RU2364047C2 - Method and device of improved coding in multiuser communication systems - Google Patents

Abstract

FIELD: communication facilities.

SUBSTANCE: invention concerns information transfer in wireless communication system. First and second data packs are sent in a relatively large block including multiple minimum transmission units (MTU). Each MTU corresponds to an unique resource combination. First MTU pack is used for delivery of first data pack with transmission unit containing at least most of the MTU. Second pack of the MTU is used for delivery of second data pack containing less MTU than the first pack and at least some MTU included in the first pack. First and second data packs are sent by transmitting at least part of MTU included in the first and second MTU packs with respective information modulated in them. Data transfer can be performed by overlapping first and second data on MTU used jointly.

EFFECT: enhanced transmission rate in communication channel due to coding control with overlapping for broadband communication methods or communication with multiple access.

31 cl, 19 dwg, 1 tbl

Description

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention is directed to providing improved methods for encoding and transmitting information in a wireless communication system.

State of the art

Overlay coding will be disclosed for multi-user communication systems. Multi-user communication systems use several transmitters and receivers that communicate with each other, and can use one or more communication methods. In general, multi-user communication methods can be categorized into one of two scenarios:

(a) a single transmitter communicating with multiple receivers is commonly referred to as a broadcast communication method, and

(b) several transmitters communicating with a common receiver, which is commonly referred to as a multiple access communication method.

The broadcast communication method is commonly known in the field of communications and information theory literature as a “broadcast channel” and will be referred to as such in the rest of this document. “Broadcast channel” refers to the physical communication channel between the transmitter and multiple receivers, as well as the communication resources used by the transmitter to communicate. Similarly, a multiple access communication method is commonly known as a “multiple access channel” and this terminology will be used in the rest of this document. Once again, “multiple access channel” refers to physical communication channels between multiple transmitters and a common receiver, along with the communication resources used by the transmitters. A broadcast method is often used to implement a downlink in a typical cellular wireless communication system, where the base station broadcasts to multiple wireless terminals, while an uplink in such a system is typically implemented using a multiple access communication method in which the multiple wireless terminals can transmit signaling to the base station.

A transmission resource in a multi-user communication system can generally be represented in a temporary, frequency, or code space. Information theory proposes to increase the capacity of the system in both scenarios, in particular, by simultaneously transmitting to multiple receivers in the case of a broadcast communication method or by allowing multiple transmitters to simultaneously transmit, in the case of a multiple access communication method, over the same transmission resource, for example, on those the same frequencies at the same time. In the case of a broadcast communication method, the technology used to transmit simultaneously to multiple users on the same transmission resource is also known as “overlay coding”. In the context of the present invention, controlled superposition coding is shown as a valuable practical technology both in the broadcast communication method and in the multi-access communication method.

The advantages of overlay coding are apparent from the following disclosure of transmission technologies for a broadcast communication method. Consider a single transmitter that communicates with two receivers whose channels can be described by external Gaussian noise levels N ₁ and N ₂ , with N ₁ <N ₂ , that is, the first receiver operates on a stronger channel than the second receiver. Assume that the communication resources available to the transmitter are the full bandwidth W and the full power P. The transmitter can use several strategies to communicate with the receivers. 1 is a graph 100 that represents the speeds achievable in a broadcast channel for a first user with a stronger receiver and a second user with a weaker receiver, according to three different transmission strategies. The vertical axis 102 of FIG. 1 represents speed for a stronger receiver, while horizontal axis 104 represents speed for a weaker receiver.

First, consider a strategy in which a transmitter multiplexes these two receivers in time, allocating all its resources to one receiver at some point in time. If the fraction of the time spent communicating with the first (stronger) receiver is denoted by α, then it will be quite simple to show that the achievable speeds for two users satisfy

Since the segment of time spent on servicing the first user, α, varies, the speeds obtained by the above equations are represented by a straight line 106 in FIG. 1, reflecting the Time Division Multiplexing (TDM) strategy. Now consider another transmission strategy in which the transmitter allocates a certain fraction of the bandwidth, β, and the fraction of available power γ to the first user. The second user receives the remaining fractions of bandwidth and power. Having allocated these shares, the transmitter communicates with two receivers simultaneously. With this transmission strategy, the velocity domain can be characterized by the following equations:

The speeds obtained by the above equations are clearly visible from the segmented convex curve of line 108 in FIG. 1, representing a frequency division multiplexing strategy (CDM, FDM). Obviously, the strategy for dividing the available power and bandwidth between two users is correspondingly superior to the allocation of resources in the time division. However, the second strategy is still not optimal.

The upper bound of the velocity regions achievable in all transmission strategies is the broadcast region. For the Gaussian case, this region is characterized by the equations

and it is indicated by a dash-dot curve line 110 in figure 1, representing the throughput. Thomas carpet (Thomas Cover) in TMKover, Broadcast Channels, IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, IT-18 (1): 14 February 1972 (TMCover, Broadcast Channels, IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, IT- 18 (1): 2 14, 1972) it was shown that a communication technology called “overlay coding” allows this area of throughput to be achieved. According to this technology, signals are transmitted to different users with different powers in the same transmission resource and superimposed on each other. The achievable overlay gains are superior to any other communication technology that requires sharing a transmission resource between different users.

The basic concept of overlay coding is shown in graph 200 of FIG. 2. Graph 200 includes a vertical axis 202 representing a quadrature and a horizontal axis 204 representing a common mode. Although modulation of the EMF is assumed in this example, the choice of modulation sets is generally not limited. In addition, this example is presented for two users with a direct generalization of the concept to multiple users. Assume that the transmitter has a total power budget P transmission. Suppose that the first receiver, called the “weaker receiver,” sees more channel noise, and the second receiver, called the “stronger receiver,” sees less channel noise. Four 205 circles marked in a certain way represent the points of the combination of the EMF, which will be transmitted at a higher power (more securely). (1-α) P to a weaker receiver, with the arrow 206 being a measure of the transmit power of the high power EMF. Meanwhile, additional information is transmitted to the stronger receiver at low power (less secure), αP, also using the combination of the EMF, and arrow 207 is a measure of the transmit power of the EMF of lower power. In fact, the transmitted symbols, which together contain both signals of higher and lower power signals, are represented by empty circles 208 in FIG. 2. The key idea that this illustration depicts is that the transmitter communicates with both users while using the same transmission resource. In this document, a high power signal is also called a protected signal, and a low power signal is also called a conventional signal.

The receiver strategy is quite simple. A weaker receiver sees a more powerful combination of the EMF with a low power signal superimposed on it. The signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) experienced by a weaker receiver may not be sufficient to distinguish a low power signal, so a low power signal appears as noise and slightly degrades the SNR when a weaker receiver decodes a powerful signal. On the other hand, the SNR experienced by a stronger receiver is sufficient to distinguish points of the low power PSF aggregate. The strategy of a stronger receiver is to first decode the high power points (which are for the weaker receiver), eliminate their contribution to the composite signal, and then decode the low power signal.

However, in practice, this strategy usually does not work well. Any shortcomings in the neutralization of a powerful signal manifest themselves as noise when the decoder restores a low-power signal.

In light of the foregoing, it is obvious that there is a need for new methods and devices that will allow communication systems to work with broadcast communication methods and / or multi-access communication methods using superimposed encoding in order to take advantage of higher achievable channel speeds, and which at the same time overcome practical difficulties caused by the incomplete neutralization of the high power signal, as well as the complexity and cost associated with the approach, I’ll conclude learning about using a common decoder.

Disclosure of invention

The present invention is directed to providing transmitter and receiver technology for encoding, which allows decoding of a conventional signal without the risk of imperfectly neutralizing the protected signal.

An exemplary embodiment of the invention is described below in the context of a cellular wireless data system using orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM). Although an exemplary communication system has been used for the purpose of disclosing the invention, the present invention is not limited to an exemplary embodiment and can also be applied to many other communication systems, for example, a code division multiple access (CDMA, CDMA).

According to various embodiments of the invention, the first and second sets of information are transmitted using a transmission unit, the transmission unit includes a plurality of minimum transmission units, each minimum transmission unit corresponds to a unique combination of resources, said resources include at least two of time, frequency, phase and spreading code. The minimum unit of transmission is also called the degree of freedom. In this document, the concepts of “minimum unit of transfer” and “degree of freedom” are used interchangeably. The transmission unit may be relatively large compared to the minimum size transmission unit that may be required to encode one of the sets of information to be transmitted.

One exemplary embodiment of the invention includes determining a first set of said minimum transmission units for use in transmitting said first set of information, said first set includes at least a majority of minimum transmission units in a transmission unit, determining a second set of said minimum transmission units for use in transmitting a second set of information, said second set of minimum transmission units includes less minimum transmission units than the first set; at least some of the minimum transmission units in the first and second sets of minimum transmission units are the same; and the transmission of the first and second sets of information is carried out using the minimum transmission units included in said first and second sets of minimum transmission units. A first set of said minimum transmission units included in a transmission unit is used in transmitting said first set of information, said first set includes at least a majority of said minimum transmission units in a transmission unit. The second set of said minimum transmission units is determined, for example, selected for use in transmitting said second set of information, said second set of minimum transmission units includes less than the minimum transmission units than the first set; at least some of the minimum transmission units in the first and second sets of minimum transmission units are the same. The first and second sets of information are transmitted by transmitting at least some minimum transmission units included in said first and second sets of minimum transmission units, with the corresponding information modulated thereafter. The transmission of information may be by overlaying the first and second information on the shared minimum transmission units or by “puncturing” the first set of information so that the second set of information is transmitted in the minimum units of information that are common to the first and second sets. To recover information lost due to the imposition of a second set of information on shared transmission units, error correction codes may be used. The information transmitted in the first and second sets of information may be, for example, user data and management information, including notifications and selections.

The first and second sets of information can be, and in various embodiments, are transmitted using the first and second segments of the minimum transmission units, by transmitting the minimum transmission units containing modulated information corresponding to different information sets from different transmitters. The transmitters can be placed in various devices, for example, in wireless terminals. In other embodiments, the first and second sets of information are transmitted by transmitting the minimum transmission units used to transmit the first and second sets of information from a single transmitter, such as a base station transmitter.

The first set of minimum transmission units includes most of the minimum transmission units in a transmission unit, but this is usually a high percentage of minimum transmission units, for example, in some embodiments, the first set of minimum transmission units includes at least 75% of the total number of minimum units transmission, and in some cases 100% of the minimum transmission units in said block. The second set of minimum transmission units typically includes less than 50% of the minimum transmission units in a block and, in some cases, relatively few minimum transmission units, for example, less than 5 or 10% of the number of minimum transmission units in a transmission block. In such cases, even if none of the minimum transmission units in the second set of data transmission units is restored by the receiver decoding the minimum transmission units used to transmit the first set of information, information from the first set intended for transmission in some of the minimum transmission units, included in the second set can be restored in some embodiments by using error correction codes.

