transmission duration. For example, in some aspects, one or more distributed discovery nodes may be constrained by a maximum transmit power and may not be permitted to transmit a discovery signal on the common discovery channel above the maximum transmit power. In another example, one or more distributed discovery nodes may be constrained by a maximum duty cycle and may not be permitted to transmit a discovery signal on the common discovery channel with a duty cycle exceeding the maximum duty cycle. In another example, one or more distributed discovery nodes may be constrained by a maximum single transmission and may not be permitted to transmit a discovery signal for a continuous period of time exceeding the maximum single transmission duration.

Such access rules may be predefined and preprogrammed into each distributed discovery node, thus enabling each distributed discovery node to obey the access rules when broadcasting discovery signals on the common discovery channel.

Additionally or alternatively, in some aspects the distributed discovery nodes e.g., network access nodes 210 , 212 , and 214 - 230 may utilize an active sensing mechanism similar to carrier sensing or collision detection and random backoff (as in e.g., Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n protocols) in order to transmit their respective discovery signals without colliding with the discovery signals transmitted by other of network access nodes 210 , 212 , and 214 - 230 on the common discovery channel.

In such an active sensing scheme, distributed discovery nodes (including cases where multiple centralized discovery nodes act as distributed discovery nodes to share the same common discovery channel(s)) may employ ‘listen-before-talk’ and/or carrier sensing techniques (e.g., handled at control module 608 and radio system 604 ) in order to perform radio sensing on the common discovery channel prior to actively broadcasting discovery signals. For example, in an exemplary scenario network access node 210 may prepare to transmit a discovery signal on the common discovery channel. In order to prevent collisions with transmissions from other distributed discovery nodes on the common discovery channel, network access node 210 may first monitor the common discovery channel (e.g., over a sensing period) to determine whether any other distributed discovery nodes are transmitting on the common discovery channel. For example, in some aspects network access node 210 may measure the radio energy on the common discovery channel and determine whether the radio energy is above a threshold (e.g., in accordance with an energy detection scheme). If the radio energy on the common discovery channel is below the threshold, network access node 210 may determine that the common discovery channel is free; conversely, if the radio energy on the common discovery channel is above the threshold, network access node 210 may determine that the common discovery channel is busy, e.g., that another transmission is ongoing. In some aspects, network access node 210 may attempt to decode the common discovery channel (e.g., according to the common discovery signal format) to identify whether another network access node is transmitting a common discovery signal on the common discovery channel.

If network access node 210 determines that the common discovery channel is free, network access node may proceed to transmit its common discovery signal on the common discovery channel. If network access node 210 determines that the common discovery channel is busy, network access node 210 may delay transmission of its common discovery signal, monitor the common discovery channel again, and re-assess whether the common discovery channel is free. Network access node 210 may then transmit its common discovery signal once the common discovery channel is free. In some aspects, the network access nodes using the common discovery channel may utilize a contention-based channel access scheme such as carrier sensing multiple access (CSMA), CSMA Collision Avoidance (CSMA/CA), or CSMA Collision Detection (CSMA/CD) to govern access to the common discovery channel. Such may prevent collisions between common discovery signals transmitted by different network access nodes and prevent signal corruption on the common discovery channel. In some aspects, network access nodes may handle collisions unilaterally, and terminal devices may not need to address collisions. For example, if there is a collision between two (or more) network access nodes in transmitting a discovery signal on the common discovery signal, the involved network access nodes may detect the collision and perform a backoff procedure before they attempt to transmit the discovery signal again. There may be problems of hidden node, where network access nodes may be too far from one another to detect collisions observed at a terminal device (e.g., where the terminal device is in between two network access nodes and will observe collisions that the network access nodes may not detect at their respective locations). In various aspects, participating network access nodes may utilize different techniques to address the hidden node problem. For example, network access nodes may utilize repetition, in other words, by repeating transmission of a discovery signal multiple times. In some aspects, network access nodes may utilize random backoff, which may prevent two (or more) network access nodes from detecting a transmission by a third network access node and both attempting to transmit at the same time after using the same backoff time. In some aspects, the network access nodes may utilize a centrally managed scheme, such as where each network access node reports to a coordinating entity. The coordinating entity may be a designated network access node or a radio device that is specifically dedicated to managing access to the common discovery channel. The coordinating entity may grant access to the common discovery channel individually to network access nodes. In some aspects, each network access node may report to a single coordinating entity which then does the broadcast and is in communication with other nearby coordinating entities (that also perform broadcast) and have a way of managing their broadcasts so they do not overlap, for example by scrambling the signal using an orthogonal codes such as Zadoff-Chu sequence.

In some aspects, distributed discovery nodes (including cases where multiple centralized discovery nodes act as distributed discovery nodes to share the same common discovery channel(s)) may utilize cognitive radio technologies. In particular, cognitive radio devices can be configured to detect available, or ‘free’ channels, that are not being utilized. Cognitive radio devices may then seize a detected available channel and use the channel for radio transmission and reception. Accordingly, in some aspects, there may be a set of common discovery channels that are eligible for use as a common discovery channel. A distributed discovery node such as network access node 210 may be preparing to transmit a discovery signal and may aim to find an available time-frequency resource to use as the common discovery channel to transmit the discovery signal. Accordingly, in some aspects, network access node 210 may be configured to utilize cognitive radio techniques to adaptively identify an available common discovery channel from the set of common discovery channels that is available. For example, network access node 210 may evaluate radio signals received on one or more of the set of common discovery channels and determine whether any of the set of common discovery channels are free, such as e.g., by performing energy detection (e.g., to detect radio energy from any type of signal) or discovery signal detection (e.g., to detect discovery signals by attempting to decode the radio signals). Upon identifying an available common discovery channel, network access node 210 may utilize the available common discovery channel to transmit a discovery signal. In some aspects, the set of common discovery channels may be predefined, which may enable terminal devices to be aware of which frequency channels are common discovery channels and therefore to know which frequency channels to scan for discovery signals on. In some aspects, distributed discovery nodes may be configured to broadcast the set of common discovery channels (e.g., as part of the discovery signal) in order to inform terminals which frequency channels are eligible for use as a common discovery channel.

In some aspects, distributed discovery nodes (including cases where multiple centralized discovery nodes act as distributed discovery nodes to share the same common discovery channel(s)) may operate a single frequency network to broadcast a common discovery signal on a single frequency common discovery channel. For example, a plurality of distributed discovery nodes (e.g., multiple of network access nodes 210 - 230 ) may coordinate to exchange discovery information and consolidate discovery information and/or receive consolidated discovery information from a central coordinating point (e.g., a server or core network node that consolidates discovery information). The plurality distributed discovery nodes may then generate the same common discovery signal and then transmit the same common discovery signal in a synchronized fashion on the singe frequency common discovery channel, thus forming a single frequency network that carries the common discovery signal. In some aspects, this may require infrastructure coordination in order to consolidate information and/or maintain synchronized transmission. Single frequency common discovery channel broadcast in this manner may increase the coverage area and provide a common discovery signal across a large area.

In some aspects, distributed discovery nodes (including cases where multiple centralized discovery nodes act as distributed discovery nodes to share the same common discovery channel(s)) may utilize a minimum periodicity (and optionally also maximum periodicity) for discovery signal broadcast on the common discovery channel. Maximum channel access times may also be employed with required back-off times in which a distributed network access node may be required to wait for a predefined duration of time following a discovery signal broadcast to perform another discovery signal broadcast. Such techniques may ensure fairness by preventing distributed discovery nodes from overusing the common discovery channel by broadcasting discovery signals too frequently.

It is desirable that the discovery signal format be particularly robust for distributed discovery architectures due to the high potential for collisions (although such robustness may be beneficial in both centralized and distributed discovery architectures). Accordingly, it is desirable that the discovery signals be well-suited for low-sensitivity detection and decoding in addition to fast and accurate acquisition procedures. The requirements may however be less stringent than conventional cellular cases (e.g., LTE, UMTS, and GSM) signal reception due to the associated modality. In other words, only a deterministic amount of data may be included in the discovery signals and may be able to utilize a predefined bandwidth and rate. Such may enable design of low-power receiver circuitry at common discovery module 306 e , which may offer further benefits.

As noted above, there may exist multiple centralized discovery nodes in centralized discovery architectures that each assume discovery broadcast responsibilities for other network access nodes. Accordingly, such scenarios may be treated as a mix between centralized and distributed discovery architectures where potential collisions may occur between discovery signal broadcasts. Centralized discovery nodes may consequently also employ similar access techniques as noted above, such as access rules and active sensing, in order to minimize the impact of such potential collisions.

In some aspects of centralized and distributed discovery architectures, terminal devices receiving discovery signals on the common discovery channel may perform error control in order to ensure that information transmitted on the common discovery channel is correct. For example, if there is incorrect information on the common discovery channel (for example, if a distributed discovery node broadcasts discovery information on the common discovery channel that is incorrect or misdirected), reception of such information by a terminal device may result in terminal resources being wasted to read the incorrect information and potentially to act on it by pursuing subsequent communication operations under false assumptions. In the case that a terminal device attempts to establish a connection with a false network access node, such may unavoidably result in a waste of terminal resources. However, these scenarios may not be a fatal error (e.g., may not lead to a total loss of connectivity or harm to the terminal device or network).

In the event of incorrect discovery information provided on the common discovery channel, there may instead exist several remedial options available to both terminal devices and network access nodes. Specifically, a terminal device that has identified incorrect discovery information (via a failed connection or inability to detect a network access node based on discovery information provided on the common discovery channel) may notify a network access node that the terminal device is connected to (potentially after an initial failure) that there is incorrect information being broadcasted on the common discovery channel.

The notified network access node may then report the incorrect information, e.g., via a backhaul link, to an appropriate destination in order to enable the erroneous discovery information to be fixed. For example, the notified network access node may utilize a connection via a backhaul link (if such exists depending on the network architecture) to the offending network access node that is broadcasting the incorrect discovery information to inform the offending network access node incorrect discovery information, in response to which the offending network access node may correct the incorrect discovery information. Alternatively, if the discovery information is handled in a database e.g., as in the case of external database 800 of FIG. 8 , the notified network access node may inform the external database (via a backhaul link) of the incorrect discovery information, which may prompt the external database to correct the incorrect discovery information. The discovery information may thus be self-maintained, or ‘self-policed’, in order to ensure that the discovery information is correct.

In some aspects, centralized and distributed discovery architectures may enable terminal devices to employ a common discovery module to handle discovery responsibilities for multiple radio access technologies. As detailed above, such may significantly reduce the power penalty for discovery procedures and may further simplify discovery procedures due to the presence of only a single (or a limited number) of common discovery channels. In some aspects, the common discovery channel scheme may use cooperation of network access nodes in accordance with a centralized and/or distributed discovery architecture, which may coordinate with one another in order to consolidate discovery broadcast responsibilities at single network access nodes (in the case of centralized network architectures) and/or cooperate with one another to minimize the impact of collisions (in the case of distributed network architectures).

Continuing with the setting of FIG. 8 related to a centralized discovery architecture, in some aspects terminal devices may additionally utilize external database 800 in a more active role. For example, terminal devices that currently have a RAT connection providing access to external database 800 may query external database 800 for information related to nearby radio access networks and network access nodes. For example, in an exemplary configuration where external database 800 is provided as an external service in an Internet-accessible network location (e.g., as an internet cloud server), terminal devices that have active Internet connections (e.g., provided via a RAT connection) may exchange data with external database 800 in order to obtain discovery information for relevant network access nodes from external database 800 .

FIG. 9 shows an exemplary scenario in which terminal device 200 has a RAT connection with network access node 210 in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIG. 9 , network access node 210 may also interface with external database 800 via backhaul interface 612 . Terminal device 200 may utilize the RAT connection with network access node 210 in order to exchange network access node information with external database 800 .

Specifically, external database 800 may be located in an Internet-accessible network location and may accordingly have a network address such as an Internet Protocol (IP) address, thus enabling Internet-connected devices to exchange data with external database 800 . Accordingly, terminal devices such as terminal device 200 may utilize RAT connections that provide Internet access (e.g., many cellular RAT connections and short-range RAT connections) in order to exchange network access node information with external database 800 . For example, terminal device 200 may utilize a RAT connection with network access node 210 (e.g., post-discovery) in order to access external database 800 and request information for network access nodes of interest.

Terminal device 200 may utilize external database 800 to obtain information for other network access nodes (including, for example, discovery information) of interest and may apply such information obtained from external database 800 in order to influence radio access communications with such network access nodes.

For example, in the exemplary scenario of FIG. 2 in which network access nodes 212 - 230 are proximate to network access node 110 , controller 308 of terminal device 200 may query external database 800 (via the first RAT connection with network access node 210 supported by first communication module 306 a ) for information on proximate network access nodes. In response, external database 800 may provide controller 308 (via the first RAT connection with network access node 210 supported by first communication module 306 a ) with information on network access node 212 and network access nodes 214 - 230 . Such information may include discovery information, which controller 308 may receive and utilize to direct future radio access communications.

For instance, based on discovery information provided by external database 800 , controller 308 may identify that network access node 216 is within range of terminal device 200 (e.g., by comparing a current geographical location of terminal device 200 with a geographic location of network access node 216 provided by external database 800 as part of the discovery information). Controller 308 may then utilize the discovery information to connect to and establish a RAT connection with network access node 216 . Accordingly, controller 308 may generally perform any unilateral radio interactions (e.g., performing radio measurements on a discovered network access node, receiving broadcast information of a discovered network access node) or bilateral radio interactions (e.g., pursuing and potentially establishing a bidirectional connection with a discovered network access node) with network access nodes based on the network access node information provided by external database 800 .

In some aspects, external database 800 may obtain the network access node information via any number of different sources, including via connections with network access nodes (which may additionally obtain discovery information as detailed herein) and/or via interfacing with radio access network databases. Terminal devices may be able to request any type of network access node information from external database 800 during any time that the terminal devices have a RAT connection that provides Internet access. Such information may be particularly useful to terminal devices either during start-up procedures or during time periods when link quality is poor.

For example, during start-up and/or initial RAT connection establishment, terminal device 200 may seek to establish an initial RAT connection quickly (e.g., potentially without giving full-consideration to establishing the optimal RAT connection in terms of radio link strength and quality) with an Internet-connected network access node and, using the established RAT connection, may query external database 800 for information on other network access nodes such as, for example, discovery information. Terminal device 200 may then receive the requested network access node information from external database 800 via the RAT connection.

Upon obtaining the network access node information, terminal device 200 may be able to identify one or more other network access nodes and may utilize the network access node information to select a more suitable network access node to switch to (such as, for example, by utilizing discovery information provided by external database 800 to perform radio measurements in order to identify a more suitable network access node). Alternatively, in scenarios where a current RAT connection degrades, terminal device 200 may query external database 800 for information on proximate network access nodes, which may enable terminal device 200 to select a new network access node to connect to that may provide a better RAT connection.

Regardless of the particular scenario, in some aspects terminal devices such as terminal device 200 may utilize external database 800 to obtain information on network access nodes of interest and may potentially utilize such information (including, for example, discovery information) to perform unilateral or bilateral radio interactions with one or more of the network access nodes.

External database 800 may therefore receive queries for network access node information from one or more terminal devices, where the terminal devices may transmit the queries via a radio access network to external database 800 using network addressing protocols (e.g., Internet Protocol (IP) addressing, Media Access Control (MAC) addressing, etc.). External database 800 may respond to such queries by then providing the requested information back to the terminal devices via the reverse of the same link. Accordingly, external database 800 may individually respond to each query using network addressing protocols.

Alternatively, in some aspects external database 800 may collect a number of different requests from multiple terminal devices and distribute the requested information via a multicast or broadcast mode. Accordingly, external database 800 may be configured to provide the requested information via either the same link used by the counterpart terminal devices to query for information or by a multicast or broadcast channel. For example, external database 800 may provide the requested information in multicast or broadcast format on a common discovery channel as detailed above. Terminal devices may therefore either utilize a common discovery module such as common discovery module 306 e or a dedicated radio access communication module (e.g., any of communication modules 306 a - 306 d depending on which radio access technology was employed to query the information from external database 800 ).

In some aspects, the use of external database 800 in conjunction with a centralized discovery node architecture may also be expanded to provide information to network access nodes, such as, for example, to provide network access nodes with important information regarding other network access nodes. For example, Wi-Fi access points may be required to have radio sensing capabilities in order to ensure that their transmissions do not interfere with other transmitters using the same unlicensed spectrum. For example, Wi-Fi access points may be able to detect the presence of nearby radar transmitters, which may see governmental or defense usage and thus may be given a high priority in terms of avoiding interference (e.g., by a regulatory body such as the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)). As there may exist multiple different types of radar signals that may not all be detectable at a given geographic location, it may be relatively complex for Wi-Fi access points to perform comprehensive radar sensing.

In order to alleviate such issues, in some aspects, Wi-Fi access points may utilize external database 800 as a database to maintain information regarding radar signals. Accordingly, Wi-Fi access points may report detected radar signals to external database 800 , which may through the use of a centralized discovery node broadcast such information in order to allow other Wi-Fi access points to be aware of nearby radar transmitters. Wi-Fi access points may thus be configured with reception components in order to receive such information on a common discovery channel and may consequently rely on such information instead of having to perform complete radar sensing functions.

Discovery signals that are broadcasted based on information provided by external database 800 may therefore in some cases not be limited only to reception and usage by terminal devices. Accordingly, in some aspects network access nodes may also utilize such information in particular for interference management purposes. For example, any number of different types of network access nodes may receive and apply such discovery signals in order to be aware of the presence of other network access nodes and subsequently apply interference management techniques in order to reduce interference.

Although detailed above and depicted as a single database, in some aspects multiple instances of external database 800 may be deployed where each instance may contain the same or different information, such as, for example, a different external database to serve certain geographic regions.

In some aspects, the techniques detailed above regarding the common discovery channel may also be expanded to device-to-device communications, where one or more terminal devices may utilize the common discovery channel to broadcast discovery information locally available at each mobile terminal. For example, controller 308 may previously have obtained discovery information for one or more network access nodes, for example, either via conventional discovery at one of communication modules 306 a - 306 d or reception of discovery information on a common discovery channel via common discovery module 306 e.

In order to simplify discovery procedures for other proximate terminal devices, controller 308 may then transmit the obtained discovery information as a discovery signal (e.g., by generating the discovery signal according to a predefined format) on a common discovery channel, for example, by using transmission components included in common discovery module 306 e (in which case common discovery module 306 e may be more than a simple low-complexity receiver) or another communication module configured to transmit discovery signals on the common discovery channel. Accordingly, other terminal devices may thus receive the discovery signal on the common discovery channel and utilize the discovery information contained therein to perform unilateral or bilateral radio interactions with the network access nodes represented in the discovery information.

In some aspects, such device-to-device operation of the common discovery channel may function similarly to distributed discovery architectures as detailed above, where each transmitting terminal device may operate as a distributed discovery node in order to broadcast discovery signals on the common discovery channel.

FIG. 10 shows a method 1000 of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects. The method 1000 includes decoding discovery information for a first radio access technology and a second radio access technology from a common discovery channel ( 1010 ), wherein the discovery information is encoded into one or more discovery signals according to a common discovery signal format, and controlling one or more RAT connections of different radio access technologies according to the discovery information ( 1020 ). In one or more further exemplary aspects of the disclosure, one or more of the features described above in reference to FIGS. 1 - 9 may be further incorporated into method 1000 . In particular, method 1000 may be configured to perform further and/or alternate processes as detailed regarding terminal device 200 .

1.2 Common Channel #2

In some aspects of this disclosure, terminal devices may coordinate with network access nodes to use a common control channel that provides control information for multiple radio access technologies. Accordingly, instead of monitoring a separate control channel for multiple radio access technologies, a terminal device may consolidate monitoring of the separate control channels into monitoring of a common control channel that contains control information for multiple radio access technologies.

In some aspects, terminal devices may also receive control information that instructs the terminal devices how and when to transmit and receive data over wireless access network. Such control information may include, for example, time and frequency scheduling information, coding/modulation schemes, power control information, paging information, retransmission information, connection/mobility information. Upon receipt of this information, terminal devices may transmit and receive radio data according to the specified control parameters in order to ensure proper reception at both the terminal device and on the network side at the counterpart network access node.

A RAT connection may rely on such control information. For example, as previously detailed regarding FIG. 3 , controller 308 may maintain a separate RAT connection via two or more of communication modules 306 a - 306 d (although in many scenarios the cellular connections for each of communication modules 306 a - 306 c may be jointly managed, for example, in a master/slave RAT scheme). Accordingly, controller 308 may receive control information for the first RAT to maintain a first RAT connection via first communication module 306 a (e.g., LTE control information to maintain an LTE connection in an exemplary LTE setting) while also receiving control information for the second RAT to maintain a second RAT connection via second communication module 306 c (e.g., Wi-Fi control information to maintain a Wi-Fi connection in an exemplary Wi-Fi setting). Controller 308 may then manage the first and second RAT connections according to the respective control information and corresponding radio access protocols.

Even if one of the RAT connections is idle, for example, not actively exchanging user data traffic, controller 308 may still monitor that one of the RAT connections, in particular for control information such as, for example, paging messages.

For example, even if the first RAT connection at first communication module 306 a is in an idle state, (e.g., camped on an LTE cell but not allocated any dedicated resources in an exemplary LTE setting), controller 308 may still monitor the first RAT connection via first communication module 306 a in case a network access node of the first RAT (e.g., an LTE cell) transmits a paging message to first communication module 306 a that indicates incoming data for first communication module 306 a . Accordingly, controller 308 may continuously monitor first radio access LTE connection for incoming first RAT data with first communication module 306 a.

Similarly, regardless of whether a second RAT connection at second communication module 306 b is idle, controller 308 may also continuously monitor the second RAT connection for incoming second RAT data with second communication module 306 b (and likewise for any other RAT connections, e.g., at communication modules 306 c - 306 d ). This may cause excessive power consumption at communication modules 306 a - 306 d due to constant monitoring for control information.

It may therefore be advantageous to consolidate monitoring for multiple RAT connections into a single RAT connection, such as, for example, by being able to monitor a single RAT connection for control information of multiple RATs. For example, terminal device 200 may be able to monitor for Wi-Fi beacons and data (including e.g., beacon frames to indicate pending data for Wi-Fi devices currently using power-saving mode, which may prompt wakeup to receive the data) and other Wi-Fi control information of a Wi-Fi connection over an LTE connection. This may involve network-level forwarding of incoming data for one RAT connection to another RAT connection (e.g., forwarding Wi-Fi data via an LTE connection), which may enable terminal device 200 to monitor one RAT connection in place of multiple RAT connections. For example, terminal device 200 may be able to receive incoming Wi-Fi data with first communication module 306 a , which may allow terminal device 200 to avoid continuously monitoring the Wi-Fi connection with second communication module 306 b.

These aspects may therefore enable controller 308 to utilize a forwarding and common monitoring scheme where the monitoring of incoming data for multiple of communication modules 306 a - 306 d is consolidated onto a single RAT connection. In the example described above, controller 308 may therefore only monitor the first RAT connection with first communication module 306 a . As incoming second RAT data will be forwarded to the first RAT connection, e.g., forwarded to the network access node counterpart to terminal device 200 for the first RAT connection, controller 308 may receive such incoming second RAT data at first communication module 306 a.

Controller 308 may proceed to identify the incoming data for the second RAT, such as, for example, a paging message for the second RAT connection at second communication module 306 b , and proceed to control the second RAT connection according to the incoming second RAT data. For example, after receiving data on the first RAT connection, first communication module 306 a may provide received data (which may include the incoming second RAT data embedded in first RAT data) to controller 308 , which may identify the incoming second RAT data. In the case where the incoming second RAT data is e.g., a second RAT paging message, controller 308 may activate second communication module 306 b and proceed to receive the incoming second RAT data indicated in the second RAT paging message. Analogous consolidation of monitoring for multiple RAT connections may likewise be realized with any other combination of two or more RAT connections. For example, in an exemplary LTE and Wi-Fi setting where the first RAT is LTE and the second RAT is Wi-Fi, controller 308 may receive Wi-Fi control data via first communication module 306 a (where the Wi-Fi data was forwarded to the LTE connection at the network-level). Controller 308 may then control the Wi-Fi connection via second communication module 306 b based on the Wi-Fi control data.

The forwarding and common monitoring system may rely on cooperation from at least one of the counterpart network access nodes. For example, in the above example the second RAT network access node may identify incoming data addressed to terminal device 200 and forward the identified data to the first RAT network access node for subsequent transmission to terminal device 200 over the first RAT connection. Accordingly, the forwarding and common monitoring system may rely on a forwarding scheme in which second RAT data at the second RAT network access node intended for terminal device 200 is forwarded to the first RAT network access node, thus enabling the first RAT network access node to subsequently transmit the second RAT data over the first RAT connection to first communication module 306 a.

Although, in certain scenarios, both the first RAT network access node and the second RAT access node may be configured according to the forwarding and common monitoring scheme, the forwarding and common monitoring scheme may be implemented with only a single cooperating network access node that forwards data to the terminal device via a non-cooperating network access node.

FIG. 11 illustrates an exemplary forwarding and common monitoring system in accordance with some aspects. In FIG. 11 , second RAT data intended for terminal device 200 is re-routed, or forwarded, from a second RAT connection to a first RAT connection, thus enabling terminal device 200 to forego monitoring of the second RAT connection and instead only monitor the first RAT connection. While some examples in the following description may focus on LTE and Wi-Fi, terminal device 200 may analogously apply the same forwarding and common monitoring technique for any two or more radio access technologies.

In scenario 1100 shown in FIG. 11 , terminal device 200 may have a first RAT connection and a second RAT connection via first communication module 306 a and second communication module 306 d , respectively. As shown in 1100 , terminal device 200 may have a second RAT connection supplied by network access node 1106 that provides terminal device 200 with a connection to internet network 1102 . Terminal device 200 may also have a first RAT connection supplied by network access node 1108 that routes through core network 1104 to internet network 1102 .

In some aspects, as the first RAT connection and the second RAT connections are separate, terminal device 200 may be assigned a network address for each connection. For example, terminal device 200 may have a network address of e.g., a. b. c. d for the second RAT connection (that identifies terminal device 200 as an end-destination of the second RAT connection) and a network address of e.g., e. f. g. h for the first RAT connection (that identifies terminal device 200 as an end-destination of the first RAT connection). Data packets (such as IP data) may be routed along the first and second RAT connections from internet network 1102 to terminal device 200 according to the first and second RAT network addresses. In some aspects, the network addresses may be IP addresses. In some aspects, the network addresses may be MAC addresses. Other network addressing protocols may also be used without departing from the scope of this disclosure. In some aspects, terminal device 200 can be associated with one or more network addresses, where networks may use the one or more addresses to route data to terminal device 200 . The one or more network addresses can be any type of address that is compliant with the underlying network.

Controller 308 may therefore maintain both the first and second RAT connections with first communication module 306 a and second communication module 306 b in order to exchange user data traffic with internet network 1102 . If a RAT connection is in an active state, controller 308 may constantly operate the corresponding communication module in order to exchange uplink and downlink data with the appropriate network access node. Alternatively, if a RAT connection is in an idle state, controller 308 may only periodically operate the corresponding communication module to receive infrequent control data such as paging messages, which may indicate that an idle connection may be transitioned to an active state in order to receive incoming data.

If a paging message is received for a given idle RAT connection, controller 308 may subsequently activate the corresponding communication module in order to transition the corresponding RAT connection to an active state to receive the incoming data indicated in the paging message. Accordingly, such paging message monitoring may require that controller 308 monitor both first communication module 306 a and second communication module 306 b even when the underlying RAT connections are in an idle state. This may require high battery power expenditure at terminal device 200 .

In some aspects, in order to avoid having to monitor two or more RAT connections separately, controller 308 may execute the forwarding and common monitoring mechanism illustrated in FIG. 11 . This temporarily disconnects one of the RAT connections and arranges for incoming data for the disconnected RAT connection to be forwarded to another RAT connection. Controller 308 may then monitor for data of the disconnected RAT connection on the remaining RAT connection.

For example, in a scenario where the second RAT connection with network access node 1106 is in an idle state and the first RAT connection with network access node 1108 is in either an active or idle state, controller 308 may temporarily disconnect the second RAT connection and transfer monitoring of the second RAT connection from second communication module 306 b to first communication module 306 a . Controller 308 may therefore place second communication module 306 b in an inactive state, which may conserve battery power.

In some aspects, in order to disconnect a RAT connection (e.g., the second RAT connection), controller 308 may set up a forwarding path in order to ensure that data intended for terminal device 200 on the disconnected RAT connection, such as e.g., paging messages and other control data, is re-routed to another RAT connection (e.g., through network access node 1108 ).

Accordingly, as shown in scenario 1100 , controller 308 may transmit a forwarding setup instruction to network access node 1106 (via second communication module 306 b over the second RAT connection) that instructs network access node 1106 to temporarily disconnect the second RAT connection and to re-route second RAT data intended for terminal device 200 to an alternate destination. For example, controller 308 may instruct network access node 1106 to forward all second RAT data intended for the second RAT network address a. b. c. d of terminal device 200 to the first RAT network address e. f. g. h of terminal device 200 . Upon receipt of the forwarding setup instruction network access node 1106 may register the alternate destination of terminal device 200 , e.g., first RAT network address e. f. g. h in a forward table (as shown in FIG. 11 ), and thus activate forwarding to the alternate destination.

FIG. 12 shows an internal configuration of network access node 1106 in accordance with some aspects. Network access node 1106 may include antenna system 1202 , radio system 1204 , communication system 1206 (including control module 1208 and forwarding table 1112 ), and/or backhaul interface 1212 . Network access node 1106 may transmit and receive radio signals via antenna system 1202 , which may be an antenna array including multiple antennas. Radio system 1204 may perform transmit and receive RF and PHY processing in order to convert outgoing digital data from communication module 1206 into analog RF signals to provide to antenna system 1202 for radio transmission and to convert incoming analog RF signals received from antenna system 1202 into digital data to provide to communication module 1206 . Control module 1208 may control the communication functionality of network access node 1106 according to the corresponding radio access protocols, e.g., Wi-Fi/WLAN, which may include exercising control over antenna system 1202 and radio system 1204 .

