EP4732460A1 - Network assistance for mu-mimo advanced receiver - Google Patents

Abstract

An apparatus configured to process, based on signaling received from a base station, network assistance (NWA) information for multi-user (MU)-multiple input multiple output (MIMO) advanced receiver operation, the NWA information comprising an indication of one or more parameters for one or more co-scheduled UEs and configure MU-MIMO advanced receiver circuitry to perform interference mitigation based on the one or more parameters for the one or more co-scheduled UEs.

Description

Network Assistance for MU-MIMO Advanced Receiver

Inventors: Manasa Raghavan, Haitong Sun, Hossam K Shokr, Raj raj an Balraj and Yang Tang

Background

[0001] A user eguipment (UE) may be eguipped with an advanced receiver configured to mitigate intra-cell interference. To mitigate intra-cell interference, the UE may use certain parameters of co-scheduled UEs. The parameters of a co-scheduled UE may be determined by the UE via network assistance (NWA) signaling .

Summary

[0002] Some example embodiments are related to an apparatus having processing circuitry configured to process, based on signaling received from a base station, network assistance (NWA) information for multi-user (MU) -multiple input multiple output (MIMO) advanced receiver operation, the NWA information comprising an indication of one or more parameters for one or more co-scheduled UEs and configure MU-MIMO advanced receiver circuitry to perform interference mitigation based on the one or more parameters for the one or more co-scheduled UEs.

[0003] Other example embodiments are related to method for processing, based on signaling received from a base station, network assistance (NWA) information for multi-user (MU) - multiple input multiple output (MIMO) advanced receiver operation, the NWA information comprising an indication of one or more parameters for one or more co-scheduled UEs and configuring MU-MIMO advanced receiver circuitry to perform interference mitigation based on the one or more parameters for the one or more co-scheduled UEs.

Brief Description of the Drawings

[0004] Fig. 1 shows an example network arrangement according to various example embodiments.

[0005] Fig. 2 shows an example user equipment (UE) according to various example embodiments.

[0006] Fig. 3 shows an example base station according to various example embodiments.

[0007] Fig. 4 shows a method for advanced receiver interference mitigation according to various example embodiments .

[0008] Fig. 5 shows a signaling diagram for network assistance (NWA) signaling for advanced receiver interference mitigation for multi-user (MU) -multiple input multiple output

(MIMO) according to various example embodiments.

[0009] Fig. 6 shows an example table for a bitfield index configured to provide information for co-scheduled UEs according to various exemplary embodiments.

Detailed Description

[0010] The example embodiments may be further understood with reference to the following description and the related appended drawings, wherein like elements are provided with the same reference numerals. The example embodiments relate to network assistance (NWA) signaling for multi-user (MU) -multiple input multiple output (MIMO) .

[ 0011 ] The example embodiments are described with regard to a user equipment (UE ) . However, reference to a UE is merely provided for illustrative purposes . The example embodiments may be utili zed with any electronic component that may establish a connection to a network and is configured with the hardware , software , and/or firmware to exchange information and data with the network . Therefore , the UE as described herein is used to represent any appropriate electronic component .

[ 0012 ] The UE may be equipped with one or more advanced receivers each configured to mitigate intra-cell interference . The term "advanced receiver" generally refers to a component of the UE configured to suppress or cancel interference . As a result , the advanced receiver may provide improved performance with regard to signal detection and/or decoding . In the examples provided below, the advanced receiver may be referred to as an enhanced-minimum mean square error (MMSE ) -interference rej ection combining ( IRC ) (E-MMSE-RC ) receiver or a reduced complexitymaximum likelihood (R-ML ) receiver configured for MU-MIMO . While the example embodiments provide benefits for these types of receivers , the example embodiments are not limited to these types of receivers and may be used with any appropriate type of advanced receiver .

[ 0013] The example embodiments are further described with regard to a fi fth generation ( 5G) New Radio (NR) network . However, reference to a 5G NR network is merely provided for illustrative purposes . The example embodiments may be utili zed with any appropriate type of network ( e . g . , 5G, 5G advanced, 6G, etc . ) .

[ 0014 ] A UE equipped with an advanced receiver use certain parameters of co-scheduled UEs to adequately mitigate interference . In one example , the UE may determine the parameters of a co-scheduled UE by performing blind detection . Blind detection refers to the UE blindly decoding candidate resources in a search space . However, blind detection is associated with a high processing complexity .

[ 0015 ] In another example , the UE may determine the parameters of a co-scheduled UE based on NWA signaling . NWA signaling may refer to an exchange of information between the UE and the network that explicitly or implicitly provides the UE with parameters of co-scheduled UEs to enable the advanced receiver to adequately mitigate interference . However, using NWA signaling increases signaling overhead .

