WO2020064369A1

WO2020064369A1 - Random access transmissions for wireless networks

Info

Publication number: WO2020064369A1
Application number: PCT/EP2019/074512
Authority: WO
Inventors: Keeth Saliya Jayasinghe LADDU; Emad Farag; Juha Sakari Korhonen
Original assignee: Nokia Technologies Oy
Priority date: 2018-09-28
Filing date: 2019-09-13
Publication date: 2020-04-02

Abstract

A technique includes transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

Description

RANDOM ACCESS TRANSMISSIONS FOR WIRELESS NETWORKS

Inventors:

Keeth Saliya Jayasinghe Laddu

Emad Farag

Juha Sakari Korhonen

PRIORITY CLAIM

[0001] This application claims priority to United States Provisional Application No. 62/739,144, filed on September 28, 2018, entitled,“RANDOM ACCESS

TRANSMISSIONS FOR WIRELESS NETWORKS,” the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference.

TECHNICAL FIELD

[0002] This description relates to communications.

BACKGROUND

[0003] A communication system may be a facility that enables communication between two or more nodes or devices, such as fixed or mobile communication devices. Signals can be carried on wired or wireless carriers.

[0004] An example of a cellular communication system is an architecture that is being standardized by the 3^rd Generation Partnership Project (3 GPP). A recent development in this field is often referred to as the Long Term Evolution (LTE) of the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) radio-access technology. E- UTRA (evolved UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access) is the air interface of 3GPP's Long Term Evolution (LTE) upgrade path for mobile networks. In LTE, base stations or access points (APs), which are referred to as enhanced Node AP (eNBs), provide wireless access within a coverage area or cell. In LTE, mobile devices, or mobile stations are referred to as user equipments (UE). LTE has included a number of improvements or developments.

[0005] 5G New Radio (NR) development is part of a continued mobile broadband evolution process to meet the requirements of 5G, similar to earlier evolution of 3G & 4G wireless networks. A goal of 5 G is to provide significant improvement in wireless performance, which may include new levels of data rate, latency, reliability, and security. 5G NR may also scale to efficiently connect the massive Internet of Things (IoT), and may offer new types of mission-critical services.

SUMMARY

[0006] According to an example implementation, various example embodiments are described and illustrated.

[0007] According to an example embodiment, a method may include:

transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[0008] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include means for transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[0009] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program code; the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to: transmit configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[0010] According to an example embodiment, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of: transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[0011] According to an example embodiment, a method may include:

transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift step that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

[0012] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include means for transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift step that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

[0013] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program code; the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to: transmit, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift step that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

[0014] According to an example embodiment, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift step that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

[0015] According to an example embodiment, a method may include:

transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a first type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a second type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

[0016] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include means for transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a first type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a second type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

[0017] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program code; the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a first type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a second type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

[0018] According to an example embodiment, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a first type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a second type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

[0019] According to an example embodiment, a method may include:

transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a short cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a short signature region, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a long signature region; wherein at least the long signature regions for transmitting the IAB random access preamble signatures are provided within short signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access.

[0020] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include means for transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a short cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a short signature region, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a long signature region; wherein at least the long signature regions for transmitting the IAB random access preamble signatures are provided within short signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access.

[0021] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program code; the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to: transmit, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a short cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a short signature region, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a long signature region; wherein at least the long signature regions for transmitting the IAB random access preamble signatures are provided within short signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access.

[0022] According to an example embodiment, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a short cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a short signature region, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a long signature region; wherein at least the long signature regions for transmitting the IAB random access preamble signatures are provided within short signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access.

[0023] According to an example embodiment, a method may include:

transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including: a first cyclic shift step to be used by devices that are within one hop (or within a first distance) away from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature; a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the first hop (or outside of the first distance) from the base station and within a second hop from the base station (or within a second distance from the base station that is greater than the first distance) to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; a third cyclic shift step, longer than the second cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the second hop (or outside of the second distance) from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[0024] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include means for transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including: a first cyclic shift step to be used by devices that are within one hop (or within a first distance) away from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature; a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the first hop (or outside of the first distance) from the base station and within a second hop from the base station (or within a second distance from the base station that is greater than the first distance) to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; a third cyclic shift step, longer than the second cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the second hop (or outside of the second distance) from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[0025] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program code; the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to: transmit, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including: a first cyclic shift step to be used by devices that are within one hop (or within a first distance) away from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature; a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the first hop (or outside of the first distance) from the base station and within a second hop from the base station (or within a second distance from the base station that is greater than the first distance) to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; a third cyclic shift step, longer than the second cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the second hop (or outside of the second distance) from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[0026] According to an example embodiment, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including: a first cyclic shift step to be used by devices that are within one hop (or within a first distance) away from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature; a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the first hop (or outside of the first distance) from the base station and within a second hop from the base station (or within a second distance from the base station that is greater than the first distance) to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; a third cyclic shift step, longer than the second cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the second hop (or outside of the second distance) from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[0027] According to an example embodiment, a method may include:

transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein only one first random access preamble signature, having a length of the first cyclic shift step and provided within a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region), that is allocated to be used by user devices, overlaps a second signature region (or second cyclic shift region) of a second random access preamble signature, having a length of the second cyclic shift step, that is allocated to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; wherein the first random access preamble signature is provided at a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region) that is a cell-specific cyclic shift offset from a start of the second random access preamble signature.

[0028] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include means for transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein only one first random access preamble signature, having a length of the first cyclic shift step and provided within a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region), that is allocated to be used by user devices, overlaps a second signature region (or second cyclic shift region) of a second random access preamble signature, having a length of the second cyclic shift step, that is allocated to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; wherein the first random access preamble signature is provided at a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region) that is a cell-specific cyclic shift offset from a start of the second random access preamble signature.

[0029] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program code; the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to: transmit configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein only one first random access preamble signature, having a length of the first cyclic shift step and provided within a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region), that is allocated to be used by user devices, overlaps a second signature region (or second cyclic shift region) of a second random access preamble signature, having a length of the second cyclic shift step, that is allocated to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; wherein the first random access preamble signature is provided at a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region) that is a cell-specific cyclic shift offset from a start of the second random access preamble signature.

[0030] According to an example embodiment, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of: transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein only one first random access preamble signature, having a length of the first cyclic shift step and provided within a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region), that is allocated to be used by user devices, overlaps a second signature region (or second cyclic shift region) of a second random access preamble signature, having a length of the second cyclic shift step, that is allocated to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; wherein the first random access preamble signature is provided at a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region) that is a cell-specific cyclic shift offset from a start of the second random access preamble signature.

[0031] According to an example embodiment, a method may include:

transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; transmitting, by the base station, information indicating a first target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by user devices, and indicating a second target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; determining, by the base station, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by a user device or by an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature.

[0032] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include means for transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; transmitting, by the base station, information indicating a first target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by user devices, and indicating a second target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; determining, by the base station, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by a user device or by an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature.

[0033] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program code; the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to: transmit, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; transmitting, by the base station, information indicating a first target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by user devices, and indicating a second target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature;

determining, by the base station, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by a user device or by an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature.

[0034] According to an example embodiment, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; transmitting, by the base station, information indicating a first target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by user devices, and indicating a second target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; determining, by the base station, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by a user device or by an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature.

[0035] According to an example embodiment, a method may include:

transmitting, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; determining, by the base station, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by the first type of device or the second type of device.

[0036] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include means for transmitting, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; determining, by the base station, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by the first type of device or the second type of device.

[0037] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program code; the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to: transmit, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; determining, by the base station, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by the first type of device or the second type of device.

[0038] According to an example embodiment, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of: transmitting, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; determining, by the base station, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by the first type of device or the second type of device.

[0039] According to an example embodiment, a method may include:

transmitting, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the first set of devices include devices that are located inside a first radius from the base station, or user devices having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is less than or equal to than the first round trip time; and wherein the second set of devices include devices that are located outside of the first radius from the base station, or having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is greater than the first round trip time.

[0040] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include means for transmitting, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the first set of devices include devices that are located inside a first radius from the base station, or user devices having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is less than or equal to than the first round trip time; and wherein the second set of devices include devices that are located outside of the first radius from the base station, or having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is greater than the first round trip time.

[0041] According to an example embodiment, an apparatus may include: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program code; the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to: transmit, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the first set of devices include devices that are located inside a first radius from the base station, or user devices having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is less than or equal to than the first round trip time; and wherein the second set of devices include devices that are located outside of the first radius from the base station, or having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is greater than the first round trip time.