True overlay can be used to transmit information corresponding to both the first and second sets of information using the minimum transmission unit common to both the first and second sets of minimum transmission units. Alternatively, the information corresponding to the first set of information intended for transmission in shared minimum units of information may be “punctured”, for example, not transmitted, with the recovery of “punctured” information using error-correcting codes.

In one particular exemplary embodiment, as part of the transmission of said first and second sets of information, using at least some of the minimum transmission units included in the first set of minimum transmission units, can be transmitted at a first power level, then how the minimum transmission units in said second set of minimum transmission units are transmitted at a higher power level than said first signal at the base of the minimum transmission unit. The power level at which the minimum information units in the second set are transmitted is, in some embodiments, at least 3 dB higher than the power level at which the minimum transmission units corresponding to the first signal are transmitted. The power level of the minimum information modules in the aforementioned first and second sets can sometimes be different and different, for example, to reflect changing channel conditions.

Various embodiments of the receiver are possible in accordance with the invention. Two receivers, for example the first and second receivers, can work independently and in parallel. One of the receivers is used to restore the first set of information, and the other receiver is used to restore the second set of information from the minimum units of information in said transmission unit that are actually transmitted. In one such embodiment, the first receiver processes the minimum blocks of information, including the signal corresponding to the second set of information, as containing impulse noise and, for example, discards, ignores or otherwise minimizes their contribution to the output of the receiver. In this embodiment, the second receiver processes the contribution of the signals corresponding to the first set of information to the received minimum transmission units as background noise. Since the signal corresponding to the second set of information is usually transmitted using relatively high power levels, for example, the power levels sufficient to interpret the signals of the first receiver as impulse noise, it is usually relatively easy to reconstruct the second signals even when the signals corresponding to the first set of information look like background noise. Since the effect of transmitting the second set of information is usually limited by the relatively small number of characters in the transmission unit, the effect of high power signals on the signals used to transmit the first set of information tends to be very limited, allowing recovering any lost information in many cases by using conventional corrected codes errors included in the transmitter information.

In another embodiment, the device also includes two receivers. However, instead of operating independently and in parallel, the first receiver identifies the minimum transmission units that correspond to the second set of information, for example, the minimum high power transmission units. It then transmits information indicating which received minimum transmission units correspond to the second information set to the second receiver. The second receiver discards the minimum transmission units corresponding to the second set of information, and then decodes the remaining received minimum transmission units. Since the number of discarded minimum units of information tends to be small, for example, less than 5% of the received minimum units of information, in many cases the second receiver usually has the ability to continue to recover the full first set of information by using error correction codes used to protect the transmitted information from errors caused by the loss or damage of the minimum transmission units during transmission.

In various embodiments, the invention takes into account the advantages of overlay coding in a multi-user communication system using a receiver that is simple in design but reliable in operation. The invention discloses new effective coding techniques with overlay for both the broadcast channel and the multiple access channel.

In a broadcast scenario, for example, a single transmitter sends data to multiple receivers. In the context of an exemplary system, the transmitter is a base station connected via a downlink to wireless receivers, such as mobile receivers. Mobile users in a cellular communication system may be exposed to a wide range of SNR conditions caused by differences in transmission line losses as a function of location within a cell. Assume, without departing from the generalization of consideration, that the base station has two signals that it wishes to transmit simultaneously to two different mobile receivers experiencing different losses on the transmission line. An ordinary signal is intended for a receiver that experiences a higher signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and which we will call the “stronger” receiver in the future. The second signal, called a “protected” signal, is designed for a “weaker” receiver, which operates on a lower quality channel with lower SNR. The division of mobile receivers into “stronger” or “weaker” is not static and is a relative definition.

If overlay coding is not used, then the resources of the overhead communication line should be divided between the normal and protected signal, which is not optimal. In order to distinguish between the new overlay coding method disclosed in the present invention, the known overlay coding method described in the prior art section is hereinafter referred to as “classic overlay coding” in the rest of this document. In the context of classical coding with overlay, both the protected signal and the normal signal are transmitted with the same air link resource. For example, assume that the air link resource for transmission of both conventional and protected codeword includes K symbols A _1, ..., A _K. In addition, suppose that a regular codeword should carry M information bits, and a protected codeword should carry N information bits. Assume that both regular and protected codewords use DFMP modulation (binary phase shift keying). In classical hypothetical coding, M ordinary information bits are converted to K coded bits according to a coding scheme such as convolutional coding, and K coded bits are then mapped to K DFMP symbols

In ₁ , ..., In _K. Meanwhile, N secure information bits are converted to other K coded bits, according to a different coding scheme, such as convolutional coding, and then K coded bits are mapped to K DFMP symbols C ₁ , ..., C _K. Finally, K symbols of the DFMP from the protected information bits and K symbols of the DFMP from ordinary information bits are combined and transmitted using the K symbols A ₁ , ..., A _{K of the} air link resource:

А ₁ = В ₁ + С ₁ , ..., А _К = В _К + С _К. In a composite signal, protected symbols are usually transmitted at a higher power per bit so that weaker receivers are able to reliably receive them. Regular symbols transmit at a relatively lower power per bit. In this example, and in reality in general, the energy of an ordinary signal is distributed over all degrees of freedom at which the protected signal is transmitted.

The transmitter powers are selected so that the weaker receiver would usually only be able to decode the protected codeword. A normal signal will be perceived by this receiver simply as noise. A stronger receiver, on the other hand, should be able to decode both codewords. A good decoding strategy that a stronger receiver could use is to try to decode the two codewords together. However, this is often too complicated for receivers to practice. Therefore, the strategy commonly used by a stronger receiver is sequential decoding. The stronger receiver first decodes the protected codeword, then extracts it from the received composite signal, and finally decodes the regular codeword, which is the codeword of interest to the stronger receiver. In practice, however, the aforementioned sequential neutralization and decoding scheme may not always be reliably implemented. If the SNR of stronger and weaker receivers and the speeds required for communication are such that conventional and superimposed signals transmit at approximately the same power, then neutralizing the protected codeword can be difficult or inaccurate.

Obstacles to sequential decoding exist in practice even when the transmit powers of these two codewords are different. For example, most communication systems have a certain degree of inherent noise in the receiver. Unlike additive noise, these intrinsic noises are usually correlated with the transmitted signal and have energy that is proportional to the transmit power. The channel estimation noise in wireless communication systems is an example of intrinsic noise. In the context of classical superposition coding, channel estimation noise causes an imperfect neutralization of the protected signal in a stronger receiver. The residual suppression error can have significant energy, especially when compared to a low power superimposed signal. Therefore, a stronger receiver may not be able to correctly decode the normal codeword in the presence of a residual neutralization error.

From these considerations, it becomes obvious that although classical superposition coding distributes the energy of the protected code word over each of the degrees of freedom, it is desirable to concentrate this energy in one or more degrees of freedom. The concentration of energy on a limited number of degrees of freedom, in accordance with the invention, provides a simple detection and neutralization of the protected signal in the receiver even when the total transmission energy involved in the two signals is the same. According to the invention, the energy in the codeword is concentrated in one or more degrees of freedom.

Using the encoding and transmission methods described above, multiple sets of information can be transmitted by sharing an overlapping set of communication resources, such as time, frequency, and / or code. Numerous additional features and advantages of the present invention are apparent from the following detailed description.

List of drawings

1 is a graph illustrating achievable broadcast channel speeds for a first user with a stronger receiver and a second user with a weaker receiver, with three different transmission strategies.

Figure 2 is an example of coding with superposition with modulation of the EMF.

Figure 3 is an example of phase-modulation.

4 is an example of a flash coding with overlay in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 5 is another example of superimposed flash coding according to the invention, in which the flash signal concentrates its energy at 4 symbol locations.

FIG. 6 is an exemplary flash overlay coding in a multiple access channel, shown as a composite signal at a base station receiver, in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 7 illustrates exemplary traffic segments and distribution of traffic segments by a base station to a user.

FIG. 8 shows exemplary allocation segments corresponding to traffic segments.

FIG. 9 illustrates exemplary downlink traffic segments and acknowledgment segments.

FIG. 10 illustrates exemplary allocation segments, downlink traffic segments, and acknowledgment segments, each of the allocation and acknowledgment segments using flash overlay coding in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 11 - two cited as an example of a set of information, the transmission unit of the minimum transmission units (MEP) and partially overlapping sets of minimum transmission units that can be used to determine the sets of information, and can be used partially or entirely to transmit signals to transmit information, in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 12 is another exemplary MEP transmission unit, wherein it is shown that the transmission unit can be subunited in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 13 is one way of transmitting two signals corresponding to two sets of information using different devices with different transmitters, each transmitter generating a signal corresponding to one set of information in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 14 are two other methods of transmitting two sets of information using either a single transmitter that provides two signals, each signal corresponds to information in one set of information, or using a single transmitter that internally combines signaling to produce a single combined signal, in accordance with the present invention .

FIG. 15 shows two devices in accordance with the present invention, including a filtering and error correction module; each device includes two receivers, and each device can be used to receive a combined signal and find two sets of information that have been transmitted.

FIG. 16 is another device in accordance with the present invention, including a MEP signal identification module; said device includes two receivers, and said device can be used to receive a combined signal and find two sets of information that have been transmitted.

FIG. 17 is an exemplary communication system implementing the devices and methods of the present invention.

FIG. 18 is an exemplary base station made in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 19 is an exemplary end node (wireless terminal) made in accordance with the present invention.

The present invention is directed to providing transmitter and receiver technologies for encoding, allowing decoding of a conventional signal without compromising the imperfect neutralization of the protected signal.

FIG. 17 illustrates an exemplary communication system 1700 using devices and methods in accordance with the present invention. An exemplary communication system 1700 includes a plurality of base stations, including base station 1 (BS 1) 1702 and base station N (BS N) 1702 ′. BS 1 1702 is associated with many end nodes (KU), KU 1 1708, KU N 1710 through wireless lines 1712, 1714, respectively. Similarly, BS N 1702 'is associated with a variety of end nodes (KU), KU 1 1708', KU N 1710 'through wireless lines 1712', 1714 ', respectively. Cell 1 1704 represents a wireless coverage area in which BS 1 1702 can communicate with a CS, such as KU 1 1708. Cell N 1706 represents a wireless coverage area in which BS N 1702 'can communicate with a CS, such as KU 1 1708'. KU 1708, 1710, 1708 'and 1710' can move throughout the communication system 1700. Base stations BS 1 1702, BS N 1702 'are connected to a network node 1716 by network lines 1718, 1720, respectively. The network node 1716 is connected to other network nodes, for example, another base station, a router, a home agent node, server nodes Authentication Authorization Accounting (Authentication, Authorization, Accounting of resources; AAU (AAA)), etc. and with the Internet via a network link 1722. Network communication lines 1718, 1720, 1722 may be, for example, fiber optic cables. A communication network line 1722 provides an interface outside the communication system 1700, allowing users, such as a control unit, to communicate with nodes outside the 1700 system.