[ 0016] The example embodiments use a combination of NWA signaling and blind detection to enable the UE equipped with an advanced receiver to mitigate intra-cell interference for MU- MIMO . This approach provides a balance between UE processing complexity and signaling overhead . In one aspect , the example embodiments relate to NWA signaling for frequency domain resource allocation ( FDRA) of co-scheduled UEs . In another aspect , the example embodiments relate to NWA signaling for modulation order of co-scheduled UEs . In a further aspect , the example embodiments relate to UE capability signaling for advanced receiver operation . Each of these example aspects will be described in detail below . [0017] Fig. 1 shows an example network arrangement 100 according to various example embodiments. The example network arrangement 100 includes a UE 110 and a UE 112. The UEs 110, 112 may be any type of electronic component that is configured to communicate via a network, e.g., mobile phones, tablet computers, desktop computers, smartphones, phablets, embedded devices, wearables, Internet of Things (loT) devices, etc.

[0018] The example embodiments relate to co-scheduled UEs. Some of the examples provided below are described from the perspective of the UE 110 with at least one co-scheduled UE 112. Traffic for the UE 112 may interfere with traffic for the UE 110. The UE 110 may be equipped with an advanced receiver configured to mitigate interference caused by co-scheduled UEs. An actual network arrangement may include any number of UEs being used by any number of users. Thus, the example of a two UEs 110, 112 is merely provided for illustrative purposes.

[0019] The UEs 110, 112 may be configured to communicate with one or more networks. In the example of the network arrangement 100, the network with which the UEs 110, 112 may wirelessly communicate is a 5G NR radio access network (RAN) 120. The UEs 110, 112 may also communicate with other types of networks (e.g., sixth generation (6G) RAN, 5G cloud RAN, a next generate RAN (NG-RAN) , a legacy cellular network, a wireless local area network (WLAN) , etc.) and the UEs 110, 112 may also communicate with networks over a wired connection. Therefore, the UEs 110, 112 may have a 5G NR chipset to communicate with the NR RAN 120 and, optionally, any other appropriate type of chipset to communicate with other types of networks. [0020] The 5G NR RAN 120 may be a portion of a cellular network that may be deployed by a network carrier (e.g., Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, etc.) . The 5G NR RAN 120 may include cells and base stations that are configured to send and receive traffic from UEs that are eguipped with the appropriate cellular chip set. In this example, the 5G NR RAN 120 includes the next generation NodeB (gNB) 120A. However, reference to a gNB is merely provided for illustrative purposes, the example embodiments may be utilized with any appropriate type of access node (e.g., Node Bs, evolved NodeBs (eNBs) , home eNBs (HeNBs) , macrocells, microcells, small cells, femtocells, etc.) .

[0021] Any association procedure may be performed for the UE 110 to connect to the 5G NR RAN 120. For example, the 5G NR RAN 120 may be associated with a particular network carrier where the UE 110 and/or the user thereof has a contract and credential information (e.g., stored on a SIM card) . Upon detecting the presence of the 5G NR RAN 120, the UE 110 may transmit the corresponding credential information to associate with the 5G NR RAN 120. More specifically, the UE 110 may associate with a specific cell operated by the gNB 120A.

[0022] The network arrangement 100 also includes a cellular core network 130, the Internet 140, an IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) 150, and a network services backbone 160. The cellular core network 130 may refer an interconnected set of components that manages the operation and traffic of the cellular network. The cellular core network 130 also manages the traffic that flows between the cellular network and the Internet 140. The IMS 150 may be generally described as an architecture for delivering multimedia services to the UE 110 using the IP protocol. The IMS 150 may communicate with the cellular core network 130 and the Internet 140 to provide the multimedia services to the UE

110. The network services backbone 160 is in communication either directly or indirectly with the Internet 140 and the cellular core network 130. The network services backbone 160 may be generally described as a set of components (e.g., servers, network storage arrangements, etc.) that implement a suite of services that may be used to extend the functionalities of the UE 110 in communication with the various networks.

[0023] Fig. 2 shows an example UE 110 according to various example embodiments. The UE 110 will be described with regard to the network arrangement 100 of Fig. 1 and may also apply to the UE 112. The UE 110 may include a processor 205, a memory arrangement 210, a display device 215, an input/output (I/O) device 220, a transceiver 225 and other components 230. The other components 230 may, for example, multiple panels each comprising one or more antenna elements, an audio input device, an audio output device, a power supply, a data acquisition device, ports to electrically connect the UE 110 to other electronic devices, etc.