[0042] According to an example embodiment, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of:

[0043] The details of one or more examples of implementations are set forth in the accompanying drawings and the description below. Other features will be apparent from the description and drawings, and from the claims.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0044] FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a wireless network according to an example implementation.

[0045] FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating a network that includes user devices (UFs), IAB nodes, and IAB donor nodes according to an example embodiment.

[0046] FIG. 3 is a diagram in which a base station (BS) has configured two different cyclic shift steps to be used for FTEs and IAB nodes according to an example embodiment. [0047] FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating an IAB signature that is provided in a long signature region that is provided on two short signature regions that are provided for contention-less or dedicated random access according to an example embodiment.

[0048] FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating a more general example where an IAB signature is provided in a long signature region that is provided on two short signature regions that are provided for contention-less or dedicated random access according to an example embodiment.

[0049] FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an IAB signature within a long signature region overlaps a FTE signature within a short signature region, in which the short FTE signature is provided with a cell-specific cyclic shift offset with respect to the start of the overlapping long IAB node signature according to an example embodiment.

[0050] FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating IAB nodes at different distances or number of hops from a donor IAB node according to an example embodiment.

[0051] FIG. 8 is a diagram illustrating use of three different cyclic shift steps (and three different signature region lengths) based on IAB nodes that are located at three different distances from an IAB donor node according to an example embodiment.

[0052] FIG. 9 is a flow chart illustrating operation of a system according to an example embodiment.

[0053] FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an other example solution.

[0054] FIG. 11 is a block diagram of a node or wireless station (e.g., base station/ access point or mobile station/user device) according to an example

implementation.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0055] FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a wireless network 130 according to an example implementation. In the wireless network 130 of FIG. 1, user devices 131, 132, 133 and 135, which may also be referred to as mobile stations (MSs) or user equipment (UEs), may be connected (and in communication) with a base station (BS) 134, which may also be referred to as an access point (AP), an enhanced Node B (eNB), a gNB, or a network node. At least part of the functionalities of an access point (AP), base station (BS) or (e)Node B (eNB) may be also be carried out by any node, server or host which may be operably coupled to a transceiver, such as a remote radio head. BS (or AP) 134 provides wireless coverage within a cell 136, including to user devices 131 , 132, 133 and 135. Although only four user devices are shown as being connected or attached to BS 134, any number of user devices may be provided. BS 134 is also connected to a core network 150 via a Sl interface 151. This is merely one simple example of a wireless network, and others may be used.

[0056] A user device (user terminal, user equipment (UE) or mobile station) may refer to a portable computing device that includes wireless mobile communication devices operating with or without a subscriber identification module (SIM), including, but not limited to, the following types of devices: a mobile station (MS), a mobile phone, a cell phone, a smartphone, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a handset, a device using a wireless modem (alarm or measurement device, etc.), a laptop and/or touch screen computer, a tablet, a phablet, a game console, a notebook, and a multimedia device, as examples. It should be appreciated that a user device may also be a nearly exclusive uplink only device, of which an example is a camera or video camera loading images or video clips to a network.

[0057] In LTE (as an example), core network 150 may be referred to as Evolved Packet Core (EPC), which may include a mobility management entity (MME) which may handle or assist with mobility/handover of user devices between BSs, one or more gateways that may forward data and control signals between the BSs and packet data networks or the Internet, and other control functions or blocks.

[0058] In addition, by way of illustrative example, the various example implementations or techniques described herein may be applied to various types of user devices or data service types, or may apply to user devices that may have multiple applications running thereon that may be of different data service types. New Radio (5G) development may support a number of different applications or a number of different data service types, such as for example: machine type communications (MTC), enhanced machine type communication (eMTC), Internet of Things (IoT), and/or narrowband IoT user devices, enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB), and ultra-reliable and low-latency communications (ETRLLC).

[0059] IoT may refer to an ever-growing group of objects that may have Internet or network connectivity, so that these objects may send information to and receive information from other network devices. For example, many sensor type applications or devices may monitor a physical condition or a status, and may send a report to a server or other network device, e.g., when an event occurs. Machine Type Communications (MTC, or Machine to Machine communications) may, for example, be characterized by fully automatic data generation, exchange, processing and actuation among intelligent machines, with or without intervention of humans. Enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) may support much higher data rates than currently available in LTE.

[0060] Ultra-reliable and low-latency communications (URLLC) is a new data service type, or new usage scenario, which may be supported for New Radio (5G) systems. This enables emerging new applications and services, such as industrial automations, autonomous driving, vehicular safety, e-health services, and so on. 3GPP targets in providing connectivity with reliability corresponding to block error rate (BLER) of 10 ⁵ and up to 1 ms U-Plane (user/data plane) latency, by way of illustrative example. Thus, for example, URLLC user devices/UEs may require a significantly lower block error rate than other types of user devices/UEs as well as low latency (with or without requirement for simultaneous high reliability)

[0061] The various example implementations may be applied to a wide variety of wireless technologies or wireless networks, such as LTE, LTE-A, 5G, cmWave, and/or mmWave band networks, IoT, MTC, eMTC, eMBB, URLLC, etc., or any other wireless network or wireless technology. These example networks, technologies or data service types are provided only as illustrative examples.

[0062] A user device (or UE) may typically perform a random access procedure with a BS in order to access a cell or establish a connection to the cell. A random access (or RA or RACH) request may include a UE sending a RA preamble signature to the BS. A RA preamble signature may be based on a root Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequence. ZC sequences have zero auto correlation property. This means that a plurality of orthogonal RA preamble signatures may be obtained or generated from different cyclic shifts of a root ZC sequence. Each RA preamble signature for a given ZC root sequence may be cyclically shifted by N* Ncs, where N is the signature index (e.g., N= 0, 1 , 2, 3, ...63, for example), and Ncs is the cyclic shift step or length of a signature region for a RA preamble signature. Thus, N=0 indicates a RA preamble signature corresponding to the root ZC sequence (no cyclic shift), N=l indicates a RA preamble signature having a total cyclic shift of 1 *Ncs; N=2 indicates a RA preamble signature having a total cyclic shift of 2*Ncs. The cyclic shift (total cyclic shift) indicates how much a RA preamble signature is shifted, with respect to the start of the root ZC sequence (or with respect to the start of the first RA preamble signature of the root sequence that has zero cyclic shift). Thus, different cyclic offsets of ZC sequences are orthogonal to each other and, therefore, as many signatures as possible should be obtained from a single ZC sequence. However, as will be explained below, there may be limitations on how small Ncs value can be, and in some situations, to obtain a sufficient number of signatures, cyclic shifts of multiple ZC sequences must be used. Different root ZC sequences are not orthogonal but may cause some mutual interference if received in overlapping time and frequency.

In this manner, different ZC root sequences, and/or different ZC sequences with different cyclic shifts may be used to generate a number of different RA preamble signatures.

[0063] However, the orthogonality of cyclically shifted versions of a root sequence is retained at the receiver side only if the relative cyclic shift between two sequences or signatures is larger than any difference in their respective receive timing, which is based on the round trip time (RTT), or cell radius. Thus, for a given ZC root sequence, the cyclic shift step (Ncs) may be larger for larger cell radius (due to larger RTT), while a cyclic shift step (Ncs) may typically be allowed to be smaller for a cell having a smaller cell radius due to a smaller RTT between a BS and UEs within that cell radius, while maintaining orthogonality of the RA preamble signatures. However, with a larger cyclic shift step (Ncs), for given ZC root sequence, there will be fewer cyclic steps, and thus fewer signatures for a ZC root sequence. Whereas, for a smaller cyclic shift step (e.g., for a smaller radius cell), there will be more signatures for a ZC root sequence. Thus, the cyclic shifts (and signature regions) will be larger for a larger Ncs, and the cyclic shifts (and signature regions) will be smaller for a smaller Ncs.

[0064] According to an illustrative example embodiment, during an random access (RA or RACH) procedure, the UE sends a random access channel (RACH) preamble (message 1), which may be a RA preamble signature (e.g., a signature, based on a ZC root sequence, with a given cyclic shift, and provided or transmitted within a signature region having a length that is the Ncs, for example). In response, BS may correlate received signals (e.g., received RA preamble signatures) against different cyclic shifts of one or more ZC root sequences, to determine if a correlation peak is found for one of the ZC root sequences and for which cyclic shift. In response, the BS may send a random access response (RAR) (message 2) to confirm receipt of the RA preamble signature, which may include a signature index, an uplink (UL) grant (e.g., a grant resource for UL transmission by the user device), C-RNTI (e.g., assignment of cell radio network temporary identifier), and TA (e.g., timing advance information for the UE to use for the UL transmission), and/or other information. The BS may also send downlink control information (DCI), to the UE that includes a CRC that is scrambled based on a random access-radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI) that is associated with the time -frequency resources used to transmit the RA preamble signatures. The DCI may indicate time-frequency resources where the RAR is transmitted. The UE may unscramble a received DCI based on its RA-RNTI, to learn where to receive the RAR that was sent in response to the transmission of the RA preamble signature. The UE may then send the first message (message 3) via the uplink resources allocated in the resource grant, to identify itself and/or sent RRC connection request, or send data, and/or request further resources for uplink transmissions. Message 3 may be sent by the UE to the BS to acknowledge receipt of the RAR, and to include its identity for contention resolution (resolving the situation that two UEs have sent the same signature) and/or to request UL resources for UL transmission with a buffer status report and request RRC connection if such connection does not already exist. And the BS may send message 4, which, for contention resolution, repeats the identity obtained in message 3 and gives RRC connection setup if obtaining that was the purpose of random access.

