WO2022120856A1

WO2022120856A1 - Base station antenna and base station device

Info

Publication number: WO2022120856A1
Application number: PCT/CN2020/135962
Authority: WO
Inventors: 肖伟宏; 王琳琳; 牛立栋; 彭中卫
Original assignee: 华为技术有限公司
Priority date: 2020-12-11
Filing date: 2020-12-11
Publication date: 2022-06-16
Also published as: CN116420283A

Abstract

A base station antenna and a base station device. The base station antenna comprises a signal processing unit and an antenna array. The signal processing unit comprises a signal transceiver port, a phase-shifting feed network, and a filter unit. The signal transceiver port is connected to a first end of the phase-shifting feed network; a second end of the phase-shifting feed network is connected to a first end of the filter unit; and a second end of the filter unit is connected to the antenna array. The cascade connection of the filter unit between the phase-shifting feed network and the antenna array not only can non-linear interference generated by the phase-shifting feed network be suppressed in a downlink transmission scenario to enable a receiver to receive more pure signals, reduce the probability of interference of other frequency band signals in the receiver by signals emitted by the base station antenna, thereby improving anti-interference capability of the receiver, but out-of-band interference of signals in other transmission links by signals in a current transmission link can be suppressed in an uplink transmission scenario, thereby improving anti-interference capability of the base station antenna.

Description

A base station antenna and base station equipment

technical field

The present application relates to the field of communication technologies, and in particular, to a base station antenna and base station equipment.

Background technique

At this stage, massive multiple input multiple output (MM) technology, as a high-end form of multiple input multiple output (MIMO) technology evolution, has gradually become a base station antenna. key technology. Taking the time division duplex (TDD) system as an example, the number of channels in a traditional TDD system can usually only be set to 2, 4 or 8, while the number of channels in a TDD system using MM technology can reach 64, 128 or even 256, and can continue to increase in the future. By using the multi-channel of the MM technology to jointly process the signal, the spatial diversity and multiplexing of the channels can effectively improve the transmission rate of the signal and the data amount of the signal transmitted at one time.

However, there are usually some nonlinear devices in the base station antenna. After the signal is processed by these nonlinear devices, problems such as nonlinear interference will be introduced. During downlink transmission, if the nonlinear interference generated in the base station antenna is not suppressed, the signal sent by the base station antenna may also interfere with signals in other frequency bands in the receiver, reducing the anti-interference ability of the receiver. During uplink transmission, if the nonlinear interference generated in the base station antenna is not suppressed, the signal transmitted on a certain communication system in the base station antenna may also interfere with the signal transmitted on other communication systems, reducing the anti-interference ability of the base station antenna.

To sum up, how to suppress the nonlinear interference generated in the base station antenna has become an urgent problem to be solved at present.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present application provides a base station antenna and base station equipment for suppressing nonlinear interference generated in the base station antenna.

In a first aspect, the present application provides a base station antenna, including a signal processing unit and an antenna array, the signal processing unit includes a signal transceiving port, a phase-shifting feed network, and a filtering unit, and the signal transceiving port is connected to a first end of the phase-shifting feed network. , the second end of the phase-shift feeding network is connected to the first end of the filter unit, and the second end of the filter unit is connected to the antenna array. During downlink transmission, the phase-shifted feeding network can perform phase-shifted feeding on the transmitted signal from the signal transceiver port and then send it to the filtering unit, and the filtering unit can filter the transmitted signal after the phase-shifted feeding and send it to the antenna array , so that the filtered transmission signal is radiated by the antenna array. During uplink transmission, the filtering unit can filter the received signal from the antenna array and send it to the phase-shifted feed network, and the phase-shifted feed network performs phase-shifted feed on the filtered received signal and sends it to the signal Transceiver port.

In the above design, by cascading the filter unit between the phase-shift feed network and the antenna array, on the one hand, nonlinear interference generated by the phase-shift feed network can be suppressed in the downlink transmission scenario, so that the receiver can receive more For a pure signal, it reduces the probability of interference of the signal sent by the base station antenna to the signals of other frequency bands in the receiver, improves the anti-interference ability of the receiver, and protects the receiver. The out-of-band interference of the signal in the current transmission link to the signal in other transmission links can improve the anti-interference ability of the base station antenna by purifying the signals on each transmission link in the base station antenna. It can be seen that this design can effectively improve the quality of the signals sent and received by the base station antenna.

In an optional design, the transmitted signal and the received signal may be carried in the same frequency band, for example, carried in different time slots of the same frequency band in the TDD system. In this way, the base station antenna can use the same phase-shifting feed parameters and the same filter parameters to adjust the received and received signals in the same frequency band, and this method can achieve more finer phase-shift adjustment or filter adjustment for the frequency band.

In an optional design, the signal processing unit may include M signal transceiving ports and a first combiner/splitter, the first combiner/splitter includes M split ends and a combiner end, and the first combiner/split The M split ends of the splitter are respectively connected to the M signal transceiving ports, and the combined end of the first combiner/splitter is connected to the first end of the phase-shifted feeding network. Among them, M is a positive integer greater than or equal to 2. During downlink transmission, the first combiner/splitter can combine the M transmission signals from the M signal transceiving ports into one channel and send it to the phase-shifting feed network. During downlink transmission, the first combiner/splitter can divide the received signal after the phase-shifted power feed into M channels and then send them to M signal transceiver ports respectively. In this design, M signal sending and receiving ports can correspond to M frequency bands, the same phase-shifting feed network is used to tune the sending and receiving signals of M frequency bands, and the same filtering unit is used to filter and share the sending and receiving signals of M frequency bands. The same antenna array radiates and receives the transceiver signals of M frequency bands, which eliminates the need to set up its own dedicated phase-shifting feed network, filter unit and antenna array for the transceiver signals of each frequency band, effectively reducing the phase-shifting needs to be deployed in the base station antenna. The number of feeding networks, filter units and antenna arrays saves the layout space of the base station antenna. In addition, this method integrates more frequency bands for transmitting and receiving signals on the same antenna array as much as possible, which also helps to realize the multiplexing of the antenna arrays and reduce the mutual interference between the antenna arrays.

In an optional design, the base station antenna may include K signal processing units and a second combiner/splitter, the second combiner/splitter includes K split ends and a combiner end, and the K signal processing units correspond to The second ends of the K filter units are respectively connected to the K branch ends of the second combiner/splitter, and the combiner end of the second combiner/splitter is connected to the antenna array. Wherein, K is a positive integer greater than or equal to 2. During downlink transmission, the second combiner/splitter can combine the K transmit signals after filtering and processing sent by the K filtering units into one channel and send it to the antenna array. During uplink transmission, the second combiner/splitter can divide the received signal into K channels and send them to K filter units respectively. In this design, K signal processing units can correspond to K frequency bands, respectively. By setting respective filters for the sending and receiving signals of K frequency bands, different filtering rules can be set for different frequency bands, which is convenient for network optimization equipment to target The filtering operation of a certain frequency band is optimized. In addition, the design also sets its own dedicated phase-shifting feed network for the transmit and receive signals of the K frequency bands, so the transmit and receive signals of each frequency band can also be independently phase-shifted and fed, which helps the base station antenna to flexibly adjust the phase of each frequency band. . Furthermore, the design radiates or receives the transmit and receive signals of K frequency bands through the same antenna array, which not only reduces the layout space occupied by the base station antenna, but also achieves stronger beam coverage through fewer transmit and receive channels, with maximum Make use of the caliber of the sky.

In an optional design, the phase-shifting feed network may include a first digital phase shifter, a first end of the first digital phase shifter corresponds to a first end of the phase-shifting feed network, and the first digital phase shifter The second end of the corresponding to the second end of the phase-shift feeding network. The first digital phase shifter can perform phase-shift feeding on the transmitted signal and send it to the filtering unit, and can also perform phase-shift feeding on the filtered received signal and send it to the signal transceiving port. The design can realize beamforming of the transmit and receive signals through only one digital phase shifter, which helps to reduce the number of components in the base station antenna, and reduces the occupied space and cost of the base station antenna.

In an optional design, the phase-shifted feed network may include a power divider and N second digital phase shifters, the power divider includes a first end and N second ends, and the first end of the power divider Corresponding to the first end of the phase-shifting feed network, the N second ends of the power divider are respectively connected to the first ends of the N second digital phase shifters, and the second ends of the N second digital phase shifters are connected to the filtering unit . Among them, N is a positive integer greater than or equal to 2. During downlink transmission, the power divider can divide the transmission signal into N transmission sub-signals and send them to the N second digital phase shifters respectively, and the N second digital phase shifters can divide the power distribution of the N transmission sub-signals. The signal is phase-shifted and sent to the filtering unit. During uplink transmission, the N second digital phase shifters can perform phase shifting processing on the filtered N received signals from the filtering unit and send them to the power divider, and the power divider can phase-shift the N second digital phase shifters from the filtering unit. The phase-shifted N received signals of the device are weighted and then sent to the signal transceiver port. In this design, by setting the power divider to distribute the power of the transmitted signal or to weight multiple received signals, the transmitted signal and the received signal can be divided into multiple links and transmitted in parallel, so as to improve the transmission efficiency of the received and received signals. Furthermore, by setting N digital phase shifters to phase shift the N transmitted sub-signals or the N received signals respectively, the beam radiation direction of the antenna array radiating the transmitted signal or the received signal can be changed more flexibly and finely.

In an optional design, the filtering unit may include N filters, the antenna array may include N groups of radiating units, and the first ends of the N filters are respectively connected to the second ends of the N second digital phase shifters, The second ends of the N filters are respectively connected to the N groups of radiation units. During downlink transmission, the N second digital phase shifters can perform phase-shift processing on the N transmitted sub-signals after power distribution and send them to N filters respectively. The transmission sub-signals are filtered and sent to N groups of radiation units, and the N groups of radiation units respectively radiate the filtered N transmission sub-signals. During uplink transmission, N groups of radiation units send N received signals to N filters respectively, and the N filters can filter the N received signals from N groups of radiation units and send them to N second digital shifters. A phase shifter, where N second digital phase shifters perform phase shifting on the N received signals after filtering and processing from the N filters, and then send them to the power divider. In this design, by setting N transmission links in each transceiver channel between the signal transceiver port and the antenna array, the transceiver signals can be transmitted in parallel through the N transmission links, so as to improve the transmission efficiency of the transceiver signals. In addition, the N filters are used to filter the sending and receiving signals on the N transmission links respectively, which can suppress the nonlinear interference generated by the nonlinear devices on each transmission link in a more targeted manner, and accurately improve each transmission link. The quality of the signal transmitted on each transmission link improves the anti-interference ability of the base station antenna when processing the uplink signal while effectively reducing the interference of the downlink signal to the signals of other frequency bands in the receiver.