[0024] The processor 205 may be configured to execute a plurality of engines of the UE 110. For example, the engines may include an interference mitigation for MU-MIMO engine 235. The interference mitigation for MU-MIMO engine 235 may perform various operations related to interference mitigation for MU- MIMO such as, but not limited to, transmitting UE capability information for a MU-MIMO advanced receiver operation, receiving NWA signaling and collecting parameters corresponding to coscheduled UEs. [0025] The above referenced engine 235 being an application (e.g., a program) executed by the processor 205 is merely provided for illustrative purposes. The functionality associated with the engine 235 may also be represented as a separate incorporated component of the UE 110 or may be a modular component coupled to the UE 110, e.g., an integrated circuit with or without firmware. For example, the integrated circuit may include input circuitry to receive signals and processing circuitry to process the signals and other information. The engine may also be embodied as one application or separate applications. In addition, in some UEs, the functionality described for the processor 205 is split among two or more processors such as a baseband processor and an applications processor. The example embodiments may be implemented in any of these or other configurations of a UE .

[0026] The memory arrangement 210 may be a hardware component configured to store data related to operations performed by the UE 110. The display device 215 may be a hardware component configured to show data to a user while the I/O device 220 may be a hardware component that enables the user to enter inputs. The display device 215 and the I/O device 220 may be separate components or integrated together such as a touchscreen .

[0027] The transceiver 225 may represent one or more hardware components configured to establish a connection with the 5G NR- RAN 120, an LTE-RAN (not pictured) , a legacy RAN (not pictured) , a WLAN (not pictured) , etc. Accordingly, the transceiver 225 may operate on a variety of different frequencies or channels (e.g., set of consecutive frequencies) . The transceiver 225 may encompass an advanced receiver (e.g. , E-MMSE-RC, R-ML, etc. ) for MU-MIMO. The transceiver 225 includes circuitry configured to transmit and/or receive signals (e.g., control signals, data signals) . Such signals may be encoded with information implementing any one of the methods described herein. The processor 205 may be operably coupled to the transceiver 225 and configured to receive from and/or transmit signals to the transceiver 225. The processor 205 may be configured to encode and/or decode signals (e.g., signaling from a base station of a network) for implementing any one of the methods described herein .

[0028] Fig. 3 shows an example base station 300 according to various example embodiments. The base station 300 may represent the gNB 120A or any other access node through which the UEs 110, 112 may establish a connection and manage network operations.

[0029] The base station 300 may include a processor 305, a memory arrangement 310, an input/output (I/O) device 315, a transceiver 320 and other components 325. The other components 325 may include, for example, an audio input device, an audio output device, a battery, a data acquisition device, ports to electrically connect the base station 300 to other electronic devices and/or power sources, etc.

[0030] The processor 305 may be configured to execute a plurality of engines of the base station 300. For example, the engines may include a MU-MIMO engine 330. The MU-MIMO engine 330 may perform various operations related to MU-MIMO and enabling advanced receiver operation at UEs.

[0031] The above noted engine 330 being an application (e.g., a program) executed by the processor 305 is only example. The functionality associated with the engine 330 may also be represented as a separate incorporated component of the base station 300 or may be a modular component coupled to the base station 300, e.g. , an integrated circuit with or without firmware. For example, the integrated circuit may include input circuitry to receive signals and processing circuitry to process the signals and other information. In addition, in some base stations, the functionality described for the processor 305 is split among a plurality of processors (e.g., a baseband processor, an applications processor, etc. ) . The example embodiments may be implemented in any of these or other configurations of a base station.

[0032] The memory arrangement 310 may be a hardware component configured to store data related to operations performed by the base station 300. The I/O device 315 may be a hardware component or ports that enable a user to interact with the base station 300.

[0033] The transceiver 320 may be a hardware component configured to exchange data with the UE 110 and any other UE in the network arrangement 100. The transceiver 320 may operate on a variety of different frequencies or channels (e.g. , set of consecutive frequencies) . The transceiver 320 includes circuitry configured to transmit and/or receive signals (e.g. , control signals, data signals) . Such signals may be encoded with information implementing any one of the methods described herein. The processor 305 may be operably coupled to the transceiver 320 and configured to receive from and/or transmit signals to the transceiver 320. The processor 305 may be configured to encode and/or decode signals (e.g., signaling from a UE) for implementing any one of the methods described herein. [0034] Fig. 4 shows a method 400 for advanced receiver interference mitigation according to various example embodiments. The method 400 is described from the perspective of the UE 110 of the network arrangement 100 of Fig. 1.

[0035] In 405, the UE 110 connects to a network that supports MU-MIMO, which refers to technology that allows spectrum to be shared among multiple users. To provide an example, the UE 110 and the UE 112 may be co-scheduled on the same cell. The traffic for the UE 112 may cause intra-cell interference on the traffic for the UE 110 (and vice versa) .

[0036] In 410, the UE 110 collects various parameters associated with one or more co-scheduled UEs. These parameters may be used for advanced receiver operation at the UE 110. For example, the UE 110 collects parameters associated with the UE 112. However, reference to a single co-scheduled UE is merely provided for illustrative purposes. The example embodiments may apply to any appropriate number of co-scheduled UEs.