[0065] Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes may be provided to extend wireless coverage to areas outside of a cell radius of a BS. An IAB node does not have a wired connection to the core network. An IAB node may, for example, be a wireless relay node in which UEs are connected to the IAB node for wireless services. Because the IAB node does not have a wired connection to the core network, the IAB node establishes a wireless connection to a nearby BS in order to relay information to and from the core network via the BS. Thus, an IAB node may, for example, be considered a wireless relay node, that appears to its connected UEs as a BS, and appears to a connected BS as a UE. The BS that the IAB node may connect to may be referred to as an IAB donor node (e.g., a BS that provides a connection to/from the core network for the IAB node). Thus, the IAB node and the ETEs connected to the BS (IAB donor node) may communicate over shared spectrum or shared time-frequency resources. In addition to establishing connections to its local ETEs, an IAB node may also typically perform random access to the donor IAB node in order to establish a connection to the IAB donor node (e.g., nearby BS). Thus, the IAB donor node (or nearby BS) may receive random access requests (e.g., RA preamble signatures) from its local ETEs as well as from one or more IAB nodes, for example.

[0066] FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating a network that includes user devices (ETEs), IAB nodes, and IAB donor nodes according to an example embodiment. In FIG. 2, IAB node 1 and IAB node 2 are shown, which have backhaul connections (or may transmit backhaul RA preamble signatures) to an IAB donor node 212. Thus, IAB donor node may have access connections (or RACH communications to access ETEs) to its ETEs, and may have backhaul connections (or backhaul RACH communications) 214 and 216 to IAB node 1 and IAB node 2, respectively.

[0067] In an illustrative example, the RACH preambles may be Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequences. The zero auto -correlation property of these sequences allows obtaining multiple preamble signatures (distinguishable versions) from a root sequence by cyclic shifting the ZC sequence. The number of cyclic shifts, obtained from a root sequence, depends on the maximum round-trip time (RTT) that needs to be supported (cyclic shift step (Ncs) between signatures must correspond to a delay change larger than the maximum RTT). In an IAB deployed network, depicted in FIG. 2, an IAB Node (e.g.,

IAB node -2) may need to try initial access to an IAB-donor node 212 from a distance that may considerably (even by a factor larger than 2) exceed the IAB donor node’s cell radius that in the absence of IAB deployment would be used for determining the cyclic shift step. Thus, if the cyclic shift step for ETEs would be selected for supporting also RTT of IAB nodes, the supportable number of cyclic shifts for each ZC root sequence decrease significantly when access ETEs and IAB nodes use same resources for RACH (random access requests/RA preamble signatures). This is because, for example, the larger cyclic shift step (Ncs) associated with the larger distance from IAB donor node 212 to IAB node 2, may be used for all UEs and IAB nodes that may establish a connection to the IAB donor node. However, by using a larger cyclic shift, e.g., based on the larger RTT for the IAB node 2 (RTT between IAB node 2 and IAB donor node 212), this increases the cyclic shift step (Ncs) and decreases the number of available RA preamble signatures available for each ZC sequence. Thus, more ZC sequences will be required to provide the same number of RA preamble signatures (e.g., 64). However, this increases the likelihood of RA preamble signature collisions between adjacent or nearby cells and/or IAB nodes because of more limited reuse of the root ZC sequences. Furthermore, as different root ZC sequences are not orthogonal, it is important to minimize the number of root ZC sequences used within one cell even if the reuse of root sequences for different cells was not a problem.

[0068] Example solution 1 :

[0069] FIG. 3 is a diagram in which a BS has configured two different cyclic shift steps to be used for ETEs and IAB nodes according to an example embodiment. As shown in FIG. 3, a first set 302 of RA preamble signatures (or ETE cyclic shifts) for ETEs are shown, which have a short cyclic shift step, including EGE signature 0 (no cyclic shift), EGE signature 1 (EGE sig. 1 , with a cyclic shift of l *short cs), EGE Signature 2 (EGE sig. 2, with a cyclic shift of 2* short Ncs), ...Each EGE signature is provided within a short signature region. For example, EGE sig. 1 is provided within short signature region 312, EGE sig. 2 is provided within short signature region 314, etc. Each short signature region has a length of short Ncs (the length of the short cyclic shift step that is used for the ETEs). Also shown in FIG. 3, a set 304 of IAB signatures (or IAB cyclic shifts) are shown, including IAB signature 0 (with zero cyclic shift), IAB signature 1 (with a cyclic shift of 1* long Ncs), etc. Each IAB signature is provided within a long signature region, which is the length of long Ncs. IAB signature 0 is provided within long signature region 316, while IAB signature 1 is provided within long signature region 318. Thus, the long signature region used for each IAB signature is longer than the short signature region used for each EGE signature, and in fact, a length of the long signature region may be four times (for example) the length of the short signature region. Likewise, the length of long cyclic shift (or long Ncs) may be four times (for example) the length of short cyclic shift (short Ncs). It can also be seen that each IAB signature overlaps multiple (e.g., four) EGE signatures. For example, long signature region 316 for IAB signature 0 overlaps the short signature regions for the first four UE signatures.

[0070] For each ZC root sequence, two Ncs values are defined (e.g., a short Ncs and a long Ncs. The smaller or shorter Ncs is for UEs and the larger (or longer) Ncs may be used for IAB nodes, as shown in FIG. 3. The IAB signature or long signature region (or IAB cyclic shift) may span over (or overlap in time with) multiple UE signatures (or multiple short signatures regions or multiple short cyclic shifts) of access UEs. When a correlation peak corresponding to e.g., the third UE signature (UE sig. 2) is received, as shown in FIG. 2, it is also the possibility that the signal (causing the correlation with one or more ZC root sequences) came from an IAB node transmitting the first IAB signature (IAB signature 0), e.g., since the correlation point for these two signatures are near each other or at the same point, for example. Thus, the correlation peak may have been caused by a signature from a UE, or a signature from an IAB node. Different techniques may be used to provide a RAR to each or both the UE and IAB node, and different techniques may be used to indicate that a RAR is intended for or transmitted to either the UE or the IAB node. For example, the base station may send two random access response (RAR) messages, one assuming that the signal was sent by a UE and another assuming IAB node, and see which one receives the RAR and sends message 3.

[0071] As both types of nodes use the same RACH resources, the base station does not know the detected PRACH belongs to a IAB node or UE. See Figure 2.

[0072] The base station may respond to the PRACH with two random access responses (RAR). One RAR is intended to (or transmitted to) the access UE assuming the UE cyclic shift configuration (short cyclic shift) and the other one based on IAB cyclic shift configuration (the long cyclic shift). Different UL resource allocations may be provided in the RARs (a different UL resource allocation may be indicated in each RAR). RAR for access UEs may have much lower periodicity, while RAR for IAB could have much longer periodicity.

[0073] Thus, an example flow for solution 1 may include, for example the following performed by a BS/IAB donor node:

[0074] 1) Configure RACH/random access for one or more devices (e.g., UEs and/or IAB nodes), including configuring a first and second cyclic shift step. [0075] 2) Receive random access preamble signature(s) from one or more devices

(e.g., from one UE and from one IAB node, for example).

[0076] 3) BS sends random access responses (RARs)

[0077] 4) Receive message 3. Based on received message 3 known if preamble was from UE or from IAB node

[0078] 5) Transmit Message 4 , for contention resolution and RRC (radio resource control) configuration for UE or for IAB node (configurations could differ).

[0079] How to distinguish the RARs sent for IAB nodes from those sent for UEs needs to be solved.