In an optional design, the base station antenna may further include a control unit and a control interface, the input end of the control unit is connected to the control interface, and the output end of the control unit is connected to the digital phase shifter. Wherein, the digital phase shifter may be a first digital phase shifter or N second digital phase shifters. When the beam of the base station antenna needs to be adjusted, the control unit can send a phase-shift control command to the digital phase shifter according to the phase-shift control signal from the control interface, so that the digital phase shifter can adjust the transmission signal or the received signal according to the phase-shift control command. Phase, to achieve beam adjustment of the base station antenna. The design can realize the adjustment of each digital phase shifter through microwave switching, which helps to flexibly adjust the beam of the base station antenna through a convenient control method.

In a second aspect, the present application provides a base station device, including the base station antenna according to any one of the first aspect and one or more transceivers, wherein the one or more transceivers can be connected to the base station antenna.

In an optional design, the transceiver is a remote radio frequency unit.

These and other aspects of the present application will be more clearly understood in the description of the following embodiments.

Description of drawings

FIG. 1 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of a system architecture to which an embodiment of the present application is applicable;

FIG. 2 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of the internal architecture of a base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 3 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of a beamforming architecture;

FIG. 4 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of the internal structure of a base station antenna;

FIG. 5 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of the internal structure of another base station antenna;

FIG. 6 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of the internal structure of still another base station antenna;

FIG. 7 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of a base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 8 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of another base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 9 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of still another base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 10 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of still another base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 11 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of still another base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 12 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of a base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 13 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of another base station antenna corresponding to an embodiment of the present application.

Detailed ways

The base station antenna provided in the embodiments of the present application may be applicable to various communication systems, such as: a fifth generation (5th Generation, 5G) communication system or a new radio (new radio, NR) system, a 6G communication system, a long term evolution (long term evolution) LTE) system, global system of mobile communication (GSM) system, code division multiple access (CDMA) system, wideband code division multiple access (WCDMA) ) system, general packet radio service (GPRS) system, LTE time division duplex (TDD) system, universal mobile telecommunication system (UMTS), global interconnection microwave connection It can also be a communication system in other unlicensed frequency bands, which is not limited.

The technical solutions in the embodiments of the present application will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings in the embodiments of the present application. It should be understood that the described embodiments are only a part of the embodiments of the present application, but not all of the embodiments.

FIG. 1 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of a system architecture to which the embodiments of the present application are applied. As shown in FIG. 1 , the system architecture may include radio access network devices, such as but not limited to the base station 100 shown in FIG. 1 . The radio access network equipment may be located in a base station subsystem (base btation bubsystem, BBS), a terrestrial radio access network (UMTS terrestrial radio access network, UTRAN) or an evolved terrestrial radio access network (evolved universal terrestrial radio access, E- UTRAN), it is used for cell coverage of wireless signals to realize the connection between the terminal equipment and the radio frequency end of the wireless network. Specifically, the base station 100 may be a base station (base transceiver station, BTS) in a GSM or CDMA system, a base station (NodeB, NB) in a WCDMA system, or an evolved base station (evolutional NodeB) in an LTE system , eNB or eNodeB), can also be a wireless controller in a cloud radio access network (cloud radio access network, CRAN) scenario, or the base station 100 can also be a relay station, an access point, an in-vehicle device, a wearable device, and future A base station in a 5G network or a base station in a PLMN network to be evolved in the future, for example, a new wireless base station, is not limited in the embodiments of the present application.

As shown in FIG. 1 , a possible structure of the base station 100 may include a base station antenna 110 , a transceiver 120 and a baseband processing unit 130 . Among them, the base station antenna can select a new generation of beamforming antennas to form an antenna system, for example, an analog beamforming antenna and a digital beamforming antenna are used to form a hybrid beamforming (HBF) antenna system. The transceiver 120 can be connected to the antenna port of the base station antenna 110, so that the base station antenna 110 can receive the transmission signal sent by the transceiver 120 through its antenna port and radiate it out through the radiating element of the base station antenna 110, or radiate the radiation of the base station antenna 110. The received signal received by the unit is sent to the transceiver 120 .

In implementation, the transceiver 120 may be a remote radio frequency unit, the baseband processing unit 130 may be a baseband unit, and the base station antenna 110 is usually integrated with the remote radio frequency unit in the same device, which is called an active antenna processing unit (active antenna unit, AAU). In this scenario, the baseband unit can be used to process the baseband signal to be sent and transmit it to the remote radio frequency unit, or receive the received signal sent by the remote radio frequency unit (that is, the received radio frequency signal received by the base station antenna 110 during the signal reception process passes through the remote radio frequency unit. The baseband signal obtained after the conversion processing of the end radio frequency unit) and processing. The remote radio frequency unit can convert the baseband signal to be sent sent by the baseband unit into a transmit radio frequency signal (including performing necessary signal processing on the baseband signal to be sent, such as signal amplification, etc.), and then transmit the radio frequency signal through the base station antenna 110. The antenna port is sent to the base station antenna 110, and the base station antenna 110 radiates the transmitted radio frequency signal. Alternatively, the remote radio frequency unit may also receive the received radio frequency signal sent by the antenna port of the base station antenna 110, convert it into a received baseband signal, and send it to the baseband unit.

It should be understood that FIG. 1 only illustrates the connection relationship between one transceiver 120 and one antenna port of the base station antenna 110 . In other optional embodiments, the number of antenna ports in the base station antenna 110 may also be at least two, and the number of transceivers 120 may also be at least two, wherein each antenna port may be connected to one transceiver 120, multiple transceivers 120 may be connected to the same baseband processing unit 130.

FIG. 1 also exemplarily shows a possible deployment scenario of the base station antenna. As shown in FIG. 1 , the deployment scenario may include a pole, an antenna adjustment bracket, a feeder, a joint seal, and a grounding device. Wherein, the end of the base station antenna 110 close to the antenna port can be fixedly connected to the pole, and the end of the base station antenna 110 away from the antenna port can be movably connected to the pole through the antenna adjustment bracket, so that the position of the base station antenna 110 can be adjusted through the antenna adjustment bracket. The outgoing feeder at the antenna port of the base station antenna 110 is connected to the transceiver 120, and the feeder can also extend to the grounding pipe to connect the grounding device. Wherein, the connection between the antenna port and the feeder, and the connection between the feeder and the grounding pipe can be sealed through the joint seal. It should be understood that FIG. 1 only shows the deployment mode of the base station antenna including one antenna. In other scenarios, the base station antenna may also include multiple antennas installed around the pole, and the installation positions of the multiple antennas may be the same or different. , when the installation positions are different, multiple antennas can form their own different beam coverage.

FIG. 2 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of the internal architecture of a base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 2 , in this embodiment of the present application, the base station antenna may include a signal processing unit and an antenna array, and a signal processing unit and an antenna. The array is usually placed in a radome. The radome has good electromagnetic wave penetration characteristics in terms of electrical performance, and can withstand the external harsh environment in terms of mechanical properties. Components are protected from external harsh environments. The base station antenna may also include an antenna port, which is usually placed on the outside of the radome to allow for docking with the transceiver. The base station antenna may include at least one antenna array composed of multiple radiating elements and metal reflectors. Multiple radiating elements are usually placed on the front of the metal reflector, and the metal reflector can reflect the antenna signal incident on the front of the metal reflector. Focus on the receiving point (ie, the radiating element) to improve the receiving sensitivity of the antenna signal and strengthen the receiving ability of the antenna. Contrary to the radiating unit, other electrical components in the base station antenna are usually arranged on the back of the metal reflector. In this way, the metal reflector can also block or shield the radio waves emitted from other electrical components on its back, so as to reduce the impact of other radio waves on the received signal. interference. The metal reflector can also be called a bottom plate, an antenna panel, a reflector or a metal reflector, and the like. The frequencies of the radiating elements in the same antenna array may be the same or different. The base station antenna may also include a transmission or calibration network (ie, transmission component or calibration network) connected to the signal processing unit. The base station antenna can achieve different beam radiation directions through the transmission component, or can also change the phase of the signal through a phase shifter. Alternatively, the calibration signal (carrying the target phase) can be obtained through the calibration network, and the phase-shifting feed parameters in the signal processing unit can be adjusted according to the deviation between the actual phase of the antenna array and the target phase, so as to gradually adjust the actual phase of the antenna array to the target. phase for accurate transmit and receive operations.

Further introduce some terms involved in the following embodiments of this application:

(1) Radiating unit: It is the unit that constitutes the basic structure of the antenna, which is used to radiate or receive radio waves, and belongs to a passive device. The radiating element converts high-frequency currents into microwave signals to form specific beams in space. The radiating unit in the base station antenna mainly includes two types: vibrator unit and patch unit. The vibrator unit, also known as the antenna vibrator or vibrator, is mainly used for dual-polarized antennas, low-frequency antennas or high-frequency antennas. SMD units are mainly used for narrowband antennas, single-band antennas and indoor antennas. The radiation unit in this application can be used for a single-band antenna or a multi-band antenna, and can be used for either a single-polarized antenna or a multi-polarized antenna, which is not specifically limited in this application.