[0037] In some embodiments, the parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs may include demodulation reference signal (DMRS) port information for a co-scheduled UE . This information may allow the UE 110 to perform channel estimation for DMRS ports of co-scheduled UEs. Some advanced receivers may use the channel state information associated with the co-scheduled UEs and/or the UE 110 to suppress or cancel the interfering traffic.

[0038] The parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs may further include parameters such as, but is not limited to, physical resource block (PRE) bundling size for the co-scheduled UE, frequency domain resource allocation information for a coscheduled UE within each physical resource block group (PRG) of the UE 110, frequency domain resource allocation information for a co-scheduled UE across different PRGs of the UE 110, DMRS power boosting information for the co-scheduled UE, time domain resource allocation of the co-scheduled UE and channel state information (CSI ) -reference signal (RS) of the co-scheduled UE .

[0039] With regard to R-ML advanced receiver operation, the parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs may further include a modulation order of the UE 110 and co-scheduled UE for joint detection by the R-ML advanced receiver. To provide an example, the network may indicate that there are no co-scheduled UEs with a same DMRS sequence as the UE 110. In other examples, the network may indicate that in all the PRBs allocated to the UE 110, all the co-scheduled UEs with a same DMRS sequence as the UE 110 are scheduled having a particular modulation scheme (e.g., quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK) modulation, 16QAM (quadrature amplitude modulation) , 64QAM, 256QAM, 1024QAM, etc.

[0040] In some embodiments, one or more of the above referenced parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs may be provided to the UE 110 using radio resource control (RRC) signaling, one or more medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) and/or in any other appropriate manner. In some embodiments, the UE 110 may obtain one or more of the above referenced parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs using blind detection on network resources.

[0041] In 415, the UE 110 performs interference mitigation using its advanced receiver (e.g., E-MMSE-RC, R-ML, etc.) . The one or more parameters associated with the co-scheduled UEs may enable the advanced receiver to suppress or cancel intra-cell interference caused by traffic for the co-scheduled UEs . The interference mitigation techniques used by the advanced receiver may improve signal detection performance at the UE 110 . However, the speci fic interference mitigation techniques used by the advanced receiver are beyond the scope of the example embodiments . Instead, the example embodiments relate to how the UE 110 may obtain the various parameters associated with the coscheduled UEs that may be used to perform interference mitigation for MU-MIMO .

[ 0042 ] Fig . 5 shows a signaling diagram 500 for NWA signaling for advanced receiver interference mitigation for MU-MIMO according to various example embodiments . The signaling diagram 500 includes the UE 110 and the gNB 120A.

[ 0043] In 505, the UE 110 sends capability information for MU-MIMO advanced receiver capabilities to the gNB 120A. The capability information may provide information such as , but not limited to, an indication of whether the UE 110 is equipped with an E-MMSE-RC or an R-ML advanced receiver for MU-MIMO .

[ 0044 ] According to some aspects , the example embodiments introduce capability information to support the example NWA signaling techniques introduced herein . The example capability information is described below after the description of the example NWA signaling . While the example UE capability information may provide benefits to the example NWA signaling techniques introduced herein, the example NWA signaling does not require the use of capability information . The example capability information and the example NWA signaling introduced herein may be used independently from one another, in conj unction with other currently implemented mechanisms for MU- MIMO advanced receiver operation, in conj unction with future implementations of mechanisms for MU-MIMO advanced receiver operation or independently from other mechanisms for MU-MIMO advanced receiver operation .

[ 0045 ] In 510 , the UE 110 collects various parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs that may be used for advanced receiver interference mitigation . For example , the UE 110 and the UE 112 may be scheduled on a same cell operated by the gNB 120A. The traf fic for the UE 112 and the traf fic for the UE 110 may interfere . Accordingly, the UE 110 may collect various parameters associated with the UE 112 to enable the advanced receiver to perform intra-cell interference mitigation for MU- MIMO .

[ 0046] The UE 110 may collect various parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs based on NWA signaling from the gNB 120A. An example of NWA signaling is shown in 510a of the signaling diagram 500 . The UE 110 may also perform blind detection on network resources to collect various parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs . An example of blind detection is shown in 510b of the signaling diagram 500 . The NWA signaling in 510a may aide the performance of the blind decoding in 510b .

[ 0047 ] The UE 110 may be preconfigured to make default assumptions about characteristics of certain parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs . According to some aspects , the example NWA signaling introduced herein may be used to confirm or invalidate the default assumptions . However, the example embodiments do not require preconfigured defaults and may be used with or without any preconfigured information at the UE 110 .