On Fig presents an exemplary base station 1800 in accordance with the present invention. An exemplary base station 1800 may serve as a more detailed representation of the base stations 1702, 1702 'of FIG. 17. An exemplary base station 1800 includes a plurality of receivers, a receiver 1 1802, a receiver N 1804, a plurality of transmitters, a transmitter 1 1810, a transmitter N 1814, a processor 1822 such as a CPU, an input / output interface 1824, and a memory 1828 associated with each other another bus 1826. The various elements 1802, 1804, 1810, 1814, 1824 and 1828 can exchange data and information on the bus 1826.

Receivers 1802, 1804 and transmitters 1810, 1814 are connected to antennas 1806, 1808 and 1818, 1820, respectively, providing the base station 1800 with the ability to communicate, for example, exchange data and information, with end nodes, such as wireless terminals, within its cellular coverage area. Each receiver 1802, 1804 may include a decoder 1803, 1805, respectively, which receives and decodes the signaling that has been encoded and transmitted by end nodes operating within its cell. The receivers 1802, 1804 may be any of the exemplary receivers shown in devices 5 1502 in FIG. 15, device 6 1532 in FIG. 15 or device 7 1562 in FIG. 16, for example, receivers (1506, 1508), (1536, 1542), (1563, 1564), or their modifications. Receivers 1802, 1804, in accordance with the invention, can receive a combined signal including a regular or basic signal and a flashing signal and search for sets of information corresponding to the original sets of information before transmission. Each of the transmitters 1810, 1814 may include an encoder 1812, 1816, which encodes the signaling prior to transmission. The transmitters 1810, 1814 may be any of the exemplary transmitters shown in device 1 1302 and device 2 1308 in FIG. 13, device 3 in FIG. 14 or device 4 1410 in FIG. 14, for example, by transmitters (1304 and 1310), (1404), (1412), or their modifications. Transmitters 1802, 1805, in accordance with the invention, can transmit one or more of the following: a conventional or basic signal, a flashing signal and / or a combined signal.

Memory 1828 includes routines 1830 and data / information 1832. Processor 1822 controls the operation of base station 1800 by executing routines 1830 and using data / information 1832 from memory 1828 to control receiver (s) 1802, 1804, transmitter 1810, and interface 1824 I / O in order to perform operational control of the basic functionality of the base station, as well as manage new features and improvements of the present invention, including the generation and transmission of combined signals, receiving combinations nnyh signals division combined signal to a conventional or baseline information signal and the information signal is flashing, the separation and recovery of information. An I / O interface 1824 that provides the base station 1800 with an interface with the Internet and other network nodes, such as intermediate network nodes, routers, AAA server nodes, home agent nodes, etc., thereby allowing the end nodes to communicate over wireless links with a base station 1800 for connecting, communicating and exchanging data and information with other peer nodes, for example, another end node located in the communication system, and external to the communication system, for example p over the Internet.

Routines 1830 include communications routines 1834 and base station control routines 1836. The base station control routine 1836 includes scheduler 1838, error detection and correction module 1840, transmitter control routine 1844, and receiver control routine 1846. Data / information 1832 includes receiver information 1 1850, received information 1852, transmission information 1854, transmission information 1856, identified MEP information 1858, and user data / information 1848. User data / information 1848 contains multiple user information, information 1860 user 1 and information 1862 of user N. Each user information, for example information 1860 of user 1, includes terminal identification (ID) information 1864, data 1866, quality message information 1868 anal, information and segment information 1870 1872 classification.

Transmission 1 information 1854 may include a set of information that may correspond to a first signal, for example, a regular or basic signal, information defining a MEP transmission unit that can be used to transmit the first signal, information defining a first set of MEP to be used for determine the signal, information that will be modulated by the first set of MEPs to determine the first signal, information defining which MEPs corresponding to the information of the first signal should be For example, on a wireless terminal. In some embodiments, each of the MEPs delivering the first set of information data will be transmitted. In other embodiments, most MEPs delivering the first set of information should be transmitted. In such an embodiment, MEPs corresponding to the first set of information, which also correspond to the second set of information, such as a flashing signal, can be reset before transmission.

Transmission information N 1856 may include a set of information that can correspond to a second signal, for example, a flash signal, information defining a MEP transmission unit that can be used to transmit a second signal, for example, to a wireless terminal, information defining a second set of MEP, which will be used to determine the second signal, information that will be modulated by the second set of MEPs to determine the second signal. The first and second transmission units may be the same. In this case, the information of the transmission unit, which determines the size and / or shape of the shared transmission unit, can be stored, and often is, in the memory 1828 separately from the information 1854, 1856 of the transmission. The received information 1 1850 includes a first set of recovered information from the receiver 1, 1802, for example, information corresponding to the first set of information of the wireless terminal before transmission. The first set of recovered information could be recovered, for example, from a regular or basic signal. The received information N 1852 includes a second set of recovered information from the receiver N, 1804, for example, information corresponding to the second set of information of the wireless terminal before transmission. A second set of recovered information could be recovered, for example, from a flashing signal.

Conventional and flashing signals, each defining an initial set of information before transmission, share some common MEPs. Identified MEP information 1856 may include a series of identified MEPs in the second or flashing signal; a set of identified MEPs could be received by decoder 1805 of receiver N. Information 1858 of identified MEPs can be directed to receiver 1 1802, and the receiver can eliminate these MEPs before transmitting the received the signal to be performed by the error correction module, or, alternatively, the information 1858 of the identified MEP can be directed to the error detection and correction module 1840 in the memory and / and whether on the module for detecting and correcting errors in the decoder 1803.

Data 1866 may include received data from the end nodes and data to be transmitted to the end nodes. In some embodiments, for each of the N wireless terminals that can communicate with the base station at some point in time, one terminal ID 1864 is used. After entering the cell, the wireless terminal, for example the end node, receives the terminal ID 1864 assigned to it. Thus, the ID terminals are used repeatedly because the wireless terminals enter and leave the cell. Each base station has a set of terminal identifiers (terminal IDs) 1864 assigned to users, for example, served wireless terminals. The channel quality message information 1868 may include user channel quality information determined by base station 1800 and user feedback information including downlink channel quality messages, interference information, and power information from wireless terminals. Segment information 1870 may include information defining segments allocated to users in terms of users in terms of type of use, for example, a traffic channel, an allocation channel, a request channel; characteristics, such as MEP, frequency / phase and time, OFDM symbol tones; The type of signal used for segments, for example, regular or basic, as opposed to flashing. Classification information 1872 includes information categorizing a user, for example, a wireless terminal as a “stronger" or "weaker" transmitter.

Communication routine 1834 includes various communications applications that can be used to provide specific services, such as IP telephony, text service, and / or interactive games, to one or more end user nodes in a system.

The base station control routines 1836 perform functions including basic control of the base station and control related to the apparatus and method of the present invention. The base station control routines 1836 control the generation and reception of a signal, the detection and correction of errors, the sequence of data hopping and pilot; an I / O interface 1824, allocating segments to users, and scheduling users to obtain an ID of 1864 terminals. More specifically, the scheduler 1838 plans users to obtain an ID of 1864 terminals, allocates segments to users using information 1872 classification of users and information 1870 segment. The scheduler makes decisions regarding which users should be allocated which segments for regular or basic signals, and which users should be allocated which segments for flashing signals in accordance with the invention. Some specific users, for example those who have high power and have small amounts of information to transmit, may be better suited to using flashing alarms than other users who want to transmit large amounts of information and have limitations on available power. Some specific types of channels may be more suitable for using flashing signaling. For example, in many cellular communication systems, control channels transmit at broadcast power, which is necessary due to the presence of mobile users with the weakest channels. Flashing alarms are well suited for such applications, and their use can often lead to a reduction in power with a small loss in reliability or even in the absence of such loss. By using classification information 1872 and segment information 1870, scheduler 1838 can adapt users with a low Downlink Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) to regular segments in a channel, while users with high SNR can be adapted to flash, for example, “secure” segments in the channel.

The transmitter control module 1844 uses data / information 1832, including transmission information 1 1854, transmission information N 1856, terminal ID 1864, data 1866, and segment information 1870 to generate transmission signals and control the operation of transmitters 1810, 1814 in accordance with the invention. For example, transmitter control module 1844 can control a transmitter 1810 to encode it with encoder 1812 for sets of information included in transmission information 1 1854 into a signal, for example, a regular or basic signal that transmitter 1 1810 can transmit. Transmitter control module 1844 can encode information sets , including information N 1856 transmitting to a flashing or protected signal using a set of MEPs corresponding to information 1856. Transmission control module 1844 can control transmitter N 1814 to encode it with encoder 1816 sets of information included in transmission information N 1854 to a signal that transmitter N 1816 can transmit. For example, transmission control module 1844 can encode a set of information included in transmission information N 1856 in a flash signal using a set of MEPs corresponding to information 1856. B alternatively, in various embodiments of transmitters 1810, 1814, a single transmitter may be used that internally combines or mixes the signal based on transmission information 1 1854 and transmission information N 1856 Chi under the control of the transmitter control module 1844. Such a mixing operation may involve the imposition of conventional and flashing alarms before transmission and / or the selective formation of one transmission set of MEPs, including each of the flashing signal elements and elements in the normal signal that are not included in the flashing signal.

A receiver control module 1846 controls the operation of receivers 1802, 1804 for receiving a combined signal and extracting two sets of information, for example, receiver information 1 1850 and receiver information N 1852 in accordance with the invention. The receiving process under the control of the receiver control module 1846 may include controlling decoders 1803, 1805 and controlling other elements in the receivers. In some embodiments, the receiver control module 1846 controls impulse noise filters, background noise filters, and receiver error correction modules 1802, 1804. In some embodiments, the receiver control module controls the 2nd signal MEP identification module in a single receiver, such as receiver N 1804, and a discarding module in another receiver, for example, receiver 1 1802, and transmits the identified 1858 MEP information from receiver N 1804 to receiver 1 1802, which allows receiver 1 1802 to remove MEPs, including the information of the flashing signal is received from the information flow entering the error detection module, which is trying to restore the information set of the conventional signal.

Error correction module 1840 works in conjunction with error detection and correction module, which can be included in receivers 1802, 1804, or instead of it. The ability to detect and correct errors inherent in receivers 1802, 1804 and / or module 1840 allows the base station 1800 to restore sets of information corresponding to sets of information before transmission, even though a (normal or basic) signal representing a set of information before transmission, was superimposed with a second flashing signal (flashing signal) or “punctured”, for example, replacing some MEP with a second signal (flashing signal). In some embodiments, the MEPs corresponding to the second set of information completely overlap the MEPs corresponding to the first set of information. In addition, in some embodiments, MEPs corresponding to the first set of information completely occupy the transmission unit.

In FIG. 19 shows an exemplary end node (wireless terminal) 1900 in accordance with the present invention. An exemplary end node 1900 may be used in any of the end nodes 1708, 1710, 1708 ', 1710' of FIG. 17. An exemplary end node 1900, such as a wireless terminal, may be a mobile terminal, a mobile phone, a mobile node, a fixed wireless device, etc. In the present description, references to end node 1900 can be understood as corresponding to any wireless terminal, mobile node, etc. Wireless terminals may be mobile nodes or fixed devices that support wireless links. An exemplary end node 1900 includes a plurality of receivers, a receiver 1 1902, a receiver N 1904, a plurality of transmitters, a transmitter 1 1910, a transmitter N 1912, a processor 1926, such as a CPU, and a memory 1930, interconnected by a 1928 bus. Various elements 1902, 1904, 1910, 1912, 1926, 1930 can exchange information and data on the 1928 bus.