[0080] Example Solution la:

[0081] A different RA-RNTI for access UEs and IABs can be used to

differentiate RAR for access and IAB. A UE or IAB node detects the DCI format 1 0 with the CRC scrambled by the corresponding RA-RNTI and a corresponding PDSCH that includes a DL-SCH transport block within the window, the UE passes the transport block to higher layers. Thus, a first RA-RNTI may be used to scramble a first RAR sent to UE, and a second RA-RNTI may used to scramble the second RAR sent to IAB node. UE may use first RA-RNTI to descramble or decode DCI transmitted to the UE (including the time frequency resources where first RAR sent to UE is provided), and then obtain or receive the first RAR. Likewise, the IAB node may use second RA-RNTI to descramble or decode the DCI that indicates time frequency resources of RAR sent to it. The different RA-RNTIs for IAB nodes can be obtained e.g. by adding an offset to UE RA-RNTI.

[0082] Example Solution lb:

[0083] Signaling (e.g., a field, a flag, or one or more bits) in the DCI can be used to indicate either IAB or access UE specific RAR. For example, reserved bits in DCI (downlink control information) format 1 0 (with CRC (cyclic redundancy check) scrambled by RA-RNTI) may contain IAB specific details to decode the RAR when it is only intended or transmitted to IABs. On the other hand, an IAB node may detect any DCI format 1 0 (with CRC scrambled by RA-RNTI), and content of the DCI can indicate the possibility of using UE specific RAR also for the IAB. This could be a useful scenario when an IAB node is not having different CS (cyclic shift) region compared to access UEs.

[0084] BS may provide configuration information to UE and IABs, including information related to different cyclic shifts for UEs and IABs. For example: For initial access (e.g. after the IAB is powered up) configuration information should be in the broadcasted system information. At least for handover (IAB connection moved from old parent node to a new parent node) this information can also be in the HO command i.e. in dedicated RRC signaling. Most of the RACH information would be common for UEs and IAB nodes (frequency resources, time resources, first root sequence index, preamble power setting...) and would not need to be broadcasted separately (but would need to be given in case of IAB node HO i.e. if the parameters for connecting to a new Donor node are given in a RRC message). The IAB specific RACH configuration information would at least tell what Ncs is used by IAB nodes. In the case that IAB signatures are taken from the set of signatures not selectable by UEs (example solution 2 below), it should be indicated which are the signatures for contention based IAB use or how IAB node finds the correct long signature (There are many ways but e.g., could indicate the root sequence, UE (or short) Ncs, IAB (or long) Ncs, and identify the first UE Ncs used for the IAB signature (first short/UE signature index where IAB signature will begin)).

[0085] In the illustrative example of FIG. 3, a first (e.g., short) cyclic shift step is used for UEs, and a second (e.g., long) cyclic shift step is used for IAB nodes. As part of this, the BS may transmit configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step (e.g., a short cyclic shift step) to be used by UEs to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step (e.g., long cyclic shift step), longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[0086] Furthermore, with reference to FIG. 3, the BS may also perform correlation of a received signal against the random access root preamble sequence for multiple cyclic shifts, and transmit, based on a result of the performing correlation, a plurality of random access responses, including at least a first random access response to a user device and a second random access response to an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node. [0087] Also, for example, a device-type-specific RA-RNTI may be used to indicate whether the RAR is provided for a UE(s) or IAB(s). For example, with reference to FIG. 3, the BS may transmit a random access response, and then transmit a downlink control information (DCI) indicating time-frequency resources where the random access response is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a device-specific random access-radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI), including either a first RA-RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to a user device or a second RA-RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node.

[0088] Also, for example, the random access response may include at least the following information for either one or more UEs if the downlink control information is transmitted via the first RA-RNTI (e.g., a RA-RNTI indicating RAR is for or transmitted to a UE device), or for one or more Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes if the downlink control information is transmitted via the second RA-RNTI (e.g., RA-RNTI indicating RAR is for an IAB): a random access preamble signature index of the received random access preamble signature; a timing advance; and an uplink resource grant for transmission of message 3 of a random access procedure.

[0089] Also, with reference to FIG. 3, a RA-RNTI may be used to scramble a CRC of the RAR that is transmitted to both the UE and the IAB that transmitted RA preamble signatures. For example, the BS may transmit downlink control information indicating time-frequency resources where a random access response (RAR) is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a RA-RNTI associated with (a time and frequency resource(s) used by) both a UE (or user device) that transmitted a first random access preamble signature based on the first cyclic shift step, and an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node that transmitted a second random access preamble signature based on the second cyclic shift step, wherein both the first and second random access preamble signatures are based on the random access preamble root sequence. The BS may also transmit a random access response, including at least the following for each of the user device and the Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node: a random access preamble signature index of the received random access preamble signature; a timing advance; and an uplink resource grant. [0090] According to yet another example embodiment, with reference to FIG. 3, the BS may include control information, such as a UE/IAB device flag that indicates whether the RAR is intended for a UE or an IAB node, for example. Thus, for example, the BS may transmit a random access response (RAR), and then transmit downlink control information indicating a device type, either a user device or an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node, for which the random access response is intended for.

[0091] Example solution 2:

[0092] FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating an IAB signature that is provided in a long signature region that is provided on two short signature regions that are provided for contention-less or dedicated random access according to an example embodiment. For example, as shown in FIG. 4, for root sequence n+2, IAB signature 410 (provided within a long signature region 412, or having a length of a long cyclic shift) is provided within the signature space of two short signature regions that are understood by ETEs as being reserved for dedicated or contention-less random access for a cell. Thus, an IAB signature within a long signature region may be provided or may occupy signature space of a plurality (e.g., 2, 4, ...) of short signature regions that are allocated by the network for dedicated or contention-less random access. Although these two signature regions (allocated or used by the long signature region 412) are allocated by core network or understood by UEs as being for dedicated or contention-less random access, an IAB may use such long signature space 412 and IAB signature 410 for contention based random access, or contention-less random access of IAB nodes.

[0093] A way of separating the resources for ETEs and IAB nodes is to specify that some of the random access preamble signatures that are signaled as not selectable for ETEs (i.e., normally reserved for contention less use) are actually reserved for IAB nodes (either as IAB contention based or dedicated RACH resources) as depicted in FIG. 4 where first two short signature regions (or first two short cyclic shifts) of root sequence n+2 are reserved for one IAB signature.

[0094] Thus, with reference to FIG. 4, according to an example embodiment, a BS may transmit configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift, are configured for use by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift, are configured for use by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the second random access preamble signatures have a length that is an integer multiple of a length of the first random access preamble signatures; and wherein the one or more first random access preamble signatures and the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access. For example, the one or more second random access preamble signatures for the root sequence may be configured for use by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to perform either contention-free random access or contention-based random access to the cell. The BS may also transmit configuration information indicating that: one or more third random access preamble signatures, based on the first cyclic shift, for a second root sequence (e.g., see root sequence n+3) are configured for use by UEs (user devices) to perform contention-free random access; and one or more fourth random access preamble signatures, based on the first cyclic shift, for a third root sequence (e.g., see root sequence n+l) are configured for use by user devices to perform contention-based random access.

[0095] Also, with reference to FIG. 4, in yet another example embodiment, the BS may transmit configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a short cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a user device random access preamble signature to the cell within a short signature region, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a IAB random access preamble signature to the cell within a long signature region; wherein the long signature region for transmitting the IAB random access preamble signature is a length of a plurality of short signature regions; and wherein at least the long signature regions for transmitting the IAB random access preamble signatures are provided within short signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access. [0096] FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating a more general example where an IAB signature is provided in a long signature region that is provided on two short signature regions that are provided for contention-less or dedicated random access according to an example embodiment. FIG. 5 is also related to solution 2. Here a root sequence gives 8 signatures. Signatures 0-34 (each of these UE signatures provided within a short signature region) are for UEs to select for contention-based RA. The rest of the short signatures are divided by the network into two groups by combining some of the short signatures with consecutive cyclic shifts to be used for IAB nodes (and thus provided within a long signature region, that include multiple short signature regions) while leaving rest of the short signatures to be used with EGE contention-free RA. Here three long signatures (for IABs) with twice the Ncs of EGE signatures are formed from signatures 38 ... 43. Thus, a long signature for IABs is provided from the signature space of short signatures 40 and 41 ; a second long signature for IAB nodes is provided from signature space of short signatures 42 and 43, and a third long signature for IABs is provided from the signature space of short signatures 38 and 39.

[0097] There are multiple ways to signal where the IAB signatures are located (or provided for or within which short signature or occupying signature space of which short signatures): Root sequence (root 4 in FIG. 5), a long cyclic shift (long Ncs) of the first IAB signature (which is 2* short Ncs in this example), and the total number of IAB signatures (3 in FIG. 5) are given. Long Ncs of the first IAB signature need not necessarily be a multiple of short Ncs of ETEs although that could be reasonable to reduce the signaling and could allow optimal utilization of cyclic shift space. From long Ncs (or Ncs_iab) and the first cyclic shift offset, IAB node would count how many signatures it gets from the indicated root sequence and if the first root sequence does not give enough signatures, IAB node finds the rest from the following root sequences (in FIG. 5, only one IAB signature is obtained from short signatures of root 4, and the rest of the long or IAB node signatures are obtained or provided from short signatures or short signature regions of root 5).