(2) Feeding network: The feeding network is usually composed of a controllable impedance transmission line, which may include a phaser (Phaser) and/or a power divider (PD). A power divider, or both a phase shifter and a power divider. A phase shifter is a device that can adjust the phase of a signal, and can include both digital phase shifters and analog phase shifters. A power divider is a device that can divide an input signal into two or more output signals according to the energy. The energy of the two or more output signals can be equal or unequal. When the power divider is used in reverse (that is, receiving signals through the output end and sending signals through the input end), the power divider can also synthesize two or more input signals into one output signal according to the energy, and the energy of the output signal is equal to two The sum of the energy of one or more input signals. A power divider used in reverse can also be called a combiner. When the feeding network only includes a phase shifter, the feeding network can feed the transmitted signal to the radiating unit according to a certain phase, or send the received signal to the remote radio frequency unit according to a certain phase. When the feeding network only includes the power divider, the feeding network can feed the transmitted signal to the radiating unit according to a certain amplitude, or send the received signal to the remote radio frequency unit according to a certain amplitude. When the feeder network includes both a power divider and a phase shifter, the feeder network can feed the transmitted signal to the radiating unit with a certain amplitude and phase, or send the received signal to the remote radio unit with a certain amplitude and phase.

(3), phase-shift feeding network: refers to the feeding network including phase-shifters, such as including only phase-shifters, or including both phase-shifters and power dividers.

(4) Filter: It is a passive device with frequency selection function, which can effectively filter out the frequency band of a specific frequency or frequencies other than a certain frequency band, so that the useful signal with a specific frequency in the signal can pass through and attenuate other frequencies. signal to filter out interference noise, perform spectrum analysis, and suppress out-of-band interference. The filter can be provided in the feed network or the phase-shifted feed network, in other components, or as a separate component.

(5) Communication system: In this application, the maximum frequency range that can be carried by a radio frequency transceiver port of a remote radio frequency unit is referred to as a communication system. The RF transceiver port is an interface device, which can be an MQ connector, a DIN interface or other standard connectors.

(6) Combiner/Splitter: It is a functional complex of combiner and splitter. A combiner is a device that can combine two or more radio frequency signals in two or more communication systems into one radio frequency signal. A splitter is a device that can divide one radio frequency signal into two or more radio frequency signals corresponding to two or more communication systems. The combiner/splitter refers to a combination of two or more radio frequency signals located in two or more communication systems into one radio frequency signal, and can also divide one radio frequency signal into two or more corresponding communication systems. A device with two or more radio frequency signals. Combiners, splitters, and combiners/splitters also avoid the interaction of signals in various communication systems.

(7), MM technology and beamforming:

MM technology is a high-end form in the evolution of MIMO technology, and is a key technology in the development of 4.5G, 5G or 6G communication systems. The antenna under the MM technology has a smaller physical size, so that more antennas can be set in the base station antenna with limited space, even if the base station antenna in the future communication system uses high-frequency carriers (for example, the 5G communication system uses millimeter-level high frequency). The received energy area of a single antenna is small, and the base station antenna can also increase the transceiver gain through a large number of antennas set inside. In addition, the MM technology also uses static scene beams, and can increase the degree of freedom in the vertical dimension for transmitting and receiving signals. In this way, the base station antenna can flexibly adjust the beam shape of the transmitting and receiving signals in the horizontal and vertical dimensions with the support of the MM technology. Helps to improve the three-dimensional coverage of base station antennas.

In the MM technology, the implementation of beamforming is an important factor that affects the transmission and reception performance of the base station antenna. Beamforming is a signal processing technique that uses an array of sensors to directionally transmit and receive signals, also known as beamforming or spatial filtering. When the phase-shifted feed network is used to achieve beamforming, by adjusting the phase-shifted feed parameters of the phase-shifted feed network, constructive interference can be obtained for signals at certain angles, while destructive interference is obtained for signals at other angles. to generate different beam coverage. There are three commonly used beamforming in MM technology: analog beamforming, digital beamforming and HBF. Among them, analog beamforming refers to beamforming analog signals, digital beamforming refers to beamforming digital signals, and HBF refers to beamforming both digital signals and analog signals. shape. Generally speaking, the signal transmitted over the air is an analog signal, and the signal processed in the baseband unit is a digital signal. Therefore, after the uplink analog signal sent by the terminal equipment enters the remote radio frequency unit through the base station antenna, it needs to be converted by an analog-to-digital converter first. The digital signal is then transmitted to the baseband unit for processing. After the downlink digital signal sent by the baseband unit enters the remote radio frequency unit, it also needs to be converted into an analog signal by a digital-to-analog converter and then sent to the air through the radiation unit of the base station antenna. In this case, an analog-to-digital converter needs to be set on the remote radio frequency unit side as the receiving end, and a digital-to-analog converter needs to be set on the remote radio frequency unit side as the transmitting end. In this way, when the base station equipment adopts digital beamforming, the downlink digital signal can complete the beamforming process before entering the digital-to-analog converter set on the remote radio frequency unit side of the transmitter, or the uplink analog signal transmitted over the air can be The beamforming process is completed after being converted into a digital signal by an analog-to-digital converter set on the remote radio frequency unit side of the receiving end. When the base station equipment adopts analog beamforming, the downlink digital signal can be processed into an analog signal by the digital-to-analog converter set on the remote RF unit side of the transmitting end, and then the beamforming processing is completed, or the uplink analog signal transmitted over the air can be processed. Before the signal enters the analog-to-digital converter set on the remote radio frequency unit side of the receiving end, the beamforming process is completed first. When the base station equipment adopts HBF, the downlink digital signal can complete the digital beamforming process before entering the digital-to-analog converter set on the remote radio frequency unit side of the transmitting end, and then the digital-to-analog converter set by the remote radio frequency unit of the transmitting end The analog beamforming process is completed after the analog signal is processed. It can also be that the uplink analog signal transmitted in the air completes the analog beamforming process before entering the analog-to-digital converter set on the remote radio frequency unit side of the receiving end, and then the analog beamforming process is completed at the receiving end. The digital beamforming process is completed after the analog-to-digital converter provided on the remote radio frequency unit side is converted into a digital signal.

Taking downlink transmission as an example, FIG. 3 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of a beamforming architecture, wherein (a) in FIG. 3 illustrates a base station antenna architecture using analog beamforming, and (b) in FIG. 3 ) diagram illustrates the base station antenna architecture using digital beamforming, and (c) in FIG. 3 illustrates the base station antenna architecture using HBF. As shown in (a) of Figure 3, the base station equipment using analog beamforming will send the downlink digital signal sent by the baseband unit to the radio frequency link in the remote radio frequency unit, and the remote radio frequency link will convert it into The downlink analog signal is then input to the base station antenna through the antenna port, and then the downlink analog signal is mapped to different antenna arrays through the analog beamforming (analog beamforming, ABF) matrix in the base station antenna. As shown in (b) of Figure 3, the base station equipment using digital beamforming will first map the downlink digital signals to different radio frequency units in the remote radio unit through the digital beamforming (DBF) matrix in the baseband unit. The radio frequency link is sent to different antenna arrays in the base station antenna via different radio frequency links. As shown in (c) of Figure 3, HBF is an evolution of digital beamforming. The base station equipment using HBF will first map the downlink digital signal to the remote radio unit through the DBF matrix in the baseband unit. Different radio frequency links are then converted into downlink analog signals in each radio frequency link and then input to the base station antenna through the antenna port, and then mapped to different antenna arrays through the ABF in the base station antenna. DBF completes the final beamforming by combining digital beamforming and analog beamforming, which can switch beams more flexibly and quickly, and effectively improve the antenna coverage performance of the base station antenna.

The following exemplarily introduces the internal structures of several optional base station antennas.

Figure 4 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of the internal structure of a base station antenna. As shown in Figure 4, in this example, the baseband unit performs digital beamforming on the downlink digital signal and sends it to each radio frequency link in the remote radio frequency unit , a digital-to-analog converter is set on each radio frequency link in the remote radio frequency unit, so the downlink digital signal output by the baseband unit is converted into a downlink analog signal by the digital-to-analog converter in the remote radio frequency unit, and then completed in the base station antenna Analog beamforming. In this case, the base station antenna may include X antenna arrays with independent analog beamforming functions, such as antenna array 1, antenna array 2, ..., antenna array X, where X is a positive integer. Wherein, each of the X antenna arrays may include a metal reflector, a plurality of digital phase shifters, a radiation element group formed by a plurality of radiation elements in a matrix form, and a plurality of digital phase shifters and radiation elements. Groups can be placed on metal reflectors. As shown in FIG. 4 , multiple digital phase shifters in each antenna array can be connected to different radiation elements in the radiating element group respectively, and there are at least one digital phase shifter and other digital phase shifters in the multiple digital phase shifters. have different phase-shift parameters (or different total delay ranges). In this way, the base station antenna can then adjust the beam coverage corresponding to each antenna array by adjusting the phase shifting parameters of each digital phase shifter in each antenna array. When the signal transmission efficiency is low, the base station antenna can also reduce the complexity of beamforming by reducing the phase shifting parameters of some digital phase shifters, so as to improve the signal transmission efficiency.

FIG. 5 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of the internal structure of another base station antenna. As shown in FIG. 5 , in this example, the base station antenna may include a radiation unit module, a power division module, a phase shifter module, and a connection structure module connected in sequence. , drives and controllers. Wherein, the radiation unit module may include multiple groups of radiation units arranged in parallel, each group of radiation units may include an odd number (eg 3) of radiation units, and the power division module may include multiple groups of parallel arranged power dividers, phase shifter modules It may include a plurality of phase shifters arranged in parallel (eg, phase shifter 1, phase shifter 2, phase shifter 3 and phase shifter 4), and the connection structure module may include a plurality of connection structures arranged in parallel. In the base station antenna, multiple groups of radiation units, multiple groups of power dividers, multiple phase shifters and multiple connection structures correspond respectively. Each connection structure can be connected to a corresponding phase shifter, each phase shifter can also be connected to a corresponding set of power dividers, and each set of power dividers can also be connected to each of a corresponding set of radiation units Radiation unit. In this case, after receiving a control command for a certain phase shifter, the controller can send a driving command to the driver according to the control command, and the driver drives the connection structure corresponding to the target phase shifter to move, thereby driving The target phase shifter moves to change the phase shift parameters of the target phase shifter, thereby changing the beam coverage of the radiation unit.