Receivers 1902, 1904 and transmitters 1910, 1912 are connected to antennas 1906, 1908 and 1914, 1916, respectively, enabling an end node, such as a wireless terminal 1900, to communicate, for example, exchange data and information with a base station 1800 in whose cellular coverage area it operates wireless terminal 1900. Each receiver 1902, 1904 may include a decoder 1918, 1920 and, accordingly, receives and decodes the signaling encoded and transmitted by base station 1800. The receivers 1902, 1904 may be any of the following examples and the receivers represented in devices 5 1502 of FIG. 15, device 6 1532 of FIG. 15 or device 7 1562 of FIG. 16, for example, receivers (1506, 1508), (1536, 1542), (1563, 1564), or modifications. Receivers 1902, 1904, in accordance with the invention, are capable of receiving a combined signal including a regular or basic signal and a flashing signal, and to retrieve sets of information corresponding to the original sets of information before transmission. Each transmitter 1910, 1912 may include an encoder 1922, 1946, which encodes the signaling prior to transmission. The transmitters 1910, 1912 may be any of the exemplary transmitters shown in device 1 1302 and device 2 1308 of FIG. 13, device 3 of FIG. 14 or device 4 1410 of FIG. 14, for example, by transmitters (1304 and 1310), (1404), (1412), or their modifications. Transmitters 1910, 1912, in accordance with the invention, are capable of transmitting one or more of the following: a conventional or basic signal, a flashing signal and / or a combined signal.

The memory 1930 includes routines 1932 and data / information 1934. A processor 1926 controls the operation of end node 1900 by executing routines 1932 and using data / information 1934 in memory 1930 for the operation of receivers 1902, 1904 and transmitters 1910, 1912 for performing operational control of the main functional the capabilities of the base station, as well as the management of new features and improvements of the present invention, including the generation and transmission of combined signals, receiving combined signals, sharing combined with I drove at normal or baseline information signal and the information signal is flashing, the separation and recovery of information.

The routines 1932 include communication routines 1936 and wireless terminal control routines 1938. The wireless terminal control routine 1938 includes a transmitter control module 1940, a receiver control module 1942, and error correction module 1946. Data / information 1934 includes user data 1947, terminal identification (ID) information 1948, received information 1 1950, received information N 1952, transmission information 1 1954, transmission information N 1956, MEP identified information 1958, segment information 1960, information 1962 quality and information 1964 base station ID.

User data 1947 includes data to be transmitted to the base station 1800, and data received from the base station 1800, as well as intermediate data, for example, data involved in the decoding process to recover the detected information. Transmission information 1 1954 may include a set of information that may correspond to a first signal, for example, a regular or basic signal, information defining a MEP transmission unit that can be used to transmit the first signal, information defining a first set of MEP to be used for determining the signal, information that will be modulated by the first set of MEPs to determine the first signal, information defining which MEPs corresponding to the information of the first signal should be before for example, to the base station 1800. In some embodiments, each of the MEPs delivering the first set of information data will be transmitted to the base station 1800. In other embodiments, most MEPs delivering the first set of information should be transmitted to the base station 1800. Transmission information N 1956 may include a set of information that can correspond to a second signal, for example, a flashing signal, information defining a MEP transmission unit that can be used to transmit a second signal, for example, to a base station, information defining a second set of MEP to be used to determine the second signal, information that should be modulated by the second set of MEPs to determine the second signal. Received information 1 1950 includes a first set of reconstructed information from a receiver 1, 1902, for example, information corresponding to a first set of information of a base station before transmission. The first set of recovered information could be recovered, for example, from a regular or basic signal. The received information N 1952 includes a second set of recovered information from the receiver N, 1904, for example, information corresponding to the second set of information of the base station before transmission. A second set of recovered information could be recovered, for example, from a flashing signal.

A common and flashing signal, each defining an initial set of information before transmission, shares some common MEPs. Identified MEP information 1958 may include a set of identified MEPs in the second or flashing signal, wherein the set of identified MEPs could be received by decoder 1920 of receiver N. Information 1958 of identified MEPs can be directed to receiver 1 1902, and receiver 1902 can exclude these MEPs before by transmitting the received signal to the error correction module in the decoder 1918, or, alternatively, the identified MEP information 1958 may be sent to the memory error correction module 1946 and / or The module fixes to the decoder 1918.

Information 1948 Terminal ID is an ID assigned by the base station. The base station ID information 1964 includes information, such as a profiled value, that can be used to identify the particular base station with which the wireless terminal 1900 is connected. Using the base station ID information 1964 and the terminal ID 1948, the wireless terminal can determine the data hop sequences and management. Quality information 1962 may include information from detected pilots, measurements and downlink quality messages, interference levels, power information such as the current transmission level and battery power level, SNR, etc. Quality information 1962 may be returned to base station 1800 for use in classifying receivers as a "stronger" or "weaker" receiver to assist base station 1800 in planning and allocating, including identifying a regular or base segment and a flashing segment in accordance with the present invention. Segment information 1960 may include information defining segments allocated to the user in terms of type of use, for example, a traffic channel, an allocation channel, a request channel; characteristics, such as MEP, frequency / phase, and OFDM symbol tone times; The type of signal used for the segment, for example regular or basic, as opposed to flashing.

Communication routine 1934 includes various communications applications that can be used to provide specific services, such as IP telephony services, text services and / or interactive gaming, to one or more users of an end node.

The wireless terminal control routines 1938 control the basic functionality of the wireless terminal 1900, including the operation of transmitters 1910, 1912 and receivers 1902, 1904, signal generation and reception, including data / control hopping sequences, state control, and power control. The wireless terminal control routines 1938 also control new features and improvements of the present invention, including generating and transmitting combined signals, receiving combined signals, splitting the combined signal into a regular or basic information signal, and flashing information signal by splitting and recovering information.

The transmitter control module 1940 may use data / information 1934, including transmission information 1 1954, transmission information N 1956, terminal ID 1948, user data 1947 and segment information 1960 for generating transmission signals and controlling the operation of transmitters 1910, 1912 in accordance with this invention. For example, the transmitter control module 1940 can control the transmitter 1910 to encode it with the encoder 1922 the information sets included in transmission information 1 1954 into a regular or basic signal that can be transmitted by transmitter 1 1910. The transmitter control module 1940 can control transmitter N 1912 for encoding it with an encoder 1924 of information sets included in transmission information N 1956 into a flash or protected signal using a MEP set corresponding to the information in information 1956. Alternatively, in various Ianthe of transmitters 1910, 1912 single transmitter that combines or mixes the internal signal, based on the information transmission in January 1954 and 1956 transmit information N, under the control of transmitter control module 1844 may be used. Such a mixing operation may involve superimposing a conventional and flashing signal before transmission and / or selectively generating one MEP transmission set including each of the flashing signal elements and the elements in the normal signal that are not included in the flashing signal.

A receiver control module 1942 controls the operation of receivers 1902, 1904 for receiving a combined signal and extracting two sets of information, for example, receiver information 1 1950 and receiver information N 1952 in accordance with the present invention. The receiving process under the control of the receiver control module 1942 may include controlling the decoders 1918, 1920 and controlling other elements of the receivers. In some embodiments, the receiver control module 1942 controls impulse noise filters, background noise filters, and receiver error detection modules 1902, 1904. In some embodiments, the receiver control module 1942 controls the 2nd signal MEP identification module in one receiver, for example, receiver N 1904, and a drop module in another receiver, for example, receiver 1 1902, and transmits information 1858 of the identified MEP from receiver N 1904 to receiver 1 1902, which allows receiver 1 1902 to remove MEPs that are on chayut information a flashing signal of the flow of information supplied to the error correction module that tries to restore a conventional signal information.

The error correction module 1946 works in conjunction with the error correction module, which can be included in or instead of receivers 1902, 1904. The ability to detect and correct errors provided in receivers 1902, 1904 and / or module 1846 allows the wireless terminal 1900 to recover information sets corresponding to information sets before transmission, even though a (normal or basic) signal representing a set of information before transmission , was subjected to the superposition of the second flashing signal (flashing signal) or “puncturing”, for example, replacing some (some) MEP with a second signal (flashing signal).

Amplitude modulation is a modulation technique in which a transmitter concentrates its energy on a subset of degrees of freedom occupied by a code word. For example, pulse-phase modulation is one of the illustrations of amplitude manipulation, in which the transmitter uses energy only in those positions in which “1” is transmitted, and is turned off when “0” is transmitted. Pulse phase modulation can transmit log2 (M) bits, concentrating energy in one of the M positions. An extra bit can be transmitted using positive and negative pulses. An example of pulse-phase modulation is shown in FIG. 3. In FIG. Figure 3 shows a drawing 300 with 32 time intervals, for example, an example of a separate time interval 302. The energy is concentrated in the 17th time interval 306 and is represented by a pulse 304. In Figure 3, five bits of information can be transmitted using these 32 locations or time intervals, if the pulse 304 can only be in one direction, for example positive. In FIG. 3, six bits of information can be transmitted using these 32 locations or time slots if pulse 304 can be positive or negative. Generally speaking, in generalized amplitude modulation, information can be transmitted in two ways: firstly, by placing energy within the degrees of freedom occupied by the code word, and secondly, by the information contained in the signals that occupy this location. For example, if a channel can be estimated at a mobile terminal using a reference signal, the information can be encoded in phase and / or amplitude in addition to the information encoded in the energy location of the generalized amplitude-modulated signal. This form of generalized amplitude manipulation is referred to in this document as flashing alarm. Typically, in a flashing alarm paradigm, energy concentration is limited by a small subset of the available degrees of freedom.

Flashing alarms may be used in accordance with the present invention. Simple examples of flashing coding in accordance with the present invention should be given. Assume that one embodiment of the invention is applied to a digital communication system that uses DFMP signaling. In the example considered here, suppose that the air link resource includes 16 characters. For example, in an exemplary spread spectrum OFDM multiple access, these 16 terrestrial resource symbols may be 16 orthogonal tones in one OFDM symbol period, or one tone in 16 OFDM symbol periods, or any appropriate combination of symbol tones and periods ( for example, 4 tones in 4 periods of an OFDM symbol).

In FIG. 4, the superimposed signal 400 includes a regular signal 420, which is transmitted using a codeword whose energy is distributed over all 16 DFMP symbols, which are represented in FIG. 4 by small rectangles without shading. A regular codeword can be created using, for example, a convolutional code. Suppose a protected signal is to transmit 5 information bits. In this embodiment, 5 secure bits can be transmitted using the high power symbol position 430, as represented in FIG. 4 by a single large rectangle with a shader. The protected signal includes one DFMP symbol 430 transmitted with high power, while a conventional signal 420 with energy distributed over 16 symbols is superimposed on it. It should be noted that the DFMP symbol of the protected signal can be in any of 16 different symbol positions. To provide a reference to FIG. 4, the 1st symbol 401 and the 16th symbol 416 are identified. For example, in FIG. 4, the DFMP symbol is transmitted on the 9th symbol. Therefore, the position of the symbol provides the transmission of 4 bits out of 5 protected information bits. In addition, the phase (for example, the sign) of the DFMP symbol transmits the 5th protected bit.