[0098] Another way of signaling the IAB signature locations is as follows: IAB node knows or can determine the EGE Ncs (short Ncs), and the first root sequence (root 0). IAB node is informed by BS of what EGE signature the cyclic shift of the first IAB node signature corresponds to (UE signature 38 in FIG. 5). IAB node is also given IAB i.e. long) Ncs and using that the IAB node can determine the rest of the IAB signatures. This way of signaling means that in preamble response message the received IAB signature can be indicated with the UE signature number corresponding to the cyclic shift of the IAB signature (e.g. referring to Figure 5, if signature 40+41 is detected, signature 40 is indicated in the response).

[0099] Related to Figures 4 and 5, when base station receives a preamble (or RA preamble signature), there is no ambiguity whether the preamble signature had been sent by a UE or an IAB node because those are using different cyclic shifts and/or different cyclic shift steps.

[00100] Thus, an example flow for solution 2 may include, for example the following performed by a BS/IAB donor node:

[00101] 1) Configure RACH/random access for one or more devices (e.g., UEs and/or IAB nodes), including configuring first and second cyclic shift steps.

[00102] 2) Receive random access preamble signature(s) from one or more devices

(e.g., from one UE and from one IAB node, for example).

[00103] 3) Based on random access preamble signature, BS can determine whether preamble was sent by a UE or IAB node.

[00104] 4) BS sends random access responses (RARs), in response to receiving

RA preamble signature (e.g. UL resource allocation may depend on whether UE or IAB signature was observed: give high priority for IAB)

[00105] 5) Receive message 3. Based on received message 3 known if preamble was from UE or from IAB node

[00106] 6) Transmit Message 4 , for contention resolution and RRC (radio resource control) configuration for UE or for IAB node (configurations could differ).

[00107] Example Solution 3:

[00108] FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an IAB signature within a long signature region overlaps a UE signature within a short signature region, in which the short UE signature is provided with a cell-specific cyclic shift offset with respect to the start of the overlapping long IAB node signature according to an example embodiment. Thus, as shown in FIG. 6, for cell group 1 , no cyclic shift offset is provided for UE signature with respect to the start of the overlapping IAB signature; for cell group 2, a second cyclic shift offset 612 is provided for UE signature with respect to the start of the overlapping IAB signature; for cell group 3, a third cyclic shift offset 614 (longer than offset 612) is provided for UE signature with respect to the start of the overlapping IAB signature; Likewise, cell group 4 uses a cyclic shift offset 616 for UE signatures, which is longer than cyclic shift offset 614.

[00109] In this example, only one short signature is allocated to UEs within same cyclic shift (CS) space of each long IAB signature, within a cell or cell group; a starting cyclic shift (or a cyclic shift offset) for short signature (that overlaps a long signature) are different for different cells . There may be a cell specific CS (cyclic shift) offset for a short signature, for purpose of interference mitigation. Thus, to reduce interference, different root sequences may be used, or different CS offsets. This solution provides additional interference mitigation for the short (UE) signatures based on cell-specific CS (cyclic shift) offsets. There are far more UEs, than IAB nodes, hence decreasing interference for UEs is more important and may be a priority. Thus, according to an example embodiment, the BS or network may assign cyclic shifts based on the RTT of the IABs, but use different starting cyclic shifts for the same or overlapping UE/short signature in different cells, as this will reduce intercell interference between cells (as the UE doesn’t use all the delays/cyclic shifts of the root sequence). A UE in a cell (or in Cell group) may use shifted CS (cyclic shift) regions, where the unique shift is defined by the IAB CS and cell number (or group). The exact pattern for having CS regions between cells (or cell groups) may also depend on the deployment scenario (example: a UE in Cell 1 may interfere Cell 2 if the UE RTT to Cell 2 overlap with the used CS region in Cell 1).

[00110] Thus, with reference to example solution 3 and/or FIG. 6, a BS may transmit configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein only one first random access preamble signature, having a length of the first cyclic shift step and provided within a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region), that is allocated to be used by user devices, overlaps a second signature region (or second cyclic shift region) of a second random access preamble signature, having a length of the second cyclic shift step, that is allocated to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; wherein the first random access preamble signature is provided at a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region) that is a cell-specific cyclic shift offset from a start of the second random access preamble signature. In addition, for example, each of a plurality of different cells or different cell groups may each have a different and cell-specific cyclic shift offset that identifies an offset of the start of the first random access preamble signature with respect to a start of the second random access preamble signature.

[00111] As noted above, different cyclic shift steps (and thus, different length signature regions) may be used for UEs and IABs, e.g., based on a different RTT for UEs and IABs with respect to a BS or donor IAB node. However, this concept of using different cyclic shift steps (and thus different length signature regions) for ETEs and IAB nodes may be applied to IAB nodes that are provided at different distances from a BS or donor IAB node. FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating IAB nodes at different distances or number of hops from a donor IAB node according to an example embodiment. IAB nodes 1 , 2 and 3 are located at 1 hop away from donor IAB node; IAB nodes 4 and 5 are located at 2 hops away from IAB donor node; and IAB node 6 is located 3 hops away from IAB donor node. FIG. 8 is a diagram illustrating use of three different cyclic shift steps (and three different signature region lengths) based on IAB nodes that are located at three different distances from an IAB donor node according to an example embodiment. As shown in FIG. 8, IAB nodes 1, 2 and 3 are 1 hop away, and use the shortest cyclic shift step 9and thus the shortest signature region length). Those IAB nodes that are 2 hops away use an intermediate length cyclic shift step, and thus use an intermediate signature region length. And, those IAB nodes (e.g., IAB node 6) that are 3 hops away use the longest cyclic shift step and thus use the longest signature region length. In addition, it can be seen that different cyclic shift offsets are used for the short signatures (or for the short signature patterns), e.g., hop 1 signature regions are provided at no cyclic shift offset in cell 1 ; hop 1 signature regions are provided with a small cyclic shift offset for cell 2; and hop 1 signature regions are provided with a larger cyclic shift offset for cell 3.

[00112] This may be expanded for any type of node. Thus, as shown in FIG. 8, it may be beneficial to use the orthogonal assignment of cyclic shifts among different cells. When supporting capacity and latency requirements of NR, it is understood that the most of the IAB nodes may have single hop connections compared to having multiple hops. Therefore, it is possible to have many RACH transmissions in single hop IAB nodes compared to the nodes which are three hops away from the donor/parent. In FIG. 8, an illustrative example is illustrated of having different starting locations for IAB signatures considering the hop count from the donor node. The idea of short and long signatures (or signature region lengths), can be expanded to multiple - in this case 3 different signature region lengths. UEs/IAB nodes that are 1 hop away - use short signatures or short signature regions; 2 hops away - use intermediate length signatures or intermediate length signature regions; and those UEs/IAB nodes that are 3 hops away - use long signatures/signature region lengths.

[00113] Example Solution 4:

[00114] Where there is overlapping short and long signatures, BS may send two RARs (e.g., a RAR for UE, and a RAR for IAB node). But the BS may configured the UE and BS to have different target receive RACH preamble power. And in such a case, the BS may use different receive power at the BS (for a received RACH preamble/signature) to distinguish between UE and IAB node transmissions of signatures. For example, the BS may instruct the UE and IAB node to transmit RA preamble signatures with different receive power as received by BS. BS will configure what receive power of preamble at the BS. UE can estimate its pathloss based on signal it receives on BS, and the target receive power at BS, it can determine its transmission power so that its RA preamble signature will be received at the target receive power at BS.

[00115] To avoid unnecessary RARs in the above described Solutions 1 and 3, a solution may include: At the Donor/Parent node, it is also possible to distinguish PRACH of IAB nodes from access UEs by having a higher power target for IAB over access UE preamble. For example, IAB preamble can have a 3 dB higher target receive power level. The UE determines the transmit power based on the path loss and the target receive preamble power. The Donor/Parent node can determine based on the received power if the preamble is coming from IAB node or UE. Depending on the error in estimating the path loss, it is possible that the received power of the preamble is already a few dB off from the target. However, the offset between target power levels can be adjusted at the IAB node to improve the accuracy of distinguishing two type of PRACH.