[ 0048 ] To provide an example of a preconfigured default assumption for advanced receiver interference mitigation, for the PRE bundling si ze parameter and the frequency domain resource allocation of the co-scheduled UE within each PRG parameter, the UE 110 may preconfigured with a default assumption that in each PRG the resource allocation and precoding of the potential DMRS sequence aligned with coscheduled UE ( s ) in other DMRS ports of di f ferent code division multiplexed ( CDM) groups are aligned with PRG 2 or 4 .

[ 0049] In another example , the UE 110 may be preconfigured with the default assumption that the DMRS power boosting for the co-scheduled UE is the same as the DMRS boosting for the UE 110 . In a further example , the UE 110 may be preconfigured with the default assumption that the time domain resource allocation information of the co-scheduled UE is the same as the UE 110 . In another example, the UE 110 may be preconfigured with the default assumption that the CS I-RS location of the co-scheduled UE does not overlap with the PDSCH of the UE 110 .

[ 0050 ] In some embodiments , the UE 110 may be preconfigured to make default assumptions about how certain parameters associated with co-scheduled UEs for advanced receiver operation are to be collected by the UE 110 . To provide an example, the UE 110 may be preconfigured with the default assumption that the DMRS port information for the co-scheduled UE is to be obtained by the UE 110 using blind detection . In another example, the UE 110 may be preconfigured with the default assumption that the frequency domain resource allocation for the co-scheduled UE across di fferent PRGs of the UE 110 is to be obtained by the UE

110 using blind detection .

[ 0051 ] According to some aspects , the example embodiments introduce NWA information for FDRA. The UE 110 may need to know the FDRA of the co-scheduled UE for the advanced receiver to perform interference mitigation . The UE 110 and the co-scheduled UE may be allocated to the same PRBs or di f ferent PRBs . The NWA information for FDRA may be provided using dedicated radio resource control (RRC) signaling, DCI and/or any other appropriate type of signaling .

[ 0052 ] In some embodiments , the PRG granularity for the coscheduled cell may be provided using the NWA information for FDRA. As indicated above , one of the default assumptions for advanced receiver operation is that the PRG granularity for the co-scheduled UE is the same as the UE 110 . In one example , if the PRG granularity is not the same , NWA information for FDRA may be provided to invalidate the assumption . In another example , the NWA information for FDRA may include an indication of the PRG granularity for the co-scheduled UE regardless of the PRG granularity used by the UE 110 .

[ 0053] In some embodiments , the NWA information for FDRA may include a resource allocation type for the co-scheduled UE . The resource allocation may be resource allocation type 0 ( resourceAllocationTypeO ) , resource allocation type 1 ( resourceAllocationTypel ) or dynamic switch ( dynamicswitch) . In resource allocation type 0 , multiple number of consecutive resource blocks (RBs ) may be bundled into resource block groups (RBGs ) and physical downlink shared channel ( PDSCH) /physical uplink shared channel ( PUSCH) is allocated in the RBGs . In resource allocation type 1, resources are allocated to one or more consecutive RBs . The area over which resources are allocated may be defined by an RB start and a number of consecutive RBs within a specific bandwidth part (BWP) . Dynamic switch refers to a scheme where DCI indicates whether resource allocation type 0 or resource allocation type 1 is to be used.

[0054] In one example, the NWA information for FDRA may include a 1-bit indicator where a first value (e.g. , 0) indicates that the resource allocation type for all co-scheduled UEs is the same as the UE 110 and a second value (e.g., 1) indicates that the resource allocation type for at least one of the co-scheduled UEs is different than the UE 110. In another example, the NWA information for FDRA may indicate for each coscheduled UE a resource type allocation.

[0055] In another example, the UE 110 may be configured for dynamic switch allocation and the NWA information for FDRA may be provided using DCI. The DCI may indicate whether a coscheduled UE has a same or different resource type allocation as the UE 110. The DCI comprising the NWA information may be the same as the DCI providing the dynamic switch indication or these indications may be provided in separate DCI.

[0056] According to some aspects, the example embodiments introduce NWA information for modulation order. The UE 110 may need to know the modulation order of the co-scheduled UE for the advanced receiver to perform interference mitigation. The NWA information for modulation order may be provided using dedicated RRC signaling or MAC CE . [ 0057 ] The NWA information for modulation order may include a maximum modulation order among all co-scheduled UEs . By providing the maximum modulation order, the network may reduce the processing complexity for blind decoding at the UE 110 . In one approach, the NWA information for modulation order may be provided using RRC signaling and include an indication of a maximum modulation order and/or a modulation and coding scheme (MCS ) table for all co-scheduled UEs . In another example, the NWA information for modulation order may be provided using RRC signaling and include an indication of a maximum modulation order and/or an MCS table for each co-scheduled UE .