To see the advantage of this coding scheme of the present invention over the classic overlay coding scheme, consider the design of a stronger receiver. A stronger receiver may use the concept of sequential decoding. A stronger receiver first decodes the protected signal, or, alternatively, then subtracts it from the composite received signal and finally decodes a regular signal, or, alternatively, signals to a weaker receiver to reject tones in which a larger signal is detected. It should be noted that with the new coding scheme of the present invention, even if the neutralization is not perfect, damage to a conventional codeword will be limited to one or more characters, so the receiver can minimize the adverse effects of damage. For example, in a decoding procedure, a receiver may ignore a character that is occupied by a normal signal. In this case, the neutralization operation is reduced to performing the deletion at a specific location of the character with the possibility of using error correction codes to make up for this loss.

In the above example of FIG. 4, each DPSK symbol of 16 symbols of an air link resource represents a degree of freedom. An ordinary signal distributes its energy over all these 16 degrees of freedom. Meanwhile, each codeword of a protected signal concentrates its energy in one of these 16 degrees of freedom. It should be noted that the flashing signal, as defined in the above embodiment, is an orthogonal code. However, the invention is not caused by any of the orthogonality properties of the code words.

Next, a transmitter design for use with encoding implemented in accordance with the present invention will be disclosed. The above example illustrates aspects and methods of the invention that can be practiced and used in various communication systems. This method of superimposing signals by concentrating the energy of the protected signal on a small subset of the available degrees of freedom while distributing the energy of a conventional signal to essentially all available degrees of freedom is called flash overlay coding in this document. The protected codeword is designated as “flashing signal”, and the conventional codeword is indicated as “normal signal” or “base signal” in this discussion. While, generally speaking, the approach is to transmit secure information using a flashing signal and ordinary information with a normal signal, in some embodiments of the invention this can be done the other way around.

Flashing signaling, in accordance with the invention, provides a method of superposition of signals, which allows you to reliably use the coding efficiency of the overlay in practical receivers. Generally speaking, a flashing signal and a conventional signal are transmitted using the same set of transmission resources. However, each flashing signal codeword concentrates its energy on a small subset of the available degrees of freedom. Each codeword of a conventional signal can distribute its energy over each of the available degrees of freedom. For easy detection and decoding of a flashing signal, it is desirable that its energy is higher, and in some embodiments, that the energy is significantly higher than that of a conventional signal in a selected subset of degrees of freedom corresponding to the flashing signal. This relatively higher concentration of energy in the selected flashing subset is acceptable even when the total energy of the conventional signal is higher than the total energy of the flashing signal. Finally, for easy detection and decoding of a conventional signal, the effect of a flashing signal on a conventional codeword should be minimized. In other words, the energy loss in the selected subset of degrees of freedom occupied by the flashing signal should have little effect on the decoding of a conventional codeword.

The choice of transmit power of the flashing signal and the normal signal depends on several factors, including (a) the SNR of the target receivers of both the flashing and ordinary signals; (b) information transfer rates for flashing and conventional signals; and (c) a method for constructing flash codes and conventional signals. Generally speaking, powers can be independently selected to match their own reliability and encoding requirements. In addition, flashing alarms can be configured in a situation-specific manner for maximum flexibility. More specifically, the transmitter may, depending on the situation, not select the transmission of the flashing signal, but use most of its available power to transmit a conventional signal. Alternatively, the transmitter may, depending on the situation, select the transmission of the flashing signal with the highest available power and not select the transmission of a conventional signal.

The following discloses a receiver design for use in coding in accordance with the present invention. In one embodiment of the invention, the receiver first decodes the flashing signal. A flashing signal can be detected at the receiver since it is received at a much higher power than a conventional codeword in a small subset of degrees of freedom. The receiver then eliminates the effect of the flashing signal before attempting to decode a conventional codeword. In the case of classical superposition coding, neutralization involves decoding the protected codeword and subtracting this from the composite received signal. In flash overlay coding in one embodiment of the invention, the receiver completely discards the signal received in the subset of degrees of freedom of the decoded code word of the flash signal when the receiver is to decode a conventional signal. Since a conventional signal distributes its signal energy over all degrees of freedom, eliminating the signal energy in a small subset of degrees of freedom should have a small or insignificant operational value for decoding a conventional codeword due to error detection and the ability to correct the decoder.

In another embodiment, the receiver does not explicitly neutralize the flashing signal before it decodes a regular signal. Instead, the receiver directly decodes a conventional signal from a received composite signal, which may include a flashing signal. The receiver uses soft metrics related to saturation and circulation limits. Consequently, the flashing signal serves to saturate or substantially eliminate the signal component in a subset of the degrees of freedom it occupies, but has little effect on decoding of a conventional codeword. Furthermore, if the receiver is not interested in a flashing signal, the receiver may simply decode a normal signal without decoding the flashing signal, in which case the receiver may not even be aware of the presence of the flashing signal, which may be sensed and / or counted by pulsed or background noise.

The following discloses an embodiment of a control channel of the present invention. In this section, an embodiment of the invention will be described with reference to the control channel of an exemplary system. The control channel in this example carries information from a base station 1702 via a broadcast downlink to a plurality of mobile users 1708, 1710 in a cellular wireless system 1700, as shown in FIG. In most cellular wireless systems, control channels are transmitted with broadcast power, since mobile users with the weakest channels force this. Flashing alarms are well suited for this application in this scenario and lead to a significant reduction in power with little or no reliability loss.

It is contemplated that information carried on a control channel may be divided into multiple subsets, each of which is intended for one or more subsets of mobile users in the system. In this example, we assume that the control channel information can be divided into two subsets. The first subset is designated as “regular information” and is intended for those mobile users who experience moderate to high SNR on a downlink. The second subset is designated as “secure information” and is intended for a subset of users who experience a very low downlink SNR.

In the example discussed here, it is assumed that the air link resource includes 32 characters. For example, in an exemplary spread spectrum OFDM multiple access resource, the link resource may be 32 orthogonal tones in one OFDM symbol period, or one tone in 32 OFDM symbol periods, or any appropriate combination of symbol tones and periods (e.g. 4 tones in 8 periods of the OFDM symbol).

As shown in the overlay signal 500 of FIG. 5 , conventional information 540, represented by small rectangles without shading, in this example is transmitted using a 32-character code word. A first character location 501 and a 32nd character location 532 are shown for reference. This codeword is transmitted with a power that is sufficient to decode a subset of users who experience moderate or high SNR. Low SNR users are unlikely to be able to decode this codeword, and therefore, the power requirements are much lower than those that could be if the codeword needed to be decoded for each of the mobile users. This difference in the ability to decode a codeword is especially true in a wireless environment in which mobile users may experience an SNR that varies by several orders of magnitude. The secure information, which is intended for a subset of mobile users with low SNR, is transmitted using a flashing signal 550, as shown in FIG. 5 four large rectangles with shading. In this embodiment, it is assumed that each protected codeword concentrates its energy at 4 symbol locations 502, 512, 520, 530. Sets of 4 symbol locations are assumed to be non-overlapping in this example, resulting in 8 orthogonal sets, each of which includes yourself 4 character locations. Generally speaking, however, in other designs, codeword sets may overlap partially or completely. The concentration of energy of the protected codeword in more than one symbol location is important from the point of view of diversity in cellular wireless systems and provides a greater degree of protection against channel attenuation and interference.

In the example of FIG. 5, each set of secure codewords transmits 3 bits only by its location. Suppose k is an index of 8 different character sets of a broadcast link resource. Assume that these 32 air link resource symbols are indexed from 0 to 31. For k = 0 ..., 7 the air link resource symbols of the kth location of the symbol set are symbols k, k + 8, k + 16 and k + 24.

When the flash codeword includes multiple characters, additional information bits can be transmitted using these characters. Assume that {q0, ql, q2, q3} denote these four characters that must be transmitted with four characters of the air link resource from any of the eight character sets of the air link resource. In one embodiment, {q0, ql, q2, q3} can be generated with 4 Walsh codes of length 4, as shown in Table 1. Choosing q0, ql, q2, or q3 results in an additional 2 bits transmitted by selecting these 4 codewords .

This information can be decoded by the mobile receiver in a simple manner. The mobile receiver can identify the location of the flash signal due to its higher energy, which is used to identify 3 bits of the character set locations. It then extracts characters that include the flashing signal and decodes the remaining 2 bits. This example codeword construction leads to codewords having a different error protection property. Bits that distinguish the location of the flashing signal are received with high reliability. This is especially true when transmitting a flashing signal over a wireless channel, since only one of the four symbol locations must be obtained to determine the codeword set. Detection of q0, ql, q2 or q3 may be more prone to errors from channel attenuation or interference. Alternatively, the receiver may use a more sophisticated decoder, such as a maximum probability decoder, to decode the full flash signal. Once again, it should be noted that the present invention is not caused by the use of orthogonal codes on the flashing signals, as presented in this example.

This concept can also be directly extended to multidimensional modulation sets. For example, if DFMP modulation is to be used, another bit may be sent with the phase (i.e., sign) of the flash codeword. Moreover, if the modulation of the EMF is to be used, an additional one bit can be sent with the choice of either in-phase or quadrature signaling.

Table 1
Design of orthogonal codes on flashing signals Codeword Index {q0, q1, q2, q3} bit values 0 {+, +, +, +} one {+, +, -, -} 2 {+, -, +, -} 3 {+, -, -, +}

The following describes flashing signaling in multiple access channels in accordance with the present invention. Although the invention has been disclosed above in the broadcast channel paradigm, it is also applicable in the structure of a multiple access channel. This aspect of the invention will be described in the context of a mobile uplink, which is an exemplary system multiple access channel. Consider a base station receiver that receives signals from two mobile transmitters on the uplink. Since base station 1702 is also a coordinating entity, it can distinguish between these two transmitters in a relative sense. Assume that a mobile transmitter that operates on a channel with lower path loss is defined as a “stronger” transmitter, and another transmitter that experiences higher path loss is considered a “weaker” transmitter. The base station instructs the weaker transmitter to transmit its signal, distributing the signal energy over each of the degrees of freedom, while the stronger transmitter is instructed to concentrate its transmission energy on several degrees of freedom. The received composite signal 600 at the base station receiver 1802 is shown in FIG. 6. The base station receiver 1802 can easily decode and eliminate a flashing signal 610 represented by a large rectangle with shading transmitted from a “stronger” transmitter, before decoding a weak signal 620 represented by small rectangles without shading transmitted from a “weaker” transmitter.