FIG. 6 exemplarily shows a schematic diagram of the internal structure of still another base station antenna. As shown in FIG. 6 , in this example, in addition to the radiating element, the base station antenna may also include a phase shifter. Each radiating element and each shifter The phasers are arranged in a phased scanning array in a matrix form. When the base station equipment adopts this kind of base station antenna structure, there are two kinds of phase shifters in the base station equipment, one of which is integrated in the base station antenna and directly connected to the radiating unit, and the other is integrated in the radio frequency transceiver channel of the remote radio frequency unit (ie RF link). In this way, the base station equipment can achieve different phase shifting purposes more flexibly by comprehensively adjusting the phase shifter in the remote radio unit and the phase shifter in the base station antenna.

For the base station antennas shown in Figures 4 to 6, each antenna array corresponds to a transceiver channel. Although these base station antennas can improve the transceiver performance of the base station antennas by increasing the number of transceiver channels, these base station antennas are only used in each transceiver channel. The phase shifter and radiation unit are set in the system, but the filter unit is not set. Therefore, each transceiver channel cannot filter the signals transmitted by each other, so that the base station antenna cannot suppress the nonlinear interference generated in each transceiver channel. Increasing the interference of the downlink signal sent by the base station antenna to the receiver to the signals of other frequency bands in the receiver may also cause the signals in each transceiver channel of the base station antenna to interfere with each other, reducing the quality of the base station antenna transceiver signals. In an optional implementation manner, although a filtering unit may also be provided outside the radiation unit (ie, at the main feed input port of the antenna array), to eliminate the signal by sequentially connecting the phase shifter, the radiation unit and the filtering unit However, this connection method can only eliminate the interference before the downlink signal enters the base station antenna or the uplink signal can eliminate the interference before it is sent to the air, but cannot suppress the interference generated inside the base station antenna, cannot effectively protect the receiver, and cannot suppress the interference. Mutual interference of signals on each transceiver channel inside the base station antenna. In addition, the increase of transceiver channels will also increase the cost of base station antennas. In the case of limited cost of base station antennas, only a small number of transceiver channels can be set in the setting methods shown in Figures 4 to 6, resulting in base station antennas. The beam coverage capability of the device decreases accordingly.

In view of this, the present application provides a base station antenna for suppressing interference generated inside the base station antenna and improving the beam coverage capability of the base station antenna as much as possible on the basis of saving layout space.

The specific structure of the base station antenna in the present application is described below with specific embodiments. Exemplarily, the following takes the TDD system as an example for introduction. In the TDD system, the base station antenna may use different time slots in the same radio frequency band to perform uplink and downlink transmissions respectively.

It should be noted that, in the following description, the names of each port are only exemplary descriptions, and in other optional implementation manners, each port may also have other names. For example, other names of the ports may refer to general names, for example, other names of the input terminals may be the first communication terminals, and other names of the output terminals may be the second communication terminals. For another example, other names of ports can also refer to names related to the functions implemented by the ports. For example, the input terminal is used to refer to a port with a receiving function, so other names of the input terminal can also be the receiving terminal, and the output terminal is used to refer to the receiving terminal. Refers to a port that has a transmit function, so other names for the output end can also be the transmit end. There are many ways of naming ports. As long as a port with the same or similar functions as the port in this application can be implemented, even if the port name is different from the port name in this application, it still falls within the protection scope of this application, and this application does not Repeat them one by one.

It should be noted that, in the following description, ports and ports have a corresponding relationship, which may mean that the two ports are the same port or that the two ports are connected through a line, which is not specifically limited in this application.

It should be understood that the terms "system" and "network" in the embodiments of the present application may be used interchangeably. "At least one" means one or more, and "plurality" means two or more. "And/or", which describes the association relationship of the associated objects, indicates that there can be three kinds of relationships, for example, A and/or B, which can indicate: the existence of A alone, the existence of A and B at the same time, and the existence of B alone, where A, B can be singular or plural. The character "/" generally indicates that the associated objects are an "or" relationship. "At least one item(s) below" or similar expressions thereof refer to any combination of these items, including any combination of single item(s) or plural items(s). For example, at least one item (a) of a, b, or c can represent: a, b, c, a-b, a-c, b-c, or a-b-c, where a, b, c may be single or multiple .

And, unless otherwise specified, ordinal numbers such as “first” and “second” mentioned in the embodiments of the present application are used to distinguish multiple objects, and are not used to limit the order, sequence, priority or importance of multiple objects degree. For example, the first combiner/splitter and the second combiner/splitter are only to distinguish different combiners/splitters, but not to indicate the difference in priority or importance of the two combiners/splitters .

[Example 1]

FIG. 7 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of a base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 7 , the base station antenna may include a signal processing unit and an antenna array. The signal processing unit may include a signal transceiving port (TR), a phase-shifting feed network, and a filtering unit. The signal transceiving port TR is connected to the first end (A ₁ ) of the phase-shifting feed network, and the second end (A 1 ) of the phase-shifting feed network. A ₂ ) is connected to the first end (B ₁ ) of the filtering unit, and the second end (B ₂ ) of the filtering unit is connected to the antenna array. In this example, the signal transceiving port TR may correspond to the antenna port of the base station antenna, for example, the signal transceiving port TR is the antenna port of the base station antenna, or the signal transceiving port TR is connected to the antenna port of the base station antenna through a line. One antenna port of the base station antenna can correspond to one frequency band, and can be connected to one radio frequency communication port of the remote radio frequency unit. For downlink transmission, the signal transceiver port TR receives the transmitted signal (such as the downlink radio frequency signal) from the remote radio frequency unit and sends the transmitted signal to the phase-shifted feeder network, and the phase-shifted feeder network can process the transmitted signal. The phase-shifted feed is processed and sent to the filter unit, and then the filter unit filters out the frequency band corresponding to the signal transceiving port TR (that is, the frequency band corresponding to the antenna port connected to the signal transceiving port TR) from the transmitted signal after the phase-shift feeding. ), but only the transmission signal of the frequency band corresponding to the signal transceiver port TR is reserved, and then the transmission signal of this frequency band is sent to the antenna array, and the transmission signal of this frequency band is radiated by the antenna array. For uplink transmission, the same antenna array receives the received signal (such as the uplink radio frequency signal) and sends the received signal to the filtering unit, and then the filtering unit filters out the frequency band corresponding to the signal transceiver port TR from the received signal Only the received signal of the frequency band corresponding to the signal transceiver port TR is reserved, and then the received signal of this frequency band is sent to the phase-shifted feed network, and the received signal of this frequency band is processed by the phase-shifted feed network. The phase-shifted power feed is sent to the signal transceiver port TR, and then transmitted to the remote radio frequency unit.

Using the base station antenna shown in Figure 7, by cascading the filter unit between the phase-shifting feed network and the antenna array, on the one hand, nonlinear interference generated by the phase-shifting feed network can be suppressed in the downlink transmission scenario, so that the receiving The receiver receives a purer signal, reduces the interference probability of the signal sent by the base station antenna to the signals of other frequency bands in the receiver, improves the anti-interference ability of the receiver, and protects the receiver. In the transmission scenario, the out-of-band interference of signals in the current transmission link to signals in other transmission links is suppressed, and the anti-interference capability of the base station antenna is improved by purifying the signals on each transmission link in the base station antenna. It can be seen from this that the base station antenna shown in FIG. 7 can effectively improve the quality of the signals sent and received by the base station antenna.

In an optional implementation manner, one transceiver channel of the base station antenna may only be used to process the transceiver signals of the same frequency band. In this case, the transmit signal and the receive signal in one transceiver channel may be carried in different frequency bands of the same frequency band. at the same time slot. For example, when the base station antenna includes only one transceiver channel, the base station antenna may also have only one antenna port, and the antenna port is connected to one radio frequency transceiver port of the remote radio frequency unit. In this way, the base station antenna can receive the transmission signal of a certain frequency band sent by the connected radio frequency transceiver port on a certain time slot through its antenna port, and then perform phase-shift feeding processing and filtering on the transmission signal according to the downlink transmission process in the above content. After processing, the processed transmission signal is radiated into the air through the radiation unit of the base station antenna. The base station antenna can also receive the received signal of the same frequency band sent by the terminal device on another time slot through its radiating unit, and then filter and phase-shift the received signal according to the uplink transmission process in the above content. The antenna port is sent to the remote radio unit.

In another optional implementation manner, one transceiver channel of the base station antenna may be used to process transceiver signals in multiple frequency bands. In this case, the transmit signals in one transceiver channel may be carried in multiple frequency bands at the same time slot, the received signal in the transceiving channel can be carried in another time slot of the multiple frequency bands. For example, when the base station antenna includes only one transceiver channel, the base station antenna may have multiple antenna ports and multiple signal transceiver ports in one-to-one correspondence at the same time, and multiple antenna ports may be respectively connected to multiple radio frequency units of the same remote radio unit. The transceiver port can also be connected to the radio frequency transceiver ports of different remote radio frequency units respectively, and one radio frequency transceiver port corresponds to one frequency band. In this way, the base station antenna can receive the transmit signals of multiple frequency bands sent by the connected multiple radio frequency transceiver ports in a certain time slot through its multiple antenna ports, and then transmit signals of multiple frequency bands according to the downlink transmission process in the above content. After the phase-shift feeding processing and filtering processing are performed, the processed transmission signal is radiated into the air through the radiation unit of the base station antenna. The base station antenna can also receive the received signals of multiple frequency bands sent by the terminal equipment on another time slot through its radiating unit, and then perform filtering processing and phase-shift feeding processing on the received signals of multiple frequency bands according to the uplink transmission process in the above content. Then, it is sent to multiple remote radio frequency units or different radio frequency transceiver ports of the same remote radio frequency unit through multiple antenna ports of the base station antenna.