[ 0058 ] In another approach, the NWA information for modulation order of co-scheduled UEs may be provided using a MAC CE . The exemplary MAC CE may include a bitfield with one or more bits that are mapped to an index where each index value provides di f ferent modulation order information for co-scheduled UEs . An example of this approach is shown in the table 600 of Fig . 6 . The table 600 includes a column 605 comprising index values #0- 6 . The exemplary MAC CE described above may include a bitfield with one or more bits that maps to the index values shown in column 605 of the table 600 . Column 610 of the table 600 includes a description of the indication provided by each respective index value . In this example, the MAC CE may use a bitfield mapped to an index where index #0 indicates that there are no co-scheduled UEs with a same DMRS sequence as the UE 110 . Index #1 may indicate that in all the PRBs allocated to the UE 110 , all the co-scheduled UEs with the same DMRS sequence as the UE 110 have QPSK scheduled . Index #2 may indicate that in all the PRBs allocated to the UE 110 , all the co-scheduled UEs with the same DMRS sequence as the UE 110 have 16QAM scheduled . Index #3 may indicate that in all the PRBs allocated to the UE 110 , all the co-scheduled UEs with the same DMRS sequence as the UE 110 have 64QAM scheduled . Index #4 may indicate that in all the PRBs allocated to the UE 110 , all the co-scheduled UEs with the same DMRS sequence as the UE 110 have 256QAM scheduled . Index #5 may indicate that in all the PRBs allocated to the UE 110 , all the co-scheduled UEs with the same DMRS sequence as the UE 110 have 1024QAM scheduled . Index # 6 may indicate that in each individual PRB allocated to the UE 110 , the following condition is satis fied, only single modulation order is allocated for the for the co-scheduled UEs which have a same DMRS sequence as the UE 110 i f the co-scheduled UEs exist . Further index values may be used for other cases not covered by the index #0- 6 . The table 600 is provided as one example and is not intended to limit the example embodiments in any way . Therefore , reference to index values #0- 6 and their corresponding description is provided for illustrative purposes and this bitfield approach may be used with any appropriate number of index values used to convey any appropriate type of information for co-scheduled UEs .

[ 0059] In another example , the MAC CE may indicate the modulation order up to (N) co-scheduled layers with the same PRB allocation as target PDSCH . The value of N may be based on UE 110 capability and provided to the network using UE capability information . In a further example, the MACE CE may indicate the modulation order across different PRBs allocated to di fferent co-scheduled UEs .

[ 0060 ] The MAC CE based NWA approach may account for time needed for MAC CE processing . In one approach, the co-scheduled UE with target modulation order can be transmitted after MAC CE processing time . For example , the co-scheduled UE may be scheduled in slot n+THARQ+3 millisecond (ms ) where PDSCH carrying the MAC CE is transmitting in slot n. In another approach, the co-scheduled UE may be transmitted at the same time, but the UE 110 may employ the advanced receiver interference mitigation after MAC CE processing.

[0061] In 515, the UE 110 receives control information and/or data from the gNB 120A using its advanced receiver. For example, the UE 110 may receive PDCCH and/or PDSCH. The advanced receiver may perform interference mitigation to facilitate the reception of the control information and/or data in 515.

[0062] As mentioned above, according to some aspects, the example embodiments introduce UE capability signaling for MU- MIMO advanced receiver operation. In some embodiments, the UE capability for MU-MIMO advanced receiver operation may include an indication of whether the UE 110 supports advanced receiver operation for MU-MIMO (e.g., E-MMSE-IRC, R-ML, etc. ) . The UE capability information for MU-MIMO advanced receiver operation may also indicate how may antenna ports the UE 110 can blindly detect .

[0063] In some embodiments, the UE capability information for MU-MIMO advanced receiver operation may indicate whether the UE 110 is capable of handling different precoding granularity in DMRS ports on other CDM groups. In other embodiments, the UE capability information may indicate whether the UE 110 is capable of handling different TDRA than one or more co-scheduled UEs .

[0064] In addition, the example embodiments introduce UE capability information to indicate if the UE 110 supports R-ML receiver operation for MU-MIMO. In one example, the UE 110 may indicate a number (N) of co-scheduled UE layers the UE 110 can jointly process for MU-MIMO. In another example, the UE 110 may indicate if the UE 110 is capable of blind detection of coscheduled UE modulation order (e.g. , NWA information for modulation order) .

Examples

[0065] In a first example, a method, comprising processing, based on signaling received from a base station, network assistance (NWA) information for multi-user (MU) -multiple input multiple output (MIMO) advanced receiver operation, the NWA information comprising an indication of one or more parameters for one or more co-scheduled UEs and configuring MU-MIMO advanced receiver circuitry to perform interference mitigation based on the one or more parameters for the one or more coscheduled UEs.

[0066] In a second example, the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information comprises frequency division resource allocation (FDRA) for the one or more co-scheduled UEs, wherein the one or more co-scheduled UEs is allocated on different physical resource blocks (PRBs) than the apparatus.