The classification of mobile transmitters as “stronger” or “weaker” is not static and is a relative definition that allows some flexibility within the system. The definition of mobile transmitters as being “stronger” or “weaker” may be due to other criteria instead of or in addition to the path loss experienced on the uplink. Such a designation or classification as “stronger” or “weaker" mobile transmitter may in some embodiments be applied in the context of interference costs in an uplink cellular communication line. For example, a mobile transmitter that leads to high uplink interference in other cells can be considered a “weaker” transmitter and, therefore, can be instructed by the base station to transmit its signal, distributing energy over each of the degrees of freedom. On the other hand, a mobile transmitter that has low interference costs due to its location can be considered a “stronger” transmitter, and it can use flash overlay coding to superimpose its signal on the signal of the “weaker” transmitter. Alternatively, in some embodiments, the mobile transmitters may be categorized as “stronger” or “weaker” based on device limitations, such as battery power or condition.

Flashing alarms in an exemplary system should be disclosed in accordance with the methods and devices of the present invention. In an exemplary wireless data transmission system, the air link resource mainly includes bandwidth, time, and power. An overhead resource that transports data and / or voice traffic is called a traffic channel. In an exemplary system, data is transmitted over a traffic channel in traffic channel segments (traffic segments for short). Traffic segments can serve as the main or minimum modules of the available traffic channel resources. Downlink traffic segments transport data traffic from the base station to the wireless terminals, while uplink traffic segments transport data traffic from the wireless terminals to the base station. In an exemplary system, a traffic segment includes a number of frequency tones in a finite time interval.

In an exemplary system used to disclose the invention, traffic segments are dynamically shared between wireless terminals 1708, 1710, which communicate with base station 1702. A scheduling function, for example, module 1838 in base station 1800 allocates each upstream and downstream segment to one of mobile terminals 1708, 1710 based on a number of criteria. The allocation of traffic segments can be carried out segment by segment to different users. For example, in FIG. 7, in a graph 700 of frequency versus vertical axis 702 versus time along horizontal axis 704, segment A 706, shown with vertical hatching, is allocated to base station planner by user # 1, and segment B 708 shown with horizontal hatching is allocated to user # 2 The base station scheduler can quickly allocate traffic channel segments to different users according to their traffic needs and channel conditions, which can usually change over time. The traffic channel is thus effectively dynamically allocated to various users and shared by them on a segment-by-segment basis. In an exemplary system, traffic channel segment assignment information is transported over an allocation channel, which includes a series of allocation segments. In a cellular wireless system such as system 1700, which is shown in FIG. 17, allocation segments are typically transmitted in a downlink. There are allocation segments for downlink traffic segments and separate allocation segments for uplink traffic segments. Each traffic segment is associated with a unique allocation segment. The associated allocation segment transmits destination information of the traffic segment. The destination information may include the identifier of the user terminal (s) that is allocated to use this traffic segment, as well as the coding and modulation scheme used in this traffic segment. FIG. 8 is a graph 800 with a vertical axis 802 representing frequency and a horizontal axis 804 representing time. FIG. 8 shows two allocation segments, allocation segment A ′ (AS A ′) 806 and allocation segment B ′ (AS B ′) 808, which transmit destination information of traffic segments A (TSA) 810 and B (TSB) 812. Channel Allocation is a shared channel resource. Users, such as wireless terminals, receive the destination information transmitted in the allocation channel, and then use the segments of the traffic channel according to the destination information.

The data transmitted by the base station 1702 in the downlink traffic segment is decoded by the receiver of the designated wireless terminal 1708, 1710, while the data transmitted by the dedicated wireless terminal 1708, 1710 in the uplink segment is decoded by the receiver in the base station 1702. Typically, the transmitted segment includes redundant bits that help the receiver determine if the data is decoded correctly. This is done because the wireless channel may be unreliable, and high integrity requirements are usually put forward for usable data traffic.

Due to interference, noise, and / or channel attenuation in a wireless system, a traffic segment transmission may succeed or fail. In an exemplary system, the traffic segment receiver sends an acknowledgment to indicate whether the segment has been received correctly. Confirmation information corresponding to traffic channel segments is transported in an acknowledgment channel, which includes a series of acknowledgment segments. Each traffic segment is associated with a unique acknowledgment segment. For the downlink traffic segment, the acknowledgment segment is in the uplink. For the uplink traffic segment, the acknowledgment segment is in the downlink. At a minimum, the acknowledgment segment transmits one-bit information, for example, a bit indicating whether the corresponding traffic segment was received correctly or not. Due to a predetermined connection between uplink traffic segments and acknowledgment segments, it may not be necessary to transmit other information, such as a user identifier or segment index, in the acknowledgment segment. The acknowledgment segment typically uses a user terminal, for example, a wireless terminal 1708, 1710, which uses an associated traffic segment, rather than other user terminals. Thus, in both communication lines (uplink and downlink), the acknowledgment channel is a shared resource since it can be used by many users. However, there is usually no competitiveness that may result from sharing the acknowledgment channel, since there is usually no uncertainty as to which user terminal should use a particular acknowledgment segment. 9 is a graph 900 of downlink traffic segments having a vertical axis 902 representing a frequency, a horizontal axis 904 representing time, a first traffic segment, a traffic segment A 906 (TS) and a second traffic segment TSB 908. FIG. 9 also shows a second uplink acknowledgment segment (ACK) graph 905 comprising a vertical axis 952 representing a frequency and a horizontal axis 954 representing time. Fig. 9 also shows two uplink acknowledgment segments A "956 and B" 958 that transmit downstream acknowledgment information of traffic segments A 906 and B 908 from the wireless terminal 1708 to the base station 1702.

As described above, the exemplary system 1700 may be a packet-switched cellular wireless data transmission and processing system with traffic segments allocated dynamically by the base station 1702 on the downlink and uplink. An application of the invention to an exemplary system 1700 will now be described in the context of a cellular downlink. Assume that base station 1702 can, in a manner such as time slicing, allocate up to two traffic segments at some point in time. The selection of users for whom these segments are intended is broadcast on the allocation channel. Further, let us assume, without prejudice to the generalization of the description, that one of these two users operates at a lower SNR than the other user. In this context, these two users are regarded as mutually “stronger” and “weaker”.

The graph in FIG. 10 represents the frequency along the vertical axis 1002 versus time along the horizontal axis 1004. FIG. 10 also shows A (normal) allocation segment (ASG) 1006, A traffic channel segment (TCHa) 1008, A (flashing) acknowledgment segment 1010 (ACKf), B flash allocation segment 1005 (ASGf), B traffic channel segment 1007 (TCHb), and B acknowledgment segment 1009 (ACKr) 1009. ASGf 1005 is within the frequency spectrum of ASGr 1006. ACKf 1010 is within the frequency range Spectrum ACKr 1009.

As shown in FIG. 10, allocation information for a stronger user, (ASGr), 1006 is transmitted using a conventional signal on the allocation channel, while information, (ASGf), 1005 for a weaker user is transmitted using a flashing signal. A stronger receiver learns from its (usual) destination that it has received a traffic segment indicated by TCHa 1008, while a weaker receiver likewise notifies its corresponding traffic segment indicated by TCHb 1007 by flashing signaling allocation (ASGf) 1005. B In an exemplary system, mobile receivers 1708, 1710 provide uplink feedback confirmation to base station 1702 to indicate the status of a received traffic segment.

Two mobile users 1708, 1710 may use flashing alarms to superimpose their acknowledgment signals, as shown in FIG. 10. To this end, it is assumed that a “stronger” downlink receiver is a stronger uplink transmitter and therefore reports its confirmation using a flashing signal (ACKf) 1010. A weaker receiver distributes the energy of its acknowledgment signal over each of degrees of freedom and reports it to the base station 1702 in the form of a normal signal (ACKr) 1009.

The following describes the throughput of a cellular wireless system depending on the flashing signaling. Cellular wireless systems are typically noise-dependent, and their capacity depends on the amount and characteristics of external interference. Using flashing alarms has a very significant effect on interference levels. A well-known information-theoretical result is that among all noise signals with the same energy, Gaussian noise, the noise leads to the lowest bandwidth. Flashing signals, due to their design, have peaks, are completely non-Gaussian in nature. Therefore, with the same total amount of interference, when one cell in the wireless system uses flashing signals, the effect of these signals (as interference) on other cells is less than it would be when using signals similar to Gaussian. This applies to uplink paths as well as downlink paths of cellular wireless systems.

11 illustrates two exemplary sets of information, a first set of information 1150 and a second set of information 1160 that can be transmitted using a transmission unit in accordance with the present invention. The first set of information 1150 includes information A ₁ 1151, information A ₂ 1152, information A _N 1153; the second set of information 1160 includes information B ₁ 1161, information B ₂ 1162, information B _N 1163. The first set of information may be, for example, user data, selections, or confirmations. The second set of information may be, for example, user data, confirmations, or selections. 11 also shows a graph of 1100 minimum transmission units (MEP), in which the vertical axis represents frequency tones, and the horizontal axis 1104 represents time. In FIG. 11, each small rectangle refers to a particular MEP module, for example, section 1112 represents 1 degree of freedom that can be used to transmit information. Each time slot on the horizontal axis, for example time slot 1110, represents a time for transmitting a MEP, for example, an OFDM symbol time. Each square in FIG. 11, for example an example square 1114, is a MEP module. Each MEP corresponds to a unique combination of resources used to transmit information, said combination of resources including at least two of the time, frequency, phase, and spreading code. In an OFDM system, a MEP can be a frequency or a phase in time, for example, a common-mode or quadrature component in an OFDM tone symbol. In a CDMA system, the MEP module can be, for example, an extension code allocated to a time module. An exemplary transmission unit 1106 shown in FIG. 11 is a collection of 24 MEPs. Information for the first set of information 1150 is determined by the first set of minimum transmission units. The first set of minimum transmission units is identified by squares with a diagonal line 1116 ascending from left to right. An exemplary first MEP set includes 15 MEPs, for example, an exemplary MEP 1120 is in the first MEP set. The first set of MEPs includes at least the majority of MEPs in transmission unit 1106 in accordance with the invention. In some embodiments, the first set of MEPs includes at least 75% of the MEPs in transmission unit 1106. The example of FIG. 11 is an embodiment that includes 15 MEPs of the first set / 20 of the total number of MEPs of block 1106 = 75%. Information for the second set of information 1160 is determined from the second set of minimum transmission units. The second set of minimum transmission units is identified by squares with a diagonal line 1118 descending from left to right. The second example set of minimum transmission units includes 3 MEPs. In accordance with the invention, the second set of MEPs includes less MEPs than the first set of MEPs, and some of the MEPs in the first and second sets of MEPs are the same. For example, in FIG. 11, two MEPs are included in both sets, MEP 1122 and MEP 1123. In some embodiments, the second MEP set has less than half the number of MEPs of the first MEP set; 11 is an illustration of such an embodiment. Information in the first and second sets of information 1150, 1160 can be transmitted, for example, from the base station 1702 to the wireless terminal 1708, 1710 using the minimum transmission units included in the first and second sets of minimum transmission units.