In a specific solution design, FIG. 8 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of another base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 8 , in this example, the signal processing unit may include a first combine/split and M signal transceiver ports, such as TR ₁ , TR ₂ , ..., TR _M , where M is a positive integer greater than or equal to 2. _Wherein , the first combiner/splitter may include _M branch ends (such as C ₁ , C ₂ , . The split terminals C ₁ ˜CM are respectively connected to the _M signal transceiving ports TR ₁ ˜TR _M , and the combining terminal C ₀ of the first combiner/splitter is connected to the first terminal A ₁ of the phase-shift feeding network. In this design, the M signal transceiving ports TR ₁ to TR _M correspond to M frequency bands respectively. During downlink transmission, after receiving the transmission signals of M frequency bands from the M signal transceiver ports TR ₁ to TR _M , the first combiner/splitter can combine the transmission signals of the M frequency bands into one channel and send it to the phase shifter. The feed network, and then the phase-shifted feed network performs phase-shift feed processing on the synthesized transmission signal and sends it to the filtering unit. The filtering unit can remove M signal transceiver ports TR from the combined transmission signal. Signals of other frequency bands (including but not limited to other frequency bands and satellite frequency bands in the TDD system) other than the M frequency bands corresponding to ₁ to TR _M are filtered out, and only the M signal transceiver ports TR ₁ to TR _M correspond to The transmission signals of the M frequency bands are then sent to the antenna array for radiation. During uplink transmission, after the filtering unit receives the received signal from the antenna array, the filtering unit may filter out the received signal except the M frequency bands corresponding to the M signal transceiving ports TR ₁ -TR _M from the received signal , and only retain the received signals of M frequency bands corresponding to the M signal transceiver ports TR ₁ to TR _M , and then send the received signals of these M frequency bands to the phase-shift feeding network, and the phase-shift feeding network will provide the M frequency bands. The received signals of each frequency band are subjected to phase-shifted feed processing and then sent to the first combiner/splitter. The first combiner/splitter can divide the received signals after the phase-shifted feed into M channels corresponding to M frequency bands respectively. The signals are received and respectively sent to the M signal receiving ports TR ₁ to TR _M corresponding to the M frequency bands.

It should be noted that when the base station antenna performs downlink transmission, there may be one or some signal transceiver ports that do not receive the transmitted signal. In this case, the number of transmitted signals in the transmitted signals of the M frequency bands may be less than M. Only one sends a signal. When the base station antenna performs uplink transmission, the received signal after phase-shift feeding may only have received signals of one or some frequency bands. In this case, there may be one or more channels of received signals obtained by branching. The received signal is empty, that is, there is no received signal, or no received signal passes through the one or more channels.

Using the base station antenna shown in Figure 8, the transceiver signals of multiple frequency bands can share the same phase-shifting feed network for ESC, share the same filter unit for filtering, and share the same antenna array for radiation and reception. The transceiver signals of each frequency band are provided with their own dedicated phase-shifting feed network, filter unit and antenna array, which can effectively reduce the number of components to be deployed in the base station antenna and save the layout space of the base station antenna. In addition, one antenna array corresponds to one transceiver channel. This solution integrates more frequency bands of transceiver signals on the same antenna array as much as possible, which can not only achieve beam adjustment for signals in multiple frequency bands while reducing the number of transceiver channels, but also Mutual interference between the antenna arrays can be reduced through the multiplexing of the antenna arrays.

The above-mentioned embodiment introduces the possible situation that the base station antenna includes only one signal processing unit. In the embodiment of the present application, the base station antenna may also include multiple signal processing units, and the structures of the multiple signal processing units may be the same as the same signal processing unit described in the above embodiment, and the multiple signal processing units are different from each other. The structure of the signal processing unit may also be the same as that of the two signal processing units with different structures introduced in the above embodiments. The following takes the signal processing unit shown in FIG. 7 as an example to illustrate the possible structure of a base station antenna including multiple signal processing units:

FIG. 9 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of another base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 9 , the base station antenna may include an antenna array, a second combiner/splitter, and K signal processing units, such as Signal processing unit 1, signal processing unit 2, ..., signal processing unit K, wherein the structure of each signal processing unit is the same as that of the signal processing unit shown in FIG. 7, and the K signal processing units may respectively correspond to K frequency bands, K is a positive integer greater than or equal to 2. In this case, the second combiner/splitter may include K branch terminals (such as Z ₁ , Z ₂ , . . . , Z _K ) and a combiner terminal Z ₀ , corresponding to the K signal processing units The second ends (eg, P ₁₂ , P ₂₂ , . . . , P _K2 ) of the K filter units (eg, filter unit 1, filter unit 2, . There are several split ends Z ₁ to Z _K , and the combiner end Z ₀ of the second combiner/splitter is connected to the antenna array. During downlink transmission, after receiving the transmitted signals of the K frequency bands after filtering and processing from the K filtering units, the second combiner/splitter can combine the transmitted signals of the K frequency bands after filtering and processing into one channel and send it to the antenna array for radiation. The number of transmitted signals in the filtered transmitted signals of the K frequency bands may be less than K, for example, the signal processing unit corresponding to one or some frequency bands does not receive the transmitted signals. During uplink transmission, after the second combiner/splitter receives the received signal from the antenna array, the received signal can be divided into K channels of received signals corresponding to K frequency bands and sent to K filter units respectively, by The K filtering units respectively perform filtering processing on the received signals according to the frequency bands corresponding to the signal processing units in which they are located. Among them, the number of received signals in the K channels of received signals obtained by splitting may be less than K. For example, there is no signal of a certain frequency band or some frequency bands in the received signal received by the second combiner/splitter. In this case, The second combiner/splitter may not send received signals to the filtering units corresponding to these non-existing frequency bands.

Using the base station antenna as shown in Figure 9, by setting the corresponding filters for the transceiver signals of each frequency band, not only can different filtering rules be set for different frequency bands, it is convenient for network optimization equipment to perform filtering operations for a certain frequency band. It can also suppress the nonlinear interference generated by the nonlinear devices in each communication system through the filter set in each communication system, so as to improve the user experience and realize the communication system corresponding to each frequency band in the same Coexistence in Transceiver Channels. In addition, the design also sets its own dedicated phase-shifting feed network for the transceiver signals of each frequency band, so the transceiver signals of each frequency band can also be independently phase-shifted and fed, which helps to flexibly adjust the phase of each frequency band. Further, the design radiates or receives the transceiver signals of multiple frequency bands through the same antenna array, which can not only reduce the layout space occupied by the base station antenna, but also achieve stronger beam coverage through fewer transceiver channels to maximize the beam coverage. Use the sky caliber. In this way, even in the scenario of fast switching of dynamic beams, the base station antenna can increase the antenna gain as much as possible through a separate phase-shifting feed, so as to accurately point to the user and effectively improve the network performance of the base station antenna.

It should be understood that any signal processing unit shown in FIG. 9 can also be replaced with the signal processing unit shown in FIG. 8 , and any scheme of the base station antenna obtained by a simple replacement operation is within the protection scope of the present application. This will not be introduced one by one.

Now, on the basis of the technical solution corresponding to the base station antenna shown in FIG. 7 in the above-mentioned embodiment, the structure of the phase-shift feeding network is further introduced. It should be noted that the second embodiment only introduces the structure of the phase-shifting feed network by taking the base station antenna architecture of FIG. 7 as an example. Phase feed network.

[Example 2]

In this embodiment of the present application, the phase-shifted feeding network may refer to any network that can realize the function of phase-shifted feeding. For example, a phase shifter may be included in the phase-shifted feed network, or a power divider may also be included. The type of the phase shifter may be a digital phase shifter or an analog phase shifter, which is not specifically limited. The following is an example to introduce two possible structures of the phase-shifting feed network by taking the phase-shifting feed network including a digital phase shifter as an example. Among them, the digital phase shifter is a discontinuous phase shifting device, which includes a circuit for controlling phase change and a related radio frequency path, through which a constant phase shift function can be achieved, such as at least at the millisecond level. The phase switching is completed within the The digital phase shifter can be implemented by means of microwave switching, and can also be implemented by other devices with a constant phase difference function, which is not specifically limited.

Structure one

FIG. 10 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of another base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 10 , in this example, the phase-shifting feed network may include a digital phase shifter (ie, a first digital phase-shifter). filter), the filtering unit may comprise a filter. The first end of the digital phase shifter corresponds to the first end A ₁ of the phase-shifting feed network, for example, the first end of the digital phase shifter is the first end A ₁ of the phase-shifting feed network, or the digital phase shifter The first end of the transformer is connected to the first end A ₁ of the phase-shift feeding network through a line. The second end of the digital phase shifter corresponds to the second end A ₂ of the phase shift feed network, for example, the second end of the digital phase shifter is the second end A ₂ of the phase shift feed network, or the second end of the digital phase shifter The second end is connected to the second end A ₂ of the phase-shifted feeding network through a line. Correspondingly, the first end of the filter corresponds to the first end B ₁ of the filter unit. For example, the first end of the filter is the first end B ₁ of the filter unit, or the first end of the filter is connected to the filter unit through a line. the first end B ₁ . The second end of the filter corresponds to the second end B ₂ of the filtering unit, for example, the second end of the filter is the second end B ₂ of the filtering unit, or the second end of the filter is connected to the second end of the filtering unit through a line B ₂ . During downlink transmission, the digital phase shifter can process the phase of the transmitted signal from the signal transceiving port TR into a target phase and send it to the filter. Although the digital phase shifter will inevitably cause out-of-band interference in the process of changing the signal phase, a filter is cascaded after the digital phase shifter, and the filter can filter out the signal from the transmitted signal of the target phase. Signals of other frequency bands other than the transmission signal of the frequency band corresponding to the transceiver port TR are reserved, and only the transmission signal of the frequency band corresponding to the signal transmission and reception port TR is reserved to suppress the interference generated inside the digital phase shifter. After that, the filter sends the transmit signal in this frequency band to the antenna array for radiation. During uplink transmission, the filter can filter out signals of other frequency bands except the received signals of the frequency band corresponding to the signal transceiving port TR from the received signals from the antenna array, and only keep the receiving signals of the frequency band corresponding to the signal transceiving port TR. The signal in the current communication system is made purer, thereby reducing the interference effect of the signal in the current communication system on the signals in other current communication systems. After that, the filter can send the received signal in the frequency band to the digital phase shifter, and the digital phase shifter processes the phase of the received signal after filtering as the target phase and sends it to the signal transceiving port TR. In this way, the signal in the current communication system is filtered through the filter, and then the pattern of the receiving antenna is changed through the digital phase shifter, so that the uplink signal can be fed to the remote radio frequency unit through the filter and the digital phase shifter almost losslessly. .