[0067] In a third example, the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information indicates that the one or more coscheduled UEs is configured with a different physical resource block group (PRG) granularity than the apparatus.

[0068] In a fourth example, the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information comprises a resource type allocation for the one or more co-scheduled UEs, wherein the resource type allocation is one of resourceAllocationTypeO resourceAllocationTypel or dynamicswitch .

[ 0069] In a fi fth example , the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information comprises a 1-bit indicator, wherein a first value of the 1-bit indicator is configured to indicate all co-scheduled UEs have a same resource allocation type as the apparatus .

[ 0070 ] In a sixth example , the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information comprises a 1-bit indicator, wherein a first value of the 1-bit indicator is configured to indicate all co-scheduled UEs have a same resource allocation type as the apparatus and a second value of the 1-bit indicator is configured to indicate at least one co-scheduled UE has a di f ferent resource type allocation than the apparatus .

[ 0071 ] In a seventh example , the method of the first example , wherein the NWA information is provided in downlink control information ( DCI ) and configured to indicate whether the apparatus has a same or di fferent type of resource allocation than a co-scheduled UE .

[ 0072 ] In an eighth example , the method of the first example , wherein the NWA information indicates a maximum modulation order of all co-scheduled UEs .

[ 0073] In a ninth example , the method of the eighth example , wherein the NWA information further includes a modulation coding scheme (MCS ) table for all co-scheduled UEs . [0074] In a tenth example, the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information indicates a maximum modulation order for each co-scheduled UE .

[0075] In an eleventh example, the method of the tenth example, wherein the NWA information further includes a modulation coding scheme (MCS) table for each co-scheduled UE .

[0076] In a twelfth example, the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information is provided via medium access control (MAC) control element (CE) that includes a bit field mapped to an index, wherein one or more entries of index indicate a modulation order for all the co-scheduled UEs with a same demodulation reference signal (DMRS) sequence as the apparatus .

[0077] In a thirteenth example, the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information is provided via one or more medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) that indicate a modulation order for a number of co-scheduled layers with a same physical resource block (PRE) allocation as a target physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) .

[0078] In a fourteenth example, the method of the thirteenth example, wherein the number of co-scheduled layers is determined based on UE capability information.

[0079] In a fifteenth example, the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information is provided via one or more medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) and configured to indicate a modulation order across different physical resource blocks (PRBs) allocated to different coscheduled UEs.

[0080] In a sixteenth example, the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information is provided via one or more medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) and the one or more co-scheduled UEs is scheduled after a UE processing time for the MAC CE .

[0081] In a seventeenth example, the method of the first example, wherein the NWA information is provided via one or more medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) , the one or more co-scheduled UEs is scheduled at a same time and a MU-MIMO advanced receiver is configured to perform interference mitigation after a UE processing time for the MAC CE .

[0082] In an eighteenth example, the method of the first example, further comprising generating, for transmission to the base station, UE capability information for a MU-MIMO advanced receiver, the UE capability information comprising an indication of a number of antenna ports to blindly detect.

[0083] In a nineteenth example, the method of the first example, further comprising generating, for transmission to the base station, UE capability information for the MU-MIMO advanced receiver, the UE capability information comprising an indication of whether handling different precoding granularity in demodulation reference signal (DMRS) ports on other code division multiplexed (CDM) groups is supported.

[0084] In a twentieth example, the method of the first example, further comprising generating, for transmission to the base station, UE capability information for the MU-MIMO advanced receiver, the UE capability information comprising an indication of whether handling dif ferent time domain resource allocation ( TDRA) than the one or more co-scheduled UEs is supported .

[ 0085 ] In a twenty first example , the method of the first example , further comprising generating, for transmission to the base station, UE capability information for the MU-MIMO advanced receiver, wherein the UE capability information indicates presence of a reduced complexity-maximum likelihood (R-ML ) receiver .

[ 0086] In a twenty second example , the method of the twenty first example , wherein the UE capability information is further configured to indicate a number of co-scheduled UE layer the apparatus is configured to j ointly process for MU— MIMO .

[ 0087 ] In a twenty third example , the method of the twenty first example , wherein the UE capability information is further configured to indicate whether blind detection of co-scheduled UE modulation order is supported .

[ 0088 ] In a twenty fourth example , a processor configured to perform any of the first through twenty third examples .

[ 0089] In a twenty fi fth example , a user eguipment (UE ) configured to perform any of the first through twenty third examples .

[ 0090 ] Those skilled in the art will understand that the above-described example embodiments may be implemented in any suitable software or hardware configuration or combination thereof . An example hardware platform for implementing the example embodiments may include , for example, an Intel x86 based platform with compatible operating system, a Windows OS , a Mac platform and MAC OS , a mobile device having an operating system such as iOS , Android, etc . The example embodiments described above may be embodied as a program containing lines of code stored on a non-transitory computer readable storage medium that, when compiled, may be executed on a processor or microprocessor .