FIG. 12 shows a graph 1200 of the relationship between the minimum transmission units (MEP) along the vertical axis 1202 versus time along the horizontal axis 1204. FIG. 12 shows an exemplary transmission unit 1205 including 1600 MEP. The first set of information may be represented by the first set of MEPs, including the majority of 1600 MEPs in block 1205 transmission. Block 1205 transmission, in accordance with the invention, can be divided into subunits. 11, a MEP transmission unit 1205 is divided into 16 MEP subunits, each subunit comprising 100 MEP. Each small square, for example, an example square 1206, includes a MEP subunit. In some embodiments, the first set of MEPs may be subdivided into small sets of information, each set being represented by the first set of MEPs in a separate subunit. In combination, the small sets of information represent the first set of information that is encoded by most of the large transmission blocks 1205. An exemplary subunit 1207 illustrates 100 typical MEPs of an exemplary subunit. Exemplary subunits 1208 illustrate 100 typical MEPs of another subunit. The individual MEPs of the other subunits of the transmission unit 1205 are not shown, but each of the other subunits can be considered similar to the example subunit 1207. Each circle in the subunit represents the MEP. Each diagonal line, ascending from left to right and intersecting a circle, represents a separate MEP, which is used to represent information in the first set of information. Each diagonal line, descending from left to right and intersecting a circle, represents a separate MEP, which is used to represent information in the second set of information. 12, an exemplary MEP 1208 is one of the MEPs used to represent the first set of information; cited as an example, MEP 1211 is another MEP used to represent the first set of information. The MEP 1209 cited as an example is not used to represent information in the first set or in the second set of information in a specific case, although it is part of an exemplary transmission block 1205. Thus, at the time point presented, MEP 1209 is not used to carry signals corresponding to the first or second information sets. An exemplary MEP 1210 is used to represent information in both the first set of information and the second set of information.

In the example of FIG. 12, each subunit, for example, subunit 1207, can be used to represent information that uniquely represents part of a first set of information uniquely identified by a small MEP subunit. However, the second set of information may represent a different set of information, for example, 10-bit information. To uniquely transmit 10-bit information, 2 ¹⁰ = 1024 possible minimum transmission units may be required. A transmission unit 1205 with 1600 possible available minimum transmission units and a single MEP allocated to represent a particular value of 10-bit information may be used. In this example, the MEP 1210 is one MEP used to deliver information of the second set of information when transmitting information. 12 shows a case in which each of the MEPs included in the second set of MEPs is also included in the first set of MEPs.

13 1301 shows one method for transmitting two sets of information, for example, information sets 1150 and 1160 of FIG. 11, in accordance with the invention. FIG. 13 comprises a first device, for example a device 1 1302, including a transmitter, a transmitter 1, 1304, and a second device, for example, a device 2 1308, including a transmitter, a transmitter 2 1310. Each device may be, for example, a base station or a wireless terminal of the type those shown in FIG. The first set of information 1150 is transmitted by signals, for example, signal 1 1306 transmitted by transmitter 1 1304. Signal 1 1306 is sometimes called a basic or normal signal. A second set of information 1160 is transmitted by signals, for example, signal 1 1312 transmitted by transmitter 2 1310. Signal 2 is sometimes referred to as a flashing signal. In the exemplary case of FIG. 13, signal 1 1306 will use the first set of minimum transmission units, while signal 2 1312 will use the second set of minimum transmission units. Some of the MEPs of the first set transmitted by the transmitter 1 1304 will be the same as some of the MEPs of the second set, which leads to some overlap of signal 1 1306 and signal 2 1312.

FIG. 14 shows two methods for transmitting two sets of information, for example, the information sets 1150 and 1160 of FIG. 11, in accordance with the invention. In the first method shown in FIG. 14, an exemplary device 3 1402, such as a base station or wireless terminal, includes a transmitter, transmitter 3 1404, capable of transmitting signals corresponding to both the first and second sets of information 1150, 1160 respectively. In FIG. 14, signal 3 1406 corresponds to the first set of information 1150 and uses the first set of MEPs, while signal 4 1408 corresponds to the second set of information 1160 and uses the second set of MEPs. Signal 3 1406 is sometimes called a base signal or a regular signal, while signal 4 1408 is sometimes called a flashing signal. Signal 4 1408 is transmitted at a higher power level than signal 3 1406, based on the minimum transmission unit. In some embodiments, the power level at which signal 4 1408 is transmitted is at least 3 dB higher than the power level at which minimum transmission units corresponding to signal 3 1406 are transmitted. In some embodiments, the transmission power level of the minimum transmission units used for signal transmission 3 1406, may be different. The transmit power level of the MEP used to transmit the signal 4 1408 may also be different.

In the second method shown in FIG. 14, an exemplary device, device 4 1410, such as a base station or wireless terminal, includes a transmitter, transmitter 4 1412. Transmitter 4 1412 includes a 1st signal module 1411 and a module 1413 second signal. The first signal module 1411 generates a signal 5 1414 corresponding to the first information set 1150. The second signal module 1411 generates a signal 6 1416 corresponding to the second information set 1160. The signal 5 1414 and the signal 6 1416 are combined by the combiner module 1418 before transmitting the MEP in the signal 1420. Signal 5 1414 is sometimes referred to as a basic or normal signal, and signal 6 of 1416 is sometimes called a flashing signal. Combiner module 1418 can superimpose two signals, signal 5 1414 and signal 6 1416. Alternatively, combiner module 1418 can compare the set of MEPs that will be used to transmit signal 5 1414 with the set of MEPs that will be used to transmit signal 6 1416 The combiner module 1418 can send information in the signal 6 1414 to each of the required MEPs, however, the module 1418 can exclude from the set of MEPs allocated for the signal 5 1414 those MEPs that are already allocated for transferring the signal 6 1416. For example, in the example of 11 MEP 1122 and M EP 1123 could be excluded from the transfer of information of signal 5 1141. Thus, the second set of information 1160 in signal 6 1416 punctures or replaces the first set of information 1150 in signal 5 1414, which would occupy the same MEP. This embodiment assumes that the receiver is capable of detecting and correcting errors sufficient to restore the initial first set of information 1150, some of which was not transmitted. Thus, instead of using the actual overlay, the signals corresponding to the second set can be transmitted without overlapping the signals of the first set, overlapping the first set of signals discarded before the actual transmission. In this case, the MEPs used to transmit the second set of information puncture the set of MEPs in the shared transmission unit that were selected to transmit the first set of information.

On Fig presents an example device, device 5 1502, for example a base station or a wireless terminal, which can be used to receive combined signals, in accordance with the invention, and to obtain two sets of received information, Information A '1516 and Information B '1518. Information A' 1516 is a reconstructed set of information corresponding to the first set of initial information Information A 1150 of FIG. 11, before transmission. Information B '1518 is a reconstructed set of information corresponding to the first set of initial information Information B of FIG. 11, prior to transmission. The device 5 1502 includes a first receiver, a receiver 1 1506, including a pulse noise filter 1510 and an error correction module 1512. The combined signal, signal 8 1520, containing signals that have been transmitted together for some time, such as signal 3 1406 (normal or base signal) of FIG. 13 and signal 4 1408 (flashing signal) of FIG. 13, is processed by receiver 1 1506 moreover, the pulse noise filter 1510 filters out or rejects the signal corresponding to the MEP blocks obtained from the second information set 1160. The remaining signal (normal signal) corresponding to most MEPs in the set of MEPs corresponding to the first information set 1150 is processed by the error correction module 1512, which recovers the “lost information”, and thus the received Information Set A ′ 1516 is a good representation of the Information Set A 1150 before transfer. Device 5 1502 also includes a second receiver, receiver 2 1508, including a background noise filter 1514. The combined signal 8 1520 also hits receiver 2 1508, where the background noise filter 1514 processes as the noise signal corresponding to the first set of information 1150, for example signal 3 1406, and removes or rejects this low level signal, leaving a signal (for example, a flashing signal) from which a good presentation of the second set of information B 1160 can be restored before transmission, as the received set B '1518 of information.

The second device, device 6 shown in Fig. 15, performs a combined signal reception and information retrieval similar to device 5 1502. Device 6 1532 includes a first receiver, receiver 1 1540, and a second receiver, receiver 2 1538. Receiver 1 1536 includes itself a decoder, decoder 1 1540, which includes a pulse filter 1544 and module 1546 error correction. Receiver 2 1538 includes a decoder, decoder 2 1542, including a background noise filter 1548. The operation of device 6 1532 is similar to that described with respect to device 5 1502, except that additional decoding takes place in device 6 1532. During their operation, receivers 1536 and 1538 operate independently and in parallel. The first receiver 1536 processes the flashing signal as impulse noise and rejects the flashing symbols as impulse noise or performs some other operation, for example, a saturation operation, processing the flashing component in the same way as any other impulse noise signals could be processed. Receiver 2 1538 decodes the flashing signal when processing a lower power signal as background noise. The combined signal 9 1554 is similar to the combined signal 8 1520, which includes both conventional and flashing signals. The received information set A ”1550 corresponds to a good reconstruction of the initial first information set A 1150 of FIG. 11, before transmission. The received set B "1552 information corresponds to a good reconstruction of the initial second set of information B 1160 of Fig. 11, before transmission.

FIG. 16 illustrates another exemplary device, device 7 1562, such as a base station or wireless terminal, including a first receiver, receiver 1 1563 and a second receiver, receiver 2 1564. Receiver 1 1563 includes a decoder 1565 including discard module 1570 and error correction module 1566. Receiver 2 1564 includes a decoder 1566, including a background noise filter 1567, and a 2nd signal MEP identification module 1568. The combined signal 10 1573 is received and supplied to the receiver 2 1564. At the decoder 1566 of the receiver 2 1564, the signal can be filtered by a background filter 1567, and the information is decoded and provided as a set of Information B ″ 1572, reconstruction of the initial set of information B 1160 of FIG. 11, before transmission. Additionally, the 2nd signal MEP identification module 1568 identifies the set of MEP 1569 corresponding to the second (flashing) signal and sends this information 1573 to receiver decoder 1565 1563. In some embodiments, the identified MEP 15 set 73 is one of the in-phase or quadrature component tones at various points in time of a symbol.

Drop module 1570 at decoder 1565 at receiver 1 1563 receives the identified MEP 1573 set and rejects or removes information obtained from these MEP modules before the information enters error correction module 1566. Alternatively, information identifying the MEP of the second or flashing signal may be transmitted directly to error correction module 1566 1566, which can eliminate the effects of these MEPs. The set of information A ″ 1571 corresponds to the reconstruction of the first set of information 1150 of FIG. 11, before transmission. The rejection of the identified MEPs and their effect on the lower power signal is in sharp contrast with the overlay decoding technique known in the art that requires the exact removal of the component high power signal from the block of the received signal until the base signal is restored.

Although they have been described in the context of an OFDM system, the methods and devices of the present invention are applicable to a wide variety of communication systems, including many communication systems not operating with OFDM and / or non-cellular communication systems.