Radio system 1204 , control module 1208 may be structurally realized as hardware-defined modules, e.g., as one or more dedicated hardware circuits or FPGAs, as software-defined modules, e.g., as one or more processors executing program code that define arithmetic, control, and I/O instructions (e.g., software and/or firmware) stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, or as mixed hardware-defined and software-defined modules.

In some aspects, forwarding table 1112 may be embodied as a memory that is accessible (read/write) by control module 1208 . Backhaul interface 1212 may be a wired (e.g., Ethernet, fiber optic, etc.) or wireless (e.g., microwave radio or similar wireless transceiver system) connection point for physical connection configured to transmit and receive data with other network nodes, which may be e.g., a microwave radio transmitter, or a connection point and associated circuitry for a fiber backhaul link.

In some aspects, control module 1208 may receive forwarding setup instructions (following processing by antenna system 1202 and radio system 1204 ) as illustrated in 1100 and proceed to activate forwarding for terminal device 200 by updating forwarding table 1112 according to the alternate destination, e.g., first RAT network address e. f. g. h as provided by controller 308 in the forwarding setup instructions.

Following forwarding activation, network access node 1106 may re-route all second RAT data received from internet network 1102 that is intended for terminal device 200 (e.g., addressed to second RAT network address a. b. c. d) to the alternate destination, e.g., first RAT network address e. f. g. h. As the alternate destination is merely the first RAT network address of the first RAT connection of terminal device 200 , such may as a result re-route the second RAT data to terminal device 200 via the first RAT network address. Accordingly, terminal device 200 may receive the second RAT data over the first RAT connection at first communication module 306 a along with other data addressed to first RAT network address e. f. g. h.

In some aspects, control module 1208 may populate forwarding table 1112 using forwarding setup instructions received from served terminal devices. Forwarding table 1112 may contain forwarding entries including at least an original network address and a forwarding network address. In some aspects, control module 1208 may register, in forwarding table 1112 , the original network address (e.g., a. b. c. d for terminal device 200 ) of the terminal devices with the forwarding network address specified in the forwarding setup instruction (e.g., e. f. g. h for terminal device 200 ). Accordingly, upon receipt of the forwarding setup instruction from terminal device 200 (where terminal device 200 has second RAT network address a. b. c. d and specifies forwarding network address e. f. g. h in the forwarding setup instruction), control module 1208 may register the original second RAT network address a. b. c. d and forwarding network address e. f. g. h at forwarding table 1112 . In some cases, control module 1208 may also set an ‘active flag’ for the forwarding entry of terminal device 200 to ‘on’, where the active flag for a forwarding entry may specify whether the forwarding path is currently active.

In some aspects, after receiving the forwarding setup instruction from terminal device 200 at 1100 , control module 1208 may proceed to forward all incoming data intended for terminal device 200 at second RAT network address a. b. c. d to first RAT network address e. f. g. h. FIG. 11 shows the high-level forwarding path via internet network 1102 , core network 1104 , and network access node 1108 while FIG. 12 shows the internal path within network access node 1106 in accordance with some aspects. As depicted in 1110 , internet network 1102 may provide data packets to network access node 1106 , which may be addressed to various terminal devices that are served by network access node 1106 . Network access node 1106 may receive such data packets at backhaul interface 1212 , which may route incoming data packets to control module 1208 . Control module 1208 may check the destination network address of each data packet with the original network addresses in forwarding table 1112 as shown in FIG. 12 in order to determine whether any data packets should be re-routed to a forwarding network address.

Accordingly, as shown in 1110 , network access node 1106 may receive a data packet (or a stream of data packets where the following description may likewise apply for multiple data packets) from internet network 1102 that are addressed to destination network address a. b. c. d. Network access node 1106 may receive such data packets from internet network 1102 via backhaul interface 1212 , where data packets may subsequently be received and processed at control module 1208 .

Subsequently, control module 1208 may then, for each data packet addressed to a served terminal device, check whether the destination network address matches with an original network address registered in forwarding table 1112 with an active forwarding flag. If a data packet is addressed to an original network address with an active flag in forwarding table 1112 , control module 1208 may forward the data packet to the forwarding network address registered with the original network address in forwarding table 1112 .

Accordingly, as shown in FIG. 12 , upon receipt of a data packet addressed to terminal device 200 (e.g., at network address a. b. c. d), control module 1208 may compare the destination network address of a. b. c. d to the forwarding entries of forwarding table 1112 and determine that destination network address a. b. c. d matches with original network address a. b. c. d for terminal device 200 and has an active forwarding flag. Consequently, instead of transmitting the data packet to terminal device 200 via the second RAT connection (provided from radio system 1204 and antenna system 1202 to second communication module 306 b ), control module 1208 may re-route the data packet to the forwarding network address of terminal device 200 registered to original network address a. b. c. d in forwarding table 1112 , e.g., to forwarding network address e. f. g. h which may be the first RAT network address registered by terminal device 200 in the initial forwarding setup message.

Upon identifying the appropriate forwarding network address for the data packet, control module 1208 may re-address the data packet (e.g., depending on the corresponding header encapsulation and transmission protocols, e.g., according to a IP addressing scheme) and transmit the re-addressed data packet to internet network 1102 via backhaul interface 1212 . Since the data packet is re-addressed to the forwarding network address a. b. c. d, internet network 1102 may route the re-addressed data packet to core network 1104 .

In some aspects, core network 1104 may similarly utilize the forwarding network address a. b. c. d to route the re-addressed data packet to the appropriate network access node associated with the forwarding network address of e. f. g. h, for example, to network access node 1108 that is providing a first RAT connection to terminal device 200 with first RAT network address e. f. g. has the user-side destination address.

Network access node 1108 may then transmit the re-addressed data packet to terminal device 200 using the first RAT connection, where terminal device 200 may receive the re-addressed data packet at first communication module 306 a and subsequently process the re-addressed data packet at controller 308 . Accordingly, controller 308 may not actively operate second communication module 306 b to receive the data packet. Instead, controller 308 may consolidate monitoring for both the first and second RAT connections at only first communication module 306 a . Controller 308 may identify that the re-addressed data packet is a second RAT data packet and may process the re-addressed data packet according to the associated second RAT protocols as if the data packet had actually been received at second communication module 306 b.

As previously indicated, the data packet may be control data, such as a paging message, that indicates incoming second RAT data addressed to terminal device 200 . Upon recognition that the data packet is a second RAT paging message, controller 308 may activate second communication module 306 b and proceed to activate and control second communication module 306 b in order to receive the incoming second RAT data over the second RAT connection.

In order to receive the incoming second RAT data over the second RAT connection, controller 308 may de-activate forwarding at network access node 1106 . Accordingly, controller 308 may resume the second RAT connection at second communication module 306 b with network access node 1106 and transmit a forwarding deactivation instruction to network access node 1106 . In some aspects, network access node 1106 and controller 308 may maintain the second RAT connection ‘virtually’ during forwarding, such as by keeping the network addresses and ignoring any keep-alive timers (which may otherwise expire and trigger complete tear-down of the connection). Accordingly, once controller 308 f decides to de-activate forwarding and utilize the second RAT connection again, second communication module 306 b and network access node 1106 may resume using the second RAT connection without performing a full connection re-establishment procedure. For example, controller 308 may transmit a request (via the forwarding link) to network access node 1106 to resume using the second RAT connection. Network access node 1106 may then respond with an acknowledgement (ACK) (via the forwarding link), which may prompt control module 1208 to resume using the second RAT connection with second communication module 306 d . In some aspects, controller 308 may expect that network access node 1106 is configured to continue monitoring the second RAT connection and may resume transmitting on the second RAT connection via second communication module 306 b . Alternatively, in some aspects network access node 1106 and controller 308 may terminate (e.g., completely tear-down) the second RAT connection during forwarding, and may re-establish the second RAT connection, such as by performing e.g., via discovery and initial connection establishment.

In some aspects, control module 1208 may receive the forwarding deactivation instruction (via antenna system 1202 and radio system 1204 ) and proceed to de-activate the forwarding link. In some cases, control module 1208 may de-activate the forwarding link by changing the active flag in forwarding table 1112 for terminal device 200 to ‘off’ (control module 1208 may alternatively delete the forwarding entry from forwarding table 1112 ). Consequently, upon receipt of further data packets addressed to terminal device at a. b. c. d, control module 1208 may determine from forwarding table 1112 that no forwarding link is currently active for the destination network address a. b. c. d and may proceed to wirelessly transmit the data packets to terminal device 200 over the second RAT connection. Terminal device 200 may therefore receive the incoming second RAT data indicated in the initially-forwarded paging message over the second RAT connection at second communication module 306 b.

As indicated above, in some aspects network access node 1106 may implement the forwarding link by re-addressing data packets that are initially addressed to the second RAT network address of terminal device 200 to be addressed to the first RAT network address. In some aspects, network access node 1106 may implement the forwarding link for a given data packet by wrapping the data packet with another wrapper (or header) that contains the first RAT network address of terminal device 200 (e.g., the forwarding network address). Network access node 1106 may then send the re-wrapped data packet to internet network 1102 , which may then route the re-wrapped data packet to core network 1104 and network access node 1108 according to the wrapper specifying the first RAT network address of terminal device 200 . Network access node 1108 may then complete the forwarding link by transmitting the re-wrapped data packet to terminal device 200 over the first RAT connection.

FIG. 13 outlines the forwarding and common monitoring scheme as method 1300 executed at terminal device 200 in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIG. 13 , controller 308 may first select a connection to temporarily deactivate, for example, the second RAT connection via network access node 1106 , and may establish a forwarding link for all incoming data on the deactivated RAT connection in 1302 . In particular, controller 308 may transmit a forwarding setup instruction to the network access node originally supporting the selected RAT connection, e.g., the ‘original network access node’, that specifies a forwarding network address for the original network access node to forward all future incoming data addressed to terminal device 200 . Controller 308 may then deactivate the selected RAT connection, which may include deactivating associated communication components, e.g., second communication module 306 b , which controller 308 may place in an idle, sleep, or power-off state in order to conserve power.

In some aspects, in 1304 , controller 308 may then proceed to transmit and/or receive data over the remaining RAT connections including the RAT connection associated with the forwarding link, e.g., the first RAT connection with network access node 1108 . Accordingly, as opposed to executing communications over the deactivated RAT connection, controller 308 may keep the communication components associated with the deactivated RAT connection in an inactive state and instead monitor for associated incoming data on the forwarding link. The original network access node may proceed to forward all incoming data addressed to terminal device 200 at the original network address to the forwarding network address specified by controller 308 in the forwarding setup instruction, which may be a network address of a remaining RAT connection of terminal device 200 that is provided by another network access node, e.g., the ‘selected network access node’.

Controller 308 may thus examine data received from the selected network access node on the forwarding link in 1306 to determine whether incoming data is intended for the RAT connection associated with the forwarding link or has been forwarded after initially being addressed to terminal device 200 over the deactivated RAT connection. If all incoming data on the forwarding link is originally associated with the RAT connection associated with the forwarding link, controller 308 may continue transmitting and receiving data on the remaining RAT connections in 1304 .

Alternatively, if controller 308 determines that forwarded data for the deactivated RAT connection was received on the forwarding link 1306 , controller 308 may read the forwarded data to identify the contents of the forwarded data and determine what further action is appropriate. More specifically, controller 308 may determine in 1308 whether controller 308 needs to re-establish the deactivated RAT connection in order to receive further incoming data on the currently deactivated RAT connection.

In some aspects, if the forwarded data identified in 1306 is the only incoming data for the deactivated RAT connection or if the forwarded data identified in 1306 indicates that only a limited amount of further incoming data is pending for the deactivated RAT connection (e.g., a paging message that only indicates a limited amount of further incoming data), in 1308 , controller 308 may decide that it is not necessary to re-establish the deactivated RAT connection and may proceed to receive any remaining forwarded data for the deactivated RAT connection from the selected network access node over the forwarding link in 1310 .

Alternatively, if controller 308 decides in 1308 that the deactivated RAT connection should be re-established (e.g., in the event that the forwarded data identified in 1306 indicates a significant amount of incoming data for the deactivated RAT connection) or if the forwarded data indicates that uplink data traffic is necessary, controller 308 may proceed to 1312 to re-establish deactivated RAT connection and deactivate the forwarding link.

More specifically, controller 308 may re-connect to the original network access node that initially provided the currently deactivated RAT connection (if the network access node is still available, as further detailed below) to re-establish the deactivated RAT connection and subsequently deactivate the forwarding link by transmitting a forwarding deactivation instruction to the original network access node on the now-re-established RAT connection. Such may include re-activating the communication components associated with the re-established RAT connection, e.g., second communication module 306 b . The original network access node may then deactivate the forwarding link by updating the forwarding table.

As the forwarding link is now deactivated, the original network access node may not forward incoming data addressed to terminal device 200 and may instead proceed to transmit the incoming data to terminal device 200 over the re-established RAT connection. Accordingly, controller 308 may receive the remaining data on the re-established RAT connection via the associated communication components in 1314 .

If necessary, following conclusion of reception of the remaining data in 1314 , controller 308 may in some aspects decide to establish a new forwarding link by transmitting a forwarding setup instruction to the original network access node (potentially routed through the selected network access node), thus once again deactivating the same RAT connection and allowing for deactivation of the associated communication components. Controller 308 may thus conserve power by deactivating the associated communication components and resuming the forwarding link via another RAT connection, e.g., by consolidating reception for multiple RAT connections into one.

While forwarding link activation as in 1302 may be completed via transmission of a forwarding setup instruction and subsequent registration by a network access node, re-establishment of previously deactivated RAT connections (and the associated forwarding link de-activation) as in 1312 may be complicated due to dynamic radio conditions and network mobility.

For example, while terminal device 200 may be within range of network access node 1106 in 1100 and 1110 (and thus capable of transmitting forwarding instructions to network access node 1106 ), terminal device 200 may move to a different geographic location after forwarding has been activated by network access node 1106 . Additionally or alternatively, changing network and radio conditions may render network access node 1106 incapable of completing transmissions to terminal device 200 (or vice versa) even if terminal device 200 remains in the same geographic location.

Accordingly, in some cases controller 308 may not be able to re-establish the original RAT connection with network access node 1106 . As a result, controller 308 may not be able to deactivate the forwarding link and resume communication over the original RAT. Accordingly, network access node 1106 may continue forwarding data addressed to terminal device 200 according to the forwarding link as initially established by controller 308 .

If a RAT connection with the same radio access technology as the original RAT connection is desired, controller 308 may therefore discover a new network access node of the same radio access technology; for example, in the setting of FIG. 11 controller 308 may perform discovery for the second RAT in order to detect proximate network access nodes of the second RAT with which to establish a new RAT connection (e.g., to the same destination address in internet network 1102 using a new network access node).

Accordingly, controller 308 may trigger discovery at the appropriate communication module, e.g., second communication module 306 b (or alternatively using a common discovery channel and procedure as previously detailed regarding common discovery module 306 e in FIG. 3 ; such common discovery may equivalently be employed to discover network access nodes), in order to detect proximate network access nodes of the desired radio access technology. If the appropriate communication module, e.g., second communication module 306 b , discovers a suitable network access node, controller 308 may establish a RAT connection with the selected network access node and, via the selected network access node, may hand over the deactivated RAT connection from the original network access node, e.g., network access node 1106 , to the selected network access node, e.g., another network access node (not explicitly shown in FIG. 11 ). As the original network access node is still operating a forwarding link according to the forwarding setup instruction initially provided by controller 308 , controller 308 may therefore utilize the selected network access node to route a forwarding deactivation instruction to the original network access node to instruct the original network access node to deactivate the forwarding link.

In the setting of FIG. 11 , controller 308 may address the forwarding deactivation instruction to network access node 1106 ; consequently, the selected network access node may receive the forwarding deactivation instruction from controller 308 and route the forwarding deactivation instruction to the original network access node, e.g., via internet network 1102 .

As controller 308 also needs all future data to be routed to terminal device 200 via the selected network access node, controller 308 may also arrange a connection handover in order to permanently transfer the deactivated RAT connection at the original network access node to the selected network access node, thus enabling controller 308 to continue with the newly established RAT connection at the selected network access node.

Controller 308 may eventually decide to re-establish a forwarding link while connected to the selected network access node, in which case controller 308 may transmit a forwarding setup instruction to the selected network access node with a forwarding address in the same manner as previously detailed and subsequently have data associated with the RAT connection with the selected network access node be forwarded to terminal device 200 via another network access node.

While controller 308 may successfully perform discovery in certain scenarios to detect proximate network access nodes of the same radio access technology as the deactivated RAT connection, there may be other cases in which controller 308 is unable to detect any suitable network access nodes, thus leaving the forwarding link active at the original network access node without any way to re-establish a RAT connection with the same radio access technology as the deactivated RAT connection. Accordingly, controller 308 may resort to other radio access technologies.

For example, controller 308 may utilize the remaining RAT connection on which the forwarding link is active, e.g., the first RAT connection via network access node 1108 in the setting of FIG. 11 , in order to deactivate the existing forwarding link at the original network access node, e.g., network access node 1106 , and transfer the deactivated RAT connection to the remaining RAT connection.

More specifically, in some aspects controller 308 may utilize the remaining RAT connection to route a forwarding deactivation instruction to the original network access node; for example, in the setting of FIG. 11 , controller 308 may utilize the first RAT connection with network access node 1108 to route a forwarding deactivation instruction to network access node 1106 via core network 1104 and internet network 1102 . Network access node 1106 may thus receive the forwarding deactivation instruction and proceed to deactivate the forwarding link (e.g., via update of forwarding table 1112 ), thus terminating forwarding of data addressed to terminal device 200 to the forwarding network address originally specified by controller 308 in the initial forwarding setup instruction.

Controller 308 may also arrange transfer of the deactivated RAT connection at network access node 1106 to network access node 1108 , thus ensuring that terminal device 200 continues to receive the associated data via the remaining RAT connection. As the second RAT connection is now broken, terminal device 200 may forfeit the second RAT network address and instead rely on the first RAT connection and associated first RAT network address for data transfer.

The forwarding and common monitoring scheme detailed above may not be limited to receipt of paging messages and may be particularly well-suited for forwarding and common monitoring for any sporadic and/or periodic information. Control information may thus be particularly relevant, in particular idle mode control information such as paging messages that occur relatively infrequently. However, the forwarding and common monitoring scheme may be equivalently applied for any data and/or data stream. For example, the re-addressed data packet detailed above may contain a second RAT paging message that indicates that only a small amount of incoming second data is pending transmission to terminal device 200 . Accordingly, instead of re-activating the second RAT connection at second communication module 306 b and deactivating the forwarding link with a forwarding deactivation instruction, controller 308 may instead leave the forwarding link untouched (e.g., refrain from transmitting a forwarding deactivation instruction) and thus allow network access node 1106 to continue to forward data packets to terminal device 200 by re-addressing the data packets with the forwarding network address e. f. g. h and routing the re-addressed data packets to terminal device 200 via internet network 1102 , core network 1104 , and network access node 1108 (e.g., the forwarding link). While excessive extraneous data traffic on the first RAT connection between network access node 1108 and terminal device 200 may lead to congestion, forwarding of reasonable amounts of data to terminal device 200 via the forwarding link may be acceptable. Accordingly, terminal device 200 may in some aspects avoid activating second communication module 306 b to receive the incoming data and may instead receive the second RAT data via the forwarding link from network access node 1108 .

Following reception of the incoming second RAT data via the forwarding link, terminal device 200 may continue to consolidate monitoring at first communication module 306 a by leaving the forwarding link intact at network access node 1106 , e.g., by refraining from transmitting a forwarding deactivation instruction. While it may be advantageous to avoid transmitting large amounts of data (such as a multimedia data stream or large files) over the forwarding link, terminal device 200 may implement forwarding for any type or size of data in the same manner as detailed above; accordingly, all such variations are within the scope of this disclosure.

Larger amounts of data such as for multimedia data streams or large files may also be manageable depending on the capacity and current traffic loads of the network access node selected to support the forwarding link; accordingly, high-capacity and/or low traffic network access nodes may be more suitable to handle larger amounts of forwarded data than other low-capacity and/or high traffic network access nodes.

The forwarding links detailed herein may be primarily utilized for downlink data; however, depending on the configuration of network access nodes, terminal device 200 can in some aspects transmit uplink data over the forwarding link. For example, if a forwarding link is active and controller 308 has uplink data to transmit on the idle RAT connection, controller 308 may decide whether to utilize the forwarding link to transmit the uplink data or to re-activate (or re-establish) the idle RAT connection. For example, if the uplink data is a limited amount of data (e.g., less than a threshold), controller 308 may transmit the uplink data via the forwarding link. If the uplink data is a larger amount of data (e.g., more than the threshold), controller 308 may re-activate (or re-establish) the idle RAT connection to transmit the uplink data. In some aspects, controller 308 may first transmit an access request message to the network access node of the idle RAT connection via the forwarding link to initiate re-establishment of the idle RAT connection.

In addition to forwarding setup and forwarding deactivation instructions, in some aspects terminal device 200 may additionally employ forwarding modification instructions. Terminal device 200 may employ such forwarding modification instructions in order to modify an existing forwarding link (either active or inactive). For example, terminal device 200 may be assigned a new first RAT network address, e.g., q. r. s. t, and may update the forwarding entry at network access node 1106 in order to ensure that future data packets are routed to the new first RAT network address. Controller 308 may therefore generate a forwarding modification instruction that identifies the new first RAT network address q. r. s. t. as the forwarding network address and transmit the forwarding modification instruction to network access node 1106 (via the second RAT connection with second communication module 306 b ).

Control module 1208 may receive the forwarding modification instruction via backhaul interface 1212 and subsequently update the entry for terminal device 200 in forwarding table 1112 to replace the old forwarding network address (e. f. g. h) with the new forwarding network address (q. r. s. t). Such forwarding modification instructions may additionally be combined with forwarding setup or forwarding deactivation instructions by including an activation or deactivation instruction in the forwarding modification instruction that prompts control module 1208 to set the active forwarding flag in forwarding table 1112 .

The exemplary scenarios 1100 and 1110 detailed above may be employed for any type of radio access technology. For example, in some aspects the first RAT may be e.g., LTE and the second RAT may be e.g., Wi-Fi, where network access node 1108 may be an LTE eNodeB and network access node 1106 may be a Wi-Fi AP. In some aspects, the first RAT may be Wi-Fi and the second RAT may be LTE, where network access node 1108 may be a Wi-Fi AP and network access node 1106 may be an LTE eNodeB. In some aspects, the first or second RAT may be Wi-Fi and the other of the first or second RAT may be Bluetooth. Any radio access technology may be utilized without departing from the scope of this disclosure.

In various aspects, terminal device 200 may therefore rely on cooperation via various network access nodes in order to execute the forwarding and common monitoring scheme. In some aspects, the forwarding network access node (network access node 1106 or network access node 1108 ) may implement the forwarding procedure without manipulation of the underlying radio access protocols. Such may rely on the fact that incoming data may be forwarded to the same destination device via another network address assigned to the destination device. In other words, the standardized protocols, e.g., Wi-Fi, LTE, etc., in the specific examples, may not be modified in order to support the forwarding scheme as only the local configuration of the network access node may be modified to include the forwarding structure.

As cooperation by the network access nodes may be important, the ability of terminal device 200 to implement the forwarding and common monitoring scheme may depend on whether the associated network access nodes support the forwarding system. Accordingly, if only one of network access node 1106 or network access node 1108 supports forwarding, in some aspects terminal device 200 may only be able to forward data traffic associated with the forwarding-capable network access node to the non-forwarding-capable network access node (and not vice versa). Regardless, only one of the network access nodes may be compatible in order to allow terminal device 200 to utilize the forwarding and common monitoring scheme.

However, if multiple network access nodes support forwarding, e.g., if both network access node 1106 and network access node 1108 support forwarding, terminal device 200 may be able to select which of the RAT connections to temporarily disconnect and which to support the forwarding link. As previously detailed, the forwarding and common monitoring scheme may offer power consumption advantages as terminal device 200 may be able to temporarily deactivate one or more communication modules and have all associated data packets forwarded to other active communication modules, thus consolidating incoming data packet monitoring to the active communication modules. Applications where terminal device 200 has active RAT connections to two or more network access nodes that each are forwarding-capable may therefore be particularly advantageous if one RAT connection is more power-intensive than the other as terminal device 200 may be able to temporarily disconnect the power-intensive RAT connection and forward all associated data to the other RAT connection.

For example, if the second RAT connection over second communication module 306 b requires less power consumption than the first RAT connection over first communication module 306 a , controller 308 may elect to initiate first RAT-to-second RAT forwarding and thus transmit a forwarding setup instruction to network access node 1108 that specifies the second RAT network address of terminal device 200 as the destination network address.

In some aspects, controller 308 may consider factors instead of or in addition to power consumption in deciding which RAT connection to disconnect and which to support the forwarding link (which may only be viable in scenarios where multiple RAT connections are provided by forwarding-capable network access nodes). For example, controller 308 may consider which RAT connections are most ‘active’, e.g., which RAT connections are receiving the heaviest data traffic, and/or which RAT connections are most likely to receive data such as, for example, paging messages. As previously introduced, common monitoring may be particularly advantageous for idle-mode monitoring for messages such as paging messages and other control information (although all data is considered applicable). As each RAT connection of terminal device 200 may operate separately and may utilize different scheduling and formatting parameters, the various RAT connections may have different traffic loads at any given time.

For example, each RAT connection may be in an active or idle state (where radio access technologies may also have other activity states), where active RAT connections may be allocated dedicated radio resources and idle RAT connections may not have any dedicated radio resources allocated. Active RAT connections may thus have a large amount of data traffic (e.g., downlink and uplink control and user data) while idle RAT connections may have a minimal amount of data traffic (e.g., limited to paging messages).

Due to the relatively heavy data traffic of active RAT connections compared to idle RAT connections, controller 308 may elect to consolidate data traffic for idle RAT connections onto the active RAT connection by establishing a forwarding link at the network access node for the idle RAT connection that forwards data to the active RAT connection. As such may require the active RAT connection to transmit both the forwarded data and the existing data of the active RAT connection, the forwarded data traffic may be light enough that the active RAT connection does not become overloaded.

For example, the idle RAT connection may only provide paging messages over the forwarding link to the active RAT, which may be relatively infrequent and only contain a small amount of data; accordingly, it may be unlikely that forwarding links will become overloaded. Conversely, if controller 308 elects to consolidate e.g., a video stream from an active RAT connection onto another active RAT connection, the latter RAT connection may become overloaded (although such may depend on the capacity and current traffic scenario of the network access node tasked with forwarding).

Controller 308 may therefore be configured to select which RAT connections to temporarily disconnect and which RAT connection to activate as a forwarding link based on data traffic loads. Controller 308 may additionally consider which RAT connection is most likely to receive incoming data; for example, a given RAT connection may generally receive incoming data such as, for example, paging messages more frequently than another RAT connection, which may be due to the underlying access protocols and/or the current status of the RAT connection. Controller 308 may thus identify which RAT connection is more likely to receive incoming data and which RAT connection is less likely to receive incoming data and subsequently assign the ‘more likely’ RAT connection as a forwarding link for the ‘less likely’ RAT connection.

Controller 308 may additionally or alternatively be configured to consider the coverage range of the network access nodes associated with each RAT connection in selecting which RAT connection to disconnect and which to use for the forwarding link. For example, cellular network access nodes (e.g., base stations) may generally have a substantially larger coverage area than short-range network access nodes (e.g., WLAN APs, Bluetooth master devices, etc.), where similar comparisons may generally be established for various radio access technologies.

As the RAT connection associated with the larger coverage area will support a larger range of mobility of terminal device 200 , controller 308 may elect to temporarily disconnect the RAT connection with the shorter range (e.g., by transmitting a forwarding setup instruction to the network access node providing the RAT connection with the shorter range) and thus utilize the RAT connection with the greater range as the forwarding link. In the exemplary setting of FIG. 11 , controller 308 may therefore select to temporarily disconnect the second RAT connection provided by network access node 1106 and thus utilize the first RAT connection via network access node 1108 as the forwarding link.

Not only may cellular network access nodes provide a larger coverage area than short-range network access nodes, many cellular radio access networks may collectively provide more consistent coverage over large geographic areas. For example, Wi-Fi network access nodes that are available to terminal device 200 (e.g., that terminal device 200 has permission or credentials to connect to) may only be sporadically available on a geographic basis, e.g., such as in a home, office, or certain other public or private locations, and may generally not form a continuous geographic region of availability. Accordingly, if terminal device 200 moves outside of the coverage area of e.g., network access node 1106 , terminal device 200 may not have any available Wi-Fi network access nodes to connect to. Consequently, if terminal device 200 selects to use a Wi-Fi connection as a forwarding link and later moves out of the coverage of the associated Wi-Fi network access node, terminal device 200 may not be able to continue to use the Wi-Fi connection as a forwarding link.

However, cellular radio access networks may generally have a largely continuous coverage area collectively formed by each cell, thus providing that terminal device 200 will have another cellular network access node available even if terminal device 200 moves outside of the coverage area of network access node 1108 . Accordingly, controller 308 may additionally or alternatively also consider which underlying radio access network provides more continuous coverage, where cellular radio access networks and other long-range radio access networks are generally considered to provide more continuous coverage than short-range radio access network such as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

Additionally or alternatively, in some aspects controller 308 may consider the delay and/or latency demands of one or more RAT connections. For example, certain data streams such as voice and other multimedia streaming may have strict delay and latency demands, e.g., may not be able to tolerate large amounts of delay/latency. Accordingly, if one of the RAT connections have strict delay/latency demands, controller 308 may elect to temporarily disconnect another RAT connection and continue to utilize the RAT connection with strict delay/latency demands as the forwarding link as such may preserve the ability of the strict RAT connection to continue to seamlessly receive the underlying data.

Additionally or alternatively, in some aspects controller 308 may consider the security requirements of one or more RAT connections. For example, certain data streams may have high priority security requirements and thus may be transferred only over secure links. Accordingly, if, for example, one of the RAT connections has very strict security requirements, controller 308 may elect to temporarily disconnect another RAT connection and continue to utilize the RAT connection with strict security requirements as the forwarding link.

Controller 308 may thus be configured to utilize any one or combination of these factors in selecting which RAT connection to use as a forwarding link and which RAT connection to temporarily disconnect (e.g., which to consolidate onto the forward link).