[00116] Thus, with respect to example solution 4, according to an example embodiment, a BS may transmit configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell. The BS may also transmit information indicating a first target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by user devices, and indicating a second target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes. The BS may receive a random access preamble signature. The BS may measure received power of the received signal (e.g., of the received RA preamble signature) and then determine whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by a UE (user device) or by an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature. The BS may then transmit a random access response to either a user device or an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node based upon the determining (e.g., based on whether the receive power indicates the transmitting device was a UE or an IAB node, then the appropriate RAR would be transmitted back to the transmitting device (UE or IAB node)).

[00117] FIG. 9 is a flow chart illustrating operation of a system according to an example embodiment. Several changes, or features are described in FIG. 9, including: Change 1 : IAB and access UEs have different cyclic shifts with the same Cell. Change 2: Donor/Parent IAB node (e.g., BS) responds with two RAR messages. Change 3: UE/IAB node receives RAR and decodes the intended message. At shown in FIG. 9, at 910, BS transmits synchronization signals, which are received by the UE. And the UE part of IAB node uses the synchronization signals to find a good or best beam with respect to the IAB donor node. At 920, IAB donor node transmits system information (including remaining minimum system information). Based on this system information, at 930, UE part of IAB node sends a RA preamble signature to donor IAB node/BS (RACH preamble). At 940, the IAB donor node responds with RAR message (which may include multiple RAR messages, or one RAR message with information for both UE and IAB node). DCI information may indicate, or RA-RNTI for DCI information may indicate, for which device (UE or IAB node) the RAR is intended, for example. At 950, UE part of IAB node transmits message 3, e.g., RR connection request to IAB node. At 960, IAB donor node transmits message 4, e.g., RRC connection setup. At 970, IAB donor node transmits channel state information-Reference signals (CSI-RS) and/or a synchronization signal block (SS block). At 980, the IAB donor node transmits downlink control information. At 990, UE part of IAB node transmits Beam/CSI report.

[00118] As an example, implementation of solution 1, as shown in FIG. 10, consider an access network, with zero Correlation Zone Config 5, i.e., Ncs = 10 for the access UEs. There are 13 UE signatures per Root sequence. For 64 signatures, the number of used ZC sequence is 5 as shown in FIG. 10. Assume that the RTT of the IAB nodes is 4 times that of the access UEs. i.e. IAB signature spans 4 UE signatures, hence, each ZC root sequence contains 3 IAB signatures. As shown in FIG. 10, there are 15 IAB signatures across the 5 ZC sequences. It should be noted that the Random Access rate for IAB nodes is less than that of access UEs, hence a fewer number of signatures is used for IAB nodes. It could be typical that only part of the signature space is needed for IAB signatures. For instance, in the configuration of Figure 5, IAB signatures of root 0 and 1 could be enough for providing sufficient RACH capacity for IAB nodes.

[00119] The benefit of the described methods is to provide RACH (random access) channel for IAB nodes with minimal resource use. In solution 1, no additional resources from time, frequency or root sequence space is needed at all. In solution 2, some UE signature resources are sacrificed for IAB signatures but this may be acceptable because time -frequency resources are saved if solution 2 is used instead of allocating separate frequency and time resources for IAB nodes’ RACH.

[00120] Example 1. A method comprising: transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[00121] Example 2. The method of example 1 , further comprising: transmitting a plurality of random access responses, including at least a first random access response to the first type of device, and a second random access response to the second type of device.

[00122] Example 3. The method of any of examples 1-2, further comprising:

[00123] performing correlation of a received signal against the random access root preamble sequence; transmitting, based on a result of the performing correlation, a plurality of random access responses, including at least a first random access response to the first type of device and a second random access response to the second type of device.

[00124] Example 4. The method of any of examples 1-3, wherein the first type of device comprises user devices, and the second type of device comprises Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes.

[00125] Example 5. The method of example 4, further comprising: transmitting a plurality of random access responses, including at least a first random access response to a user device and a second random access response to an Integrated Access and

Backhaul (IAB) node.

[00126] Example 6. The method of any of examples 4-5, further comprising: performing correlation of a received signal against the random access root preamble sequence; transmitting, based on a result of the performing correlation, a plurality of random access responses, including at least a first random access response to a user device and a second random access response to an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node.

[00127] Example 7. The method of any of claim 1, further comprising:

transmitting, by the base station, a random access response; transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating time -frequency resources where the random access response is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a device-type-specific random access radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI), including either a first RA-RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to the first type of device or a second RA-RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to an the second type of device.

[00128] Example 8. The method of any of examples 1-7, further comprising: transmitting, by the base station, a random access response; transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating time-frequency resources where the random access response is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a device-type-specific random access radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI), including either a first RA-RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to a user device or a second RA-RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node.

[00129] Example 9. The example of any of examples 1-8, wherein the random access response comprises one or more of the following: a random access preamble signature index of the received random access preamble signature; a timing advance; and an uplink resource grant for transmission of message 3 of a random access procedure.

[00130] Example 10. The method of any of examples 1 -3, further comprising: transmitting, by the base station, a random access response; and, transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating time-frequency resources where the random access response is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a device-type-independent random access-radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI) and the control information includes additional information that is needed for reception of the random access response and the additional information is readable only by the second type of device.

[00131] Example 1 1. The method of example 10, wherein the additional information indicates an offset of a resource allocation of the random access response read by or transmitted to the second type of device relative to a resource allocation read by or transmitted to the first type of device (that does not have the additional information) or indicates a random access response scrambling used by the second type of device for receiving the random access response that is different from random access response scrambling used by the first type of device for receiving a random access response. [00132] Example 12. The method of any of examples 1 -1 1, further comprising: transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating time-frequency resources where a random access response is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a RA-RNTI associated with a time and frequency resource(s) used by both the first device type that transmitted a first random access preamble signature based on the first cyclic shift step, and the second device type that transmitted a second random access preamble signature based on the second cyclic shift step, wherein both the first and second random access preamble signatures are based on the random access preamble root sequence; and transmitting, by the base station, a random access response, including one or more of the following for each of the first device type and the second device type: a random access preamble signature index of the received random access preamble signature; a timing advance; and an uplink resource grant.

[00133] Example 13. The method of any of examples 1 -12, and further comprising: transmitting, by the base station, a random access response; transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating a device type, either the first device type or the second device type, for which the random access response is intended for.

[00134] Example 14. The method of any of examples 1 -13, wherein the second cyclic shift step is longer than the first cyclic shift step.

[00135] Example 15. The method of any of examples 1 -14, wherein the second cyclic shift step is an integer multiple of the first cyclic shift step.

[00136] Example 16. A method comprising: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift step that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device. [00137] Example 17. A method comprising: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a first type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a second type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

[00138] Example 18. The method of example 17 wherein the first type of device comprises user devices, and the second type of device comprises Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes.

[00139] Example 19. The method of any of examples 17-18 wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures for the root sequence are configured for use by the second type of device to perform either contention-free random access or contention-based random access to the cell.

[00140] Example 20. A method comprising: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a short cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a short signature region, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell within a long signature region; wherein at least the long signature regions for transmitting the IAB random access preamble signatures are provided within short signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access.

[00141] Example 21. The method of example 20, further comprising: receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; determining, by the base station, a root sequence and a cyclic shift of the received random access preamble signature; and, determining, by the base station, whether the random access preamble signature was transmitted by the first type of device or a second type of device based on the root sequence and cyclic shift of the received random access preamble, based on the first and second type of devices being assigned to random access preamble signatures with different cyclic shifts and/or based on different root sequences.

[00142] Example 22. The method of examples 20-21 wherein the first type of device comprises user devices, and the second type of device comprises Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes.

[00143] Example 23. A method comprising: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including: a first cyclic shift step to be used by devices that are within one hop (or within a first distance) away from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature; a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the first hop (or outside of the first distance) from the base station and within a second hop from the base station (or within a second distance from the base station that is greater than the first distance) to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and, a third cyclic shift step, longer than the second cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the second hop (or outside of the second distance) from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

[00144] Example 24. The method of example 23, further comprising: receiving a random access preamble signature.

[00145] Example 25. A method comprising: transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein only one first random access preamble signature, having a length of the first cyclic shift step and provided within a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region), that is allocated to be used by user devices, overlaps a second signature region (or second cyclic shift region) of a second random access preamble signature, having a length of the second cyclic shift step, that is allocated to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; wherein the first random access preamble signature is provided at a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region) that is a cell- specific cyclic shift offset from a start of the second random access preamble signature.

[00146] Example 26. The method of example 25, wherein each of a plurality of different cells or different cell groups each have a different and cell-specific cyclic shift offset that identifies an offset of the start of the first random access preamble signature with respect to a start of the second random access preamble signature.