In an optional implementation manner, the digital phase shifter can realize phase shifting by means of microwave switching. Continue to refer to FIG. 10 , in this mode, the base station antenna may also include a control interface and a remote control unit (or control unit), and a switch control circuit C may also be set in the digital phase shifter, and the control end of the switch control circuit C The output end of the remote control unit can be connected to the output end of the remote control unit through the radio frequency transmission line, and the input end of the remote control unit can be connected to the control interface through the radio frequency transmission line. The control interface is an interface used for data exchange between the base station antenna and the remote radio frequency unit, and is usually used to carry driving voltage and driving current. When the phase-shift parameters of the digital phase shifter need to be adjusted, the control interface can also receive an externally input phase-shift control signal and send it to the remote control unit. The remote control unit analyzes the phase-shift control signal to determine the target shift corresponding to the digital phase shifter. phase parameters, and then input the drive voltage and control flow (such as digital control flow) to the switch control circuit C according to the target phase shift parameters, and the digital phase shifter is under the action of the drive voltage received by the switch control circuit The target phase-shift parameter indicated by the control flow received by C is phase-shifted. The driving voltage may be a voltage provided by an antenna interface standard organization (AISG), or a voltage provided by other standard protocols.

Using the base station antenna shown in Figure 10, by setting the digital phase shifter, the phase adjustment in the analog domain can be performed on the downlink analog signal sent by the remote radio unit or the uplink analog signal received by the radiation unit (ie, analog beamforming). ), this adjustment method has no mechanical transmission, which helps to achieve fast phase shifting of the received and received signals. Moreover, the phase adjustment in the analog domain can also be combined with the digital beamforming on the baseband unit side to realize HBF, which helps to further improve the accuracy and efficiency of the beamforming of the base station equipment.

Structure two

FIG. 11 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of another base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 11 , multiple radiating elements in the antenna array can be divided into N groups of radiating elements, such as radiating element groups 1, 1, and 1. Radiation unit group 2, ..., radiation unit group N, where N is an integer greater than or equal to 2. In this case, the filtering unit may include N first ends (eg B ₁₁ , B ₁₂ , ..., B _1N ) and N second ends (eg B ₂₁ , B ₂₂ , ... , B _2N ), The phase-shifting feed network may include a power divider and N digital phase-shifters (ie, second digital phase-shifters), such as digital-phase-shifter 1, digital-phase-shifter 2, . . . , digital-phase-shifter N. Wherein, the power divider may include a first end (E ₀ ) and N second ends, such as E ₁ , E ₂ , . . . , E _N . Each of the N digital phase shifters may include a first end and a second end, for example, digital phase shifter 1 includes a first end F ₁₁ and a second end F ₁₂ , and digital phase shifter 2 Including a first end F ₂₁ and a second end F ₂₂ , . . . , the digital phase shifter N includes a first end F _N1 and a second end F _N2 . Wherein, the first end E ₀ of the power divider corresponds to the first end A ₁ of the phase-shift feeding network (for example, the first end E ₀ of the power divider is the first end A ₁ of the phase-shift feeding network, or the power The first end E ₀ of the divider is connected to the first end A ₁ ) of the phase-shift feeding network through a line, and the N second ends E ₁ to E _N of the power divider are respectively connected to the Nth digital phase shifters. One end F ₁₁ _{˜F N1} , the N second ends F ₁₂ _{˜F N2} of the N digital phase shifters are respectively connected to the N first ends B ₁₁ _{˜B 1N} of the filtering unit, and the N second ends B of the filtering unit are respectively connected ₂₁ to B _2N are respectively connected to N groups of radiation units.

In the above structure 2, during downlink transmission, after receiving the transmission signal from the signal transceiving port TR, the power divider can distribute the transmission signal into N transmission sub-signals according to the pre-configured weight, and then send it to N digital signals. Phase shifter, the N digital phase shifters can respectively perform phase shifting on the N transmitted sub-signals after the received power distribution and send them to the filtering unit. The corresponding frequency band filters the N transmission sub-signals to obtain N filtered transmission sub-signals, and then sends the N filtered transmission sub-signals to N groups of radiation units, and the N groups of radiation units radiate out separately. The preconfigured weights may be preconfigured in the power divider by those skilled in the art as required, for example, the weights may be divided by equal power or may be divided by unequal power. Assuming that in a case of unequal power division, the pre-configured weights correspond to 0.3, 0.5 and 0.2, then the power divider can allocate the power of the transmitted signal according to the three weights to obtain the transmitted sub-signal 1, the transmitted sub-signal 2 and the When transmitting sub-signal 3, the power of transmitting sub-signal 1 accounts for 30% of the total power of the transmitted signal, the power of transmitting sub-signal 2 accounts for 50% of the total power of the transmitted signal, and the power of transmitting sub-signal 3 accounts for 20% of the total power of the transmitted signal.

In the above structure 2, during uplink transmission, after receiving the N received signals from the N groups of radiation units, the filtering unit can respectively perform the N received signals according to the corresponding frequency bands of the N links allocated by the power divider. Perform filtering to obtain N received signals after filtering, and then send the N received signals after filtering to N digital phase shifters respectively. The N digital phase shifters can respectively perform phase shifting processing on the N received signals received respectively and send them to the power divider. The power divider may weight the phase-shifted N received signals according to a preconfigured weight and send them to the signal transceiving port TR. Assuming that the pre-configured weights are still 0.3, 0.5 and 0.2, after receiving the received signal 1, the received signal 2 and the received signal 3, the power divider can combine the power, received The power of signal 2 and the power of received signal 3 are used to obtain the weighted received signal.

Using the base station antenna shown in FIG. 11 , by setting the power divider to perform power distribution on the transmitted signal or weighting multiple received signals, the transmitted signal and the received signal can be divided into multiple links to transmit the transmitted signal and the received signal in parallel, so as to improve the transmission and reception efficiency of the signal. transmission efficiency. Moreover, by setting N digital phase shifters to perform phase-shifting processing on the N transmitted sub-signals or N received signals, not only can the antenna array radiate the transmitted signals or the beam radiation directions of the received signals more flexibly and more precisely, The adjustment of the beam can also be realized through the comprehensive adjustment of the N phases, and the deviation of this adjustment method is smaller, which helps to improve the accuracy of the beam adjustment. In this way, even in the case of a certain number of transceiver channels, this method can improve the beam scanning capability of the base station antenna through the power distribution function of the power divider and the phase shifting function of multiple digital phase shifters, and realize the dynamic adjustment of the beam. Improve the network performance and user experience of base station antennas. In addition, through the phase adjustment of the digital phase shifter in the analog domain and the phase adjustment of the baseband unit in the digital domain, hybrid beamforming can be realized together, which helps to improve the speed of beam switching and effectively improve the performance of base station equipment. Network performance and user experience.

In an optional implementation manner, continuing to refer to FIG. 11 , the digital phase shifter 1 to the digital phase shifter N may implement phase shifting by means of microwave switching. In this manner, the base station antenna may further include a control interface and a remote control unit, and a switch control circuit (eg, digital phase shifter 1) may also be set in each digital phase shifter from digital phase shifter 1 to digital phase shifter N. A switch control circuit C1 is set in the digital phase shifter 2, a switch control circuit C2 is set in the digital phase shifter 2, ..., a switch control circuit CN is set in the digital phase shifter N), the control terminal of the switch control circuit in each digital phase shifter (ie The control terminal of the switch control circuit C1, the control terminal of the switch control circuit C2, ..., the control terminal of the switch control circuit CN) can all be connected to the output terminal of the remote control unit, and the input terminal of the remote control unit can be connected to the control interface. When it is necessary to adjust the phase shifting parameters of a certain phase shifter, the control interface can send the externally input phase shifting control signal to the remote control unit, and the remote control unit analyzes the phase shifting control signal to determine the target digital phase shifter to be adjusted and The corresponding target phase shift parameters, and then according to the target phase shift parameters, the drive voltage and control flow (such as digital control flow) can be input to the switch control circuit set in the target digital phase shifter to be adjusted to make the target digital phase shifter. Under the action of the driving voltage, phase shifting is performed according to the target phase shifting parameter indicated by the control flow.

The solution in the above structure 2 actually realizes one input and N outputs, or N inputs and one output through the power divider and N digital phase shifters, which is only a possible structure of the phase-shifted feeding network. It should be understood that as long as it can realize a phase-shifted feeding network with one input and N outputs, or N inputs and one output, it is within the protection scope of the present application, and the present application will not describe them one by one.

In an optional design, the digital phase shifter and the switch control circuit provided on it can be placed on the back of the metal reflector of the antenna array. In this way, by dispersing the digital phase shifters and the radiation units on both sides of the metal reflector, it is helpful to use the isolation effect of the metal reflector to reduce the influence of the phase shift operation on the radiation units.

In an optional design, the digital phase shifter and the switch control circuit provided on it can be integrated on a printed circuit board (PCB), so that the digital phase shifter and the switch provided on it can be shortened The distance between the control circuits enables the control instructions of the switch control circuit to be transmitted to the digital phase shifter more quickly, so as to improve the control efficiency of the digital phase shifter. Or, in another optional design, the digital phase shifter and the switch control circuit provided on it can also be independently designed as required, which is not specifically limited in this application.

In an optional design, any adjacent components in the signal processing unit may be configured as an integrated design, jumper connection or radio frequency cable connection, or may be configured as other connection methods as required. Wherein, any adjacent components may refer to a power divider and N digital phase shifters, or may refer to N digital phase shifters and filtering units, or may refer to a power divider, N digital phase shifters and filtering units unit. When set as an all-in-one design or jumper connection, signals can be transmitted directly between adjacent components without the need to transmit through RF cables, which not only helps reduce the number of RF cables and costs, but also It can reduce insertion loss and improve the speed of signal streaming.

In an optional design, the power divider or filter may be implemented in the form of a microstrip line or a suspended stripline, so as to effectively reduce the insertion loss. Of course, other implementation forms, such as integrated design, can also be adopted as required.