Controller 308 may additionally or alternatively be configured to adapt or switch the forwarding link based on the changing statuses of the RAT connections. For example, in an exemplary scenario of FIG. 11 where controller 308 consolidates Wi-Fi traffic onto the LTE connection via a forwarding link, the Wi-Fi connection may initially be in an idle state while the LTE connection may initially be in an active state. However, upon receipt of a forwarded Wi-Fi data packet or network management message over the LTE connection, controller 308 may activate second communication module 306 b in order to receive the incoming Wi-Fi data. As the Wi-Fi connection has therefore transitioned from idle to active and the LTE connection remains active, controller 308 may not implement any forwarding; however, if the LTE connection eventually transitions to idle, controller 308 may consolidate the LTE connection onto the Wi-Fi connection by transmitting a forwarding setup instruction to network access node 1108 that instructs network access node 1108 to forward incoming LTE data packets to the Wi-Fi network address of terminal device 200 .

Likewise, if both the LTE and the Wi-Fi connections are initially idle, controller 308 may select to consolidate data traffic from one RAT connection onto the other via a forwarding link and proceed to only monitor for data traffic on the remaining active RAT connection, for example, by establishing a forwarding link at network access node 1108 that re-routes LTE data packets addressed to terminal device 200 to the Wi-Fi connection.

If controller 308 then receives a forwarded LTE data packet from network access node 1106 over the Wi-Fi connection that contains an LTE paging message, controller 308 may subsequently activate first communication module 306 a to support the now-active LTE connection and ‘switch’ the forwarding link by de-activating the existing forwarding link at network access node 1108 (via a forwarding deactivation instruction) to establish a new forwarding link at network access node 1106 (via a forwarding setup instruction) that forwards Wi-Fi data traffic for the still-idle Wi-Fi connection to the now-active LTE connection. All such variations are thus within the scope of this disclosure.

While the forwarding links detailed above have been described as being explicitly activated and de-activated with forwarding setup and deactivation instructions, respectively, in some aspects controller 308 may establish a forwarding link with an expiry period after which the forwarding network access node may terminate the forwarding link. For example, controller 308 may decide to establish a forwarding link for a certain time period, e.g., defined in the order of milliseconds, seconds, minutes, hours, etc., and accordingly may explicitly identify an expiry period in a forwarding setup instruction provided to a network access node, e.g., network access node 1106 . Upon receipt and identification of the forwarding setup instruction, control module 1208 may register the forwarding link as a forwarding entry in forwarding table 1112 and additionally trigger an associated timer with an expiry time equal to the expiry period specified in the forwarding setup instruction. Control module 1208 may then forward all data packets addressed to terminal device 200 according to the registered forwarding link until the timer expires, after which control module 1208 may unilaterally deactivate the forwarding link (e.g., by setting the active flag to ‘off’ or deleting the forwarding entry from forwarding table 1112 ) and refrain from re-routing any further data packets addressed to terminal device 200 (until e.g., another forwarding setup message is received).

The RAT connections involved in the forwarding and common monitoring scheme detailed above may also be part of a multi-SIM scheme where e.g., some RAT connections are associated with a first SIM and other RAT connections are associated with a second SIM.

FIG. 14 shows method 1400 of performing radio communications in connection with the forwarding and common monitoring scheme detailed above. As shown in FIG. 14 , method 1400 includes transmitting and receiving data over a first radio access connection with a first network access node ( 1410 ), transmitting and receiving data over a second radio access connection with a second network access node ( 1420 ), wherein the first radio access connection and the second radio access connection utilize different radio access technologies, establishing a forwarding link that instructs the first network access node to re-route data intended for the first radio access connection to the second radio access connection ( 1430 ), and receiving data for the first radio access connection and the second radio access connection over the second radio access connection ( 1440 ).

In one or more further exemplary aspects of the disclosure, one or more of the features described above in reference to FIGS. 11 - 13 may be further incorporated into method 1400 . In particular, method 1400 may be configured to perform further and/or alternate processes as detailed regarding terminal device 200 .

2 Power-Efficiency

Power management may be an important consideration for both network access nodes and terminal devices in radio communication networks. For example, terminal devices may need to employ power-efficient designs to reduce battery drain and increase operation time while network access nodes may strive for power efficiency in order to reduce operating costs. Power-efficient designs and features may therefore be exceedingly valuable.

FIG. 15 shows radio communication network 1500 in accordance with some aspects, which may include terminal devices 1502 and 1504 in addition to network access nodes 1510 and 1512 . Although certain aspects of this disclosure may describe certain radio communication network setting (such as e.g., an LTE, UMTS, GSM, other 3 rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) networks, WLAN/Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 5G, mmWave, etc.), the subject matter detailed herein is considered demonstrative in nature and may therefore be analogously applied to any other radio communication network. The number of network access nodes and terminal devices in radio communication network 1500 is exemplary and is scalable to any amount.

Accordingly, in an exemplary cellular setting network access nodes 1510 and 1512 may be base stations (e.g., eNodeBs, NodeBs, Base Transceiver Stations (BTSs), etc.) while terminal devices 1502 and 1504 may be cellular terminal devices (e.g., Mobile Stations (MSs), User Equipments (UEs), etc.). Network access nodes 1510 and 1512 may therefore interface (e.g., via backhaul interfaces) with a cellular core network such as an Evolved Packet Core (EPC, for LTE), Core Network (CN, for UMTS), or other cellular core network, which may also be considered part of radio communication network 1500 . The cellular core network may interface with one or more external data networks. In an exemplary short-range setting, network access node 1510 and 1512 may be access points (APs, e.g., WLAN or Wi-Fi APs) while terminal device 1502 and 1504 may be short range terminal devices (e.g., stations (STAs)). Network access nodes 1510 and 1512 may interface (e.g., via an internal or external router) with one or more external data networks.

Network access nodes 1510 and 1512 (and other network access nodes of radio communication network 1500 not explicitly shown in FIG. 15 ) may accordingly provide a radio access network to terminal devices 1502 and 1504 (and other terminal devices of radio communication network 1500 not explicitly shown in FIG. 15 ). In an exemplary cellular setting, the radio access network provided by network access nodes 1510 and 1512 may enable terminal devices 1502 and 1504 to wirelessly access the core network via radio communications. The core network may provide switching, routing, and transmission of traffic data related to terminal devices 1502 and 1504 and may provide access to various internal (e.g., control nodes, other terminal devices on radio communication network 1500 , etc.) and external data networks (e.g., data networks providing voice, text, multimedia (audio, video, image), and other Internet and application data). In an exemplary short-range setting, the radio access network provided by network access nodes 1510 and 1512 may provide access to internal (e.g., other terminal devices connected to radio communication network 1500 ) and external data networks (e.g., data networks providing voice, text, multimedia (audio, video, image), and other Internet and application data). Network access nodes 1510 and 1512 may be network access nodes for any other type of radio access technology and analogously provide a radio access network to proximate terminal devices in this manner.

The radio access network and core network (if applicable) of radio communication network 1500 may be governed by network protocols that may vary depending on the specifics of radio communication network 1500 . Such network protocols may define the scheduling, formatting, and routing of both user and control data traffic through radio communication network 1500 , which includes the transmission and reception of such data through both the radio access and core network domains of radio communication network 1500 . Accordingly, terminal devices 1502 and 1504 and network access nodes 1510 and 1512 may follow the defined network protocols to transmit and receive data over the radio access network domain of radio communication network 1500 while the core network may follow the defined network protocols to route data within and outside of the core network. Exemplary network protocols include LTE, UMTS, GSM, WiMAX, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, mmWave, etc., any of which may be applicable to radio communication network 1500 .

Both the radio access network and core network of radio communication network 1500 may be governed by network protocols that may vary depending on the specifics of radio communication network 1500 . Such network protocols may define the scheduling, formatting, and routing of both user and control data traffic through radio communication network 1500 , which includes the transmission and reception of such data through both the radio access and core network domains of radio communication network 1500 . Accordingly, terminal devices 1502 and 1504 and network access nodes 1510 and 1512 may follow the defined network protocols to transmit and receive data over the radio access network domain of radio communication network 1500 while the core network may follow the defined network protocols to route data within and outside of the core network. Exemplary network protocols include LTE, UMTS, GSM, WiMax, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, etc., or other 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G, next generation like 6G, etc. technologies either already developed or to be developed, any of which may be applicable to radio communication network 1500 .

FIG. 16 shows an internal configuration of terminal device 1502 , which may include antenna system 1602 , radio frequency (RF) transceiver 1604 , baseband modem 1606 (including physical layer processing module 1608 and controller 1610 ), data source 1612 , memory 1614 , data sink 1616 , and power supply 1618 . Although not explicitly shown in FIG. 16 , terminal device 1502 may include one or more additional hardware, software, and/or firmware components (such as processors/microprocessors, controllers/microcontrollers, other specialty or generic hardware/processors/circuits, etc.), peripheral device(s), memory, power supply, external device interface(s), subscriber identity module(s) (SIMs), user input/output devices (display(s), keypad(s), touchscreen(s), speaker(s), external button(s), camera(s), microphone(s), etc.), etc.

Terminal device 1502 may transmit and receive radio signals on one or more radio access networks. Baseband modem 1606 may direct such communication functionality of terminal device 1502 according to the communication protocols associated with each radio access network, and may execute control over antenna system 1602 and RF transceiver 1604 in order to transmit and receive radio signals according to the formatting and scheduling parameters defined by each communication protocol. Although various practical designs may include separate communication subsystems for each supported radio access technology (e.g., a separate antenna, RF transceiver, physical layer processing module, and controller), for purposes of conciseness the configuration of terminal device 1502 shown in FIG. 16 depicts only a single instance of each such components.

Terminal device 1502 may transmit and receive radio signals with antenna system 1602 , which may be a single antenna or an antenna array including multiple antennas and may additionally include analog antenna combination and/or beamforming circuitry. In the receive path (RX), RF transceiver 1604 may receive analog radio frequency signals from antenna system 1602 and perform analog and digital RF front-end processing on the analog radio frequency signals to produce digital baseband samples (e.g., In-Phase/Quadrature (IQ) samples) to provide to baseband modem 206 . RF transceiver 1604 may accordingly include analog and digital reception components including amplifiers (e.g., a Low Noise Amplifier (LNA)), filters, RF demodulators (e.g., an RF IQ demodulator)), and analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) to convert the received radio frequency signals to digital baseband samples. In the transmit path (TX), RF transceiver 1604 may receive digital baseband samples from baseband modem 1606 and perform analog and digital RF front-end processing on the digital baseband samples to produce analog radio frequency signals to provide to antenna system 1602 for wireless transmission. RF transceiver 1604 may thus include analog and digital transmission components including amplifiers (e.g., a Power Amplifier (PA), filters, RF modulators (e.g., an RF IQ modulator), and digital-to-analog converters (DACs) to mix the digital baseband samples received from baseband modem 1606 to produce the analog radio frequency signals for wireless transmission by antenna system 1602 . Baseband modem 1606 may control the RF transmission and reception of RF transceiver 1604 , including specifying the transmit and receive radio frequencies for operation of RF transceiver 1604 .

As shown in FIG. 16 , baseband modem 1606 may include physical layer processing module 1608 , which may perform physical layer (Layer 1) transmission and reception processing to prepare outgoing transmit data provided by controller 1610 for transmission via RF transceiver 1604 and prepare incoming received data provided by RF transceiver 1604 for processing by controller 1610 . Physical layer processing module 3488 may accordingly perform one or more of error detection, forward error correction encoding/decoding, channel coding and interleaving, physical channel modulation/demodulation, physical channel mapping, radio measurement and search, frequency and time synchronization, antenna diversity processing, power control and weighting, rate matching, retransmission processing, etc. Physical layer processing module 1608 may be structurally realized as a hardware-defined module, e.g., as one or more dedicated hardware circuits or FPGAs, as a software-defined module, e.g., as a processor configured to retrieve and execute program code defining arithmetic, control, and I/O instructions (e.g., software and/or firmware) stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, or as a mixed hardware-defined and software-defined module. Although not explicitly shown in FIG. 16 , physical layer processing module 1608 may include a physical layer controller configured to retrieve and execute software-defined instructions that control the various hardware and software processing components of physical layer processing module 1608 in accordance with physical layer control logic defined by the communications protocol for the relevant radio access technologies. Furthermore, while physical layer processing module 1608 is depicted as a single component in FIG. 16 , in some aspects physical layer processing module 1608 may be collectively implemented as separate sections of physical layer processing components where each respective section is dedicated to the physical layer processing of a particular radio access technology.

Terminal device 1502 may be configured to operate according to one or more radio access technologies, which may be directed by controller 1610 . Controller 1610 may thus be responsible for controlling the radio communication components of terminal device 1502 (antenna system 1602 , RF transceiver 1604 , and physical layer processing module 1608 ) in accordance with the communication protocols of each supported radio access technology, and accordingly may represent the Access Stratum and Non-Access Stratum (NAS) (also encompassing Layer 2 and Layer 3) of each supported radio access technology. In some aspects, controller 1610 may be structurally embodied as a protocol processor configured to execute protocol software (e.g., from memory 1614 or a local controller or modem memory) and subsequently control the radio communication components of terminal device 1502 in order to transmit and receive communication signals in accordance with the corresponding protocol control logic defined in the protocol software.

Controller 1610 may therefore be configured to manage the radio communication functionality of terminal device 1502 in order to communicate with the various radio and core network components of radio communication network 1500 , and accordingly may be configured according to the communication protocols for multiple radio access technologies. Controller 1610 may either be a unified controller that is collectively responsible for all supported radio access technologies (e.g., LTE and GSM/UMTS) or may be implemented as multiple separate controllers where each controller is a dedicated controller for a particular radio access technology, such as a dedicated LTE controller and a dedicated legacy controller (or alternatively a dedicated LTE controller, dedicated GSM controller, and a dedicated UMTS controller). Regardless, controller 1610 may be responsible for directing radio communication activity of terminal device 1502 according to the communication protocols of the LTE and legacy networks. As previously noted regarding physical layer processing module 1608 , one or both of antenna system 1602 and RF transceiver 1604 may similarly be partitioned into multiple dedicated components that each respectively correspond to one or more of the supported radio access technologies. Depending on the specifics of each such configuration and the number of supported radio access technologies, controller 1610 may be configured to control the radio communication operations of terminal device 1502 in accordance with a master/slave Radio Access Technology (RAT) hierarchical or multi-Subscriber Identify Module (SIM) scheme.

Terminal device 1502 may also include data source 1612 , memory 1614 , data sink 1616 , and power supply 1618 , where data source 1612 may include sources of communication data above controller 1610 (e.g., above the NAS/Layer 3) and data sink 1616 may include destinations of communication data above controller 1610 (e.g., above the NAS/Layer 3). Such may include, for example, an application processor of terminal device 1502 , which may be configured to execute various applications and/or programs of terminal device 1502 at an application layer of terminal device 1502 , such as an Operating System (OS), a User Interface (UI) for supporting user interaction with terminal device 1502 , and/or various user applications. The application processor may interface with baseband modem 1606 (as data source 1612 /data sink 1616 ) as an application layer to transmit and receive user data such as voice data, audio/video/image data, messaging data, application data, basic Internet/web access data, etc., over radio network connection(s) provided by baseband modem 1606 . In the uplink direction, the application layers (data sink 1616 ) can provide data (e.g., Voice Over IP (VoIP) packets, UDP packets, etc.) to baseband modem 1606 , which may then encode, modulate, and transmit the data as radio signals via radio transceiver 1604 and antenna system 1602 . In the downlink direction, baseband modem 1606 may demodulate and decode IQ samples provided by RF transceiver 1604 to generate downlink traffic. Baseband modem 1606 may then provide the downlink traffic to the application layers as data source 1612 . Data source 1612 and data sink 1616 may additionally represent various user input/output devices of terminal device 1502 , such as display(s), keypad(s), touchscreen(s), speaker(s), external button(s), camera(s), microphone(s), etc., which may allow a user of terminal device 1502 to control various communication functions of terminal device 1502 associated with user data.

Memory 1614 may embody a memory component of terminal device 1502 , such as a hard drive or another such permanent memory device. Although not explicitly depicted in FIG. 16 , in some aspects the various other components of terminal device 1502 shown in FIG. 16 may additionally each include integrated permanent and non-permanent memory components, such as for storing software program code, buffering data, etc.

Power supply 1618 may be an electrical power source that provides power to the various electrical components of terminal device 1502 . Depending on the design of terminal device 1502 , power supply 1618 may be a ‘definite’ power source such as a battery (rechargeable or disposable) or an ‘indefinite’ power source such as a wired electrical connection. Operation of the various components of terminal device 1502 may thus pull electrical power from power supply 1618 .

Terminal devices such as terminal devices 1502 and 1504 of FIG. 15 may execute mobility procedures to connect to, disconnect from, and switch between available network access nodes of the radio access network of radio communication network 1500 . As each network access node of radio communication network 1500 may have a specific coverage area, terminal devices 1502 and 1504 may be configured to select and re-select between the available network access nodes in order to maintain a strong radio access connection with the radio access network of radio communication network 1500 . For example, terminal device 1502 may establish a radio access connection with network access node 1510 while terminal device 1504 may establish a radio access connection with network access node 1512 . In the event that the current radio access connection degrades, terminal devices 1502 or 1504 may seek a new radio access connection with another network access node of radio communication network 1500 ; for example, terminal device 1504 may move from the coverage area of network access node 1512 into the coverage area of network access node 1510 . As a result, the radio access connection with network access node 1512 may degrade, which terminal device 1504 may detect via radio measurements such as signal strength or signal quality measurements of network access node 1512 . Depending on the mobility procedures defined in the appropriate network protocols for radio communication network 1500 , terminal device 1504 may seek a new radio access connection (which may be triggered at terminal device 1504 or by the radio access network), such as by performing radio measurements on neighboring network access nodes to determine whether any neighboring network access nodes can provide a suitable radio access connection. As terminal device 1504 may have moved into the coverage area of network access node 1510 , terminal device 1504 may identify network access node 1510 (which may be selected by terminal device 1504 or selected by the radio access network) and transfer to a new radio access connection with network access node 1510 . Such mobility procedures, including radio measurements, cell selection/reselection, and handover are established in the various network protocols and may be employed by terminal devices and the radio access network in order to maintain strong radio access connections between each terminal device and the radio access network across any number of different radio access network scenarios.

The various network activities of terminal devices 1502 and 1504 and network access nodes 1510 and 1512 may necessarily consume power, such as in the transmission, reception, and processing of radio signals. Furthermore, power consumption may not be limited to exclusively network activities as many terminal devices may serve other purposes other than radio communications, such as in the case of e.g., smartphones, laptops, and other user-interactive devices. While terminal devices may generally be low-power devices, many terminal devices may additionally be mobile or portable and may thus need to rely on ‘finite’ battery power. Conversely, network access nodes such as cellular base stations and WLAN APs may generally (although not exclusively) have ‘unlimited’ wired power supplies; however, the high-transmission power and infrastructure support demands may expend considerable power and thus may lead to high operating costs. Accordingly, power-efficient designs may play a vital role in prolonging battery life at terminal devices and reducing operating costs at network access nodes.

Aspects disclosed herein may improve power-efficiency in radio access networks. Such aspects may be realized through efficient operational and structural design at terminal devices and network access nodes in order to reduce power consumption, thus prolonging battery life and reducing operating costs.

2.1 Power-Efficiency #1

According to an aspect of the disclosure, a radio access network may provide multiple different options of radio access channels for terminal devices; for example, as opposed to providing only a single paging, control, traffic data, or random access channel, a radio access network may provide multiple paging/control/random access channels, or multiple ‘channel instances’, that are each tailored to different needs, e.g., to a different power consumption level (e.g., power efficiency) need. Accordingly, terminal devices may be able to selectively choose which channel instances to utilize based on a desired power efficiency, e.g., where some terminal devices may opt for low-power consumption channels (that may offer higher power efficiency at the cost of performance) while other terminal devices may opt for ‘normal’ power consumption channels. In addition to power efficiency, terminal devices may also consider latency and reliability requirements when selecting channel instances. Some aspects may be applied with control, paging, and/or random access channels, where multiple of each may be provided that are each tailored for different power-efficiency, reliability, and latency characteristics. These aspects can be used with common channel aspects, e.g., a common channel tailored to specific power efficiency needs.

Network access nodes and terminal devices may transmit and receive data on certain time-frequency physical channels where each channel may be composed of specific frequency resources (e.g., bands or subcarriers) and defined for specific time periods. The time-frequency resources and data contents of such physical channels may be defined by the associated network access protocols, where e.g., an LTE framework may specify certain time-frequency resources for physical channels that are particular to LTE, a UMTS framework may specify certain time-frequency resources for physical channels that are particular to UMTS, etc. Physical channels may conventionally be allocated as either uplink or downlink channels, where terminal devices may utilize uplink channels to transmit uplink data while network access nodes may utilize downlink channels to transmit downlink data. Physical channels may be further assigned to carry specific types of data, such as specific channels exclusively designated to carry user data traffic and other channels designated to carry certain types of control data.

In various aspects, physical channels may be specific sets of time and/or frequency resources. For example, in some aspects a physical channel may be constantly allocated to a dedicated set of frequency resources, such as a subcarrier (or set of subcarriers) that only carries control data in the exemplary setting of a control channel. Additionally or alternatively, in some aspects a physical channel may be allocated time-frequency resources that vary over time, such as where a physical channel is allocated a varying set of time-frequency resources (e.g., subcarriers and time periods). For example, a paging channel may occupy different time periods and/or subcarriers over time. Accordingly, a physical channel is not limited to a fixed set of time-frequency resources.

The allocation of time-frequency resources for physical channels can depend on the corresponding radio access technology. While LTE will be used to describe the allocation of time-frequency resources for physical channels, this explanation is demonstrative and can be applied without limitation to other radio access technologies. The allocation of time-frequency resources for LTE radio access channels is defined by the 3GPP in 3GPP Technical Specification (TS) 36.211 V13.1.0, “Physical Channels and modulation” (“3GPP TS 36.211”). As detailed in 3GPP TS 36.211, LTE downlink discretizes the system bandwidth over time and frequency using a multi-subcarrier frequency scheme where the system bandwidth is divided into a set of subcarriers that may each carry a symbol during a single symbol period. In time, LTE downlink (for Frequency Division Duplexing (FDD)) utilizes 10 ms radio frames, where each radio frame is divided into 10 subframes each of 1 ms duration. Each subframe is further divided into two slots that each contain 6 or 7 symbol periods depending on the Cyclic Prefix (CP) length. In frequency, LTE downlink utilizes a set of evenly-spaced subcarriers each separated by 15 kHz, where each block of 12 subcarriers over 1 slot is designated as a Resource Block (RB). The base time-frequency resource may thus be a single subcarrier over a single symbol period, defined by the 3GPP as a Resource Element (RE) where each RB thus contains 180 REs.

FIG. 17 depicts exemplary downlink resource grid 1700 in accordance with some aspects, which may be an LTE resource grid showing over two subframes and 1 resource block of subcarriers. Each unit block of downlink resource grid 1700 may represent one RE, e.g., one symbol period for one subcarrier, for a normal CP length. As specified by the 3GPP, downlink subframes may generally be divided into a control and data region, where the first several symbols are allocated for control data in the control region and the remaining symbol are allocated for user data traffic in the data region. Depending on the system bandwidth and control format, each subframe may contain between one and three control symbols at the beginning of each subframe (as indicated by a Control Format Indicator (CFI) provided on the Physical CFI Channel (PCFICH) which appears on certain REs in first symbol of each subframe).

FIG. 17 depicts the control region as containing Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) data. While the data region may generally contain Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) data, REs in both regions may be allocated to other physical channels such as Physical Broadcast Channel (PBCH), Physical Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request (HARQ) Indicator Channel (PHICH), Physical Multicast Channel (PMCH), and the aforementioned PCFICH as detailed in 3GPP TS 36.211. Accordingly, each LTE physical downlink channel may be composed of specific REs (time-frequency resources) that carry data unique to that channel.

The physical time-frequency resources (REs) of the resource grid may therefore be allocated to specific physical channels. Each physical channel may carry specific data provided by one or more transport channels, which may in turn each provide specific data to a particular physical channel that is provided by one or more particular logical channels. FIG. 18 shows an exemplary channel mapping illustrating the transport channel mapping for the PDSCH and PDCCH physical channels. As shown in FIG. 18 , the PDCCH channel may carry Downlink Control Information (DCI) data, which may be control messages addressed to specific UEs that may be transmitted on the PDCCH, while the PDSCH channel may carry data provided by the Paging Channel (PCH) and Downlink Shared Channel (DL-SCH) logical channels. The PCH may carry paging messages addressed to specific UEs while the DL-SCH may mainly carry user data traffic in addition to some control information. Accordingly, while the REs of downlink resource grid 1700 may be directly allocated to physical channels, each physical channel may contain data provided via the associated transport and logical channels including traffic data, control data, and paging data.

A terminal device such as terminal device 1502 or 1504 receiving downlink signals from a network access nodes such as network access node 1510 or 1512 may therefore be able to process each data contained at each time-frequency element of the downlink signal in order to recover the data from each channel. In an exemplary LTE setting, terminal device 1502 may process PDCCH REs in order to recover important control data (specified in a DCI message addressed to terminal device 1502 ) that may identify the presence of other incoming data in the PDSCH REs that is addressed to terminal device 1502 . The type of data indicated in a DCI message may depend on the current radio access status of terminal device 1502 . For example, if terminal device 1502 is currently in a connected radio state terminal device 1502 may be allocated dedicated downlink resources to receive traffic data on the PDSCH. Accordingly, terminal device 1502 may monitor the PDCCH during each subframe to identify DCI messages addressed to terminal device 1502 (e.g., via a Radio Network Temporary Identity (RNTI)), which may specify the location of PDSCH REs containing downlink data intended for terminal device 1502 in addition to other parameters related to the downlink data.

Alternatively, if terminal device 1502 is currently in an idle radio state, terminal device 1502 may not be in position to receive any traffic data on the PDSCH and may instead only be in position to receive paging messages that signal upcoming traffic data intended for terminal device 1502 . Accordingly, terminal device 1502 may monitor the PDCCH in certain subframes (e.g., according to periodic paging occasions) in order to identify paging control messages (DCI messages addressed with a Paging RNTI (P-RNTI)) that indicates that the PDSCH will contain a paging message. Terminal device 1502 (along with other idle mode UEs) may then receive the paging message on the PDSCH and identify whether the paging message is intended for terminal device 1502 (e.g., by means of a System Architecture Evolution (SAE) Temporary Mobile Subscriber Identity (S-TMSI) or International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI) included in the paging message)).

In other words, terminal device 1502 may monitor a control channel and a paging channel for control and paging messages intended for terminal device 1502 , where both the paging channel and the control channel may be composed of specific time-frequency resources. In addition, any reference to LTE is only for demonstrative purposes and is utilized only to provide contextual information for radio resource allocations for physical channels. Various other radio access technologies may also specify control and paging channels composed of specific time-frequency resources that a terminal device may need to monitor for the presence of control and paging messages addressed to the terminal device. Accordingly, physical channels in other radio access technologies may similarly utilize dynamic allocations of time-frequency resources.

Terminal device 1502 may transmit uplink data to a network access node such as network access nodes 1510 and 1512 . While uplink resource grids may utilize a time-frequency discretization scheme similar to downlink resource grids, the resource allocation scheme per terminal device may differ slightly between downlink and uplink. This may depend on the specifics of the radio access technology, and some radio access technologies may use different uplink and downlink allocation schemes and physical layer waveforms in the uplink and downlink while other radio access technologies may use the same uplink and downlink allocation scheme and/or physical layer waveforms in the uplink and downlink. For example, LTE downlink primarily utilizes Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) for multiple access, where RBs may be allocated in a distributed and non-contiguous fashion to different users; accordingly, along the direction of the frequency axis the RBs addressed to a specific user may be interleaved with RBs addressed to other users and may not be neighboring in the downlink resource grid. In contrast, uplink primarily utilizes Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access (SC-FDMA) in which at any point in time only a set of RBs which is contiguous along the direction of the frequency axis may be allocated to a single user.

FIG. 19 shows exemplary uplink resource grid 1900 , which may be an LTE resource grid over 25 resource blocks and two radio frames and may constitute an exemplary 5 MHz system bandwidth for FDD. As indicated above, uplink resource allocations may generally be restricted to utilize only blocks which are contiguous along the direction of the frequency axis. Note that the radio resources of uplink resource grid 1900 are shown on a different scale from downlink resource grid 1700 where each unit block of uplink resource grid 1900 represents the subcarriers of a single resource block over one subframe (two resource blocks in total).

As denoted by the shading in FIG. 19 , the time-frequency resources of uplink resource grid 1900 may also be allocated to specific uplink physical channels including the Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH), Physical Uplink Shared Channel (PUSCH), and Physical Random Access Channel (PRACH). PUCCH allocations may generally be at the upper and lower ends of the system bandwidth while the remaining portion of the system bandwidth may generally be allocated for PUSCH transmissions. Accordingly, UEs such as terminal device 1502 may be allocated radio resources (via uplink grants provided by the radio access network on the PDCCH) in order to transmit uplink traffic data on the PUSCH and uplink control data on the PUCCH.

As specified by a wireless communication standard, such as 3GPP TS 36.211, certain resource blocks generally located in the central region of the system bandwidth may be allocated for PRACH transmission. UEs such as terminal device 1502 may utilize the PRACH in order to establish an active radio connection with an eNodeB such as network access node 1510 , which may occur during a transition from an idle to a connected state, during a handover to network access node 1510 , or if timing synchronization with network access node 1510 has been lost. As opposed to the PUCCH and PUSCH radio resources that may each be uniquely allocated to individual UEs, eNodeBs may broadcast system information that identifies the PRACH radio resources (e.g., in form of a System Information Block (SIB)) to all UEs in a cell. Accordingly, PRACH radio resources may be available for use by any one or more UEs. Terminal device 1502 may therefore receive such system information from network access node 1510 in order to identify the PRACH configuration (PRACH Configuration Index), which may specify both the specific radio resources (in time and frequency) allocated for PRACH transmissions, known as a PRACH occasion, and other important PRACH configuration parameters. Terminal device 1502 may then generate and transmit a PRACH transmission containing a unique PRACH preamble that identifies terminal device 1502 during a PRACH occasion. Network access node 1510 may then receive radio data during the PRACH occasion and decode the received radio data in order to recover all PRACH transmissions transmitted by nearby UEs on the basis of the unique PRACH preamble generated by each UE. Network access node 1510 may then initiate establishment of an active radio connection for terminal device 1502 .