[00147] Example 27. A method comprising: transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; transmitting, by the base station, information indicating a first target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by user devices, and indicating a second target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes; receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; and, determining, by the base station, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by a user device or by an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature.

[00148] Example 28. The method of example 27 and further comprising:

transmitting a random access response to either a user device or an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node based upon the determining.

[00149] Example 29. A method comprising: transmitting, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell;

receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature; determining, by the base station, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by the first type of device or the second type of device.

[00150] Example 30. A method comprising: transmitting, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; wherein the first set of devices include devices that are located inside a first radius from the base station, or user devices having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is less than or equal to than the first round trip time; and wherein the second set of devices include devices that are located outside of the first radius from the base station, or having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is greater than the first round trip time.

[00151] Example 31. The method of example 30, wherein the first type of device comprises user devices, and the second type of device Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes.

[00152] Example 32. An apparatus comprising means for performing a method of any of examples 1-31.

[00153] Example 33. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of any of examples 1 -31.

[00154] Example 34. An apparatus comprising at least one processor and at least one memory including computer instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to perform a method of any of examples 1-31. [00155] FIG. 1 1 is a block diagram of a wireless station (e.g., AP, BS, eNB, UE or user device) 1000 according to an example implementation. The wireless station 1000 may include, for example, one or two RF (radio frequency) or wireless transceivers 1002A, 1002B, where each wireless transceiver includes a transmitter to transmit signals and a receiver to receive signals. The wireless station also includes a processor or control unit/entity (controller) 1004 to execute instructions or software and control transmission and receptions of signals, and a memory 1006 to store data and/or instructions.

[00156] Processor 1004 may also make decisions or determinations, generate frames, packets or messages for transmission, decode received frames or messages for further processing, and other tasks or functions described herein. Processor 1004, which may be a baseband processor, for example, may generate messages, packets, frames or other signals for transmission via wireless transceiver 1002 (1002A or 1002B). Processor 1004 may control transmission of signals or messages over a wireless network, and may control the reception of signals or messages, etc., via a wireless network (e.g., after being down-converted by wireless transceiver 1002, for example). Processor 1004 may be programmable and capable of executing software or other instructions stored in memory or on other computer media to perform the various tasks and functions described above, such as one or more of the tasks or methods described above. Processor 1004 may be (or may include), for example, hardware, programmable logic, a programmable processor that executes software or firmware, and/or any combination of these. Using other terminology, processor 1004 and transceiver 1002 together may be considered as a wireless transmitter/receiver system, for example.

[00157] In addition, referring to FIG. 1 1 , a controller (or processor) 1008 may execute software and instructions, and may provide overall control for the station 1000, and may provide control for other systems not shown in FIG. 1 1 , such as controlling input/output devices (e.g., display, keypad), and/or may execute software for one or more applications that may be provided on wireless station 1000, such as, for example, an email program, audio/video applications, a word processor, a Voice over IP application, or other application or software.

[00158] In addition, a storage medium may be provided that includes stored instructions, which when executed by a controller or processor may result in the processor 1004, or other controller or processor, performing one or more of the functions or tasks described above.

[00159] According to another example implementation, RF or wireless transceiver(s) 1002A/1002B may receive signals or data and/or transmit or send signals or data. Processor 1004 (and possibly transceivers 1002A/1002B) may control the RF or wireless transceiver 1002A or 1002B to receive, send, broadcast or transmit signals or data.

[00160] The embodiments are not, however, restricted to the system that is given as an example, but a person skilled in the art may apply the solution to other

communication systems. Another example of a suitable communications system is the 5G concept. It is assumed that network architecture in 5G will be quite similar to that of the LTE-advanced. 5G is likely to use multiple input - multiple output (MIMO) antennas, many more base stations or nodes than the LTE (a so-called small cell concept), including macro sites operating in co-operation with smaller stations and perhaps also employing a variety of radio technologies for better coverage and enhanced data rates.

[00161] It should be appreciated that future networks will most probably utilise network functions virtualization (NFV) which is a network architecture concept that proposes virtualizing network node functions into“building blocks” or entities that may be operationally connected or linked together to provide services. A virtualized network function (VNF) may comprise one or more virtual machines running computer program codes using standard or general type servers instead of customized hardware. Cloud computing or data storage may also be utilized. In radio communications this may mean node operations may be carried out, at least partly, in a server, host or node operationally coupled to a remote radio head. It is also possible that node operations will be distributed among a plurality of servers, nodes or hosts. It should also be understood that the distribution of labour between core network operations and base station operations may differ from that of the LTE or even be non-existent.

[00162] Implementations of the various techniques described herein may be implemented in digital electronic circuitry, or in computer hardware, firmware, software, or in combinations of them. Implementations may be implemented as a computer program product, i.e., a computer program tangibly embodied in an information carrier, e.g., in a machine -readable storage device or in a propagated signal, for execution by, or to control the operation of, a data processing apparatus, e.g., a programmable processor, a computer, or multiple computers. Implementations may also be provided on a computer readable medium or computer readable storage medium, which may be a non-transitory medium. Implementations of the various techniques may also include implementations provided via transitory signals or media, and/or programs and/or software

implementations that are downloadable via the Internet or other network(s), either wired networks and/or wireless networks. In addition, implementations may be provided via machine type communications (MTC), and also via an Internet of Things (IOT).

[00163] The computer program may be in source code form, object code form, or in some intermediate form, and it may be stored in some sort of carrier, distribution medium, or computer readable medium, which may be any entity or device capable of carrying the program. Such carriers include a record medium, computer memory, read only memory, photoelectrical and/or electrical carrier signal, telecommunications signal, and software distribution package, for example. Depending on the processing power needed, the computer program may be executed in a single electronic digital computer or it may be distributed amongst a number of computers.

[00164] Furthermore, implementations of the various techniques described herein may use a cyber-physical system (CPS) (a system of collaborating computational elements controlling physical entities). CPS may enable the implementation and exploitation of massive amounts of interconnected ICT devices (sensors, actuators, processors microcontrollers,...) embedded in physical objects at different locations. Mobile cyber physical systems, in which the physical system in question has inherent mobility, are a subcategory of cyber-physical systems. Examples of mobile physical systems include mobile robotics and electronics transported by humans or animals.

The rise in popularity of smartphones has increased interest in the area of mobile cyber physical systems. Therefore, various implementations of techniques described herein may be provided via one or more of these technologies.

[00165] A computer program, such as the computer program(s) described above, can be written in any form of programming language, including compiled or interpreted languages, and can be deployed in any form, including as a stand-alone program or as a module, component, subroutine, or other unit or part of it suitable for use in a computing environment. A computer program can be deployed to be executed on one computer or on multiple computers at one site or distributed across multiple sites and interconnected by a communication network.

[00166] Method steps may be performed by one or more programmable processors executing a computer program or computer program portions to perform functions by operating on input data and generating output. Method steps also may be performed by, and an apparatus may be implemented as, special purpose logic circuitry, e.g., an FPGA (field programmable gate array) or an ASIC (application-specific integrated circuit).

[00167] Processors suitable for the execution of a computer program include, by way of example, both general and special purpose microprocessors, and any one or more processors of any kind of digital computer, chip or chipset. Generally, a processor will receive instructions and data from a read-only memory or a random access memory or both. Elements of a computer may include at least one processor for executing instructions and one or more memory devices for storing instructions and data.

Generally, a computer also may include, or be operatively coupled to receive data from or transfer data to, or both, one or more mass storage devices for storing data, e.g., magnetic, magneto-optical disks, or optical disks. Information carriers suitable for embodying computer program instructions and data include all forms of non-volatile memory, including by way of example semiconductor memory devices, e.g., EPROM, EEPROM, and flash memory devices; magnetic disks, e.g., internal hard disks or removable disks; magneto-optical disks; and CD-ROM and DVD-ROM disks. The processor and the memory may be supplemented by, or incorporated in, special purpose logic circuitry.

[00168] To provide for interaction with a user, implementations may be implemented on a computer having a display device, e.g., a cathode ray tube (CRT) or liquid crystal display (LCD) monitor, for displaying information to the user and a user interface, such as a keyboard and a pointing device, e.g., a mouse or a trackball, by which the user can provide input to the computer. Other kinds of devices can be used to provide for interaction with a user as well; for example, feedback provided to the user can be any form of sensory feedback, e.g., visual feedback, auditory feedback, or tactile feedback; and input from the user can be received in any form, including acoustic, speech, or tactile input.

[00169] Implementations may be implemented in a computing system that includes a back-end component, e.g., as a data server, or that includes a middleware component, e.g., an application server, or that includes a front-end component, e.g., a client computer having a graphical user interface or a Web browser through which a user can interact with an implementation, or any combination of such back-end, middleware, or front-end components. Components may be interconnected by any form or medium of digital data communication, e.g., a communication network. Examples of communication networks include a local area network (LAN) and a wide area network (WAN), e.g., the Internet.