In various embodiments of the nodes described herein, one or more modules are used to perform steps corresponding to one or more of the methods of the present invention, for example, signal processing, message generation, and / or transmission steps. Thus, in some embodiments, various features of the present invention are applied using modules. Such modules may be implemented using software, hardware, or a combination of software and hardware. Many of the above methods or method steps can be implemented using computer-executable instructions, such as software contained in a computer-readable medium, such as a memory device, such as RAM, a floppy disk, etc., to control a machine, such as a mainframe with or without additional equipment, for the implementation of all the above methods or parts thereof, for example, in one or more nodes. Accordingly, in addition to other objects, the present invention is directed to providing a computer-readable medium comprising computer-executable instructions for controlling a machine, such as a processor and associated hardware, so that it performs one or more of the steps of the above method (s).

Numerous additional variations of the above methods and devices of the present invention are apparent to those skilled in the art in view of the above description of the invention. Such options are included in the scope of the invention. The methods and devices of the present invention can, in various embodiments, be used with CDMA, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) and / or various other types of communication technologies that can be used to provide wireless links between nodes access and wireless terminals. In some embodiments, base stations establish communication links with mobile nodes using OFDM and / or CDMA. In various embodiments, wireless terminals may be implemented as laptop computers, personal information assistants (PDAs), or other portable devices including transmit / receive paths and logic and / or routines for implementing the methods of the present invention.

The technologies of the present invention can be implemented using software, hardware, and / or a combination of software and hardware. The present invention is directed to providing a device, for example a wireless terminal, a base station, a communication system that implement the present invention. It also aims to provide methods, for example, a method for controlling and / or activating wireless terminals, base stations and / or communication systems, such as host machines, in accordance with the present invention. The present invention is also directed to providing a machine-readable medium, for example, ROM, RAM, CDs, hard disks, etc., which include machine-readable instructions for controlling a machine for performing one or more steps in accordance with the present invention.

Claims (31)

1. A method of encoding and transmitting at least the first and second sets of information using a transmission unit, said transmission unit includes a plurality of minimum transmission units, each minimum transmission unit corresponds to a unique combination of resources used for encoded information transmission, said resources include at least two of the time, frequency, phase and spreading code, the method includes
determining a first set of said minimum transmission units for use in transmitting said first set of information, said first set includes at least a majority of minimum transmission units of said transmission unit;
determining a second set of said minimum transmission units for use in transmitting said second set of information, said second set of minimum transmission units includes fewer minimum transmission units than the first set, wherein at least some of the minimum transmission units in the first and second sets of minimum units the gears are the same;
transmitting the first and second sets of information using the minimum transmission units included in the aforementioned first and second sets of minimum transmission units, with corresponding information modulated thereafter. 2. The method of claim 1, wherein said information is at least one of user data and control information, including confirmations and allocation information. 3. The method according to claim 1, in which the transmission of the first and second sets of information includes transmitting signals corresponding to the aforementioned first and second sets of information, respectively, from various transmitters. 4. The method according to claim 3, in which said various transmitters are installed on various devices. 5. The method according to claim 1, in which the signals corresponding to the aforementioned first and second sets of information are transmitted by the same transmitter. 6. The method according to claim 1, wherein said first set of minimum transmission units comprises at least 75% of the total number of minimum transmission units in said transmission unit. 7. The method according to claim 6, in which the second set of minimum transmission units has less than half the number of minimum transmission units of the first set of minimum transmission units. 8. The method according to claim 6, in which each of the minimum transmission units included in the second set of minimum transmission units is also included in said first set of minimum transmission units. 9. The method according to claim 1, wherein transmitting the first and second sets of information includes transmitting said second set of information using each minimum transmission unit in said second set of minimum transmission units, wherein transmitting the first set of information includes transmitting said first set of information and transmitting, at least a portion of said first set of minimum transmission units. 10. The method of claim 9, wherein said at least some portion of a first set of minimum transmission units includes only minimum transmission units not included in said second set of minimum transmission units. 11. The method of claim 9, wherein said at least some portion of said first set of minimum transmission units includes minimum transmission units in said second set. 12. The method according to claim 11, in which the first and second sets of information are transmitted using at least the first and second signals, respectively, the method further comprising combining the first and second signals to form a combined signal before using the minimum transmission unit included in said first and second sets of minimum transmission units for transmitting said combined signal. 13. The method according to claim 1, wherein the second signal is transmitted at a higher power level than said first signal, based on the minimum transmission unit;
moreover, the transmission of the first and second sets of information includes
the use of minimum transmission units, including the use of at least some of the minimum transmission units included in said first set of minimum transmission units for transmitting a first signal corresponding to a first set of information; and
using the minimum transmission units in said second set of minimum transmission units for transmitting a second signal corresponding to the second set of information. 14. The method of claim 13, wherein the power level at which the minimum transmission units corresponding to the second signal are transmitted is at least 3 dB greater than the power level at which the minimum transmission units corresponding to the first signal are transmitted. 15. The method according to item 13, further comprising changing the transmit power level of the minimum transmission unit used to transmit said second signal. 16. The method according to item 13, further comprising changing the transmit power level of the minimum transmission units used to transmit said first signal. 17. A device for receiving a combined signal including the first and second encoded signals transmitted together for some time, the first and second signals share an overlapping set of communication resources, said overlapping resources including at least two of the time, frequency, phase and extension code containing
a first receiver for receiving said combined signal from a communication channel, said first receiver including a filter for processing portions of said combined signal corresponding to said second signal as pulse noise;
a second receiver mounted in parallel with said first receiver for receiving said combined signal from said communication channel, said second receiver including a filter for processing a portion of said combined signal corresponding to said first signal as background noise. 18. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein said apparatus includes error correction means for recovering information lost due to processing of a portion of said combined signal corresponding to said second signal as impulse noise. 19. The device according to 17, in which the aforementioned first and second signals share the same frequency band. 20. A device for receiving a combined signal including the first and second encoded signals transmitted together for some time, containing
a first receiver for receiving a combined signal, including
i) a first filter module for filtering impulse noise from said received combined signal, portions of said signal corresponding to the second signal are treated as impulse noise by said filtering module;
ii) a first decoder for decoding information corresponding to a first signal associated with said first filter module, said first decoder determines a value of a received combined signal in a first set of minimum transmission units;
a second receiver containing
i) a second filter module for filtering background noise from said received combined signal;
ii) a second decoder for decoding information corresponding to a second signal associated with said second filter module, said second decoder determines the value of the received combined signal in a second set of minimum transmission units, with most of said second set of minimum transmission units included in said first set of transmission units . 21. A device for receiving a combined signal including the first and second encoded signals transmitted together for some time, containing
a second receiver for receiving the combined signal and identifying the minimum transmission units in said combined signal corresponding to said second signal, the second receiver generating information identifying the identified minimum transmission units corresponding to the second signal;
a first receiver for receiving said combined signal, said first receiver includes a decoder for decoding portions of said combined signal corresponding to said first signal, said decoder receiving said information, identifying identified minimum transmission units corresponding to a second signal, and not taking into account said identified minimum transmission units corresponding to the second signal. 22. The device according to item 21, in which the aforementioned identified units corresponding to the second signal are one of the in-phase and quadrature components of tones at different symbol transmission times. 23. The device according to item 21, in which said first receiver includes
an error correction circuit for recovering information of the first signal lost due to the neglect of the identified identified minimum transmission units corresponding to the second signal. 24. A device for encoding and transmitting information containing
a processor for use in a device that transmits at least a first and second set of information using a transmission unit, said transmission unit includes a plurality of minimum transmission units, each minimum transmission unit corresponds to a unique combination of resources used for encoded information transmission, said resources include at least two of the time, frequency, phase, and spreading code, the processor is configured to
determining a first set of said minimum transmission units for use in transmitting said first set of information, said first set includes at least a majority of said transmission unit;
determining a second set of said minimum transmission units for use in transmitting said second set of information, said second set of minimum transmission units includes fewer minimum transmission units than the first set, at least some of the minimum transmission units in the first and second sets of minimum transmission units are the same;
transmitting the first and second sets of information using the minimum transmission units included in said first and second sets of minimum transmission units, with corresponding information modulated thereafter. 25. A computer-readable medium containing computer-executable instructions for controlling a device that encodes and transmits at least the first and second sets of information using a transmission unit, said transmission unit includes a plurality of minimum transmission units, each minimum transmission unit corresponds to a unique combination of resources used for encoded transmission of information, said resources include at least two of time, frequency, phase, and expanding th code for executing a method that includes determining a first set of said minimum transmission units for use in transmitting said first set of information, said first set includes at least a majority of said transmission unit;
determining a second set of said minimum transmission units for use in transmitting said second set of information, said second set of minimum transmission units includes fewer minimum transmission units than the first set; moreover, at least some of the minimum transmission units in the first and second sets of minimum transmission units are the same;
transmitting the first and second sets of information using the minimum transmission units included in the aforementioned first and second sets of minimum transmission units, with corresponding information modulated thereafter. 26. A device for receiving a combined signal including the first and second encoded signals transmitted together for some time, the first and second signals share an overlapping set of communication resources, said overlapping resources including at least two of the time, frequency, phase and extension code containing
first receiver means for receiving said combined signal from a communication channel, said first receiver means including a filter for processing portions of said combined signal corresponding to said second signal as pulse noise; and
second receiver means installed in parallel with said first receiver means for receiving said combined signal from said communication channel, said second receiver means includes second means for processing a portion of said combined signal corresponding to said first signal as background noise. 27. The apparatus of claim 26, wherein said apparatus includes error correction means for recovering information lost due to processing of a portion of said combined signal corresponding to said second signal as impulse noise. 28. The device according to p, in which the aforementioned first and second signals share the same frequency band. 29. A device for receiving a combined signal including the first and second encoded signals transmitted together for some time, containing
first receiver means for receiving a combined signal, first receiver means include
i) means for filtering impulse noise from said received combined signal, portions of said signal corresponding to the second signal are treated as impulse noise by said means for filtering impulse noise; and
ii) means for decoding information corresponding to the first signal associated with said means for filtering impulse noise, said means for decoding information corresponding to the first signal determines the value of the received combined signal in the first set of minimum transmission units;
a second receiver containing
i) means for filtering background noise from said received combined signal;
ii) means for decoding information corresponding to a second signal associated with said second filter module, said means for decoding information corresponding to a second signal, determines a value of a received combined signal in a second set of minimum transmission units, with most of said second set of minimum transmission units included into said first set of transmission units. 30. A device for receiving a combined signal including the first and second encoded signals transmitted together for some time, containing
second receiver means for receiving the combined signal and identifying the minimum transmission units in said combined signal corresponding to said second signal, the second receiver means providing information identifying the identified minimum transmission units corresponding to the second signal;
first receiver means for receiving said combined signal, said first receiver means includes means for decoding portions of said combined signal corresponding to said first signal, said decoding means receiving said information, identifying identified minimum transmission units corresponding to the second signal, and not taking said identified minimum transmission units corresponding to the second signal. 31. The apparatus of claim 30, wherein said identified units corresponding to a second signal are one of the in-phase and quadrature components of tones at different symbol transmission times.

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