Terminal devices may therefore transmit and receive data on specific uplink and downlink channels that are defined as time-frequency radio resources. These channels may include paging, random access, control channels, traffic data channels, and various other channels depending on the particulars of the associated radio access standard. As described above in the exemplary case of LTE, such may include the PDCCH (control), PDSCH (traffic data), PUCCH (control), PUSCH (traffic data), and PRACH (random access), where the PDCCH and PDSCH may also be considered ‘physical’ paging channels due to the transport of paging DCI messages (DCI 1 C, addressed with P-RNTI) on the PDCCH and RRC paging messages on the PDSCH. Regardless of the specifics, physical channels for each radio access technology may be defined in time-frequency resources and may be available for transmission and reception of specific data by terminal devices and network access nodes. Accordingly, while each radio access standard may have a unique physical channel scheme, the common underlying features and usage of all radio access channels renders aspects disclosed herein applicable for radio channels of any radio access technology.

Instead of providing only a single ‘instance’ of such channels, various aspects may provide multiple instances of physical channels that have different characteristics. Furthermore, one or more of the channel instances may have characteristics tailored to a specific power efficiency, specific latency, and/or specific reliability, which may enable terminal devices to select which channel instance to utilize based on their current power efficiency and/or data connection characteristics (including the reliability and latency). The different channel instances may each utilize different settings such as periodicity, time, expected traffic, etc., in order to enable each channel instance to effectively provide desired power-efficiency, latency, and reliability levels. Furthermore, various channel instances may be provided via different radio access technologies, where channel instances provided by lower power radio access technologies may present a more power efficient option than other channel instances provided by higher power radio access technologies. Likewise, certain radio access technologies may provide greater reliability and/or lower latency, thus providing channel instances of varying reliability and latency across different radio access technologies.

FIG. 20 shows an exemplary network scenario for radio communication network 2000 according to an aspect of the disclosure. As shown in FIG. 20 , radio communication network 2000 may include terminal device 1502 , network access node 2002 , network access node 2004 , network access node 2006 , and core network 2008 . In some aspects, network access nodes 2002 - 2006 may be configured according to the same radio access technology, while in other aspects network access node 2002 - 2006 may be configured according to different radio access technologies. For example, in an exemplary scenario, network access node 2002 may be cellular base station while network access nodes 2004 and 2006 may be short-range access points, such as eNodeB 2002 , WLAN AP 2004 , and Bluetooth Low Energy (BT LE) node 2006 . Other exemplary scenarios with various radio access technologies are also within the scope of this disclosure.

Network access nodes 2002 - 2006 may be part of the radio access network of the radio communication network 2000 in order to provide radio access connections to terminal devices, such as terminal device 1502 , thus providing a connection to core network 2008 and to other external data networks (such as external Packet Data Networks (PDNs), Internet Protocol (IP) Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) servers, and other Internet-accessible data networks). The description of radio communication network 2000 below is demonstrative and any radio access technology may be incorporated into radio communication network 2000 . This includes, for example, other 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G, etc. technologies either already developed or to be developed.

Terminal device 1502 may transmit and receive radio signals on various physical channels with the various network access nodes 2002 - 2006 of radio communication network 2000 . Network access nodes 2002 - 2006 may provide their respective physical channels according to the specifics of their respective RATs, which as previously indicated may be the same or different.

One or more of network access nodes 2002 - 2006 may offer a single ‘instance’ of each channel type, for example, with additional reference to FIG. 17 . Network access node 2002 may provide a single control channel instance where the control channel for each subframe has a constant and uniform configuration. Similarly, network access node 2002 may provide a single random access channel instance (by monitoring for uplink random access channel transmissions during random access channel occasions) according to a random access channel configuration, a single data traffic channel instance, a single uplink control channel instance, single uplink data traffic channel instance, etc. Stated another way, terminal device 1502 may not be free to select between multiple instances of each specific channel.

Thus, according to an aspect of the disclosure, network access nodes such as network access node 2002 may provide multiple channel instances, e.g., multiple physical channel configurations for a given channel type, thus enabling terminal devices to select between the channel instances according to an operational profile of a terminal device. As shown in FIG. 20 , in an exemplary application, network access node 2002 may provide a broadcast channel BCH, a first and second paging channel PCH 1 and PCH 2 , a first and second random access channel RACH 1 and RACH 2 , and/or a first and second control channel CCH 1 and CCH 2 . Terminal devices served by network access node 2002 may therefore have the option to select between the different channel instances (PCH 1 vs. PCH 2 , RACH 1 vs. RACH 2 , CCH 1 vs. CCH 2 ) when transmitting and receiving relevant data. Although specific channel types are denoted herein, in some aspects network access nodes such as network access node 2002 may provide other types of channel instances such as multiple traffic data channel instances, e.g., a first and second downlink data traffic channel, a first and second uplink data traffic channel, etc. Additionally or alternatively, the number of channel instances for each channel type can be scaled to any quantity.

One or more of the channel instances may be configured differently in order to have specific characteristics, e.g., in order to provide different levels of power efficiency, different levels of latency, and/or different levels of reliability. For example, PCH 1 may be configured to enable lower power expenditure than PCH 2 for terminal devices that utilize the channels; likewise, CCH 1 may offer lower power expenditures than CCH 2 while RACH 1 may offer lower power expenditures than RACH 2 . Alternatively, PCH 2 may provide lower latency and/or higher reliability than PCH 1 . The differing configurations and resulting power-efficiency, latency, and reliability characteristics may provide terminal devices with varying options in terms of which channel instances to utilize.

As each of the channel instances may function independently (e.g., logically separate from the other channel instances), each channel instance may be allocated a different set of time-frequency radio resources. FIGS. 21 and 22 depict exemplary channel resource allocations according to some aspects, with downlink resource grid 2100 showing a traffic channel (TCH), control channel instances CCH 1 and CCH 2 , and paging channel instances PCH 1 and PCH 2 , while uplink resource grid 2200 shows control channel CCH, traffic channel TCH, and random access channel instances RACH 1 and RACH 2 . The channel resource allocation shown in FIG. 22 is exemplary and similar channel resource allocations can be realized for various different radio access technologies.

As shown in FIG. 21 , network access node 2002 may provide CCH 1 in the first two symbols of each subframe and CCH 2 in the third symbol of each subframe; accordingly, terminal devices may have the option to utilize CCH 1 if power efficiency is not of concern or to use CCH 2 if power efficiency is of concern. As CCH 2 includes less time-frequency elements, terminal devices may be able to decode CCH 2 with less processing power and may accordingly be able to limit power expenditure when utilizing CCH 2 . As described above regarding downlink resource grid 1700 , in some aspects the control channel can additionally carry paging control messages (e.g., DCI messes addressed with a P-RNTI in an exemplary LTE setting), which idle mode terminal devices may need to monitor for in order to identify that the upcoming TCH will contain a paging message. Accordingly, CCH 1 may also serve as PCH 1 . Terminal devices utilizing PCH 1 may therefore monitor CCH 1 (e.g., according to an assigned DRX cycle) for paging control messages.

These radio resource allocations are exemplary, and there exist numerous different variations for radio resource allocations for the various channel instances and all such variations are considered within the scope of this disclosure. For example, other physical channel configurations for the various channel instances may provide higher reliability and/or latency, e.g., where paging channels with a shorter period may provide for lower-latency paging (with higher energy costs) while paging channels with a longer period have higher-latency paging. The radio resource allocation (or possible sets of radio resource allocations) may be part of a defined standard, which may thus enable both terminal devices and network access nodes to have knowledge of the radio resources allocated for each channel instance. As will be described, the radio access network may broadcast the configuration information for each channel instance in order to provide terminal devices with the information necessary to access each channel instance.

With continued reference to FIG. 20 , in some aspects the radio access network may additionally provide channel instances on different radio access technologies. The differences between the radio access technologies may also introduce differences in power-efficiency, latency, and/or reliability in each of the channel instances. As shown in FIG. 20 , network access node 2004 and network access node 2006 may additionally interface with network access node 2002 . Accordingly, network access node 2004 and network access node 2006 may cooperate with network access node 2002 in order to provide further channel instances on their respective radio access technologies. For example, network access node 2002 may be configured according to a first radio access technology, network access node 2004 may be configured according to a second radio access technology, and network access node 2006 may be configured according to a third radio access technology. Network access node 2004 and network access node 2006 may then additionally provide paging channel instances PCH 3 and PCH 4 on the second and third radio access technologies, respectively (which may also occur on different frequency resources from those employed by network access node 2002 , such as on an unlicensed band compared to a licensed band employed by network access node 2002 ). Accordingly, in addition to the paging channel instances PCH 1 and PCH 2 provided by network access node 2002 on the first radio access technology, terminal device 1502 may be able to utilize PCH 3 and PCH 4 using the second or third radio access technology, respectively. Network access nodes 2002 - 2006 may additionally or alternatively cooperate in order to provide any such channel instances, e.g., random access channel instances, control channel instances, traffic data channel instances, etc. As network access node 2004 and network access node 2006 interface with network access node 2002 , cooperation between network access nodes 2002 - 2006 may be straightforward in order to forward data between the network access nodes and manage all such channel instances.

Terminal device 1502 may therefore be able to select between the various channel instances when exchanging uplink and downlink data with the radio access network collectively composed of network access node 2002 , network access node 2004 , and network access node 2006 . For example, terminal device 1502 may be able to select either channel instance in terms of random access channel, paging channel, and control channel in order to transmit or receive the associated data. Terminal device 1502 may select channel instances based on an ‘operational profile’ of terminal device 1502 , which may depend on the current power, latency, and reliability requirements of terminal device 1502 .

For example, certain types of terminal devices may serve certain applications that result in specific power, latency, and reliability requirements. For example, various devices dedicated to IoT applications may have extreme battery life requirements, such as certain types of sensors designed for operation over several years at a time without recharging or battery replacement, and may consequently require high power-efficiency. A non-limiting example can be a temperature sensor in a forest with a target battery lifetime of e.g., 10 years. The IoT applications served by these devices are typically more latency tolerant, and consequently may not have strict latency requirements compared to other devices.

Other types of terminal devices may be dedicated to V2X or machine control communications, such as vehicular terminal devices for autonomous driving or remote control for robots in a factory or production hall. Due to the critical and time-sensitive nature of such communications, these devices can have extremely high reliability requirements and low-latency requirements. Extreme battery life may in some cases not be as consequential, as recharging may be more regularly available.

Other types of terminal devices may be ‘multi-purpose’ devices, such as smartphones, tablets, laptops, which may be heavily user-interactive and serve a diverse set of applications depending on use by the user. The power, latency, and reliability characteristics may vary depending on the applications being used. For example, a user could use a multipurpose terminal device for a variety of applications including, without limitation, mobile real-time gaming, credit card reader, voice/video calls, or and web browsing. Mobile real-time gaming may have low latency requirements, which may be more important than reliability and power-efficiency. Credit card reader applications may place higher importance on reliability than latency or power efficiency. Power efficiency may be more important for voice/video calls and web browsing, but there may not be as ‘extreme’ power-efficiency requirements as in the case of devices with certain IoT applications.

FIG. 23 shows method 2300 in accordance with some aspects, which terminal device 1502 may execute in order to select and utilize a specific radio access channel instance based on an operational profile of terminal device 1502 , which may depend on the power efficiency, latency, and reliability demands of terminal device 1502 . Terminal device 1502 may primarily execute the control logic of method 2300 at controller 1610 , which may utilize the radio transmission and reception services provided by antenna system 1602 , RF transceiver 1604 , and physical layer processing module 1608 in order to trigger transmission and reception of radio signals over the radio access network. As previously noted, while FIG. 16 depicts antenna system 1602 , RF transceiver 1604 , and physical layer processing module 1608 as single components for purposes of conciseness, each of antenna system 1602 , RF transceiver 1604 , and physical layer processing module 1608 may contain radio communication components for multiple radio access technologies, such as LTE, UMTS, GSM, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, mmWave, 5G, etc.

In 2310 , controller 1610 may receive channel configuration information from the radio access network, e.g., network access node 2002 , that specifies the available or multiple channel instances and the physical channel configurations of each available or multiple channel instance. Network access node 2002 may transmit such channel configuration information in a broadcast format, such as with system information (e.g., SIB) or as a similar broadcast message. For example, in the setting of FIG. 20 , the channel configuration information may specify the available multiple channel instances. The channel configuration may also specify the radio access technology and the radio resources allocated for each channel instance. Additionally, to allow terminal devices to evaluate each of the channel instances, network access node 2002 may provide further information detailing the specific characteristics of each channel instance, such as the power-efficiency, reliability, and latency of each channel instance.

Controller 1610 may therefore be able to identify each of the channel instances in 2310 from the channel configuration information. Controller 1610 may then select a channel instance in 2320 . The type of channel instance selected by controller 1610 may depend on what type of controller 1610 is executing method 2300 to select. For example, controller 1610 may select a random access channel instance to perform RACH procedures, a control channel instance to transmit or receive control information, a paging channel instance in order to monitor for idle mode paging messages, a traffic data channel instance to transmit or receive traffic data on, etc.

In 2320 , as there may be multiple channel instances specified for each channel type, controller 1610 may evaluate the channel instances based on a current operational profile of terminal device 1502 in order to select a channel instance from the multiple channel instances. For example, controller 1610 may determine the current operational profile of terminal device 1502 in 2320 based on a power efficiency requirement, a reliability requirement of a data connection, and/or a latency requirement of terminal device 1502 . As another example, as previously indicated different types of terminal devices may serve different types of applications, and may consequently have varying power-efficiency, latency, and reliability requirements. Non-limiting examples introduced above include terminal devices for IoT applications (extreme power efficiency requirements with less importance on latency and reliability), terminal devices for V2X or machine control applications (extreme reliability and low latency requirements), and multi-purpose terminal devices for a variety of user-centric applications (higher power-efficiency requirements, but not to the level of extreme power efficiency requirements). Other types of devices and types of supported applications may also influence the power-efficiency, reliability, and latency requirements of terminal device 1502 .

Controller 1610 may therefore select the operational profile of terminal device 1502 based on the power-efficiency, reliability, and latency requirements of terminal device 1502 , which may in turn depend on the type of terminal device and types of applications supported by terminal device 1502 . In some aspects, one or more of the power-efficiency, reliability, or latency requirements of terminal device 1502 may be preprogrammed into controller 1610 .

In some aspects, the operational profile may be preprogrammed into controller 1610 . For example, if terminal device 1502 is an IoT application terminal device, an operational profile (that prioritizes power-efficiency) and/or power-efficiency, latency, and reliability requirements of terminal device 1502 may be preprogrammed into controller 1610 . Similarly, if terminal device 1502 is a multi-purpose or V2X/machine control terminal device, the corresponding operational profile and/or power-efficiency, latency, and reliability requirements may be preprogrammed into controller 1610 . Controller 1610 may therefore reference the preprogrammed operational profile and/or power-efficiency, latency, and reliability requirements in 2320 to identify the operational profile.

In some aspects, the applications served by terminal device 1502 may vary over time. For example, multi-purpose terminal devices may execute different applications depending on user interaction. Other types of terminal devices may also execute different applications over time. Accordingly, in some aspects the power-efficiency, latency, and reliability requirements of terminal devices may change over time. Controller 1610 may therefore also evaluate the current applications being executed by terminal device 1502 , in particular those that rely on network connectivity. Accordingly, controller 1610 may consider the current connection requirements, e.g., latency and reliability, of terminal device 1502 in 2320 as part of the operational profile. For example, if terminal device 1502 is a multi-purpose terminal device that is currently executing real-time gaming application, terminal device 1502 may have strict latency requirements. If terminal device 1502 is a multi-purpose terminal device that is executing a voice call, terminal device 1502 may have important power-efficiency requirements. Other cases may similarly yield connection requirements (e.g., latency and reliability requirements) for terminal device 1502 . In some aspects, controller 1610 may interface with an application processor (data source 1612 /data sink 1616 ) running applications (e.g., via Attention (AT) commands) in order to identify the current connection requirements of applications being executed by terminal device 1502 . In some aspects, controller 1610 may consider other factors in determining the operational profile, such as e.g., whether a user has provided user input that specifies a power-efficiency, latency, or reliability requirement. In a non-limiting example, a user may activate a power-saving mode at terminal device 1502 , which may indicate stricter power-efficiency requirements of terminal device 1502 .

Accordingly, depending on the current power efficiency, latency, and reliability requirements of terminal device 1502 , controller 1610 may determine the operational profile. Controller 1610 may then evaluate the multiple channel instances in 2320 based on the operational profile in order to identify a channel instance that best matches the operational profile. According to an exemplary aspect, controller 1610 may therefore evaluate the multiple channel instances based on power efficiency, latency, and reliability in 2320 in order to identify a channel instance that matches the operational profile.

Controller 1610 may thus apply predetermined evaluation logic to each of the multiple channel instances in order to identify which channel instances meet the power efficiency, reliability, and latency requirements as characterized by the operational profile. Accordingly, based on the physical channel configuration for each channel instance, controller 1610 may identify which channel instances are power-efficient, which channel instances are low-latency, and which channel instances are high-reliability. Using predetermined evaluation logic, controller 1610 may identify in 2320 which channel instances match the demands of the operational profile of terminal device 1502 .

For example, in an exemplary scenario, controller 1610 may be performing method 2300 to identify a paging channel instance for the radio access network of radio communication network 2000 . Controller 1610 may determine in 2320 that the operational profile of terminal device 1502 requires power efficiency. Accordingly, in 2320 controller 1610 may evaluate the multiple paging channel instances PCH 1 , PCH 2 , PCH 3 , and PCH 4 to identify which paging channel provides power efficiency. Controller 1610 may therefore evaluate the physical channel configuration information of each of PCH 1 , PCH 2 , PCH 3 , and PCH 4 to identify which paging channel instance is the most power efficient.

If controller 1610 considers the third radio access technology (supported by network access node 2006 ) to be the most power efficient, controller 1610 may select PCH 4 as a paging channel instance in 2320 . Alternatively, controller 1610 may determine that the physical channel configuration of PCH 2 is the most-power efficient in 2320 , such as based on the periodicity and time-frequency resource distribution of the physical channel configuration.

In another exemplary scenario, controller 1610 may be applying method 2300 to select a control channel instance and may determine in 2320 that the operational profile of terminal device 1502 requires low-latency, such as due to an active data connection that has high latency sensitivity. Controller 1610 may thus evaluate the physical channel configurations of the multiple channel instances in 2320 to identify which channel instance provides low latency, e.g., by identifying that CCH 1 has lower latency than CCH 2 . Controller 1610 may thus select CCH 1 in 2320 .

Numerous such evaluation results are possible. In some aspects, the evaluation logic used by controller 1610 in such decisions in 2320 may be preprogrammed at controller 1610 , e.g., as software-defined instructions. In some aspects, controller 1610 may additionally employ machine learning based on historical data to identify which physical channel configurations provide power-efficiency, low latency, and high reliability. Nonlimiting examples of machine learning techniques that controller 1610 can utilize include supervised or unsupervised learning, reinforcement learning, genetic algorithms, rule-based learning support vector machines, artificial neural networks, Bayesian-tree models, or hidden Markov models. Without loss of generality, in some aspects power-efficient channel configurations may have a smaller set of time-frequency resources (thus requiring less processing), be condensed in time and/or have longer transmission time periods (e.g., Transmission Time Intervals (TTI) in an exemplary LTE setting), which may enable longer time periods where radio components can be deactivated and/or powered down, and/or have a longer period (thus allowing for infrequent monitoring and longer periods where radio components can be deactivated and/or powered down). For example, in an exemplary LTE setting, for PDCCH and PDSCH, a shorter TTI can also mean that the signaling overhead for the scheduling of UL/DL grants will increase. For example, instead of scheduling always one full subframe (e.g., 2 consecutive time slots, or 1 ms) for the same terminal device, the network access node may be allowed to schedule single time slots (e.g., equivalent to 0.5 ms). Due to the finer granularity, the network access node may need more bits to describe which resources are assigned to the terminal device within the subframe (if the PDCCH is still included in the OFDM symbols 1 to 3 only). Alternatively, in some aspects there could be a PDCCH for the first time slot in OFDM symbols 1 and 2, and an additional PDCCH in OFDM symbols 8 and 9. For the terminal device this could mean in both cases that it needs to process more PDCCH information to determine whether the eNB has scheduled DL or UL resources for it.

In some aspects, a power-efficient channel configuration of a downlink traffic channel (TCH) may introduce a delay between the time slot carrying control information that indicates that the network access node has scheduled a downlink transmission and the time slot carrying the actual downlink transmission. For example, if the control information occurs immediately prior to the time slot carrying the downlink transmission, a terminal device may receive, store, and process the downlink transmission while simultaneously checking the control information to determine whether the downlink transmission is addressed to the terminal device. An exemplary case of this is the PDCCH followed by the PDSCH in LTE, where a terminal device may store and process the PDSCH while concurrently decoding the PDCCH to check if any of the PDSCH is addressed to the terminal device (e.g., a DCI addressed to the terminal device with an RNTI). A power efficient channel configuration may therefore add a delay between the control information and the downlink transmission, which may provide terminal devices with more time to receive and decode the control information before the downlink transmission starts. A terminal device may therefore be able to determine whether the downlink transmission is addressed to the terminal device at an earlier time (potentially prior to the start of the downlink transmission), and may consequently save power by avoiding the reception, storage, and processing of the downlink transmission in the window between reception of the control information and decoding of the control information. This power-efficient channel configuration may in some aspects increase power efficiency but increase latency. For example, in an exemplary LTE setting, for the DL, when the PDCCH of subframe ‘n’ indicates a DL transmission for a first terminal device, then the first part of this DL data is already included in subframe ‘n’. As it takes time for the first terminal device to process the PDCCH, the first terminal device may be forced to always receive, store and process (up to a certain degree) the full resource block. If there is a sufficient delay between PDCCH and associated DL transmission, the first terminal device will only process the OFDM symbols including the PDCCH—and the OFDM symbols including the reference symbols (RSs). (The UE can use the RSs to perform a channel estimation for the RB, which may be a pre-requisite for decoding the PDCCH.) If the PDCCH is included in e.g., the first 3 OFDM symbols (which may also include some RSs), and that further RSs are included in the 3 additional OFDM symbols 5, 8 and 12, the first terminal device may normally only process 6 OFDM symbols out of the 14 OFDM symbols of a subframe. Only if the PDCCH in subframe “n” indicates a DL transmission for the first terminal device in subframe “n+k”, then the first terminal device will process all OFDM symbols of that subframe “n+k”. E.g., for the subframes which do not include data for the first terminal device, the first terminal device can ignore 8/14=57% of the OFDM symbols and save processing energy accordingly. This may increase power efficiency but also increase the latency for DL transmissions.

In some aspects, low latency channel configurations can reduce latency by having shorter transmission time periods, such as from e.g., 1 ms to 0.5 ms (where other reductions are similarly possible depending on the initial length of the transmission time period). This may provide a finer ‘grid’ of potential transmission times, and consequently may enable transmissions to begin earlier in time. This may also reduce round trip time. For example, in an exemplary LTE setting the TTI could be reduced from 1 subframe (=1 ms) to half a subframe (=0.5 ms) or even lower values (e.g., 2 OFDM symbols=0.14 ms). If transmissions can start every 0.5 ms, this can reduce latency (and round-trip time). In some aspects, there may be issues regarding where to put the “additional” PDCCH for the lower TTI, so that “low latency” channels and “power efficient” channels can coexist on the same resource grid. E.g., one could define “low TTI subframes” and “normal TTI subframes”. In all subframes, OFDM symbols 1 to 3 carry the PDCCH which can be read and understood by all UEs. Low TTI subframes carry an additional PDCCH for the second half of the subframe in OFDM symbol 8 and 9, maybe only on certain RBs. The network access node can then schedule low TTI subframes and normal TTI subframes dependent on the scheduling requests from the terminal devices. For example, the network access node could occasionally insert a normal TTI subframe during which only “power efficient” terminal devices are scheduled. Or it could schedule transmissions for “power efficient” terminal devices for certain RBs (e.g., in a certain sub-band), and additionally, using the additional PDCCH, for the “low latency” terminal devices it schedules transmissions in the remaining sub-band.

In some aspects, low-latency channel configurations may reduce latency by reducing the delay between uplink transmission grants (granting permission for a terminal device to transmit) and the actual starting time of the uplink transmission. By enabling terminal devices to transmit at an earlier time following an uplink transmission grant, terminal devices may transmit information sooner in time, thus reducing latency. For example, in an exemplary LTE setting, delay between UL grant (given on the PDCCH in subframe ‘n’) and the actual start of the UL transmission in subframe ‘n+k’ can be reduced. As k is conventionally fixed to 4, e.g., 4 ms after the UL grant, ‘k’ could be reduced e.g., to ‘2’ or ‘1’ to reduce latency. This may involve modification on the terminal side to support this.

In some aspects, high reliability channel configurations may utilize a robust physical modulation scheme, where e.g., Binary Phase Shift Keying (BPSK) can be more robust than Quadrature Phase Shift Keying (QPSK), 16-Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (16-QAM), 64-QAM, 256-QAM, etc. In some aspects, high reliability channel configurations may send the same information repeatedly, where e.g., the repetition can occur spread over time (e.g., TTI bundling), spread over several frequencies at the same time, or spread over time and over different frequencies (e.g., frequency hopping). In some aspects, high reliability channel configurations can spread the information contained in a single bit over several coded bits by using different coding schemes, such as e.g., convolutional coding. Error correcting codes can then be used on the receiving side of the high-reliability channel configuration to detect and repair (to a certain degree) transmission errors. This may increase reliability at the expense of increased latency.

In addition to the aforementioned exemplary operational profile factors of power efficiency, latency, and reliability, controller 1610 may similarly consider any one or more factors related to Quality of Service (QoS), QoS Class Identifier (QCI), Power Saving Mode (PSM), extended DRX (eDRX), Vehicle-to-Any (V2X), etc.

As the operational profile of terminal device 1502 may depend on multiple factors, in various aspects controller 1610 may consider multiple or any combination of factors where various factors may involve tradeoffs with other factors. For example, in some cases power efficient channel instances may generally have higher latency and/or lower reliability. Accordingly, controller 1610 may ‘balance’ power efficiency vs. latency and/or reliability to select a channel instance in 2320 . In some aspects, controller 1610 may utilize ‘target’ factor levels in order to perform such balancing. For example, controller 1610 may identify a target latency that is a maximum acceptable latency and/or a target reliability that is a minimum acceptable reliability and may attempt to select a channel instance that minimizes power consumption while still meeting the target latency and/or target reliability. Alternatively, controller 1610 may identify a target power consumption level that is a maximum acceptable battery power consumption and may attempt to select a channel instance that minimizes latency and/or maximizes reliability while still meeting the target power consumption level. Controller 1610 may therefore include such target factor levels in the evaluation logic utilized to select the channel instance in 2320 based on the current operational profile.

Accordingly, in 2330 , based on an evaluation of the channel configuration information of the multiple channel instances in light of a current operational profile, controller 1610 may select a channel instance from the multiple channel instances that best matches the current operation profile of terminal device 1502 in 2320 . Controller 1610 may then transmit and/or receive data to the radio access network with the selected channel instance. In some aspects, controller 1610 may trigger channel evaluation based on current radio conditions, such as when a radio measurement (e.g., signal strength, signal quality, SNR, etc.) falls below a threshold. In some aspects, controller 1610 may trigger channel evaluation periodically, such as with a fixed evaluation period.

Depending on the type of channel instance that controller 1610 is selecting with method 2300 , controller 1610 may notify the radio access network as part of the selection procedure in 2330 of the selected channel instance in order to properly utilize the selected channel instance for transmission or reception. For example, if controller 1610 is selecting a paging channel instance with method 2300 , controller 1610 may notify the radio access network of the selected paging channel instance to enable the radio access network to page terminal device 1502 on the correct channel. Controller 1610 may similarly notify the radio access network if selecting control or traffic data channel instances. Alternatively, there may be channel instances that controller 1610 may not notify the radio access network for, such as selection of a random access channel instance, as terminal device 1502 may be able to unilaterally utilize such channel instances without prior agreement with the radio access network.

Accordingly, in some aspects controller 1610 may be further configured in 2320 to provide the radio access network, e.g., any one of network access nodes 2002 - 2006 , with a control message that specifies the selected channel instance. For example, if selecting a paging channel with method 2300 controller 1610 may transmit a control message to network access node 2002 that specifies PCH 1 as a selected paging channel instance. Network access node 2002 may in certain cases need to verify the selected paging channel instance with a core network component of core network 2008 such a e.g., a Mobility Management Entity (MME). Network access node 2002 may then either accept or reject the selected paging channel instance by transmitting a response, after which controller 1610 may proceed in to, in the case of acceptance, utilize the selected paging channel instance in 2330 (e.g., by monitoring the selected paging channel instance for paging message) or, in the case of rejection, select and propose another paging channel instance to network access node 2002 . In another example, if selecting a control channel with method 2300 , controller 1610 may transmit a control message to network access node 2002 that specifies CCH 1 as a selected control channel instance. Network access node 2002 may then accept or reject the selected control channel instance by transmitting a response, after which controller 1610 may proceed to, in the case of acceptance, utilize the selected control channel instance in 2330 (e.g., by receiving control data on the selected control channel instance in the case of downlink or by transmitting control data on the selected control channel instance in the case of uplink).

In some aspects of method 2300 , the radio access network may be able to set-up and provide certain channel instances on demand, e.g., upon request by a terminal device. Controller 1610 may be able to request a specific channel instance in 2320 as opposed to selecting from a finite group of channel instances provided by the radio access network in the channel configuration information. For example, controller 1610 may receive the channel configuration information in 2310 and determine in 2320 that the channel instances specified therein do not meet the current criteria of controller 1610 , such as if controller 1610 is targeting a low-power channel instance and none of the available channel instances meet the low-power criteria. Accordingly, controller 1610 may transmit a control message to the radio access network in 2320 that requests a low-power channel instance. The radio access network may then either accept or reject the requested channel instance. If the radio access network accepts the requested channel instance, the radio access network may allocate radio resources for the request channel instance and confirm activation of the requested channel instance to controller 1610 via a control message. Conversely, if the radio access network rejects the requested channel instance, the radio access network may transmit a control message to controller 1610 that rejects the requested channel instance. In the case of rejection, the radio access network may propose a modified requested channel instance, which controller 1610 may then either accept, reject, or re-propose. Such may continue until a modified requested channel instance is agreed upon or finally rejected. In the case of acceptance, controller 1610 may proceed to 2330 to transmit or receive data with the radio access network with the agreed-upon channel instance. Such requested channel instances may be UE-specific, e.g., accessible only by the requesting terminal device, or may be provided to groups of multiple terminal devices.