[00170] While certain features of the described implementations have been illustrated as described herein, many modifications, substitutions, changes and

equivalents will now occur to those skilled in the art. It is, therefore, to be understood that the appended claims are intended to cover all such modifications and changes as fall within the true spirit of the various embodiments.

[00171]

HARQ Hybrid Automatic Repeat reQuest

(CA)ZAC (Constant Amplitude) Zero Autocorrelation

ACK Acknowledgement

BW Bandwidth

gNB NR/5G Node B

CM Cubic metric

CP Cyclic Prefix

cs Cyclic Shift

CSI Channel state information

DCI Downlink Control Information

DFT-S-OFDM Discrete Fourier Transform Spread OFDM

DL Downlink

eMBB Enhanced Mobile Broadband GP Guard Period

FTE Long Term Evolution

NR New Radio (5G)

OCC Orthogonal Cover Code

OFDM Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing

PAPR Peak-to-average power ratio

PDCCH Physical Downlink Control Channel

PDSCH Physical Downlink Shared Channel

PRB Physical Resource Block

PUCCH Physical Uplink Control Channel

PUSCH Physical Uplink Shared Channel

QPSK Quadrature Phase Shift Keying

RF Radio Frequency

RS Reference Signal

SR Scheduling Request

SRS Sounding Reference Signal

TDD Time Division Duplexing

TDM Time Division Multiplexing

UCI Uplink Control Information

UE User Equipment

UF Uplink

URFFC Ultra-Reliable and Fow-Fatency Communications

Claims

WHAT IS CLAIMED IS:

1. A method comprising:

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

transmitting a plurality of random access responses, including at least a first random access response to the first type of device, and a second random access response to the second type of device.

3. The method of any of claims 1 -2, further comprising:

performing correlation of a received signal against the random access root preamble sequence;

transmitting, based on a result of the performing correlation, a plurality of random access responses, including at least a first random access response to the first type of device and a second random access response to the second type of device.

4. The method of any of claims 1 -3, wherein the first type of device comprises user devices, and the second type of device comprises Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

transmitting a plurality of random access responses, including at least a first random access response to a user device and a second random access response to an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node.

6. The method of any of claims 4-5, further comprising:

transmitting, based on a result of the performing correlation, a plurality of random access responses, including at least a first random access response to a user device and a second random access response to an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node.

7. The method of any of claims 1-6, further comprising:

transmitting, by the base station, a random access response;

transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating time- frequency resources where the random access response is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a device-type-specific random access radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI), including either a first RA-RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to the first type of device or a second RA- RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to an the second type of device.

8. The method of any of claims 1 -7, further comprising:

transmitting, by the base station, a random access response;

transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating time- frequency resources where the random access response is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a device-type-specific random access radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI), including either a first RA-RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to a user device or a second RA-RNTI if the random access response is transmitted to an Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) node.

9. The method of claims 1-8, wherein the random access response comprises one or more of the following:

a random access preamble signature index of the received random access preamble signature;

a timing advance; and

an uplink resource grant for transmission of message 3 of a random access procedure.

10. The method of any of claims 1 -3, further comprising:

transmitting, by the base station, a random access response;

transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating time- frequency resources where the random access response is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a device-type-independent random access-radio network temporary identifier (RA-RNTI) and the control information includes additional information that is needed for reception of the random access response and the additional information is readable only by the second type of device.

1 1. The method of claim 10, wherein the additional information indicates an offset of a resource allocation of the random access response read by or transmitted to the second type of device relative to a resource allocation read by or transmitted to the first type of device (that does not have the additional information) or indicates a random access response scrambling used by the second type of device for receiving the random access response that is different from random access response scrambling used by the first type of device for receiving a random access response.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating time- frequency resources where a random access response is transmitted, wherein a portion of the downlink control information is scrambled via a RA-RNTI associated with a time and frequency resource(s) used by both the first device type that transmitted a first random access preamble signature based on the first cyclic shift step, and the second device type that transmitted a second random access preamble signature based on the second cyclic shift step, wherein both the first and second random access preamble signatures are based on the random access preamble root sequence; and

transmitting, by the base station, a random access response, including one or more of the following for each of the first device type and the second device type:

a timing advance; and

an uplink resource grant.

13. The method of claim 1 , and further comprising:

transmitting, by the base station, a random access response;

transmitting, by the base station, downlink control information indicating a device type, either the first device type or the second device type, for which the random access response is intended for.

14. The method of any of claims 1 -13, wherein the second cyclic shift step is longer than the first cyclic shift step.

15. The method of any of claims 1 -14, wherein the second cyclic shift step is an integer multiple of the first cyclic shift step.

16. A method comprising:

transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift step that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift step, are configured for use by second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell;

wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures are provided within signature regions that are assigned for contention-free (or dedicated) random access preambles for the first type of device.

17. A method comprising:

transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating: one or more first random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated first signature region, based on a first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a first type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and one or more second random access preamble signatures, each provided in an associated second signature region that are longer than a length of the first signature regions, based on a second cyclic shift that has a length is longer than a length of the first cyclic shift, are configured for use by a second type of user device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; and

18. The method of claim 17 wherein the first type of device comprises user devices, and the second type of device comprises Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes.

19. The method of any of claims 17-18 wherein the one or more second random access preamble signatures for the root sequence are configured for use by the second type of device to perform either contention- free random access or contention- based random access to the cell.

20. A method comprising:

21. The method of claim 20, further comprising:

receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature;

determining, by the base station, a root sequence and a cyclic shift of the received random access preamble signature;

determining, by the base station, whether the random access preamble signature was transmitted by the first type of device or a second type of device based on the root sequence and cyclic shift of the received random access preamble, based on the first and second type of devices being assigned to random access preamble signatures with different cyclic shifts and/or based on different root sequences.

22. The method of claims 20-21 wherein the first type of device comprises user devices, and the second type of device comprises Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes.

23. A method comprising:

transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including:

a first cyclic shift step to be used by devices that are within one hop (or within a first distance) away from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature,

a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the first hop (or outside of the first distance) from the base station and within a second hop from the base station (or within a second distance from the base station that is greater than the first distance) to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell;

a third cyclic shift step, longer than the second cyclic shift step, to be used by devices that are outside of the second hop (or outside of the second distance) from the base station to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell.

24. The method of claim 23, further comprising:

receiving a random access preamble signature.

25. A method comprising:

transmitting configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell;

wherein only one first random access preamble signature, having a length of the first cyclic shift step and provided within a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region), that is allocated to be used by user devices, overlaps a second signature region (or second cyclic shift region) of a second random access preamble signature, having a length of the second cyclic shift step, that is allocated to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes;

wherein the first random access preamble signature is provided at a first signature region (or first cyclic shift region) that is a cell-specific cyclic shift offset from a start of the second random access preamble signature.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein each of a plurality of different cells or different cell groups each have a different and cell-specific cyclic shift offset that identifies an offset of the start of the first random access preamble signature with respect to a start of the second random access preamble signature.

27. A method comprising:

transmitting, by a base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including a first cyclic shift step to be used by user devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell; transmitting, by the base station, information indicating a first target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by user devices, and indicating a second target receive power for the transmission of random access preamble signatures by Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes;

receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature;

28. The method of claim 27 and further comprising:

29. A method comprising:

transmitting, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second type of device to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell;

receiving, by the base station, a random access preamble signature;

determining, by the base station, based on the receive power of the received random access preamble signature, whether the received random access preamble signature was sent by the first type of device or the second type of device.

30. A method comprising:

transmitting, by the base station, configuration information for a cell indicating that a plurality of cyclic shift steps of different sizes for a random access preamble root sequence are configured for random access preamble signatures for the cell, including at least a first cyclic shift step to be used by a first set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell, and a second cyclic shift step, longer than the first cyclic shift step, to be used by a second set of devices to transmit a random access preamble signature to the cell;

wherein the first set of devices include devices that are located inside a first radius from the base station, or user devices having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is less than or equal to than the first round trip time; and

wherein the second set of devices include devices that are located outside of the first radius from the base station, or having a round trip time with respect to the base station that is greater than the first round trip time.

31. The method of claim 30 wherein the first type of device comprises user devices, and the second type of device Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) nodes.

32. An apparatus comprising means for performing a method of any of claims 1 -31.

33. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, are configured to cause a computing system to perform a method of any of claims 1-31.

34. An apparatus comprising at least one processor and at least one memory including computer instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to perform a method of any of claims 1 -31.