It should be understood that the above-mentioned second embodiment only takes the phase shifter as a digital phase shifter as an example to describe the possible structure of the phase-shift feeding network. The present application does not limit the type, form and implementation of the phase shifter. For example, the phase shifters in different signal processing units may be of the same type or of different types, which is not limited in this application.

On the basis of the technical solution corresponding to the base station antenna shown in FIG. 11 in the above-mentioned embodiment, the structures of the filtering unit and the antenna array are further introduced. It should be noted that the third embodiment only takes the base station antenna architecture of FIG. 11 as an example to introduce the structures of the filtering unit and the antenna array. The structures of the filtering unit and the antenna array are also applicable to any of the base station antennas shown above. Filter unit and antenna array.

[Example 3]

FIG. 12 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of another base station antenna provided by an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 12 , in this example, the filtering unit may include N filters, such as filter 1, filter 2, ..., filter N, each of the N filters may include a first end and a second end, for example, filter 1 includes a first end H ₁₁ and a second end H ₂₁ , filter 2 Including a first end H ₁₂ and a second end H ₂₂ , . . . , the filter N includes a first end H _1N and a second end H _2N . The N first ends H ₁₁ to H _1N of the N filters respectively correspond to the N first ends of the filtering unit (B ₁₁ to B _1N as shown in FIG. 11 , such as the N first ends of the N filters H ₁₁ _{˜H 1N} are the N first ends B ₁₁ ˜B _1N of the filter unit, or the N first ends H ₁₁ _{˜H 1N} of the N filters are respectively connected to the N first ends B of the filter unit through lines ₁₁ to B _1N ), the N second ends H ₂₁ to H _2N of the N filters respectively correspond to the N second ends of the filtering unit (B ₂₁ to B _2N as shown in FIG. 11 , such as N filters The N second ends H ₂₁ to H _2N are the N second ends B ₂₁ to B _2N of the filter unit, or the N second ends H ₂₁ to H _2N of the N filters are respectively connected to the filter unit through lines. N second ends B ₂₁ to B _2N ). In this case, any one of the N digital phase shifters can send the phase-shifted transmission sub-signal to the connected filter, and any one of the N filters can The received phase-shifted transmitted sub-signals are filtered and sent to a group of connected radiation units. Alternatively, any one of the N filters can filter the received signal from the connected group of radiating elements and send it to the connected digital phase shifter, and any one of the N digital phase shifters can The phase shifter can perform phase shift processing on the received signal after filtering and send it to the power divider. By setting filters on each transmission link of the same transceiver channel, each transmission link can use its own filter to filter the signals transmitted by itself, and this method can suppress each transmission chain more targetedly. The nonlinear interference generated by the nonlinear devices on the road can accurately improve the quality of the signal transmitted on each transmission link and maximize the protection of the receiver.

In an optional implementation manner, continuing to refer to FIG. 12 , each group of radiation units in the N groups of radiation units may include multiple radiation units (each “x” in FIG. 12 is a radiation unit unit). In this case, the antenna array may further include N power dividers (namely, power dividers for short) corresponding to N groups of radiating elements (or N filters), such as power divider 1, power divider 2, ..., power divider N. Wherein, each of the N power dividers may include a first end and a plurality of second ends, and the number of the second ends is the same as the number of radiation units included in a group of radiation units corresponding to the power divider same. The first end of each power divider may be connected to the second end of the corresponding filter, and the plurality of second ends of each power divider may be respectively connected to the plurality of radiation units included in the corresponding group of radiation units. As shown in FIG. 12 , assuming that the radiation element group 1 to the radiation element group N respectively include X ₁ , X ₂ , ···, X _N radiation elements (X ₁ , X ₂ , ···, X _N are positive integers), then The power divider 1 may include a first end G ₁ and X ₁ and second ends 11, 12, ..., 1X ₁ , the first end G ₁ of the power divider 1 is connected to the second end H ₁₂ of the filter 1, The second ends 11 to 1X ₁ of the splitter 1 are respectively connected to the corresponding X ₁ radiation units; the power splitter 2 may include a first end G ₂ and X ₂ second ends 21, 22, ..., 2X ₂ , The first end G ₂ of the power divider 2 is connected to the second end H ₂₂ of the filter 2, and the second ends 21 to 2X ₂ of the power divider 2 are respectively connected to the corresponding X ₂ radiation units; N may include a first end _{GN and X N} _second ends N1, N2, ..., NX _N , the first end _{GN of the power divider N is connected to the second end H N2} _of the filter N, and the power divider N The second ends N1 to NX ₁ of each are respectively connected to the corresponding X _N radiation units.

In this embodiment, during downlink transmission, any one of the N filters can send the filtered transmission sub-signal to the connected power divider. Any one of the N power dividers can perform power distribution on the received filtered transmission sub-signals to obtain multiple transmission sub-signals, and then feed the multiple transmission sub-signals into a corresponding set of radiation A plurality of radiation units in the unit respectively radiate a plurality of transmission sub-signals through the plurality of radiation units. During uplink transmission, after any one of the N power dividers receives multiple received signals from multiple connected radiating units, it can weight the received multiple received signals and send them to the connected filter. After any one of the N filters receives the received signal sent by the connected power divider, the received signal can be filtered, and the filtered received signal can be sent to the connected digital phase shifter device. In this way, the base station antenna can not only realize the parallel transmission of transceiver signals through the power divider in the signal processing unit, but also realize the parallel transmission and reception operation of the radiation unit through the power divider set in the antenna array, which effectively improves the signal processing efficiency of the base station antenna. .

In the embodiment of the present application, since the power divider is disposed between the base station antenna and the remote radio frequency unit, and belongs to a device closer to the baseband unit, the power divider may also be called a front-end power divider. The power divider 1 to the power divider N are arranged between the antenna array and the terminal equipment, and belong to the devices far from the baseband processing unit. Therefore, the power divider 1 to the power divider N can also be referred to as the rear power divider 1 to the rear Power divider N.

It should be noted that the above is only a possible setting method of the signal processing unit by taking the filter set between the digital phase shifter and the power divider as an example, and the embodiment of the present application does not limit the digital phase shifter and the filter The setting order in the signal processing unit, for example, the digital phase shifter and filter can be set in the order of the digital phase shifter, filter and power divider described in the above content, or can be set in the order of filter, digital phase shifter and power divider. The order of the power dividers can be set in turn, and some links can be set in the order of digital phase shifter, filter and power divider, and another part of the link can be set in the order of filter, digital phase shifter and power divider. ,and many more.

In this embodiment of the present application, when the signal processing unit includes a power divider, a digital phase shifter, and a filter, the power divider, the digital phase shifter, and the filter may be set on the same physical unit, or may be set on different On the physical unit of the device, it can also be arbitrarily set in a way that some components are combined in one physical unit and some components are set independently, which is not limited in this application. Moreover, the above embodiments are described by taking the filtering unit disposed inside the signal processing unit as an example. In actual operation, the filtering unit may also be disposed outside the signal processing unit, which is not limited in this application.

It should be noted that, various embodiments in this application may also be combined with each other to form new embodiments. E.g:

FIG. 13 exemplarily shows a schematic structural diagram of another base station antenna corresponding to an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG. 13 , the base station antenna in this embodiment is a combination of the base station antenna shown in FIG. 9 and the base station antenna shown in FIG. 10 . The base station antenna gets the new base station antenna. In this example, the base station antenna may include an antenna array, a second combiner/splitter, and K signal processing units, such as signal processing unit 1, signal processing unit 2, ..., signal processing unit K, where each signal processing unit The phase-shifting feed network in the unit may include a digital phase shifter, for example, the phase-shifting feed network 1 in the signal processing unit 1 includes a digital phase shifter 1, and the phase-shifting feed network 2 in the signal processing unit 2 includes a digital phase shifter. The phase shifters 2, . . . , the phase shift feed network K in the signal processing unit K includes a digital phase shifter K. The first end of each digital phase shifter corresponds to the first end of the phase-shifting feed network where it is located, and the second end of each digital phase shifter corresponds to the second end of the phase-shifting feed network where it is located. The digital phase shifter 1 to the digital phase shifter K are respectively provided with switch control circuits C1 to CK, the control terminals of the switch control circuits C1 to CK are respectively connected to the output terminal of the remote control unit, and the input terminal of the remote control unit is connected to the control interface. In this example, the base station antenna can adjust the phase shift parameters of each digital phase shifter through the remote control unit, so that each transmit signal can achieve different phases, and then the transmit signals can be combined into one through the second combiner/splitter Then it is fed to the corresponding radiation unit through the power divider. The base station antenna can also combine the received signals of multiple radiating units into one through the power divider and send it to the second combiner/splitter. The second combiner/splitter divides the received signal into multiple received sub-signals and sends them. For a plurality of digital phase shifters, the remote control unit adjusts the phase shifting parameters of each digital phase shifter, so that the multi-channel received sub-signals can achieve different phases.

Exemplarily, in this embodiment of the present application, in addition to a filter may be set between the phase shifter and the power divider, another filter may also be set between the phase shifter and the signal transceiving port, as shown in FIG. 2 . This setting method can also filter out the impurities in the transmit signal before sending the transmit signal from the remote radio frequency unit to the phase shifter, so that the phase shifter can only phase-shift and feed the useful signal as far as possible. Phase-shift feeding is not performed on useless out-of-band interference signals, so as to achieve the purpose of saving the processing resources of the base station antenna. Moreover, this method can also filter out the impurities in the received signal before sending the received signal after the phase shifter to the remote radio unit, so that not only the remote radio unit can only perform subsequent processing on the useful signal. , so as to save the processing resources of the remote radio frequency unit, reduce the nonlinear interference generated by the phase shifter, and improve the quality of the received signal transmitted to the remote radio frequency unit. Through two filtering operations, nonlinear interference and out-of-band interference in the base station antenna can be further suppressed.

In addition, the scheme of setting the combiner/splitter between the phase shifter and the signal transceiver port shown in FIG. 2 corresponds to the base station antenna shown in FIG. 8 , and the scheme shown in FIG. 2 is set between the signal transceiver port and the antenna array. The scheme of filter and phase shifter corresponds to the base station antenna shown in FIG. 7 . It should be understood that, in addition to the components shown in FIG. 2 , other components may also be provided in the signal processing unit, which is not specifically limited.