As previously described, the various channel instances may be on different radio access technologies, such as in the example of FIG. 20 where the radio access network may provide multiple channel instances on different radio access technologies. For example, controller 1610 may receive the channel configuration from network access node 2002 in 2310 (using the first radio access technology) and select a channel instance to report to network access node 2002 in 2310 where the selected channel instance is provided on a different radio access technology, such as PCH 3 provided by network access node 2004 . Accordingly, controller 1610 may monitor the selected paging channel instance in 2330 from network access node 2004 . In other words, the selected channel instance may be on a different radio access technology than the radio access technology used to receive the channel configuration information in 2310 and/or report the selected channel instance in 2330 . Accordingly, upon receipt of a control message from controller 1610 that specifies a selected channel instance provided by a different radio access technology, e.g., PCH 3 provided by network access node 2004 , network access node 2002 may accept the selected channel instance with controller 1610 and notify network access node 2004 that terminal device 1502 has selected PCH 3 as a paging channel instance (e.g., via an interface between network access node 2002 and network access node 2004 ). Network access node 2002 may then provide paging data addressed to terminal device 1502 to network access node 2004 , which network access node 2004 may transmit on PCH 3 . Controller 1610 may simultaneously monitor PCH 3 for paging information and may accordingly be able to receive and process the paging information provided by network access node 2004 on PCH 3 . The involved network access nodes may need to be interfaced with a common core network mobility entity (e.g., an MME or similar entity) that is responsible for distributing paging at the involved network access nodes. Additional variations with different channel instances (e.g., random access channels, traffic data channels, control channels, etc.) and radio access technologies may similarly apply according to aspects of the disclosure.

In addition to employing a different radio access technology for a selected channel instance, in some aspects controller 1610 may be able to respond on a separate radio access technology in response to data received on the selected channel instance. For example, in the exemplary scenario introduced above where controller 1610 selects PCH 3 as a paging channel instance after receiving the channel configuration information from network access node 2002 (with the first radio access technology), controller 1610 may receive a paging message on PCH 3 from network access node 2004 (with the second radio access technology) that is addressed to terminal device 1502 and indicates that incoming data is waiting for terminal device 1502 . Controller 1610 may then select to either receive the incoming data from network access node 2004 (e.g., with a traffic data channel instance provided by network access node 2004 ) or from a different network access node and/or different radio access technology. For example, controller 1610 may select to receive the incoming data from network access node 2002 , e.g., on a traffic data channel instance provided by network access node 2002 . Accordingly, controller 1610 may respond to the paging message at either network access node 2004 or network access node 2002 (depending on the specifics of the paging protocol) and indicate that the incoming data should be provided to terminal device 1502 on the selected traffic data channel instance. Network access node 2002 may then provide the incoming data to terminal device 1502 on the selected traffic data channel instance. Such may be useful if, for example, the selecting paging channel instance is power-efficient but the selected traffic data channel instance has a higher reliability, latency, link capacity, rate, or quality and thus may be a better alternative for reception of traffic data. In certain aspects, controller 1610 may re-employ method 2300 in order to select a new channel instance, e.g., to select a traffic data channel instance.

In some aspects, terminal device 1502 may employ a special ‘low-power’ radio access technology to receive paging messages. For example, antenna system 1602 , RF transceiver 1604 , and physical layer processing module 1608 may contain an antenna and RF and PHY components that are low-power and may be activated by an electromagnetic wave (similar to e.g., a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) system).

FIG. 24 shows an exemplary modified configuration of terminal device 1502 in accordance with some aspects that includes low-power RAT system 2402 , which may include basic reception components such as an antenna and RF transceiver and may interface with controller 1610 . Controller 1610 may utilize low-power RAT system 2402 as a low-power alternative for utilizing channel instances such as paging channel instances. For example, controller 1610 may utilize low-power RAT system 2402 to monitor a low-power paging channel instance. As previously indicated, low-power RAT system 2402 may be activated upon receipt of a particular trigger electromagnetic wave and may therefore not need external power to monitor the low-power paging channel instance. Accordingly, a network access node configured with a counterpart RAT system may be able to provide a paging channel instance to terminal device 1502 by broadcasting the particular trigger electromagnetic wave on the low-power paging channel instance when a paging message is waiting for terminal device 1502 . Low-power RAT system 2402 may then receive trigger electromagnetic wave and ‘wake up’, thus signaling that a paging message is waiting for terminal device 1502 . Low-power RAT system 2402 may either be configured to then enter an active reception state in order to receive the subsequent paging message on the paging channel instance or instead may signal controller 1610 that a paging message is waiting for terminal device 1502 . If low-power RAT system 2402 is configured to receive the subsequent paging message, low-power RAT system 2402 may receive the paging message and provide the paging message to controller 1610 . If low-power RAT system 2402 is configured to signal controller 1610 that a paging message is waiting for terminal device 1502 , controller 1610 may then receive the indication from low-power RAT system 2402 and proceed to receive the subsequent paging message on another paging channel instance via antenna system 2402 .

In some aspects of this disclosure related to random access channels, controller 1610 may select a random access channel (from multiple available random access channel instances) in 2320 based on various operational status factors including latency requirements, application criticality, or the presence of a ‘RACH subscription’. For example, in evaluating the current operation status in 1612 , controller 1610 may identify whether the underlying trigger for random access procedures, e.g., if a particular application requires a data connection, has strict latency requirements or involves critical data. If any of such conditions are true, controller 1610 may aim to select a random access channel instance that offers a low collision probability, e.g., a low likelihood that another terminal device will transmit a similar random access preamble during the same RACH occasion. Accordingly, controller 1610 may aim to select a random access channel instance in 1610 that is not expected to be accessed by a significant number of other terminal devices, thus reducing the collision probability. Controller 1610 may therefore be able to reduce expected latency as RACH transmissions may occur without a high potential for collisions. In some aspects, controller 1610 (or the network access node) may be able to estimate the number of terminal devices that are expected to access the random access channel in a given area by tracking the terminal devices (for example, monitoring uplink interference to estimate the number of proximate terminal devices) and/or by observing traffic patterns (e.g., observing the occurrence of contention in random access procedures).

Additionally, in some aspects terminal device 1502 may have access to a ‘RACH subscription’ in which terminal device 1502 has special access to a random access channel instance that is reserved for only a select group of terminal devices. Access to such a RACH subscription may be limited and may be available as a paid feature, e.g., where a user or other party pays for access to the RACH subscription and in return is guaranteed an improved ‘level of service’.

As the RACH subscription may only available to a select number of terminal devices, the collision probability may be dramatically reduced. In the setting of method 2300 as applied for selecting a random access channel instance, the radio access network may broadcast channel configuration information that specifies the radio resources and scheduling for the RACH subscription, which controller 1610 may receive in 2310 (alternatively, the RACH subscription may be predefined). Controller 1610 may then select the RACH subscription as a random access channel instance in 2320 and proceed to transmit a RACH transmission on the RACH subscription in 2330 . As the subscription RACH may be available to only a limited number of terminal devices, there may only be low collision probability. The radio access network may additionally need to verify access to the subscription RACH with a core network component that interfaces with network access node 2002 , such as a Home Location Register (HLR) or Home Subscriber Service (HSS), which may contain a database of such subscriptions for verification purposes.

According to another aspect of method 2300 , the radio access network may restrict access to certain channel instances based on specifics of each terminal device. The radio access network may therefore provide certain channel instances that are only accessible to terminal devices that meet certain criteria, such as only low-power devices. For example, the radio access network may provide certain channel instances that are only available to devices that report having low battery power. Accordingly, the radio access network may specify in the channel configuration information that certain available channel instances are only accessible by terminal devices with low battery power, e.g., battery power falling below a certain threshold. Terminal devices may then either be expected to obey such requirements or may be required to transmit a control message that explicitly provides the current battery power level. The radio access network may then either permit or deny terminal devices from accessing the restricted channel instances based on such criteria. Other criteria such as data connection requirements, including latency and reliability, for example, may similarly be employed to restrict access to specific channel instances to certain terminal devices. In some aspects, restrictions may be overwritten in certain circumstances. For example, if terminal device 1502 has limited power resources but has high-priority traffic to send (e.g., mission-critical low-latency traffic), terminal device 1502 may transmit the high-priority traffic at the cost of power consumption. For example, if controller 1610 is low on power but has mission-critical low-latency traffic, controller 1610 may transmit the mission-critical low-latency traffic regardless of the power consumption cost.

Accordingly, controller 1610 may utilize method 2300 to select and utilize a channel instance that offers desirable properties such as power efficiency, low latency, high reliability, etc. Controller 1610 may select the channel instance based on a current operation profile of terminal device 1502 that depends on the power efficiency and connection requirements (e.g., latency and reliability) of terminal device 1502 . e.g., Although power-efficiency is relevant to aspects of the disclosure, in some aspects of power, controller 1610 may be able to select channel instances with method 2300 to satisfy any number of desired operational criteria.

As described above, cooperation from the radio access network may be relied on to provide the multiple channel instances.

FIG. 25 shows method 2500 in accordance with some aspects, which may be a counterpart to method 2300 and be executed at a network access node of the radio access network, such as network access node 2002 (or equivalently any network access node of the radio access network).

FIG. 26 shows an internal configuration of an exemplary network access node, such as network access node 2002 in accordance with some aspects, which may be configured to execute method 2500 . As shown in FIG. 26 , network access node 2002 may include antenna system 2602 , radio module 2604 , and communication module 2606 (including physical layer module 2608 and control module 1910 ). In an abridged overview of the operation of network access node 2002 , network access node 2002 may transmit and receive radio signals via antenna system 2602 , which may be an antenna array including multiple antennas. Radio module 2604 may perform transmit and receive RF processing in order to convert outgoing digital data from communication module 2606 into analog RF signals to provide to antenna system 2602 for radio transmission and to convert incoming analog RF signals received from antenna system 2602 into digital data to provide to communication module 2606 . Physical layer module 2608 may be configured to perform transmit and receive PHY processing on digital data received from radio module 2604 to provide to control module 2610 and on digital data received from control module 2610 to provide to radio module 2604 . Control module 2610 may control the communication functionality of network access node 2002 according to the corresponding radio access protocols, e.g., LTE, which may include exercising control over antenna system 2602 , radio module 2604 , and physical layer module 2608 . Each of radio module 2604 , physical layer module 2608 , and control module 2610 may be structurally realized as a hardware-defined module, e.g., as one or more dedicate hardware circuits or FPGAs, as a software-defined module, e.g., as one or more processors executing program code that define arithmetic, control, and I/O instructions (e.g., software and/or firmware) stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, or as mixed hardware-defined and software-defined modules. In some aspects, radio module 2604 may be a radio transceiver including digital and analog radio frequency processing and amplification circuitry. In some aspects, radio module 2604 may be a software-defined radio (SDR) component implemented as a processor configured to execute software-defined instructions that specify radio frequency processing routines. In some aspects, physical layer module 2608 may include a processor and one or more hardware accelerators, wherein the processor is configured to control physical layer processing and offload certain processing tasks to the one or more hardware accelerators. In some aspects, control module 2610 may be a controller configured to execute software-defined instructions that specify upper-layer control functions. In some aspects, control module 2610 may be limited to radio communication protocol stack layer functions, while in other aspects control module 2610 may also be responsible for transport, internet, and application layer functions.

Network access node 2002 may interface with a core network and/or internet networks (directly/via a router or via the core network), which may be through a wired or wireless interface. Network access node 2002 may also interface with other network access nodes, such as network access nodes 2004 and 2006 , over a wired or wireless interface. Network access node 2002 may thus provide the conventional functionality of network access nodes in radio communication networks by providing a radio access network to enable served terminal devices to access desired communication data.

Network access node 2002 may execute method 2500 at control module 2610 , which may utilize antenna system 2602 , radio module 2604 , and physical layer module 2608 to transmit and receive signals. As shown in FIG. 25 , in 2510 , control module 2610 may broadcast channel configuration information that specifies multiple channel instances, which may include channel configuration information for channel instances provided by network access node 2002 in addition to channel instances provided by other network access nodes, such as network access node 2004 and network access node 2006 .

In 2520 , control module 2610 may receive a control message from a terminal device, e.g., terminal device 1502 , that specifies a selected channel instance. As previously indicated, the selected channel instance may be provided at either network access node 2002 or at another network access node, which may or may not be the same radio access technology as network access node 2002 . Accordingly, control module 2610 may identify in 2530 whether the selected channel instance is provided by a different or another network access node and, if so, may proceed to 2550 to notify the selected network access node. In some aspects, this may involve verifying with the selected network access node whether the selected network access node will accept or reject the selected channel instance and reporting such back to terminal device 1502 . If the selected network access node accepts the selected channel instance in 2550 , control module 2610 may report such back to terminal device 1502 (thus allowing terminal device 1502 to begin utilizing the selected channel instance). Conversely, if the selected network access node rejects the selected channel instance in 2550 , control module 2610 may report the rejection to terminal device 1502 and potentially handle further relay of information between terminal device 1502 and the selected network access node to negotiate a new selected channel instance or a modified selected channel instance.

If the selected channel instance is provided by network access node 2002 , control module 2610 may proceed to 2540 to accept or reject the selected channel instance (which may include negotiating a new or modified selected channel instance in the case of an initial rejection). Control module 2610 may determine whether terminal device 1502 is authorized to access the selected channel instance in 2540 . If control module 2610 accepts the selected channel instance in 2540 , control module 2610 may proceed to 2560 to transmit or receive data with terminal device 1502 with the selected channel instance. As previously indicated, such may include transmitting or receiving traffic or control data with terminal device 1502 on a selected traffic or control channel instance, providing paging messages to terminal device 1502 on a selected paging channel instance, etc. Conversely, if control module 2610 rejects the selected channel instance, control module 2610 may notify the terminal device of the rejection of the selected channel instance in 2570 . The terminal device may then select another channel instance and transmit a control message specifying a new channel instance, which control module 2610 may receive in 2520 and continue with the rest of method 2500 .

Furthermore, as indicated above regarding random access channel instances, in some aspects terminal devices may be able to unilaterally utilize random access channels, and may not transmit a control message specifying a selected random access channel instance. Instead, terminal devices may select a random access channel instance and proceed to utilize the random access channel instance. If the selected random access channel instance is not restricted (e.g., not a RACH subscription), control module 2610 may receive and process the RACH transmission on the selected random access channel instance as per conventional procedures. However, if the selected random access channel instance is restricted (e.g., is a RACH subscription), control module 2610 may, upon receipt of a RACH transmission on the selected random access channel instance, verify whether the transmitting terminal device is authorized to utilize the selected random access channel instance. If the transmitting terminal device is authorized to utilize the selected random access channel instance, control module 2610 may proceed as per conventional random access procedures. If the transmitting terminal device is not authorized to utilize the selected random access channel instance, control module 2610 may either ignore the RACH transmission or respond with a control message specifying that the transmitting terminal device is not authorized to utilize the selected random access channel instance.

As described above regarding FIGS. 23 and 24 , in some aspects the radio access network may provide channel configuration information in a ‘broadcast format’, e.g., by broadcasting channel configuration information for the multiple channel instances to all nearby terminal devices. Additionally or alternatively to such a broadcast scheme, in some aspects network access nodes such as network access node 2002 may provide channel configuration information in response to queries from requesting terminal devices such as terminal device 1502 .

FIG. 27 shows method 2700 which control module 2610 may in some aspects execute at network access node 2002 in order to respond to queries for channel configuration information from terminal devices. As shown in FIG. 27 , control module 2610 may receive a request for channel configuration information from controller 1610 of terminal device 1502 in 2710 . The request may be a general request for channel configuration information for all channel instances, a request for channel configuration information for specific channel instances, or a request for channel configuration information for channel instances depending on a specified operational profile.

Control module 2610 may then select one or more channel instances from the available channel instances provided by the radio access network in 2720 , e.g., PCH 1 , PCH 2 , PCH 3 , PCH 4 , RACH 1 , RACH 2 , CCH 1 , and CCH 2 . If the request received in 2710 is a general request for channel configuration information for all available channel instances, control module 2610 may simply select all available channel instances in 2720 . If the request received in 2710 is a request for channel configuration information for specific channel instances, control module 2610 may select channel instances matching the specified channel instances in 2720 . For example, the request may be for channel instances of a specific channel type, such as one or more of paging channel instances, random access channel instances, traffic data channel instances, or control channel instances, such as if controller 1610 is applying method 2300 in order to select a specific type of channel instance and may transmit the request in 2710 to request channel configuration information for the specific type of channel instance. Control module 2610 may then select channel instances matching the specific types of channel instances in 2720 .

Alternatively, if the request received in 2710 is a request for channel configuration information for channel instances depending on a specified operational profile, controller 1610 may have transmitted a request in 2710 that specifies an operational profile for terminal device 1502 determined by controller 1610 (e.g., in 2320 as described above). Accordingly, the operational profile may indicate one or more of power efficiency requirements, latency requirements, or reliability requirements of terminal device 1502 . Control module 2610 may then select one or more channel instances in 2720 that match the operational profile specified by controller 1610 , such as using a similar or same procedure as described regarding controller 1610 in 2320 of method 2300 , e.g., with preconfigured evaluation logic to identify channel instances with channel configurations that match a particular operational profile. Accordingly, in such cases control module 2610 may perform the operational profile-based evaluation of channel instances (as opposed to controller 1610 as previously described). Control module 2610 may either identify a single channel instance (e.g., a ‘best match’ based on the operational profile) or a group of channel instances (e.g., a group of ‘best matches’ based on the operational profile).

Control module 2610 may thus select one or more channel instances based on the channel configuration information request in 2720 . Control module 2610 may then collect the channel configuration information for the selected one or more channel instances and transmit a response to terminal device 1502 containing the channel configuration information in 2730 .

Accordingly, controller 1610 may receive the response containing the channel configuration information after transmission by network access node 2002 . Controller 1610 may then select a channel instance based on the provided channel configuration information. If the initial channel configuration information request was a general request for channel configuration information for all available channel instances or for channel instances of a specific type, controller 1610 may select a channel instance from the specified channel instances based on the channel configuration information and the operational profile of terminal device 1502 (as previously described regarding 2320 , e.g., using preconfigured evaluation logic). If the initial channel configuration information request included an operational profile, controller 1610 may utilize the channel instance specified by network access node 2002 as the selected channel instance (if control module 2610 provided only one channel instance based on the operational profile; controller 1610 may then proceed to 2330 to utilize the selected channel instance). Controller 1610 may alternatively evaluate the specified channel instances in order to select which of the specified channel instances best matches the operational profile of terminal device 1502 (and then proceed to 2330 to utilize the selected channel instance).

FIG. 28 shows message sequence chart 2800 illustrating an exemplary operational flow according to some aspects. As shown in FIG. 28 , network access node 2002 may broadcast system information in 2802 (e.g., as SIBs) that specify the current physical channel configuration information for the active channel instances. Terminal device 1502 may then determine the current power efficiency and connection requirements of terminal device 1502 in 2802 , which may include identifying applications being executed at terminal device 1502 . For example, an application processor of terminal device 1502 (at data source 1612 /data sink 1616 ) may be executing mobile application 1 , mobile application 2 , and mobile application 3 , which may have different latency, reliability, and power-efficiency requirements. Terminal device 1502 may collect such information in addition to a current power level of power supply 1618 in 2804 . Terminal device 1502 may then determine an operational profile of terminal device 1502 in 2806 and provide the operational profile to a mobility control entity (e.g., an MME) of core network 2008 in the form of an attach request.

The mobility control entity may then decide whether to accept or reject the attach request. Optionally, in some aspects the mobility control entity may decide that a channel instance needs to be activated or reconfigured. For example, the mobility control entity may determine that terminal device 1502 should utilize a specific channel (e.g., RACH 2 ) but that the channel instance has not been activated yet (e.g., by network access node 2002 ) or is not configured correctly. The mobility control entity may then instruct the network access node responsible for the channel instance (e.g., network access node 2002 ) to activate or reconfigure the channel instance in 2810 .

The mobility control entity may then accept the attach request in 2812 with an attach accept. The attach accept may specify which channel instances terminal device 1502 should utilize (e.g., PCH 1 , PCH 2 , RACH 2 , PCCH 2 ), where the attach accept may also provide different options of channel instances for terminal device 1502 to utilize (e.g., a choice between PCH 1 and PCH 2 ). If options are presented to terminal device 1502 , terminal device 1502 may select a preferred or supported channel instance in 2814 (e.g., may select PCH 2 ). Terminal device 1502 may then complete the attach by transmitting an attach complete in 2816 , which may specify a selected channel instance (e.g., PCH 2 , in response to which the MME may instruct network access node 2002 to page terminal device 1502 only on PCH 2 ).

FIG. 29 shows method 2900 of operating a terminal device in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIG. 29 , method 2900 includes identifying an operational profile of the terminal device based on a power requirement or a connection requirement of the terminal device ( 2910 ), selecting a channel type from a plurality of channel types ( 2920 ), identifying, based on the operational profile, a physical channel configuration for the channel type from a plurality of physical channel configurations associated with a radio access network ( 2930 ), and transmitting or receiving data according to the physical channel configuration ( 2940 ).

FIG. 30 shows method 3000 of operating one or more network access nodes of a radio access network in accordance with some aspects of the disclosure. As shown in FIG. 30 , method 3000 includes providing a plurality of physical channel configurations of a specific channel type over the radio access network ( 3010 ), wherein the specific channel type is a traffic data channel, a control channel, a random access channel, or a paging channel, receiving a request to utilize a first physical channel configuration of the plurality of physical channel configurations from a terminal device ( 3020 ), and transmitting data to the terminal device or receiving data from the terminal device according to the first physical channel configuration ( 3030 ).

Accordingly, various aspects of the disclosure may rely on cooperation between a radio access network and terminal devices in order to provide multiple channel instances for use by terminal devices. Terminal devices may therefore have the option to select between multiple channel instances of the same type of channel, thus enabling terminal devices to select channel instances dependent on a current operational profile of the terminal device that may be based on a number of factors such as power efficiency, low latency, reliability, probability, etc. The channel instances may be provided on different radio access technologies (where the various network access nodes may be interfaced and thus considered part of the same radio access network), which may accordingly enable terminal devices to select channel instances provided by desired radio access technologies.

2.2 Power-Efficiency #2

In accordance with another aspect of the disclosure, power, terminal device 1502 may optimize random access transmissions in order to conserve power. As previously described, terminal device 1502 may utilize random access procedures when establishing a connection with a network access node (e.g., transitioning from idle mode to connected mode or after an Out-of-Coverage (OOC) scenario), during handover to a network access node, or if timing synchronization is lost with a network access node (although other scenarios may trigger random access procedures depending on RAT-specific protocols). Accordingly, controller 1610 may identify the random access channel (e.g., PRACH in the case of LTE), including the timing and frequency resources allocated to the random access channel, and generate a random access preamble uniquely identifying terminal device 1502 (which controller 1610 may trigger at physical layer processing module 1608 ), and transmit a random access transmission containing the random access preamble on the radio resources allocated for the random access channel.

The target network access node, e.g., network access node 2002 without loss of generality, may monitor the random access channel for random access transmissions. Control module 2610 may therefore receive and decode random access transmissions (e.g., at physical layer module 2608 ) in order to identify random access preambles that identify terminal devices performing random access procedures. Control module 2610 may therefore decode and identify terminal device 1502 based on reception and identification of the random access transmission and may proceed to establish a connection with terminal device 1502 as per conventional random access procedures (which may vary based on RAT-specific protocols).

In order to allow network access node 2002 to successfully receive and process random access transmissions, terminal device 1502 may need to utilize a sufficient transmission power. If terminal device 1502 utilizes an insufficient transmission power, control module 2610 may not be able to correctly decode the random access preamble and random access procedures with terminal device 1502 may fail. However, random access transmission power may also be limited at terminal device 1502 by battery power constraints. For example, the use of a high random access transmission power may have a high battery power penalty.

According to an aspect of this disclosure, controller 1610 may utilize an ‘optimal’ random access transmission power that utilizes a minimum transmit power to achieve a target ‘single shot RACH success rate’ e.g., the rate at which a single random access transmission is successful. Controller 1610 may therefore balance transmission power and battery power usage with RACH success rate by using an optimal random access transmission power. A nonlimiting and exemplary target RACH success rate would be 95%; in other words, the probability of more than 2 RACH attempts is <1e-3. For this exemplary target RACH success rate, less than 1 out of 1000 LTE handover procedures with network timer T 304 set to 50 ms (enough time for 2 RACH attempts) would fail.

FIG. 31 shows method 3100 according to some aspects, which controller 1610 may execute (via antenna system 1602 , RF transceiver 1604 , and physical layer processing module 1608 ) in order to perform random access procedures. Although described below in an exemplary LTE setting, controller 1610 may analogously perform method 3100 for random access procedures of any radio access technology according to the corresponding RAT-specific protocols. As shown in FIG. 31 , controller 1610 may first in 3110 identify the random access channel of a target network access node, e.g., network access node 2002 without loss of generality. In an exemplary setting of LTE, controller 1610 may receive an SIB2 message from network access node 2002 and identify the PRACH configuration index in order to identify the random access channel. Controller 1610 may then generate a random access preamble that identifies terminal device 1502 in 3120 , where the specific format of the random access preamble may be RAT-specific.

Following random access preamble generation, controller 1610 may select a random access transmission power based on a current operation status of terminal device 1502 in 3130 . Accordingly, controller 1610 may attempt to select a random access transmission power that optimally balances between battery penalty and RACH success rate. In particular, controller 1610 may apply an algorithm in 3130 in order to determine the random access transmission power based on the current operation status, where the algorithm relies on status factors such as power-efficiency requirements, connection requirements, network environment data (e.g., radio measurements, cell load metrics, etc.), collision probability, current battery consumption rates, and current battery power level. Controller 1610 may thus input such quantitative factors to the algorithm in order to determine a random access transmission power that produces a target RACH success rate. The algorithm may thus output a random access transmission power that provides an ‘optimum’ transmission power, e.g., results in a minimum amount of energy being consumed by terminal device 1502 in order to perform a successful RACH procedure.

In some aspects, the algorithm employed by controller 1610 to select the random access transmission power in 3130 may be based on historical trace log data and modem power consumption data. Accordingly, the algorithm may be developed using offline training that considers data that characterizes power consumption and RACH success—for example supervised machine learning algorithms, like support vector machines, artificial neural networks or hidden Markov models may be trained with historical trace log data captured during regular inter-operability lab testing and field testing at cellular modem development time. The historical data may cover both cell center and cell edge conditions in order to accurately reflect a wide range of mobility scenarios. The algorithm may therefore learn how the aforementioned factors of data connection latency requirements, network environment data (e.g., radio measurements, cell load metrics, etc.) collision probability, current battery consumption rates, and current battery power level interact based on the historical data and may accordingly be able to effectively determine random access transmission powers that considers such factors. The algorithm may additionally employ runtime machine learning in order to adapt random access transmission powers based on actual observations of successful and unsuccessful random access transmissions, for example the random access transmission power level for the next random access attempt may be determined with supervised or unsupervised machine learning algorithms such as reinforcement learning, genetic algorithms, rule-based learning support vector machines, artificial neural networks, Bayesian-tree models, or hidden Markov models as a one-step ahead prediction based on actual observations of successful and unsuccessful random access transmissions and the aforementioned factors of data connection latency requirements, network environment data (e.g., radio measurements, cell load metrics, etc.) collision probability, current battery consumption rates, and current battery power level over a suitable past observation window.

After completion of 3130 , controller 1610 may transmit a random access transmission to network access node 2002 that contains the random access preamble with the selected random access transmission power in 3140 . Controller 1610 may then proceed with the random access procedure as per convention. Assuming that the selected random access transmission power was sufficient and no contention or collisions occurred, network access node 2002 may be able to successfully receive and decode the random access transmission to identify terminal device 1502 and proceed to establish a connection with network access node 2002 .

2.3 Power-Efficiency #3

According to another aspect of this disclosure, terminal device 1502 may utilize a hardware configuration that enables scheduling-dependent activation or deactivation of certain hardware components. For example, the hardware design of terminal device 1502 (particularly e.g., physical layer processing module 1608 ) may be ‘modularized’ so that hardware components dedicated to specific functions, such as channel measurement, control channel search, and beamforming tracking hardware, may be deactivated during periods of inactivity. The radio access network may cooperate by utilizing specific scheduling settings that will allow terminal device 1502 to maximize power savings by frequently powering down such components. Although not limited to any particular RAT, aspects of the disclosure may be particularly applicable to LTE and 5G radio access technologies, such as millimeter wave (mmWave) other 5G radio access technologies.

As noted above, modularization may be particularly applicable for physical layer processing module 1608 . As opposed to many protocol stack layer (Layers 2 and 3) tasks, most physical layer tasks may be highly processing-intensive and thus may be more suited to hardware implementation, such as in the form of dedicated hardware such as ASICs. Accordingly, physical layer processing module 1608 may be implemented as multiple different physical layer hardware components that are each dedicated to a unique physical layer task, such as control channel search, radio channel measurements, beamtracking, and a number of other similar functions. FIG. 32 shows an exemplary internal configuration of physical layer processing module 1608 , which may include control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , beamtracking module 3206 , and PHY controller 3208 . Although not explicitly shown in FIG. 32 , physical layer processing module 1608 may include a number of additional hardware and/or software components related to any one or more of error detection, forward error correction encoding/decoding, channel coding and interleaving, physical channel modulation/demodulation, physical channel mapping, radio measurement and search, frequency and time synchronization, antenna diversity processing, power control and weighting, rate matching, retransmission processing, etc.

PHY controller 3208 may be implemented as a processor configured to execute program code for physical layer control logic software stored in a non-transitory computer readable medium (not explicitly shown in FIG. 32 ). Accordingly, PHY controller 3208 may control the other various components of physical layer processing module 1608 to perform the appropriate physical layer processing functions for both uplink data received from controller 1610 and provided to RF transceiver 1604 and downlink data received from RF transceiver 1604 and provided to controller 1610 .