[ 0091 ] Although this application described various embodiments each having di fferent features in various combinations , those skilled in the art will understand that any of the features of one embodiment may be combined with the features of the other embodiments in any manner not speci fically disclaimed or which is not functionally or logically inconsistent with the operation of the device or the stated functions of the disclosed embodiments .

[ 0092 ] It is well understood that the use of personally identi fiable information should follow privacy policies and practices that are generally recogni zed as meeting or exceeding industry or governmental requirements for maintaining the privacy of users . In particular, personally identi fiable information data should be managed and handled so as to minimi ze risks of unintentional or unauthori zed access or use , and the nature of authori zed use should be clearly indicated to users .

[ 0093] It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modi fications may be made in the present disclosure , without departing from the spirit or the scope of the disclosure . Thus , it is intended that the present disclosure cover modifications and variations of this disclosure provided they come within the scope of the appended claims and their equivalent .

Claims

What is Claimed :

1 . An apparatus comprising processing circuitry configured to : process , based on signaling received from a base station, network assistance (NWA) information for multi-user (MU) - multiple input multiple output (MIMO) advanced receiver operation, the NWA information comprising an indication of one or more parameters for one or more co-scheduled UEs ; and configure MU-MIMO advanced receiver circuitry to perform interference mitigation based on the one or more parameters for the one or more co-scheduled UEs .

2 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NWA information comprises frequency division resource allocation ( FDRA) for the one or more co-scheduled UEs , wherein the one or more coscheduled UEs is allocated on different physical resource blocks ( PRBs ) than the apparatus .

3 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NWA information indicates that the one or more co-scheduled UEs is configured with a di fferent physical resource block group ( ERG) granularity than the apparatus .

4 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NWA information comprises a resource type allocation for the one or more coscheduled UEs , wherein the resource type allocation is one of resourceAllocationTypeO , resourceAllocationTypel or dynamicswitch .

5 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NWA information comprises a 1-bit indicator, wherein a first value of the 1-bit indicator is configured to indicate all co-scheduled UEs have a same resource allocation type as the apparatus .

6 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NWA information comprises a 1-bit indicator, wherein a first value of the 1-bit indicator is configured to indicate all co-scheduled UEs have a same resource allocation type as the apparatus and a second value of the 1-bit indicator is configured to indicate at least one co-scheduled UE has a di f ferent resource type allocation than the apparatus .

7 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NWA information is provided in downlink control information ( DCI ) and configured to indicate whether the apparatus has a same or di f ferent type of resource allocation than a co-scheduled UE .

8 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NWA information indicates a maximum modulation order of all co-scheduled UEs .

9 . The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein the NWA information further includes a modulation coding scheme (MCS ) table for all co-scheduled UEs .

10 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NWA information indicates a maximum modulation order for each co-scheduled UE .

11 . The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the NWA information further includes a modulation coding scheme (MCS ) table for each co-scheduled UE .

12 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the NWA information is provided via medium access control (MAC) control element ( CE ) that includes a bit field mapped to an index, wherein one or more entries of index indicate a modulation order for all the co-scheduled UEs with a same demodulation reference signal (DMRS) sequence as the apparatus.

13. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the NWA information is provided via one or more medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) that indicate a modulation order for a number of co-scheduled layers with a same physical resource block (PRE) allocation as a target physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) .

14. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the NWA information is provided via one or more medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) and configured to indicate a modulation order across different physical resource blocks (PRBs) allocated to different co-scheduled UEs.

15. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the NWA information is provided via one or more medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) and the one or more co-scheduled UEs is scheduled after a UE processing time for the MAC CE .

16. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the NWA information is provided via one or more medium access control (MAC) control elements (CEs) , the one or more co-scheduled UEs is scheduled at a same time and a MU-MIMO advanced receiver is configured to perform interference mitigation after a UE processing time for the MAC CE.

17. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: generate, for transmission to the base station, UE capability information for a MU-MIMO advanced receiver, the UE capability information comprising an indication of a number of antenna ports to blindly detect.

18. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: generate, for transmission to the base station, UE capability information for the MU-MIMO advanced receiver, the UE capability information comprising an indication of whether handling different precoding granularity in demodulation reference signal (DMRS) ports on other code division multiplexed (CDM) groups is supported.

19. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: generate, for transmission to the base station, UE capability information for the MU-MIMO advanced receiver, the UE capability information comprising an indication of whether handling different time domain resource allocation (TDRA) than the one or more co-scheduled UEs is supported.

20. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: generate, for transmission to the base station, UE capability information for the MU-MIMO advanced receiver, wherein the UE capability information indicates presence of a reduced complexity-maximum likelihood (R-ML) receiver.