It should be noted that, the above-mentioned embodiments of the present application only take one antenna as an example to describe the possible structure of the base station antenna. In practical applications, the base station antenna may also include multiple antennas, and one or more antennas may exist in the multiple antennas to implement filtering processing and phase shifting processing using the solution in this application, which will not be described in this application.

It should be understood that each component in the above embodiments of the present application refers to functional devices, and the present application does not limit the specific implementation of these functional components.

Based on the same inventive concept, the embodiments of the present application also provide a base station device, including the base station antenna provided by the embodiments of the present application, and one or more transceivers, wherein the one or more transceivers can be respectively connected with the base station. Multiple antenna ports in the antenna are connected one by one.

Exemplarily, the transceiver in the base station equipment may be a remote radio frequency unit.

In the above-mentioned embodiments, it may be implemented in whole or in part by software, hardware, firmware or any combination thereof. When implemented in software, it can be implemented in whole or in part in the form of a computer program product. The computer program product includes one or more computer instructions. When the computer instructions are loaded and executed on a computer, all or part of the processes or functions described in the embodiments of the present application are generated. The computer may be a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, computer network, or other programmable device. The computer instructions may be stored in or transmitted from one computer-readable storage medium to another computer-readable storage medium, for example, the computer instructions may be downloaded from a website site, computer, server, or data center Transmission to another website site, computer, server, or data center by wire (eg, coaxial cable, optical fiber, digital subscriber line, DSL) or wireless (eg, infrared, wireless, microwave, etc.). The computer-readable storage medium can be any available medium that can be accessed by a computer or a data storage device such as a server, a data center, or the like that includes an integration of one or more available media. The available media may be magnetic media (eg, floppy disks, hard disks, magnetic tapes), optical media (eg, high-density digital video discs (DVDs)), or semiconductor media (eg, solid state discs, SSD)) etc.

The terms "component", "module", "system" and the like are used in this specification to refer to a computer-related entity, hardware, firmware, a combination of hardware and software, software, or software in execution. For example, a component may be, but is not limited to, a process running on a processor, a processor, an object, an executable, a thread of execution, a program, and/or a computer. By way of illustration, both an application running on a computing device and the computing device may be components. One or more components may reside within a process and/or thread of execution, and a component may be localized on one computer and/or distributed between two or more computers. In addition, these components can execute from various computer readable media having various data structures stored thereon. A component may, for example, be based on a signal having one or more data packets (eg, data from two components interacting with another component between a local system, a distributed system, and/or a network, such as the Internet interacting with other systems via signals) Communicate through local and/or remote processes.

Those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that the various illustrative logical blocks and steps described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein can be implemented in electronic hardware, or a combination of computer software and electronic hardware accomplish. Whether these functions are performed in hardware or software depends on the specific application and design constraints of the technical solution. Skilled artisans may implement the described functionality using different methods for each particular application, but such implementations should not be considered beyond the scope of this application.

Those skilled in the art can clearly understand that, for the convenience and brevity of description, the specific working process of the above-described systems, devices and units may refer to the corresponding processes in the foregoing method embodiments, which will not be repeated here.

In the several embodiments provided in this application, it should be understood that the disclosed system, apparatus and method may be implemented in other manners. For example, the apparatus embodiments described above are only illustrative. For example, the division of the units is only a logical function division. In actual implementation, there may be other division methods. For example, multiple units or components may be combined or Can be integrated into another system, or some features can be ignored, or not implemented. On the other hand, the shown or discussed mutual coupling or direct coupling or communication connection may be through some interfaces, indirect coupling or communication connection of devices or units, and may be in electrical, mechanical or other forms.

The units described as separate components may or may not be physically separated, and components displayed as units may or may not be physical units, that is, may be located in one place, or may be distributed to multiple network units. Some or all of the units may be selected according to actual needs to achieve the purpose of the solution in this embodiment.

In addition, each functional unit in each embodiment of the present application may be integrated into one processing unit, or each unit may exist physically alone, or two or more units may be integrated into one unit.

The functions, if implemented in the form of software functional units and sold or used as independent products, may be stored in a computer-readable storage medium. Based on this understanding, the technical solution of the present application can be embodied in the form of a software product in essence, or the part that contributes to the prior art or the part of the technical solution. The computer software product is stored in a storage medium, including Several instructions are used to cause a computer device (which may be a personal computer, a server, or a network device, etc.) to execute all or part of the steps of the methods described in the various embodiments of the present application. The aforementioned storage medium includes: U disk, mobile hard disk, read-only memory (ROM), random access memory (RAM), magnetic disk or optical disk and other media that can store program codes .

Although a few possible embodiments have been described in this application, additional changes and modifications to these embodiments may occur to those skilled in the art once the basic inventive concepts are known. Therefore, the appended claims are intended to be construed to include the embodiments of the present application and all changes and modifications that fall within the scope of the present application.

Obviously, those skilled in the art can make various changes and modifications to the present application without departing from the spirit and scope of the present application. Thus, if these modifications and variations of the present application fall within the scope of the claims of the present application and their equivalents, the present application is also intended to include these modifications and variations.

Claims

A base station antenna, characterized in that it includes a signal processing unit and an antenna array; the signal processing unit includes a signal transceiving port, a phase-shifting feed network and a filtering unit, and the signal transceiving port is connected to the phase-shifting feed network. a first end, the second end of the phase-shift feeding network is connected to the first end of the filtering unit, and the second end of the filtering unit is connected to the antenna array;

The phase-shift feeding network is used to perform phase-shift feeding on the transmitted signal from the signal transceiving port and then send it to the filtering unit, or to shift the received signal after filtering processing from the filtering unit. After the phase is fed, it is sent to the signal transceiver port;

The filtering unit is configured to perform filtering processing on the transmitted signal after the phase-shifted feeding and send it to the antenna array, or perform filtering processing on the received signal from the antenna array and then send it to the phase-shifted feed network;

The antenna array is configured to radiate the transmitted signal after filtering, or receive the received signal and send it to the filtering unit.
The base station antenna according to claim 1, wherein the transmitted signal and the received signal are carried in the same frequency band.
The base station antenna according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the signal processing unit comprises M signal transceiving ports and a first combiner/splitter, where M is a positive integer greater than or equal to 2; the first The combiner/splitter includes M branch ends and combiner ends, the M branch ends of the first combiner/splitter are respectively connected to the M signal transceiver ports, the first combiner/splitter The combining end is connected to the first end of the phase-shifted feeding network;

The first combiner/splitter is configured to combine the M transmission signals from the M signal transceiver ports into one and send it to the phase-shifted feeding network, or to combine all the signals after the phase-shifted feed. The received signal is divided into M channels and then sent to the M signal transceiving ports respectively.
The base station antenna according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the base station antenna comprises K signal processing units and a second combiner/splitter, and K is a positive integer greater than or equal to 2; The second combiner/splitter includes K split ends and a combiner end, and the second ends of the K filter units corresponding to the K signal processing units are respectively connected to the K split ends of the second combiner/splitter. a circuit end, the combining end of the second combiner/splitter is connected to the antenna array;

The second combiner/splitter is configured to combine the K transmit signals after filtering and processing sent by the K filter units into one channel and send them to the antenna array, or divide the received signals into K After the route, the filters are respectively sent to the K filtering units.
The base station antenna according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the phase-shift feeding network comprises a first digital phase shifter, and a first end of the first digital phase shifter corresponds to the the first end of the phase-shifting feed network, and the second end of the first digital phase shifter corresponds to the second end of the phase-shifting feed network;

The first digital phase shifter is used for phase-shifting and feeding the transmitted signal and then sending it to the filtering unit, or performing phase-shifting and feeding the filtered received signal and then sending it to the filtering unit. Signal transceiver port.
The base station antenna according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the phase-shifting feed network comprises a power divider and N second digital phase-shifters, where N is a positive integer greater than or equal to 2 ; The power divider includes a first end and N second ends, the first end of the power divider corresponds to the first end of the phase-shift feeding network, and the N second ends of the power divider respectively connect the first ends of the N second digital phase shifters, and the second ends of the N second digital phase shifters are connected to the filtering unit;

The power divider is configured to divide the transmission signal into N transmission sub-signals and then send them to the N second digital phase shifters respectively, or, for the transmission signals from the N second digital phase shifters. The phase-shifted N received signals are weighted and sent to the signal transceiving port;

The N second digital phase shifters are used for performing phase shifting on the N transmitted sub-signals after power distribution and then sending them to the filtering unit, or, performing phase shifting on the N transmitted sub-signals from the filtering unit after filtering. The received signal is phase-shifted and sent to the power divider.
The base station antenna according to claim 6, wherein the filtering unit comprises N filters, the antenna array comprises N groups of radiating units; the first ends of the N filters are respectively connected to the N filters the second ends of the second digital phase shifter, the second ends of the N filters are respectively connected to the N groups of radiation units;

The N second digital phase shifters are configured to perform phase-shift processing on the N transmitted sub-signals after power distribution and then send them to the N filters respectively, or, The filtered N received signals are phase-shifted and sent to the power divider;

The N filters are used to filter the N transmitted sub-signals after phase-shift processing and then send them to the N groups of radiation units, or to perform filtering on the N received signals from the N groups of radiation units Send to the N second digital phase shifters after filtering;

The N groups of radiation units are configured to respectively radiate the N transmit sub-signals after filtering, or transmit the N receive signals to the N filters respectively.
The base station antenna according to any one of claims 5 to 7, wherein the base station antenna further comprises a control unit and a control interface; an input end of the control unit is connected to the control interface, and an input end of the control unit is connected to the control interface. The output end is connected to a digital phase shifter; the digital phase shifter is the first digital phase shifter or N second digital phase shifters;

the control unit, configured to send a phase-shift control instruction to the digital phase shifter according to a phase-shift control signal from the control interface;

The digital phase shifter is used to adjust the phase of the transmitted signal or the received signal according to the phase shift control instruction.
A base station device, comprising the base station antenna according to any one of claims 1 to 8 and one or more transceivers;

The one or more transceivers are connected to the base station antenna.
The base station equipment of claim 9, wherein the transceiver is a remote radio frequency unit.