In contrast to the software implementation of PHY controller 3208 , each of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 may be implemented as hardware, such as an application-specific circuit (e.g., an ASIC) or reprogrammable circuit (e.g., an FPGA). Control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 may in some aspects also include software components. Further, each of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 may be ‘modularized’ and therefore may be able to be independently operated and activated. Accordingly, any one of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 may be activated/deactivated and powered up/down independent of any other components of physical layer processing module 1608 . Channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 may be located in different physical chip areas of physical layer processing module 1608 to allow for entire areas of the chip to be turned off. In some aspects, one or more of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 may have different activation levels, such as varying levels of idle, sleep, and active states. Accordingly, PHY controller 3208 may be configured to independently control one or more of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 to operate at these different activation levels.

PHY controller 3208 may trigger activation and operation of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 according to the physical layer protocols for the relevant radio access technology. For example, where PHY controller 3208 , control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 are designed for LTE operation, PHY controller 3208 may trigger activation and operation of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 according to LTE physical layer protocols for an LTE radio access connection handled by physical layer processing module 1608 . Accordingly, PHY controller 3208 may trigger operation of control channel search module 3202 when control channel data processing is received (e.g., for PDCCH search), operation of channel measurement module 3204 when channel measurement is called for (e.g., to perform reference signal measurements such as Cell-Specific Reference Signal (CRS) and other reference signal occasions), and operation of beamtracking module 3206 when periodic beamtracking is called for to support beamforming communications (e.g., for mmWave or massive MIMO systems. These aspects can be used with common channel aspects, e.g., a common channel utilizing a hardware configuration that enables scheduling-dependent activation or deactivation of certain hardware components. Accordingly, depending on the flow of an LTE connection supported by physical layer processing module 1608 , PHY controller 3208 may trigger operation of any of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 at varying points in time.

PHY controller 3208 may deactivate and/or power-down control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 during respective periods of inactivity for each module. This may be done to reduce power consumption and conserve battery power (e.g., at power supply 1618 ). Accordingly, PHY controller 3208 may deactivate and/or power down control channel search module 3202 (e.g., when there is no control channel data to decode, such as during the time period after each PDCCH has been decoded and before the next PDCCH in LTE), channel measurement module 3204 (e.g., when there is no signal to perform channel measurement on, such as during time periods when no reference signals are received), and beamtracking module 3206 (e.g., when beamtracking is not needed, such as during time periods in between periodic beamtracking occasions).

Physical layer processing module 1608 may minimize power consumption by powering down components such as control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 . According to an exemplary aspect, the physical layer processing module 1608 may power down the components (e.g., as often as possible). However, scheduling of the radio access connection supported by physical layer processing module 1608 may dictate when such power-downs are possible. For example, PHY controller 3208 may need to activate control channel search module 3202 for the control region (PDCCH symbols) of LTE subframes in order to decode the control data, which may limit the occasions when PHY controller 3208 can power down control channel search module 3202 . Likewise, PHY controller 3208 may only be able to power down channel measurement module 3204 and beamtracking module 3206 during time periods when the scheduling of the radio access connection channel does not require channel measurement and beamtracking, respectively.

In accordance with an exemplary aspect of this disclosure, the radio access network may utilize specialized scheduling to enable terminal device 1502 to implement power saving measures more frequently. For example, the specialized scheduling may limit periods when operation of dedicated hardware such as control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 is necessary and accordingly may allow PHY controller 3208 to conserve power by frequently powering down such components. In some aspects, PHY controller 3208 may utilize a machine learning technique such as supervised or unsupervised learning, reinforcement learning, genetic algorithms, rule-based learning support vector machines, artificial neural networks, Bayesian-tree models, or hidden Markov models to determine when and to what extent to implement the power saving measures. In some aspects, PHY controller 3208 may continuously learn and/or update the scheduling of the power saving measures.

FIG. 33 shows method 3300 , which may be executed at a terminal device e.g., terminal device 1502 , and a network access node e.g., network access node 2002 . Although the following description of FIG. 33 may explicitly reference LTE, this description is demonstrative and method 3300 may be analogously applied for any radio access technology.

Terminal device 1502 may employ method 3300 to utilize specialized scheduling settings with cooperation from the radio access network. In the setting of method 3300 , terminal device 1502 may utilize a ‘battery power class’ scheme in order to indicate a current battery power level to network access node 2002 , in response to which network access node 2002 may assign terminal device 1502 a scheduling setting dependent on the battery power class. Battery power classes that indicate low battery power may prompt network access node 2002 to assign more power efficient scheduling settings to terminal device 1502 .

Accordingly, in process 3302 controller 1610 may identify a battery power class of terminal device 1502 . For example, controller 1610 may monitor power supply 1618 to identify a current battery power level of power supply 1618 , which may be e.g., expressed as a percentage or a watt-hours level. Controller 1610 may then determine a battery power class based on the current battery power level, where the battery power class scheme may have a predefined number of battery power classes that are each assigned to a range of battery power levels. For example, a four-level battery power class scheme may have a first battery power class for battery power levels between 100-90%, a second battery power class for battery power levels between 90-50%, a third battery power class for battery power levels between 50-30%, and a fourth battery power class for battery power levels between 30-0%. While exemplary percentage ranges are provided, the underlying principles can be applied for different ranges. Controller 1610 may therefore compare the current battery power level of power supply 1618 to the thresholds in the battery power class scheme to determine which battery power class is correct. Other battery power class schemes may be similarly defined with more or less battery power classes and different thresholds, such as a two-level battery power class scheme with a high power setting (e.g., 50% and above) and a low power setting (e.g., less than 50%) or an unlimited-level battery power class scheme that reports the absolute battery power (expressed e.g., as a percentage or watt-hours) instead of the ‘piecewise’ battery power class schemes noted above.

As shown in FIG. 33 , controller 1610 may then report the battery power class to network access node 2002 in 3304 , e.g., as a control message. Control module 2610 may receive the battery power class report at network access node 2002 . Control module 2610 may then proceed to select a scheduling setting for terminal device 1502 depending on the reported battery power class in 3306 . As previously indicated, such scheduling settings may be designed to enable terminal device 1502 to selectively deactivate certain hardware components during periods of inactivity. As the battery power class reported by terminal device in 3304 is indicative of a current battery power level, control module 2610 may select scheduling settings in process 3306 that enable higher energy savings for low battery power classes (e.g., the exemplary third or further battery power classes introduced above). As such power-efficient scheduling settings may also result in slight performance degradations, in an exemplary aspect control module 2610 may not select such battery power classes for high battery power classes. Accordingly, control module 2610 may select the scheduling setting for terminal device 1502 based on the reported battery power class.

Control module 2610 may select the scheduling setting from a predefined plurality of scheduling settings that may each provide varying levels of energy savings to terminal devices. In the setting of FIG. 32 , the scheduling settings may enable terminal device 1502 to deactivate one or more of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 for extended periods of time. Control module 2610 may therefore have a predefined plurality of different scheduling settings to select from that offer varying levels of energy savings based on the inactivity time of the modularized modules of physical layer processing module 1608 .

For example, in an exemplary LTE setting, PHY controller 3208 may utilize control channel search module 3202 to search for control messages addressed to terminal device 1502 in the control region of each downlink subframe (as noted above with respect to FIG. 17 , e.g., DCI messages addressed to terminal device 1502 with an RNTI). As specified by the 3GPP, there may be a large set of overlapping groups of REs in the control region that can each contain a control message, e.g., ‘PDCCH candidates’. Accordingly, control channel search module 3202 may decode and check these PDCCH candidates in order to identify control messages addressed to terminal device 1502 . This control channel search procedure may require processing resources and, given that the control region of each downlink subframe may be searched, could have a battery power penalty.

Accordingly, if terminal device 1502 reports a low-battery power class in 3304 , control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting that reduces the amount of time that control channel search module 3202 needs to be active. Specifically, control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting in 3306 in which control messages addressed to terminal device 1502 will maintain the same position within the control region (e.g., the same PDCCH candidate) for each subframe. Accordingly, as opposed to checking each control message candidate location, PHY controller 3208 may only instruct control channel search module 3202 to search the dedicated control message position (e.g., the REs assigned to the PDCCH candidate dedicated to terminal device 1502 ). PHY controller 3208 may therefore only need to activate control channel search module 3202 for a reduced period of time to decode the dedicated control message position for each downlink subframe and may deactivate control channel search module 3202 during other times, thus conserving battery power. As an alternative to utilizing a single dedicated control message position, control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting in 3306 in which control messages addressed to terminal device 1502 will be located in a reduced subset of the candidate control message positions of the control region. Such may provide control module 2610 with greater flexibility in transmitting control messages (as control module 2610 may need to fit control messages for all terminal devices served by network access node 2002 into the control region) while still reducing the amount of time that control channel search module 3202 needs to be active for decoding. Additionally or alternatively, control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting that uses a temporary fixed control message candidate location scheme, where control messages addressed to terminal device 1502 will remain in a fixed control message location for a predefined number of subframes. Such may likewise reduce the amount of time that control channel search module 3202 needs to be active as control channel search module 3202 may only need to periodically perform a full control message search while maintaining a fixed control message location for all other subframes.

Additionally or alternatively to the fixed/reduced control message candidate location scheme, if terminal device 1502 reports a low-battery power class in 3304 , control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting that reduces the amount of time that channel measurement module 3204 needs to be active. Specifically, control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting in 3306 in which terminal device 1502 is not required to perform and report channel measurements to network access node 2002 . For example, in an LTE setting terminal device 1502 may need to periodically perform radio channel measurements on downlink reference signals (e.g., CRS signals) transmitted by network access node 2002 , which PHY controller 3208 may perform at channel measurement module 3204 . PHY controller 3208 may then either report these radio channel measurements back to network access node 2002 (e.g., for network access node 2002 to evaluate to determine an appropriate downlink modulation and coding scheme (MCS)) or utilize the radio channel measurements to assist in downlink decoding (e.g., for channel equalization). Performing such radio channel measurements necessarily consumes power at channel measurement module 3204 , such that control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting in 3306 that instructs terminal device 1502 to skip radio channel measurements or perform radio channel measurements less frequently. As either case will involve less necessary operation time for channel measurement module 3204 , PHY controller 3208 may conserve battery power by deactivating channel measurement module 3204 unless a radio channel measurement has to be performed according to the scheduling setting.

Additionally or alternatively to the fixed/reduced control message candidate location scheme and the channel measurement deactivation scheme, if terminal device 1502 reports a low-battery power class in 3304 , control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting that reduces the amount of time that beamtracking module 3206 needs to be active. PHY controller 3208 may utilize beamtracking module 3206 to track antenna beamsteering configurations, which may be employed in advanced radio access technologies such as mmWave and other ‘5G’ radio access technologies. As such technologies utilize very high carrier frequencies, path loss may be an issue. Accordingly, many such radio access technologies may employ highly sensitive beamsteering systems in order to counter pathloss with antenna gain. According to an exemplary aspect, PHY controller 3208 may therefore employ beamtracking module 3206 to process received signals to determine beamsteering directions, which may require constant tracking in order to monitor changes or blockages in the transmission beams. The tracking processing performed by beamtracking module 3206 may thus be frequent (e.g., occur often in time) in addition to computationally intensive and may therefore have high battery power penalties. Accordingly, control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting in 3306 that instructs terminal device 1502 to either deactivate beamtracking or to perform beamtracking less frequently. Such may consequently enable PHY controller 3208 to deactivate beamtracking module 3206 more frequently and thus conserve power.

Each of the fixed/reduced control message candidate location scheme, channel measurement deactivation scheme, and reduced beamtracking scheme may therefore enable physical layer processing module 1608 to conserve power by deactivating one or more of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 at more frequent periods in time. Assuming control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 are ‘modularized’, e.g., physically realized separately with the ability to independently deactivate, PHY controller 3208 may be able to deactivate (or trigger a low-power or sleep state) at each of control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 during respective periods of inactivity as provided by the various scheduling settings. The deactivation or triggering of low-power or sleep state, can be made at each of the channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 , or can be made selectively at one or more of the modules.

The scheduling settings available to control module 2610 may additionally include features not directly related to a modularized hardware design at terminal device 1502 . For example, certain scheduling settings may utilize a fixed MCS and/or data channel position (e.g., PDSCH). Given such scheduling settings, physical layer processing module 1608 may be able to conserve power as a result of such fixed scheduling. Additionally or alternatively, certain scheduling settings may provide fixed and guaranteed uplink grants, where resource allocations for uplink data transmissions are guaranteed for terminal device 1502 . Accordingly, instead of waking up and requesting permission to perform an uplink transmission via a scheduling request, terminal device 1502 may instead be able to wake up and directly proceed to utilize the guaranteed uplink grant resource allocation to perform an uplink transmission.

Additionally or alternatively, network access node 2002 may employ a ‘data queuing’ scheme as a component of the selected scheduling setting. For example, if terminal device 1502 reports a low-battery power class in 3304 , control module 2610 may select a scheduling setting in 3306 that will ‘queue’ downlink data intended for terminal device 1502 at network access node 2002 . Accordingly, when downlink data arrives at network access node 2002 from the core network that is addressed to terminal device 1502 (e.g., application data), network access node 2002 may check whether terminal device 1502 is currently in an idle or active state. If terminal device 1502 is in an active state, network access node 2002 may proceed to transmit the data. Conversely, if terminal device 1502 is in an idle state, network access node 2002 may refrain from providing terminal device 1502 with a paging message as per convention; instead, network access node 2002 may queue the data (e.g., temporarily store the data) and wait until terminal device 1502 enters an active state at a later time (e.g., when a voice or data connection is triggered by a user). Once terminal device 1502 enters an active state, network access node 2002 may transmit the waiting data. Such may allow terminal device 1502 to conserve power by having terminal device 1502 enter an active state a single time as opposed to multiple separate times.

The predefined plurality of scheduling settings available to control module 2610 for selection in 3306 may include any one or more of such features described above, including in particular scheduling settings such as the fixed/reduced control message candidate location scheme, channel measurement deactivation scheme, and reduced beamtracking scheme which may enable terminal devices to take advantage of modularized hardware designs to conserve power. As previously indicated, the predefined plurality of scheduling settings may contain individual scheduling settings that are designed for varying power efficiency levels. For example, certain scheduling settings may offer greater power efficiency than other scheduling settings (which may come with some performance cost) by incorporating more of the above-described features. While the predefined plurality of scheduling settings may be readily configurable, the full set of the predefined plurality of scheduling settings may be known at both terminal device 1502 and network access node 2002 .

Control module 2610 may therefore select a scheduling setting out of the predefined plurality of scheduling settings in 3306 based on the battery power class reported by terminal device 1502 in 3304 . Control module 2610 may utilize a predetermined mapping scheme, where each battery power class may be mapped to a specific scheduling setting. Control module 2610 may additionally be configured to consider factors other than battery power class in selecting the scheduling setting in 3306 , such as current cell load and/or current radio conditions.

After selecting a scheduling setting in 3306 , control module 2610 may transmit the selected scheduling setting to terminal device 1502 in 3308 , e.g., as a control message. Terminal device 1502 may then apply the selected scheduling setting in 3310 (where controller 1610 may be responsible for upper layer scheduling while PHY controller 3208 is responsible for physical layer tasks). Accordingly, given the selected scheduling setting PHY controller 3208 may control the control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 according to the selected scheduling setting by deactivating control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 during respective periods of inactivity. For example, PHY controller 3208 may deactivate control channel search module 3202 according to periods of inactivity related to a fixed/reduced control message candidate location scheme of the selected scheduling setting (if applicable), deactivate channel measurement module 3204 according to periods of inactivity related to a channel measurement deactivation scheme of the selected scheduling setting (if applicable), and deactivate beamtracking module 3206 according to periods of inactivity related to a reduced beamtracking scheme of the selected scheduling setting (if applicable). PHY controller 1608 may additionally realize power savings through fixed MCS and/or resource allocation (uplink or downlink) according to the selected scheduling setting (if applicable). Terminal device 1502 may therefore conserve power in 3310 as a result of the selected scheduling setting provided by network access node 2002 .

FIG. 34 shows method 3400 of operating a communication module arrangement in accordance with an aspect of the disclosure. As shown in FIG. 34 , method 3400 includes performing a first communication processing task with a first communication module and disabling the first communication module according to a first communication schedule when the first communication module is not in use for performing the first communication processing task ( 3410 ). A second communication processing task is performed with a second communication module and the second communication module is temporarily disabled according to a second communication schedule when the second communication module is not in use for performing the second communication processing task ( 3420 ). A power level is reported to a radio access network and a power-saving communication schedule is received in response to the reported power level. The power-saving communication schedule may include scheduling requirements for the first communication processing task and the second communication processing task ( 3430 ), and disabling the first communication module according to the scheduling requirements for the first communication processing task and disabling the second communication module according to the scheduling requirements for the second processing task ( 3440 ).

Cooperation with a network access node, such as network access node 2002 , may therefore be relied on to select scheduling settings based on a reported battery power. The predefined plurality of scheduling settings may therefore include various different scheduling settings that enable terminal devices, in particular terminal devices with modularized hardware designs such as terminal device 1502 , to selectively deactivate hardware components in order to conserve power. While the above-described examples explicitly refer to specific hardware components (control channel search module 3202 , channel measurement module 3204 , and beamtracking module 3206 ) that are included as PHY-layer components, other types of modules including both PHY and non-PHY layer modules may be employed in an analogous manner, e.g., by deactivating during periods of inactivity according to a specialized scheduling setting in order to conserve power. For example, other types of modules to which these aspects can be applied include processors, which can be configured with sleep/wake schedules and/or frequency scaling (which other modules can also use).

2.4 Power-Efficiency #4

In accordance with a further aspect of the disclosure, a terminal device may adapt downlink and uplink processing based on current operating conditions of the terminal device including battery power level and radio conditions. For example, a terminal device may employ lower-complexity demodulation and receiver algorithms in the downlink direction if strong radio conditions and/or low battery power levels are observed. Additionally, the terminal device may modify uplink processing by disabling closed-loop power control, adjusting transmission power, and/or reducing RF oversampling rates if strong radio conditions and/or low battery power levels are observed. Additionally, a terminal device may employ dynamic voltage and frequency scaling to further reduce power consumption if low battery power and/or strong radio conditions are observed. These aspects may be used with common channel aspects, e.g., a common channel employing variable complexity demodulation and receiver algorithms depending on radio conditions or battery power levels.

FIG. 35 shows an exemplary internal architecture of terminal device 1502 in accordance with some aspects of an aspect of this disclosure. As shown in FIG. 35 , terminal device 1502 may include antenna 1602 , first receiver 3502 , second receiver 3504 , third receiver 3506 , radio condition module 3508 , control module 3510 , power consumption module 3512 , power supply 1618 , other module 3514 , application processor 3516 , network module 3518 , and other module 3520 . As denoted in FIG. 35 , first receiver 3502 , second receiver 3504 , third receiver 3506 , radio condition module 3508 , control module 3510 , and power consumption module 3512 may be included as part of RF transceiver 1604 and/or baseband modem 1606 of terminal device 1502 while other module 3514 , application processor 3516 , network module 3518 , and other module 3520 may be included as part of data source 1612 and/or data sink 1616 of terminal device 1502 .

Receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may perform downlink processing on radio signals provided by antenna system 1602 as previously discussed with respect to terminal device 1502 . In some aspects, each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may be physically distinct receiver structures (e.g., structurally separate receiver instances each implemented as different hardware and/or software components) or may be different configurations of one or more single receiver structures. For example, in some aspects each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may be implemented as separate hardware and/or software components (e.g., physically distinct) or may be different configurations of the same hardware and/or software components (e.g., different configurations of a single receiver structure). Regardless, the reception processing performed by each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may be different. For example, each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may utilize different receiver algorithms, hardware components, software control, etc. Accordingly, receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may each have different reception performance and different power consumption. Generally speaking, receivers with higher performance yield higher power consumption. For example, receiver 3502 may utilize an equalizer while receiver 3504 may utilize a rake receiver; consequently, receiver 3502 may have better performance and higher power consumption than receiver 3504 . Additionally or alternatively, receiver 3504 may utilize a sphere decoder which may improve the demodulation performance of receiver 3504 while also increasing the power consumption. Each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may have similar such differences that lead to varying levels of performance and power consumption, such as different decoders, different equalizers, different filter lengths (e.g., Finite Impulse Response (FIR) filter taps), different channel estimation techniques, different interference cancellation techniques, different noise cancellation techniques, different processing bit width, different clock frequencies, different component voltages, different packet combination techniques, different number of algorithmic iterations, different usage of iterative techniques in or between components, etc. Although antenna system 1602 is depicted separately in FIG. 35 , in some aspects receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may additionally utilize different antenna configurations, such as different numbers of antenna, different beamforming settings, different beamsteering settings, different antenna sensitivities, different null-steering settings (e.g., positioning of nulls based on interferers), etc. The specific configuration of such factors for each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 , along with the associated performance and power consumption levels, may be predefined. Each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may be implemented as various different antenna (antenna system 1602 ), RF (RF transceiver 1604 ), physical layer (physical layer processing module 1608 ), and/or protocol stack (controller 1610 ) components and thus may be related to reception processing at any of the RF, PHY, and/or protocol stack levels.

Control module 3510 may be responsible for selecting which of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 (via the control module output lines denoted in FIG. 35 , which may be inter-core messages or control signals), to utilize for reception processing on signals provided by antenna system 1602 . Accordingly, the selected receiver may perform its respective reception processing to produce the resulting downlink data. Control module 3510 may be a controller configured to execute program code defining control logic for receiver selection and may be included as a software component of controller 1610 , a software component of a physical layer control module of physical layer processing module 1608 , or as a separate software component of terminal device 1502 .

Control module 3510 may be configured to select a receiver based on current radio conditions and current power levels. For example, in strong radio conditions control module 3510 may be configured to select a low-power receiver (which may also have lower performance) as the strong radio consumptions may not demand high performance. Conversely, control module 3510 may be configured to select a high-performance receiver in poor radio conditions in order to yield sufficient reception quality. Additionally, control module 3510 may be configured to select a low-power receiver if power supply 1618 has a low battery power level.

As shown in FIG. 35 , control module 3510 may receive input from radio condition module 3508 and power consumption module 3512 , which may be configured to monitor current radio conditions and power consumption, respectively, and thus may provide control module 3510 with current radio and power statuses. Radio condition module 3508 may thus monitor outputs from receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 (via the radio condition input lines denoted in FIG. 34 ) which may report parameters such as radio measurements (e.g., signal power, signal quality, signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR), etc.), channel parameters (e.g., Doppler spread, delay spread, etc.), error metrics (e.g., cyclic redundancy check (CRC) rate, block/bit error rates, average soft bit magnitudes, etc.), retransmission rates, etc., provided by receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 that are indicative of radio conditions. Radio condition module 3508 may evaluate such parameters and provide a radio condition indication to control module 3510 that specifies the current radio conditions of terminal device 1502 , thus enabling control module 3510 to select a receiver based on the current radio conditions.

Similarly, power consumption module 3512 may monitor outputs from receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 (via the power consumption input lines denoted in FIG. 34 ), and report power consumption data to control module 3510 which may indicate the current power consumption of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 . Power supply 1618 may also provide at least one of power consumption data and current battery power level data to power consumption module 3512 , which may indicate overall power consumption and remaining battery power levels of terminal device 1502 . Power consumption module 3512 may then evaluate such data and provide a power status indication to control module 3510 that specifies, for example, both the current power consumption and current battery power level of terminal device 1502 , thus enabling control module 3510 to select a receiver based on the current power status of terminal device 1502 . In some aspects, radio condition module 3508 and power consumption module 3512 may be implemented as software components such as processors configured to receive input from receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 and evaluate the inputs to provide indication data to control module 3510 . Radio condition module 3508 and power consumption module 3512 may be implemented together (e.g., at a common processor which may e.g., be the same processor as control module 3510 ) or separately.

As shown in FIG. 35 , control module 3510 may also receive input from data source 1612 /data sink 1616 including e.g., other module 3514 , application processor 3516 , network module 3518 , and other module 3520 . Such input data may include data related to applications currently being executed on application processor 3516 , user power control commands provided via application processor 3516 , thermal or heat measurements by a heat detection module (provided by e.g., other module 3514 or other module 3520 ), positioning, location, and/or velocity information (provided by e.g., other module 3514 or other module 3520 ), network data provided by network module 3518 , etc. Control module 3510 may also be configured to consider such input data in the receiver selection process. For example, high thermal or heat measurements may prompt selection of a lower-power receiver while high mobility (indicated by velocity and/or positional changes) may prompt selection of a higher performance receiver. In some aspects, control module 3510 may periodically analyze conditions as part of the selection process. The evaluation period can vary, and can also be different for different parts of the receive chain. For example, the inner receiver can evaluate/switch more frequently than an independent outer receiver component. In an exemplary LTE setting, the evaluation period can be, for example, 1 ms (e.g., one downlink TTI) or 0.5 ms (e.g., one slot). A frame that has a length of 1 ms could also be the evaluation period. In some aspects, the gaps in TDD for LTE, which can happen once or twice every 10 ms, could also serve as the evaluation period. In some aspects, there may also be much longer intervals in the order of seconds or minutes. For example, in an idle radio state (e.g., when paging), the receiver is only briefly active for the paging cycle, for example, every 1.28 seconds. Accordingly, control module 3510 may only be able to perform an evaluation according to this grid, e.g., when the receiver is on. In some aspects, the evaluation may be also based on an moving average so that the decision is not only based on a single evaluation interval but on a number of past evaluation intervals.

Control module 3510 may therefore be configured to select one of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 to utilize for reception processing based on radio conditions (reported by radio condition module 3508 ), power information (provided by power consumption module 3512 ), and other various factors (provided by other module 3514 , application processor 3516 , network module 3518 , and other module 3520 ). As previously indicated, receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 may preconfigured (either with different hardware or software configurations) according to different decoders, different equalizers, different filter lengths, different channel estimation techniques, different interference cancellation techniques, different noise cancellation techniques, different processing bit width, different clock frequencies, different component voltages, different packet combination techniques, different number of algorithmic iterations, different usage of iterative techniques in or between components, different numbers of antenna, different beamforming settings, different beamsteering settings, different antenna sensitivities, different null-steering settings, etc., and may accordingly each provide different performance and power consumption levels according to their respective configurations. It is appreciated that any combination of such factors may be available to a designer to arrive at the preconfiguration for each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 . Additionally, while FIG. 35 depicts three receivers, this is demonstrative and the number of preconfigured receivers can be scalable to any quantity.

Control module 3510 may then select one of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 based on, for example, the radio condition status, power consumption status, and the respective power consumption and performance properties of each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 . The selection logic may be predefined, such as with a lookup table with a first dimension according to a power consumption level (e.g., a quantitative power level and/or current power consumption level) provided by power consumption module 3512 and a second dimension according to a radio condition level (e.g., a quantitative radio condition level) provided by radio condition module 3508 where each entry of the lookup table gives a receiver selection of receiver 3502 , 3504 , or 3506 . Control module 3510 may then input both the power consumption level and the radio condition level into the lookup table and select the receiver corresponding to the resulting entry as the selected receiver. Such a predefined lookup table scheme may be expanded to any number of dimensions, with any one or more of e.g., current power consumption, current battery power level, radio measurements (e.g., signal power, signal quality, signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR), etc.), channel parameters (e.g., Doppler spread, delay spread, etc.), error metrics (e.g., cyclic redundancy check (CRC) rate, block/bit error rates, average soft bit magnitude, etc.), retransmission rates, etc., used as dimensions of the lookup table where each entry identifies a receiver to utilize as the selected receiver. Depending on the specifics of the predefined lookup table, control module 3510 may input the current data into the lookup table to identify one of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 to use as the selected receiver. Alternative to a completely predefined lookup table, control module 3510 may update the lookup table during runtime, e.g., based on continuous power logging. Regardless of such specifics, control module 3510 may input certain radio condition and/or power parameters into a lookup table in order to identify which of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 to use as the selected receiver. Control module 3510 may store the lookup table locally or at another location accessible by control module 3510 .

Although the receiver selection logic can be flexible and open to design considerations, without loss of generality, control module 3510 may largely aim to utilize high-performance receivers in poor radio condition scenarios and to utilize low-power receivers in low-power scenarios. For example, if radio condition module 3508 indicates that radio conditions are poor, control module 3510 may be configured to select a high-performance receiver out of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 (where e.g., the lookup table is configured to output high-performance receiver selections for poor radio condition inputs) via the control module output lines shown in FIG. 35 . Similarly, if power consumption module 3512 indicates that battery power is low or current power consumption is high, control module 3510 may be configured to select a low-power receiver out of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 (where e.g., the lookup table is configured to output low-power receiver selections for low battery power and/or high power consumption inputs) via the control module output lines.

In some aspects, control module 3510 may perform receiver selection in a worst-case scenario, such as where radio conditions are poor and/or the receiver has low power. The worst-case scenario could also be listed in the lookup table, and have specific receiver selections that are tailored for worst case scenarios. In some aspects, there could also be a further process to consider additional parameters in receiver selection, such as traffic type (where, for example, during a voice call, the receiver selection strategy may be to keep the call alive, while in a data-only scenario a reduced data rate may be acceptable) or location/‘social’ knowledge (for example, proximity to a charging possibility). These parameters may be defined as inputs to the lookup table, and control module 3510 may accordingly obtain receiver selection outputs from the lookup table using these parameters as inputs during worst-case scenarios.

In some aspects, the prioritization for battery life or performance in receiver selection by control module 3510 may further depend on the associated application. For example, when performing voice communication, performance may be more important. Control module 3510 may accordingly place a higher priority on performance when performing voice communication. When performing downloads (e.g., non-realtime), battery life may be more important. Control module 3510 may consequently place a higher priority on battery life when performing downloads.

Control module 3510 may additionally or alternatively employ other strategies in receiver selection. For example, in some aspects control module 3510 may minimize total power consumption by, for example, selecting a high-performance receiver in order to download pending downlink data as quickly as possible. Alternatively, if the performance enhancement provided by a high-performance receiver is not warranted given the current radio conditions, control module 3510 may utilize a lower performance receiver with lower power consumption. Furthermore, in various aspects the configuration of terminal device 1502 may be more sensitive to either dynamic power or leakage power, where terminal devices sensitive to dynamic power may be more power efficient when performing light processing spread over long periods of time and terminal devices sensitive to leakage power may be more power efficient when performing heavy processing over short and brief periods of time. Control module 3510 may therefore be configured to select high-performance receivers to quickly download data in the leakage-sensitive case or low-performance receivers to gradually download data in the dynamic-sensitive case.

Additionally or alternatively to receiver selection, in some aspects control module 3510 (or another dedicated control module) may employ transmitter selection similarly based on radio and/or power conditions. FIG. 36 shows an internal configuration of terminal device 1502 with transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 in accordance with some aspects. Although shown separately in FIGS. 35 and 36 , in some aspects terminal device 1502 may include both receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 and transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 and may utilize both the receiver and transmitter selection schemes. Transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may perform uplink processing on uplink data provided by controller 1610 (not shown in FIG. 36 ) as discussed with respect to terminal device 1502 . Similarly, as discussed with respect to receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 , in various aspects each of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may be physically distinct transmitter structures (e.g., structurally separate transmitter instances) or may be different configurations of one or more single transmitter structures. For example, in some aspects each of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may be implemented as separate hardware and/or software components (e.g., physically distinct) or may be different configurations of the same hardware and/or software components (e.g., different configurations of a single receiver structure). Regardless, the transmission processing performed by each of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may be different. For example, each of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may utilize different transmitter algorithms, hardware components, software control, etc. Although antenna system 1602 is depicted separately in FIG. 36 , transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may additionally utilize different antenna configurations, such as different numbers of antenna, different beamforming settings, different beamsteering settings, different antenna sensitivities, etc.

Accordingly, each of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may have different performance and power consumption levels, which may result from different RF oversampling rates, different transmission powers, different power control (e.g., closed-loop power control vs. open-loop power control), different numbers of antenna, different beamforming settings, different beamsteering settings, different antenna sensitivities, etc. The specific configuration of such factors for transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 , along with the associated performance and power consumption levels, may be predefined. In some aspects, each of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may be implemented as various different antenna (antenna system 1602 ), RF (RF transceiver 1604 ), physical layer (physical layer processing module 1608 ), and/or protocol stack (controller 1610 ) components and thus may be related to reception processing at any of the RF, PHY, and/or protocol stack levels.

As in the case of receiver selection, control module 3510 may be configured to select which of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 to utilize for transmission processing on signals provided to antenna 1602 . Accordingly, control module 3510 may be configured to evaluate radio condition and power status data provided by radio condition module 3508 and power consumption module 3512 in order to select one of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 based on the performance and power consumption characteristics of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 . As indicated above, transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may have different RF oversampling rates, different transmission powers, different power control (e.g., closed-loop power control vs. open-loop power control), different numbers of antenna, different beamforming settings, different beamsteering settings, different antenna sensitivities, etc. Accordingly, both high RF oversampling rate and high transmission power may yield higher performance but have higher power consumption. Regarding power control, in some aspects certain transmitters may utilize a transmit feedback receiver, which may be an analog component included as part of the transmitter circuitry. Transmitters may utilize the transmit feedback receiver to monitor actual transmit power, thus forming a ‘closed-loop’ for power control in order to improve the accuracy of transmission power. While the use of such closed-loop power control may yield higher performance, operation of the transmit feedback receiver may increase power consumption. Accordingly, closed-loop power control may yield higher performance and higher power consumption than open-loop power control.

Control module 3510 may therefore similarly be configured to select one of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 based on control logic, which may be e.g., a predefined or adaptive lookup table or similar type of selection logic in which control module 3510 may input parameters such as current power consumption, current battery power level, radio measurements (e.g., signal power, signal quality, signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR), etc.), channel parameters (e.g., Doppler spread, delay spread, etc.), error metrics (e.g., cyclic redundancy check (CRC) rate, block/bit error rates, average soft bit magnitude, etc.), retransmission rates, etc., in order to obtain a selection of one of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 . Control module 3510 may also generally be configured to select high performance transmitters during poor radio conditions, low performance and low power transmitters during strong radio conditions, and low power transmitters during low battery conditions and may also be configured to consider dynamic and leakage power sensitivity in transmitter selection.

For example, in an exemplary scenario, transmitter 3602 may be more precise than transmitter 3604 (e.g., according to Error Vector Magnitude (EVM)) but have higher power consumption than transmitter 3604 . Due to its lesser performance, transmitter 3604 will require an increased transmit power to achieve the same performance. However, at low or minimum transmit powers the contribution of such a transmit power increase to total power consumption may be less than the power saved through use of transmitter 3604 over transmitter 3602 . Consequently, it may be prudent to utilize transmitter 3604 , which has the lower base power consumption.

In some aspects, control module 3510 may trigger transmitter selection based on a triggering criteria. Non-limiting examples of triggering criteria can include detection that the transmit power is above/below a certain threshold, detecting that the bandwidth actually being used is above or below a certain threshold, detecting that the measured error rate is above or below a certain threshold, detecting that battery power has fallen below a threshold, detecting that power supply 1618 is charging, or detecting that the retransmission rate (e.g., uplink HARQ rate from eNB to UE in an exemplary LTE setting) is above/below a threshold. Control module 3510 may monitor such triggering criteria and trigger transmitter selection when they are met.

As both transmitter and receiver selections may have an impact on power consumption and be impacted by radio conditions, in some aspects control module 3510 may be configured to consider the performance and power consumption requirements of both receivers and transmitters during transmitter and receiver selection. Control module 3510 can be implemented as a single unified control module responsible for control of both receivers and transmitters or as two separate control modules each respectively responsible for control of one of receiver or transmitter selection.

The receiver and transmitter selection schemes described herein can utilize fixed receiver and transmitter configurations, where the properties of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 and transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 are predefined and static, e.g., as either separate structural components or as different fixed configurations of the same structural components. Alternatively, in some aspects one or more of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 and one or more of transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may be ‘configurable’ and accordingly may have certain enhancement features that may be turned on/off, switched, or adjusted, such as any of the aforementioned features related to decoders, equalizers, filter lengths, channel estimation techniques, interference cancellation techniques, noise cancellation techniques, processing bit width, clock frequencies, component voltages, packet combination techniques, number of algorithmic iterations, usage of iterative techniques in or between components, RF oversampling rates, transmission powers, power control, number of antennas, beamforming setting, beamsteering setting, antenna sensitivity, null-steering settings, etc. As these enhancement features may impact performance and power consumption, control module 3510 may oversee the activation, deactivation, and exchange of these enhancement features based on radio condition and power status data.

FIGS. 37 and 38 show exemplary configurations of terminal device 1502 (which may both be implemented simultaneously or separately at terminal device 1502 ) in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIGS. 37 and 38 , one or more of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and/or 3506 and transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may have enhancement features. Specifically, receiver 3504 may have receiver enhancement feature 2.1, receiver 3506 may have receiver enhancement features 3.1 and 3.2, transmitter 3604 may have transmitter enhancement feature 2.1, and transmitter 3606 may have transmitter enhancement features 3.1 and 3.2. The enhancement features may be software and/or hardware enhancement features; for example, the enhancement features may be a specific software algorithm, specific dedicated hardware, or a specific integrated hardware and software component. For example, the enhancement features may include particular decoders (e.g., sphere decoder), channel processor (e.g., equalizer), interference canceller (e.g., an advanced interference cancellation scheme), or any other feature related to decoders, equalizers, filter lengths, channel estimation techniques, interference cancellation techniques, noise cancellation techniques, processing bit width, clock frequencies, component voltages, packet combination techniques, different number of algorithmic iterations, different usage of iterative techniques in or between components, RF oversampling rates, transmission powers, power control, number of antennas, beamforming setting, beamsteering setting, antenna sensitivity, null-steering setting, etc. Each of the enhancement features may thus be ‘fixed’ features that can be selectively switched on or off by control module 3510 .

The activation of such enhancement features may generally improve performance at the cost of increased power consumption. Instead of having to select between fixed sets of receivers and transmitters, control module 3510 may therefore also have the option to selectively activate any of the enhancement features in order to further control the balance between performance and power consumption. Control module 3510 may thus be configured with control logic (e.g., a lookup table or similar selection logic) to select a specific receiver along with any specific enhancement features from receivers 3502 , 3504 , and/or 3506 and likewise be configured with control logic to select a specific transmitter along with any specific enhancement features from transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 . Such may accordingly give control module 3510 greater flexibility in controlling the performance and power consumption balance dependent on the current radio condition and power status reported by radio condition module 3508 and power consumption module 3512 .

Although FIGS. 37 and 38 depict multiple ‘fixed’ receivers and transmitters, in some aspects control module 3510 may be able to perform receiver and transmitter selection with only one receiver and/or transmitter by deciding which enhancement features to activate and deactivate. For example, if terminal device 1502 includes only receiver 3506 and transmitter 3606 , control module 3510 may monitor the radio condition and power status data provided by radio condition module 3508 and power consumption module 3512 in order to determine whether to increase performance (e.g., in the case of poor radio conditions) or to reduce power consumption (e.g., in the case of strong radio conditions or low battery power). Control module 3510 may then activate enhancement features to increase performance or deactivate enhancement features to decrease power consumption.

As previously indicated, in some aspects each of receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 and transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 may be fixed receivers and transmitters (optionally with fixed enhancement features) and accordingly may each be implemented as antenna, RF, PHY, and protocol stack level components. Each of the individual components (hardware and/or software) may thus be a ‘module’, which may be a hardware or software component configured to perform a specific task, such as a module related to any one or more of decoders, equalizers, filter lengths, channel estimation techniques, interference cancellation techniques, noise cancellation technique, processing bit width, clock frequencies, component voltages, number of algorithmic iterations, usage of iterative techniques in or between components, packet combination techniques, RF oversampling rates, transmission powers, power control, number of antennas, beamforming setting, beamsteering setting, antenna sensitivity, null-steering settings, etc. (where each of the enhancement features of FIGS. 37 and 38 may also be considered a module or combination of modules). Exemplary modules thus include decoders, equalizers, rake receivers, channel estimators, filters, interference cancelers, noise cancelers, etc. FIG. 39 shows a simplified internal diagram of receiver 3502 and transmitter 3602 according to some aspects. As shown in FIG. 39 , receiver 3502 may include modules 3902 , 3904 , 3906 , and 3908 , which may each configured to perform a different reception processing task in order to output downlink data while transmitter 3602 may include modules 3910 , 3912 , 3914 , and 3916 each configured to perform a different transmission processing task in order to output uplink data. Modules 3902 , 3904 , 3906 , 3908 , 3910 , 3912 , 3914 , and 3916 may be structurally realized as a hardware-defined module, e.g., as one or more dedicated hardware circuits or FPGAs, as a software-defined module, e.g., as one or more processors executing program code defining arithmetic, control, and I/O instructions (e.g., software and/or firmware) stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, or as a mixed hardware-defined and software-defined module.

In addition to switching between fixed receivers and transmitters (in addition to enhancement features) as described above, in some aspects control module 3510 may additionally be configured to adjust local parameters within receiver and transmitter modules to help optimize the performance and power consumption balance of terminal device 1502 . Exemplary adjustments include e.g., adapting the number of iterations for iterative algorithms (e.g., turbo channel decoder iterations), adapting the number of rake fingers used for a certain cell or channel, adapting the size of an equalizer matrix (where smaller matrices simplify inversion), adapting processing efficiency (e.g., switching the number of finite impulse response (FIR) filter taps), adapting processing bit width, etc. Control module 3510 may therefore be able to control receivers 3502 , 3504 , and 3506 and transmitters 3602 , 3604 , and 3606 at the ‘module’ level in order to optimize performance and power consumption.

For example, in some aspects control module 3510 may monitor the current radio condition and power status data provided by radio condition module 3508 and power consumption module 3512 to determine whether there are currently strong or poor radio conditions, high or low remaining battery power, and/or high or low current power consumption. Depending on the current radio condition and power status data, control module 3510 may decide to increase/decrease performance or to increase/decrease power consumption. In addition to selecting a receiver (or, for example, in cases where terminal device 1502 has only one receiver), control module 3510 may adjust the selected receiver at a module level to optimize performance vs. power consumption (and likewise for transmitters). For example, control module 3510 may increase iterations for iterative algorithms to increase performance and vice versa to decrease power consumption, increase the number of rake fingers to increase performance and vice versa to decrease power consumption, increase equalizer matrix size to increase performance and vice versa to decrease power consumption, increase FIR filter length to increase performance and vice versa to decrease power consumption, increase processing bit-width to increase performance and vice versa to decrease power consumption etc. Such may be defined by the control logic at control module 3510 that renders decisions based on radio condition and power status data.

In some aspects, control module 3510 may also rely on local control at each of the receiver and transmitter modules. FIG. 40 shows exemplary internal architectures of receiver modules 3902 and 3904 of receiver 3502 in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIG. 40 , in some aspects modules 3902 and 3904 may include a local control module, a quality measurement module, and a receiver algorithm module. The receiver algorithm module may apply the actual dedicated receiver processing of the respective module. The quality measurement module may evaluate the local performance of the receiver algorithm module. The local control module may oversee operation of the respective module in accordance with the performance and power consumption balance optimization. Modules 3902 and 3904 may interface with control module 3510 at the respective local control modules. Accordingly, control module 3510 may provide module-level control, e.g., to increase performance or to decrease power consumption, to the local control modules, which may then be responsible for implementing the control. The local control modules may also receive input from application processor 3516 and other triggers or information sinks.

Accordingly, the quality measurement modules may evaluate the performance of the receiver algorithm modules, such as with a quantitative metric related to the receiver algorithm module. For example, if module 3902 is a decoder, the receiver algorithm module may perform decoding while the quality measurement module may evaluate the decoder performance, such as by evaluating the soft bit quality (e.g., magnitude of a soft probability) for input data to each channel decoder iteration. The quality measurement module may then provide the local control module with a performance level of the receiver algorithm module, which the local control module may utilize to evaluate whether performance is sufficient. If control module 3510 has indicated performance should be high, e.g., in poor radio conditions, and the local control module determines that the receiver algorithm module has insufficient performance, the local control module and control module 3510 may interface to determine whether the receiver algorithm module should be adjusted to have higher performance, which may come at the cost of higher power consumption.

FIG. 41 shows an exemplary internal configuration of module 3902 in accordance with some aspects. In the exemplary setting of FIG. 41 , module 3902 may be configured as e.g., a demodulator. As shown in FIG. 41 , module 3902 may include demodulator module 4102 , cyclic redundancy check (CRC) module 4104 , local control module 4106 , and channel quality estimation module 4108 . Demodulator module 4102 may function as the receiver algorithm module while CRC module 4104 may function as the quality measurement module. Local control module 4106 may therefore interface with CRC module 4104 to evaluate the performance of demodulator module 4102 , where high CRC error may indicate poor performance and low CRC error may indicate high performance. Local control module 4106 may interface with control module 3510 to handle performance and power consumption commands from control module 3510 . Local control module 4106 may then control complexity tuning at demodulator module 4102 , where increases in complexity may yield better performance at the expense of higher power consumption. For example, local control module 4106 may increase or decrease the demodulation algorithm complexity of demodulator module 4102 , such as e.g., by switching from a linear interpolator to advanced filters for channel estimation (complexity and performance increase, and vice versa for complexity and performance decrease), switching the equalization algorithm from simple minimum mean squared error (MMSE) decoder to complex maximal likelihood (ML) decoder (complexity and performance increase, and vice versa for complexity and performance decrease). Additionally or alternatively, local control module 4106 may increase the processing efficiency of a given demodulation algorithm, such as by increasing number of FIR filter taps for a channel estimator (complexity and performance increase, and vice versa for complexity and performance decrease) or by increasing the number of iterations of a channel decoder (complexity and performance increase, and vice versa for complexity and performance decrease).

Additionally, channel quality estimation module 4108 may estimate channel quality based on input signals to obtain a channel quality estimate, which channel quality estimation module 4108 may provide to radio condition module 3508 and local control module 4106 . Radio condition module 3508 may then utilize inputs such as the channel quality estimate to evaluate radio conditions to indicate the current radio condition status to control module 3510 . Local control module 4106 may utilize the channel quality estimate from channel quality estimation module 4108 and the quality measurement from CRC module 4104 to perform local control over the demodulation complexity of demodulator module 4102 . Control module 3510 may perform global control (e.g., joint control of multiple local control modules) based on the radio conditions provided by radio condition module 3508 to scale demodulation complexity over multiple modules.

In some aspects, the local control modules of modules 3902 and 3904 may also interface with each other as shown in FIG. 40 . Accordingly, the local control modules may communicate without control module 3510 as an intermediary and may consequently be able to cooperate in order to coordinate performance and power consumption. For example, module 3902 could request a change at module 3904 to ask for a performance enhancement or power consumption reduction at module 3904 if the modules are robust against the requests (e.g., can fulfill requests in most/all cases) and no deadlock or catastrophic resonant feedback loops can occur, for example. In an exemplary scenario, module 3902 may be a Turbo channel decoder and module 3904 may be a downlink power control unit. Turbo channel decoder/module 3902 may request downlink power control unit/module 3904 to request the radio access network for a higher downlink transmission power, which would enable Turbo channel decoder/module 3902 to improve demodulation performance and potentially require less decoder iterations, thus conserving power. Such an increase in downlink power may be possible if the radio access network/current serving cell is not loaded and should have no negative impact on the power consumption in other modules. There may be numerous different scenarios in which modules (both in the receiver case shown in FIG. 40 and in the analog transceiver case) may communicate with one another and/or with control module 3510 in order to adjust the performance and power consumption balance.

Control module 3510 may therefore have a wide degree of control over the receivers and transmitters of terminal device 1502 , including the ability to select specific receivers and transmitters, activate/deactivate specific receiver and transmitter enhancement features, and control individual receivers and transmitters at a module level. In particular when controlling receivers and transmitters at a module level, the impact of even minor changes at multiple modules may have impacts on power consumption. Accordingly, control module 3510 may implement a monitoring scheme to monitor the status of multiple modules in order to help prevent or reduce sudden jumps in power consumption.

FIG. 42 shows such a configuration (in which other components of terminal device 1502 are graphically omitted for simplicity) in accordance with some aspects, in which control module 3510 may interface with multiple modules 4202 , 4204 , 4206 , 4208 , and 4210 , which may either be transmitter or receiver modules. Control module 3510 may monitor operation at each of modules 4202 , 4204 , 4206 , 4208 , and 4210 to detect potential jumps in power consumption that may arise from even small operational changes at one or more modules. For example, a slight increase in required Million Instructions per Second (MIPS) for a task at e.g., module 4202 may lead to a jump in voltage and/or clock of a software component, such as a processor core or digital signal processor (DSP), which may be implemented in module 4202 , and which may not be linearly connected to the small MIPS increase that triggered it. Such voltage and/or clock changes may additionally apply to hardware blocks, such as module 4204 implemented as a hardware component. Additionally, if the radioed transmit power is increased above certain levels, there may be a switch to a different power amplifier mode, such as in, e.g., module 4208 implemented as a power amplifier, which could result in a jump in the power needed for the certain radioed transmit power.

Accordingly, in some aspects control module 3510 may interface with each of modules 4202 , 4204 , 4206 , 4208 , and 4210 to preemptively detect such jumps in power consumption prior to their actual occurrence. Upon detection, control module 3510 may adapt behavior of the corresponding modules to help prevent the power consumption jump from occurring. Such may include accepting minimal degradations in performance, which may avoid the power consumption jump and may in certain cases not be noticeable to a user. In some aspects, control module 3510 may perform such monitoring based on parameter measurements and threshold comparisons. For example, each module may have a specific operating parameter that control module 3510 may monitor in order to detect potential power consumption jumps. Accordingly, each module (shown for modules 4208 and 4210 in FIG. 42 ) may therefore include a measurement module for measuring the parameter of interest. The modules may then provide the measured parameter to control module 3510 , which may determine if each respective measured parameter is above a respective threshold, where the thresholds may indicate potential triggering of a large jump in power consumption. If a module reports a measured parameter above the threshold, control module 3510 may instruct the module to modify behavior to bring the parameter back below the threshold. Control module 3510 may therefore help prevent power consumption jumps and thus maintain an optimal performance and power consumption balance.

Control module 3510 may thus employ any one or more of the techniques described above to maintain a desired balance between performance and power consumption, which control module 3510 may monitor based on performance and power status data. Control module 3510 may additionally consider the receiver and/or transmitter states of terminal device 1502 , as different receiver and transmitter states may yield different power states and power consumptions.

For example, radio access technologies such as LTE, UMTS, and other 3GPP and non-3GPP radio access technologies may assign certain ‘states’ to terminal device operation. Such states may include connected states (e.g., RRC_CONNECTED or CELL_DCH), idle and paging states and other various states (e.g., Forward Access Channel (FACH) and enhanced FACH (eFACH), etc.). Terminal device 1502 may additionally have other ‘internal states, such as related to algorithms such as whether Carrier Aggregation is enabled, bandwidth states such as an FFT size for LTE, whether HSDPA is enabled versus normal UMTS Dedicated Channel (DCH) operation, whether GPRS or EDGE is enabled, etc., in addition to other chip-level states such as low-power mode, high/voltage clock settings, memory switchoffs, etc. Such states may be present for multiple radio access technologies, e.g., during a handover. Control module 3510 may receive indications of such states from e.g., module 3514 , application processor 3516 , network module 3518 , other module 3520 , etc., and may utilize such knowledge in receiver and transmitter selection to optimize the performance and power consumption balance.

In some aspects, control module 3510 may utilize other techniques that may generally apply to the various receivers and transmitters of terminal device 1502 . For example, during idle transmit and/or receive periods, control module 3510 may switch off the transmitters and receivers e.g., with clock and/or power gating. Alternatively, the components of RF transceiver 1604 and baseband modem 1606 may be configured to employ Dynamic Voltage and Frequency Scaling (DVFS). Consequently, depending on the current performance and processing complexity of the various receivers and transmitters of terminal device 1502 , control module 3510 may scale back component voltage and/or processing clock frequency to conserve power. For example, based on the processing efficiency yielded by the performance level, control module 3510 may dynamically find and apply a new voltage and/processing clock setting that can satisfy the real-time processing requirements for the current receiver and transmitter selections.

In some aspects, user-implemented power schemes may also be incorporated. For example, a user of terminal device 1502 may be able to select a performance setting that affects operation of terminal device 1502 . If the user selects e.g., a high performance setting, terminal device 1502 may avoid (or may never select) to use a low power transmitter or receiver and may only select high-performance transmitters and/or receivers.

In some aspects, terminal device 1502 may locally implement receiver and transmitter selection techniques described above and may not require direct cooperation with the radio access network to implement these techniques. However, cooperation with the radio access network may impart additional aspects to terminal device 1502 with respect to power consumption control.

For example, in some aspects control module 3510 may periodically check the power level of power supply 1618 to determine whether the current power level is below a threshold, e.g., low power. Control module 3510 may then evaluate the possible receiver and transmitter selections for the current power level and, based on the possible selections, may select a preferred scheduling pattern that may optimize power saving. For example, in the downlink direction such may include identifying a candidate downlink resource block scheduling pattern (and likewise in the uplink direction). Control module 3510 may then transmit this candidate downlink resource block scheduling pattern to the radio access network, e.g., network access node 1510 . Network access node 1510 may then evaluate the requested candidate downlink resource block scheduling pattern and either accept or reject the requested candidate downlink resource block scheduling pattern via a response to control module 3510 . If accepted, control module 3510 may perform downlink reception according to the requested candidate downlink resource block scheduling pattern. If rejected, control module 3510 may propose a new candidate downlink resource block scheduling pattern and continue until a candidate downlink resource block scheduling pattern is agreed upon with network access node 1510 .

In some aspects, the candidate downlink resource block scheduling pattern requested by control module 3510 may be specifically selected based on the selected receiver and/or transmitter configurations. For example, the candidate downlink resource block scheduling pattern may be biased for either leakage or dynamic power saving depending on the power sensitivity of the selected receiver and/or transmitter configurations. For example, if the selected receiver is leakage-power sensitive, control module 3510 may request a scheduling pattern that schedules as many RBs as possible in a short duration of time (e.g., a frequency-dense pattern that fits the RB allocation into a few OFDM symbols at the beginning of a TTI). Such may allow terminal device 1502 to complete downlink processing at the selected receiver and power the receiver down for the remaining duration of each TTI. Alternatively, if the selected receiver is dynamic-power sensitive, control module 3510 may request a scheduling pattern that allocates a sparse amount of RBs in frequency over an extended period of time (e.g., multiple TTIs), which may allow control module 3510 to reduce the processing clock rate and potentially the voltage setting, which is proportional to the dynamic power consumption squared. Control module 3510 may similarly handle candidate uplink resource block scheduling patterns for the selected transmitter. Other scheduling patterns may combine uplink and downlink activity, such as an exemplary LTE scenario with 8 HARQ processes in which waking up every 4 TTI, for example, would be optimal as two uplink and downlink HARQ processes would be aligned.

FIG. 43 shows method 4300 of operating a communication system according to some aspects of an aspect of the disclosure. As shown in FIG. 43 , method 4300 includes identifying a target operational change of the communication system based on a current radio condition and a current power supply status, wherein the target operational change is a performance adjustment or a power consumption adjustment ( 4310 ). Based on the target operational change, a configuration for the communication system from a plurality of configurations having different performance properties or different power consumption properties is selected ( 4320 ). Data is transmitted or received with the communication system arrangement according to the selected configuration ( 4330 ).

2.5 Power-Efficiency #5

According to another aspect of the disclosure, a terminal device may select different transmitters or receivers to apply to certain data streams, or ‘data bearers’, to satisfy requirements of the data bearers while optimizing power consumption. As each data bearer may have different requirements, certain high-importance data bearers may warrant more intensive reception processing, such as the application of advanced interference cancelation techniques, more decoder iterations, more accurate channel estimators, etc., that may incur a high power penalty at a terminal device. In contrast, data bearers of lower criticality may not need such extra processing in order to satisfy their respective requirements. Terminal devices may therefore select receivers to apply to different data bearers based on the performance of each receiver and the requirements of each data bearer. These aspects may be used with common channel aspects, e.g., a common channel may use a certain data bearer which may be received with a certain receiver to optimize power consumption.

A ‘data bearer’ may be logical data connection that bidirectionally transports data along a specific route through a communication network. FIG. 44 shows a RAT-generic example in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIG. 44 , terminal device 1502 may utilize a radio access bearer (RAB) to communicate with a core network location of core network 4402 via network access node 1510 . Terminal devices such as terminal device 1502 may therefore communicate with various internal and external nodes of a communication network with such data bearers. For example, an LTE terminal device may communicate with an eNodeB with a radio bearer and with a Serving Gateway (SGW) of the LTE core network (EPC) with a Radio Access Bearer (RAB), which may be composed of the radio bearer and an S1 bearer between the eNodeB and the SGW. Terminal devices may communicate with external locations such as external data networks, or PDNs, with an Evolved Packet Service (EPS) bearer stretching from the terminal device to the PDN Gateway (PGW) and an external bearer connecting the PGW and the PDN. Such data bearers may be similarly provided and utilized in various different radio access technologies.

Terminal device 1502 may utilize a different data bearer for each data network to which terminal device 1502 is connected. For example, terminal device 1502 may have a default data bearer (e.g., a default EPS bearer in an LTE setting) that is connected to a default data network such as an internet network. Terminal device 1502 may have additional dedicated data bearers (e.g., dedicated EPS bearers) to other data networks such as IMS servers used for voice and other data networks utilized for video, file download, push messaging, background updates, etc., multiple of which may be active at a given time. Each data bearer may rely on specific protocols and have specific Quality of Service (QoS) requirements, which may include data performance parameters such as guaranteed data rate, maximum error rate, maximum delay/latency, etc. Accordingly, certain data bearers, such as voice traffic data bearers (e.g., to IMS services for Voice over LTE (VoLTE)), may have higher QoS requirements than other data bearers. Each data bearer may be assigned a QoS priority (e.g., priority levels assigned by QoS Class Identifier (QCI) in the case of LTE) that assigns relative priorities between different data bearers.

Data bearers with high QoS priority, such as critical data, IMS data, conversational voice and video, etc., may therefore call for more intensive receiver processing than lower priority data bearers. As intensive receiver processing generally incurs a higher power penalty, received data from high priority data bearers may be identified and received data from lower priority data bearers may be identified, so as to subsequently process the high priority data with intensive receivers while processing the low priority data with low-power receivers. Such may allow terminal devices to optimize power consumption while still meeting the QoS requirements of each data bearer.

FIG. 45 shows an internal configuration of terminal device 1502 according to another aspect of the disclosure (where other components of terminal device 1502 may be omitted from FIG. 45 for clarity). As shown in FIG. 45 , terminal device 1502 may receive radio signals via antenna system 1602 and provide the resulting signals to RF transceiver 1604 for RF demodulation. RF transceiver 1604 may provide the resulting PHY level (baseband) data to baseband modem 1606 for PHY and protocol stack processing by baseband modem 1606 , which as shown in FIG. 45 may include mapping module 4502 , receiver 4504 , receiver 4506 , receiver 4508 , and combiner module 4510 . Similar to receivers noted above, receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may either be physically distinct receivers (e.g., separate physical hardware structures) or may be different configurations of one or more physical receivers (e.g., the same physical hardware with different parameters and/or software-defined components). Regardless, the reception processing of receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may be different and each of receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may therefore have varying performance and power consumption characteristics. Mapping module 4502 may be configured with the same capabilities as previously described regarding control module 3510 , and therefore may be able to dynamically configure a single physical receiver with various different configurations in order to realize receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 . Although RF transceiver 1604 and antenna system 1602 are shown separately from receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 , in some aspects receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may be implemented as antenna, RF, PHY, and/or protocol stack level components.

As indicated above, terminal device 1502 may identify data of certain data bearers and map such data to specific receivers according to the QoS requirements of each data bearer. Accordingly, mapping module 4502 may be configured to receive data provided by RF transceiver 1604 and to map such data to receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 based on the QoS requirements of the associated data bearer. Although described on a functional level herein, in some aspects mapping module 4502 may be structurally realized as a hardware-defined module, e.g., as one or more dedicated hardware circuits or FPGAs, as a software-defined module, e.g., as one or more processors executing program code defining arithmetic, control, and I/O instructions (e.g., software and/or firmware) stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, or as a mixed hardware-defined and software-defined module. Skilled persons will appreciate the possibility to embody mapping module 4502 in software and/or hardware according to the functionality described herein.

As denoted in FIG. 45 , in some aspects mapping module 4502 may receive bearer information and power data as inputs. The power data may be provided by a component such as power consumption module 3512 , and may accordingly specify current power consumption and current battery power levels of power supply 1618 . As further described below, the bearer information may be provided by a higher-layer control component, such as controller 1610 or a PHY controller of physical layer processing module 1608 .

The bearer information may identify on a PHY level which data received by mapping module 4502 from RF transceiver 1604 is part of each data bearer. Accordingly, mapping module 4502 may receive a stream of PHY data from RF transceiver 1604 and be able to determine on a bit-level which data is part of each data bearer. For example, terminal device 1502 may currently have an active default data bearer (associated with e.g., an internet connection) and one or more active dedicated data bearers (associated with e.g., a voice call or other IMS services). Accordingly, the data stream provided by RF transceiver 1604 may contain data from all active data bearers multiplexed onto a single data stream.

Using the bearer information, mapping module 4502 may be able to identify which parts of the data stream (on a bit level) are associated with each data bearer. The bearer information may also indicate the priority of each data bearer, which may accordingly inform mapping module 4502 of the QoS requirements of each data bearer. For example, a first data bearer may be an IMS data bearer (e.g., LTE QCI 5 with priority 1), a second data bearer may be a live video streaming data bearer (e.g., LTE QCI 7 with priority 7), and a third data bearer may be a default data bearer (e.g., LTE QCI 9 with a priority 9). Accordingly, the first data bearer may have the highest QoS requirements while the third data bearer may have the lowest QoS requirements.

A terminal device may simply process the entire PHY data stream, e.g., all data bearers, with a single receiver, such as by utilizing a receiver that has high enough performance to meet the QoS requirements of the highest priority data bearer, e.g., the first data bearer. While the first data bearer may require such high-performance receiver processing to meet the QoS requirements, such may over-exceed the QoS requirements of the remaining data bearers. As receiver power consumption typically scales with performance requirements, such may yield unnecessarily high power consumption.

Terminal device 1502 may thus instead utilize mapping module 4502 to map data for each data bearer to an appropriate receiver, thus meeting the QoS requirements of each data bearer and optimizing power consumption. For example, receiver 4504 may be a high-performance receiver that meets the QoS requirements of the first data bearer, receiver 4506 may be a medium-performance receiver that meets the QoS requirements of the second data bearer, and receiver 4508 may be a lower-performance receiver that meets the QoS requirements of the third data bearer (where the performance levels of each of receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may arise from factors as described above, including e.g., different decoders, different equalizers, different filter lengths, different channel estimation techniques, different interference cancelation techniques, different noise cancelation techniques, different processing bit width, different clock frequencies, different component voltages, different packet combination techniques, different number of algorithmic iterations, different usage of iterative techniques in or between components, etc.). For example, high performance receivers such as receiver 4504 may utilize receiver enhancements (e.g., interference cancelation, equalizers, etc.) and/or have higher complexity (e.g., longer FIR filters, more decoder iterations, larger processing bit width, etc.) than low performance receivers.

As receiver 4504 has the highest performance, receiver 4504 may also have the highest power consumption. Accordingly, instead of processing each of the data bearers at receiver 4504 , terminal device 1502 may process the second data stream at receiver 4506 and the third receiver stream at receiver 4508 . The QoS requirements of each data bearer may thus be met and, due to the use of lower-power receivers 4506 and 4508 , power consumption may be reduced. Although described with specific numbers of data bearers and receivers in FIG. 45 , this is demonstrative and can be scaled to any number of data bearers and receivers, where each receiver may process one or more data bearers for which each receiver meets the QoS requirements. In certain cases, there may be fewer receivers than data bearers. Accordingly, mapping module 4502 may map the data from each data bearer to the lowest-power receiver that meets the QoS requirements of each data bearer.

Each of receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may then perform the respective processing on the received data streams provided by mapping module 4502 . In aspects where receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 are separate physical receivers, receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may be able to perform the respective processing simultaneously in parallel. Alternatively, in aspects where one or more of receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 are different configurations of the same shared physical receiver, the shared physical receiver may process the respectively received data streams sequentially by adjusting its configuration according to each receiver in a serial fashion. Receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may either have fixed configurations or may be adaptable. For example, a control module may adapt the configuration at one or more of receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 to tailor the performance of receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 by adjusting the configuration to match the QoS requirements of a given data bearer.

Following receiver processing according to their respective configurations, receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may then provide the respective processed output streams to combiner module 4510 , which may combine the respective processed output streams to form a single data stream. In some aspects, combiner module 4510 may be a digital parallel-to-serial converter configured to combine the received digital data streams into a serial data stream. Combiner module 4510 may then pass the resulting data stream to other components of baseband modem 1606 for further downlink processing. For example, mapping module 4502 , receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 , and combiner module 4510 may all be included in physical layer processing module 1608 . Combiner module 4510 may then pass the output data stream to other components of physical layer processing module 1608 for further PHY-level processing and subsequent provision to the protocol stack layers of controller 1610 .

The bearer information received by mapping module 4502 may therefore specify which data (e.g., on a bit-level) are connected to which data bearer. As the processing of receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may generally be done at the PHY level, mapping module 4502 may need to be able to discern which data is related to each data bearer at the PHY level, e.g., at physical layer processing module 1608 . Mapping module 4502 may additionally be able to identify the QoS requirements of each data bearer. However, such data bearer information may not be available in radio access technologies such as LTE; for example, according to the LTE standard, LTE protocol stack layers (e.g., at controller 1610 and counterpart layers at the radio access network) may generate physical layer transport blocks that do not specify which data bearer the data is connected to. In other words, only higher layers in the protocol stack may be aware of which data is tied to which data bearer and consequently of the QoS requirements of each data bearer. Such may hold for other radio access technologies.

Accordingly, according to some aspects network cooperation may be relied on to provide mapping module 4502 with bearer information that specifies which data is connected to which data bearer and the associated QoS requirements of each data bearer. As described below, several options for network cooperation may provide mapping module 4502 with appropriate bearer information.

For example, in some aspects the radio access network may signal the bearer information in downlink grants, which may enable mapping module 4502 to receive each downlink grant and appropriately map the related data to receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 . For example, in an LTE setting, network access node 1510 of FIG. 44 may provide downlink grants in the form of PDCCH DCI messages during each TTI. In addition to the existing information provided in such downlink grants, network access node 1510 may additionally provide bearer information that both identifies which data in the upcoming TTI is connected to which data bearer in addition to the QoS requirements of each data bearer. Terminal device 1502 may therefore decode each downlink grant to identify the bearer information for upcoming TTIs and provide the bearer information to mapping module 4502 for subsequent application in mapping incoming downlink data to receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 . In some aspects, such may involve a PHY controller of physical layer processing module 1608 and/or a protocol-stack layer component (e.g., software-defined) of controller 1610 processing downlink grants to identify the bearer information and subsequently providing the bearer information to mapping module 4502 .

As previously indicated, in some aspects receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 may be implemented at separate physical receivers or at one or more shared physical receivers (e.g., where two or more of receivers 4504 - 4508 are implemented at the same physical receiver; in some aspects, other receivers may also be implemented at separate physical receivers concurrent with operation of the one or more shared physical receivers). In the shared physical receiver case, the shared physical receiver may need to be sequentially reconfigured to meet the performance requirements of each data bearer. Accordingly, the downlink data connected to each downlink grant provided by network access node 1510 may be slightly delayed in order to enable the shared physical receiver to switch between the configurations of receivers 4504 , 4506 , and 4508 . Additionally, in some aspects the radio access network may be able to selectively activate and deactivate this feature (e.g., via higher layer reconfiguration control messages), such as in order to support data bearers with high throughput requirements that cannot tolerate the throughput loss resulting from the switching latency. If the network bearer information provision feature is deactivated, terminal device 1502 may fall back to conventional operation in which all incoming downlink data is processed with a single receiver that meets the QoS requirements of the highest priority data bearer.

Network access node 1510 may be configured in the same manner as network access node 2002 depicted in FIG. 26 . In order to facilitate the provision of bearer information to terminal device 1502 , network access node 1510 may need to identify the relevant bearer information and transmit the bearer information to terminal device 1502 . In accordance with the above-described case in which bearer information is included in downlink grants (e.g., DCI messages), control module 2610 may identify the bearer information for the downlink data addressed to terminal device 1502 and include such information in downlink grants. As such bearer information may not conventionally be available at the PHY layer, control module 2610 may need to provide bearer information to physical layer module 2608 , which physical layer module 2608 may then include in downlink grants. Network access node 1510 may then transmit such downlink grants via radio module 2604 , and antenna 2602 as previously described.

FIG. 46 shows a graphical depiction of the operation of mapping module 4502 and receivers 4504 and 4506 in accordance with some aspects. As shown in FIG. 46 , terminal device 1502 may receive downlink data as indicated in data grid 4610 , which may span three TTIs and be composed of downlink data belonging to a high priority data bearer and a low priority data bearer. Mapping module 4502 may receive the PHY-level data from RF transceiver 1604 along with the bearer information (obtained e.g., within a downlink grant provided by network access node 1510 ) that identifies which data belongs to which bearer and the QoS requirements of each data bearer. Mapping module 4502 may then identify the data belonging to the high priority data bearer and provide this data to receiver 4504 , which may be a high performance receiver that meets the QoS requirements of the high priority data bearer. Mapping module 4502 may additionally identify the data belonging to the low priority data bearer and provide this data to receiver 4506 , which may be a lower performance receiver with lower power consumption that meets the QoS requirements of the low priority data bearer. Receivers 4504 and 4506 may then perform receiver processing according to their respective configurations on the provided data, which may result in receivers 4504 and 4506 processing downlink data as respectively shown in data grids 4620 and 4630 . Accordingly, as shown in data grids 4620 and 4630 , receiver 4504 may process the data from the high priority data bearer during each TTI while receiver 4506 may process the data from the low priority data bearer during each TTI. The QoS requirements of each data bearer may therefore be met while allowing receiver 4506 to utilize a lower-power configuration, thus optimizing power consumption.

Additionally or alternatively, in some aspects network access node 1510 may use a carrier aggregation scheme to enable mapping module 4502 to map the data from each data bearer to an appropriate receiver. Accordingly, where e.g., two carriers are available for downlink transmissions from network access node 1510 to terminal device 1502 , network access node 1510 may allocate the data from a first data bearer onto a first carrier and allocate the data from a second data bearer onto a second carrier. Mapping module 4502 may therefore provide the data from the first carrier to a receiver that meets the QoS requirements of the first data bearer and provide the data from the second carrier to another receiver that meets the QoS requirements of the second data bearer.

FIG. 47 shows a graphical depiction of the operation of terminal device 1502 in accordance with some aspects of a carrier aggregation network cooperation scheme introduced above. As shown in data grid 4702 , a first carrier of the carrier aggregation scheme may contain data for a low priority data bearer while a second carrier of the carrier aggregation may contain data for a high priority data bearer. Such may rely on cooperation from network access node 1510 , which may be responsible in a carrier aggregation scheme for allocating data to each carrier. Accordingly, network access node 1510 may identify which data intended for terminal device 1502 is connected to high priority data bearers and which data intended for terminal device 1502 is connected to low priority data bearers. As such information may conventionally be available at protocol stack layers, control module 2610 may provide physical layer module 2608 with bearer information that specifies which data is connected to which data bearers. Physical layer module 2608 may then utilize such bearer information to identify which data is connected to high priority data bearers and which data is connected to low priority data bearers. Physical layer module 2608 may then transmit the low priority data on the first carrier and the high priority data on the second carrier as shown in data grid 4702 of FIG. 47 .

Terminal device 1502 may then receive both the first carrier and the second carrier according to the carrier aggregation scheme. Although not explicitly reflected in FIG. 45 , in some aspects carrier aggregation compatibility may require more complex reception functionality at antenna system 1602 , RF transceiver 1604 , and baseband modem 1606 to receive and process both carriers simultaneously. For example, there may be separate ‘duplicate’ receive chains that are each dedicated to a separate carrier. There may also be a coordination function on top of the receive chains to oversee coordinated operation between the receive chains. In some aspects of merged approaches where the receive chains for multiple carriers are fully or partially merged, the coordination function may be needed to ensure that the data is processed correctly. Accordingly, receivers 4504 - 4508 may be controlled by a coordination function that coordinates reception of data by receivers 4504 - 4508 on the various carriers. In some aspects, there may be additional self-interference cancellation components that manage the interference from the transmit chain to the receive chain.

After receiving both carriers, mapping module 4502 may map the received data to receivers 4504 and 4506 for subsequent reception processing. As the first carrier contains data from a low priority data bearer and the second carrier contains data from a high priority data bearer, mapping module 4502 may route the data received on the first carrier to receiver 4506 (which as indicated above may be lower-performance and lower power than receiver 4504 ) and route the data received on the second carrier to receiver 4504 . Terminal device 1502 may therefore meet the QoS requirements of both data bearers while conserving power through the use of lower-power receiver 4506 to process the low priority data bearer.

As opposed to the case described above regarding FIG. 46 where mapping module 4502 receives bearer information that specifies which data is connected to which data bearer on a bit-level, in some aspects mapping module 4502 may only require bearer information that specifies which carrier contains data for the high priority data bearer and which carrier contains data for the low priority data bearer. Accordingly, the bearer information provided by network access node 1510 in the case of FIG. 47 may be simplified and/or be provided less frequently.

In various aspects, network access node 1510 and terminal device 1502 may also employ further cooperation techniques to conserve power at terminal device 1502 . As shown in data grid 4802 of FIG. 48 , in some aspects network access node 1510 may delay transmission of data for low-priority data bearers to enable terminal device 1502 to power down receiver components more often. Accordingly, control module 2610 of network access node 1510 may provide physical layer module 2608 with bearer information that specifies which data is connected to high priority data bearers and which data is connected to low priority data bearers. Physical layer module 2608 may then allocate data intended for terminal device 1502 in time to provide terminal device 1502 with more receiver inactivity periods. As data connected to a low priority data bearer may have less restrictive latency requirements, network access node 1510 may be able to slightly delay (depending on the latency QoS requirements) data for the low priority data bearer in order to create more receiver inactivity periods. As shown in data grid 4802 , network access node 1510 may delay transmission of such data to align the low priority data in time with the high priority data. Accordingly, as opposed to activating receivers 4504 and 4506 for e.g., two consecutive time slots, terminal device 1502 may only activate receivers 4504 and 4506 for e.g., one time slot in which data for both the low priority and high priority data bearers is received. Terminal device 1502 may deactivate receivers 4504 and 4506 (e.g., place in a power saving state) during the resulting receiver inactivity periods, thus conserving more power. In some aspects, the ability of network access node 1510 to delay low priority data to align the low priority data with high priority data in time may depend on the latency requirements and the separation in time between the low priority data and the next scheduled high priority data. For example, network access node 1510 may be able to delay low priority data for e.g., one or two time slots (depending on the latency requirements) but may not be able to further delay the low priority data. Accordingly, network access node 1510 may only be able to align low priority data with high priority data if the high priority data is scheduled for one or two time slots following the low priority data. As in the case of FIG. 46 , network access node 1510 may provide detailed bearer information to enable mapping module 4502 to route data from high and low priority bearers to the proper receivers. In addition to the latency and time scheduling constraints on network access node 1510 , each time slot may have limited bandwidth for transmitting data to terminal device 1502 . As shown at 4804 of data grid 4802 , there may already be a large amount of high priority data scheduled for certain time slots which may prevent network access node 1510 from being able to align low priority data on the same time slot. Accordingly, if the cumulative bandwidth of the scheduled high priority data and the low priority data exceeds a bandwidth limit for a given time slot, network access node 1510 may not be able to delay the low priority data to align the low priority data with scheduled high priority data.

As data grid 4802 may include data from the high priority data bearer and the low priority data bearer on the same carrier in the same time slot, in some aspects the bearer information may specify in detail which data is connected to the high priority data bearer and which data is connected to the low priority data bearer. Alternative to the case of data grid 4802 , if low priority data does not fit in the immediately succeeding time slot, network access node 1510 may schedule transmission of the low priority data on the next upcoming time slot that can fit the low priority data. FIG. 49 shows an example in data grid 4902 , where at 4904 network access node 1510 may determine that the low priority data will not fit in the immediately succeeding time slot. Instead of transmitting the low priority data on the originally scheduled time slot, network access node 1510 may continue to delay the low priority data until the next time slot that has space for the low priority data, e.g., a delay of two time slots in the exemplary case of FIG. 49 . In some aspects, network access node 1510 may consider delays of the low priority data based on the latency requirements of the low priority data, and accordingly may in some cases only consider delays of the low priority data within a certain number of time slots.

Alternative to the cases of data grids 4802 and 4902 , in some aspects network access node 1510 may schedule transmission of data for the high priority and low priority data bearers so that each time slot contains data exclusively for one of the data bearers. As shown at 5004 of data grid 5002 in FIG. 50 , network access node 1510 may delay data for the low priority data bearer to align the low priority data with other scheduled low priority data. Accordingly, each time slot may exclusively contain data for one data bearer (or alternatively contain data for data bearers of equivalent or similar QoS requirements). As noted above, the ability of network access node 1510 to perform such scheduling adjustments may depend on the latency requirements of the low priority data bearer, the time separation between low priority data and the next scheduled low priority data, and the bandwidth limit.

The case of data grid 5002 may simplify the bearer information that network access node 1510 provides to mapping module 4502 . Instead of providing bearer information that specifies which data is connected to which data bearer, network access node 1510 may instead provide bearer information that specifies which data bearer an entire time slot is connected to. In other words, instead of specifying on a bit-level which data of each time slot is connected to which data bearer (as in the case of data grid 4802 ), the bearer information provided by network access node 1510 may instead specify which data bearer is connected to each time slot. Mapping module 4502 may then route data received in time slots containing high priority data to receiver 4504 and route data received in time slots containing low priority data to receiver 4506 .

FIG. 51 shows another scenario in which network access node 1510 and terminal device 1502 may cooperate to conserve power at terminal device 1502 by using a single carrier as opposed to multiple carriers. As operation of carrier aggregation schemes may involve more complex reception processing than single carrier schemes, terminal device 1502 may consume more power when employing carrier aggregation. Network access node 1510 may therefore cooperate with terminal device 1502 to utilize a single carrier to provide high and low priority data bearers whenever possible.

As shown in data grid 5102 , there may be scenarios such as 5104 and 5106 in which the amount of downlink data for terminal device 1502 may exceed bandwidth limits for a single carrier. Instead of allocating data onto a second carrier, network access node 1510 may instead adjust the scheduling of downlink data to enable terminal device 1502 to continue using a single carrier.

FIGS. 52 and 53 show two different solutions that network access node 1510 can utilize to allow for continued single carrier usage in accordance with some aspects. As shown in data grid 5202 of FIG. 52 , network access node 1510 may delay data for a low priority data bearer to later time slots that have sufficient bandwidth headroom, e.g., that have enough remaining bandwidth capacity relative to the limit to fit low priority data from the time slots that exceed the bandwidth limit. As the low priority data bearer may have lower latency requirements, network access node 1510 may be able to delay the low priority data for several time slots while still meeting the latency requirements. As shown in data grid 5202 , the resulting schedule adjustment may fit the data from both the high and low priority data bearers within a single carrier and avoid the need to utilize a second carrier for terminal device 1502 . Network access node 1510 may similarly provide mapping module 4502 with bearer information for each time slot that identifies which data is connected to which data bearer on a bit-level, which mapping module 4502 may apply to route high priority data to receiver 4504 and low priority data to receiver 4506 .

In some aspects, network access node 1510 may reduce the error protection on low priority data in order to reduce the total number of encoded bits for the low priority data, thus enabling network access node 1510 to fit data for both the high priority and low priority data bearers on a single carrier. More specifically, the data for both the high priority and low priority data bearers may be encoded with a channel coding scheme to provide for error correction and/or error checking (e.g., Turbo coding and Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) in an LTE setting). While lower coding rates (e.g., more coding bits) may provide better error protection, the resulting increase in coding bits may require greater bandwidth.

However, as the low priority data bearer may have a less restrictive error rate requirement than the high priority data bearer, network access node 1510 may be able to increase the coding rate of the low priority data to compress the size of the low priority data. The reduction in data size may then enable network access node 1510 to fit the data from both the high and low priority data bearers onto a single carrier. As shown in data grid 5302 , network access node 1510 may therefore identify the time slots which exceed the bandwidth limit and increase the coding rate of the low priority data to a degree that the data fits within the bandwidth limit. As network access node 1510 may only increase the coding rate for certain time slots that exceed the bandwidth limit, the low priority data in the remaining time slots may have sufficient error protection to still meet the error rate requirements of the low priority data bearer. Network access node 1510 may avoid adjustments to the data of the high priority data in order to ensure that the QoS requirements of the high priority data bearer are maintained.

With respect to performing the coding rate adjustments, in some aspects control module 2610 may provide bearer information to physical layer module 2608 , which physical layer module 2608 may utilize to identify time slots that exceed the bandwidth limit and to increase the coding rate for low priority data in such time slots to meet the bandwidth limit. Physical layer module 2608 may then provide terminal device 1502 with bearer information that specifies the bit-wise locations of high priority and low priority data in each time slot. Mapping module 4502 may then apply the bearer information to route the high priority data to receiver 4504 and the low priority data to receiver 4506 .

As the increased coding rate for the low priority data may decrease error protection, in some aspects terminal device 1502 may also in certain cases increase the performance of the low performance receiver 4506 (or utilize a slightly higher performance receiver) to help ensure that the error rate requirements of the low priority data bearer are still met. Accordingly, if mapping module 4502 receives bearer information from network access node 1510 that indicates that the coding rate for the low priority data bearer has been increased, mapping module 4502 may select a slightly higher performance receiver than would be used for low priority data with a standard coding rate. While such may also slightly increase power consumption of terminal device 1502 , this may be offset by the power savings from using a single carrier.

While described individually in FIGS. 46 - 53 , multiple of these cooperation techniques may be employed in combination by network access node 1510 and terminal device 1502 . Additionally, while FIGS. 46 - 53 show more than one receiver, mapping module 4502 may utilize any number of different receivers that may either be fixed or dynamically configurable, e.g., based on the QoS requirements of the data bearers. Any number of data bearers with varying QoS requirements and associated priorities may additionally be employed.

Mapping module 4502 may additionally be configured to consider power and radio condition status data in the same nature as control module 3510 . For example, mapping module 4502 may be configured to utilize higher performance receivers in poor radio conditions, lower power and lower performance receivers in strong radio conditions, and low power receivers in low battery power conditions. Mapping module 4502 may be configured to implement such features while ensuring that the QoS requirements of each data bearer are met.

In addition to the downlink cases related to receivers described above, in some aspects terminal device 1502 may additionally be configured in the uplink direction to utilize specific transmitters for different uplink data bearers. As in the downlink case, terminal device 1502 may additionally be responsible for maintaining uplink data bearers, where the uplink data bearers may have specific QoS requirements (which may differ from the QoS requirements of the counterpart downlink data bearer). In some cases, the uplink data bearers may run counterpart to downlink data bearers, e.g., may form the other direction of a bi-directional link between terminal device 1502 and a network node, while in other cases terminal device 1502 may have unidirectional data bearers in the uplink and/or downlink direction that do not have a counterpart data bearer in the other direction. Instead of utilizing a transmitter configuration that meets the QoS requirements of the highest data bearer, terminal device 1502 may instead selectively map data from each data bearer to a specific transmitter that meets the QoS requirements of each data bearer. By utilizing lower power transmitters for lower priority data bearers, terminal device 1502 may improve power efficiency while still meeting the QoS requirements of each data bearer.

FIGS. 54 A and 54 B show exemplary internal configurations of terminal device 1502 according to an aspect of the disclosure with respect to the uplink direction. The depictions illustrated in FIGS. 54 A and 54 B may omit certain other components of terminal device 1502 not directly related to the current aspect with respect to the uplink direction. For example, baseband modem 1606 may additionally include the downlink-direction components shown in FIG. 45 .

As shown in FIGS. 54 A and 54 B , in various aspects terminal device 1502 can combine transmitter outputs prior to RF modulation ( FIG. 54 A ) or combine transmitter outputs after RF modulation ( FIG. 54 B ). In both cases, and similar to the case of FIG. 36 described detailed above, transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 in FIG. 54 A may in various aspects be physically distinct transmitters (e.g., separate physical hardware structures) or may be different configurations of one or more physical transmitters (e.g., the same hardware with different parameters and/or software-defined instructions for execution). Regardless, the transmission processing for each of transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 may be different and each of transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 may therefore have varying performance and power consumption characteristics. Mapping module 5402 can be configured with the same or similar capabilities as previously described regarding control module 3510 , and therefore may be able to dynamically configure a single physical transmitter with various different configurations to realize transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 .

Mapping module 5402 may therefore route data for a plurality of data bearers to transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 based on the QoS requirements of the data bearers and the performance and power efficiency of transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 . For example, mapping module 5402 may route the data for each respective data bearer to the lowest-power transmitter that meets the QoS requirements of the respective data bearer.

In the case of FIG. 54 A , transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 may then perform transmission processing on such data according to their respective configurations and provide the resulting processed data to combiner 5410 a . Combiner 5410 a may combine the received data into a single stream and provide the single data stream to RF transceiver 1604 and antenna system 1602 for RF processing and transmission. Although RF transceiver 1604 and antenna system 1602 are shown separately from transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 , transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 may be implemented as antenna, RF, PHY, and/or protocol stack level components.

In the case of FIG. 54 B , transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 may then perform transmission processing on such data according to their respective configurations and provide the resulting processed data to RF transceivers 1604 a , 1604 b , and 1604 c , respectively. RF transceivers 1604 a - 1604 c may then perform RF processing and modulation on the data received from transmitters 5404 - 5408 and provide the resulting RF signals to combiner 5410 b , which may then combine the received RF signals into a single RF signal and provide the single RF signal to antenna system 1602 for transmission (although there may be additional components between combiner 5410 and antenna system 1602 , such as power amplifier components). In some aspects, combiner 5410 a may be configured for baseband data combination while combiner 5410 b may be configured for RF signal combination. Although shown separately from transmitters 5404 - 5408 in FIG. 54 B , in some aspects RF transceivers 1604 a - 1604 c can be implemented as part of transmitters 5404 - 5408 , such as e.g., RF transmitters configured to perform different RF modulation in accordance with a specific RF configuration of transmitters 5404 - 5408 .

In both cases of FIGS. 54 A and 54 B , mapping module 5402 may perform the data routing based on bearer information that may be available locally at terminal device 1502 . For example, the bearer information, e.g., the QoS requirements and the bit-level location of data for each bearer, may be available at the protocol stack layer at controller 1610 and/or the application layer at an application processor (e.g., data source 1612 /data sink 1616 ). Accordingly, such upper layers may provide the bearer information to mapping module 5402 , which may then route data to transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 based on the QoS requirements of each data bearer and the performance and power efficiency level of transmitters 5404 , 5406 , and 5408 .

Terminal device 1502 may therefore also conserve power during transmission by using lower power transmitters that still meet the QoS requirements of the data bearers. Aspects of this disclosure may therefore provide for power efficiency in both reception and transmission by enabling terminal device 1502 to selectively apply receivers and transmitters based on the QoS requirements of data bearers. Terminal device 1502 may additionally employ any of the bearer mapping techniques described in FIGS. 47 - 53 in the uplink direction.

FIG. 55 shows method 5500 of performing radio communications in accordance with some aspects of the disclosure. As shown in FIG. 55 , method 5500 includes receiving a data stream comprising first data of a first data bearer and second data of a second data bearer ( 5510 ). A first communication module is selected from a plurality of communication modules for the first data bearer based on a quality requirement of the first data bearer and a performance level of the first communication module ( 5520 ). A second communication module is selected from the plurality of communication modules for the second data bearer based on a quality requirement of the second data bearer and a performance level of the second communication module ( 5530 ). First data from the first data bearer is processed with the first communication module and second data from the second data bearer is processed with the second communication module ( 5540 ).

FIG. 56 shows method 5600 of performing radio communications according to an aspect of the disclosure. As shown in FIG. 56 , method 5600 includes identifying first data for a first data bearer of a terminal device and second data for a second data bearer of the terminal device ( 5610 ). A physical layer data stream is generated by allocating the first data and the second data in the physical layer data stream based on quality requirements of the first data bearer and the second data bearer ( 5620 ). The physical layer data stream and a physical layer message are transmitted to the terminal device ( 5630 ), such that the physical layer message specifies the allocation of the first data and the second data within the physical layer data stream.

Aspects discussed herein generally relate to power savings at terminal devices, which is a consideration due to the finite power supply (e.g., battery-powered) of many terminal devices (although not all terminal devices may be exclusively battery powered). However, power efficiency may additionally be a notable characteristic of network access nodes in order to reduce operational costs. In particular, access nodes such as base stations and access points may be able to reduce operating costs for network operators by employing power-efficient architectures and techniques to reduce power consumption. The aforementioned techniques to map lower priority data bearers to lower performance receivers and transmitters, or techniques to schedule and delay lower priority data packets in order to obtain TTIs where receivers or transmitters can be turned off completely, or techniques where the code rate of lower priority data bearers is increased in order to avoid that a secondary component carrier and its associated receivers and transmitters have to be activated may allow to reduce power consumption of network access nodes, and various other techniques such as wake/sleep cycles, frequency scaling, and traffic/task concentration (less fragmented wake/sleep cycles). In various aspects, network access nodes may be configured with advanced power management architecture, such as where the processing infrastructure of the network access node has a predefined set of ‘power states’ where each power state has a predefined level of power consumption and processing capability (e.g., the ability to support a given processing demand). The lower performance receivers and transmitters for the lower priority data bearers may have lower processing demand and turning off or de-activating receivers or transmitters temporarily reduces the average processing demand. An advanced power management architecture in a network access node may allow to reduce power consumption of network access nodes in phases of lower processing demand.

2.6 Power-Efficiency #6

According to another aspect of this dis