Abstract: Aspects of the present disclosure relate to integration of sensing and wireless communications. Wireless communication networks can configure and implement both sensing signals and communication signals. Sensing signals, or sensing reference signals, can be used to determine properties of the environment, and do not carry any information or data for the purpose of communications. Communication signals, on the other hand, are signals that carry information or data between network entities. Sensing agents can be used for both passive and active sensing. Sensing agents may be dedicated devices capable of performing passive sensing, active sensing, or both. Sensing agents can also be existing networks device such as user equipment or transmit receive points. Methodologies described here may be particularly beneficial for half-duplex systems, but could also be implemented in full duplex systems.

Abstract: A method embodiment includes implementing, by a base station (BS), a grant-free uplink transmission scheme. The grant-free uplink transmission scheme defines a first contention transmission unit (CTU) access region in a time-frequency domain, defines a plurality of CTUs, defines a default CTU mapping scheme by mapping at least some of the plurality of CTUs to the first CTU access region, and defines a default user equipment (UE) mapping scheme by defining rules for mapping a plurality of UEs to the plurality of CTUs.

Abstract: Some embodiments of the present disclosure provide a location management function that receives, from a sensor system, a sensing-based profile that includes a sensing-based observation of a UE and receives, from a communication system, a reference-signal-based observation of the UE. The location management function may derive, from the sensing-based observation, a position hypothesis and may determine, from the reference-signal-based observation, UE identity information for the UE. By processing the reference-signal-based observation in conjunction with the sensing-based observation, the location management function may determine an association between the sensing-based observation and the reference-signal-based observation. The location management function may then transmit, to the UE having the UE identity information determined from the reference-signal-based observation, an indication of the position hypothesis derived from the sensing-based observation.

Abstract: A method and User Equipment (UE) for estimating locations of obstacles to signal transmission in a wireless communication network is disclosed. The method involves at the UE in communication with the network, in response to receiving a reference signal from a neighboring node via a non-line-of-sight (NLoS) transmission, transmitting an identification of the neighboring node to network equipment implementing the wireless communications network to facilitate estimating locations of the obstacles to signal transmission based on estimates of the location of the UE and the neighboring node.

Abstract: Aspects of the present disclosure relate to integration of sensing and wireless communications. Wireless communication networks can configure and implement both sensing signals and communication signals. Sensing signals, or sensing reference signals, can be used to determine properties of the environment, and do not carry any information or data for the purpose of communications. Communication signals, on the other hand, are signals that carry information or data between network entities. Sensing agents can be used for both passive and active sensing. Sensing agents may be dedicated devices capable of performing passive sensing, active sensing, or both. Sensing agents can also be existing networks device such as user equipment or transmit receive points. Methodologies described here may be particularly beneficial for half-duplex systems, but could also be implemented in full duplex systems.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for integrated communication and sensing. For example, an electronic device may transmit a radio frequency (RF) pulse signal in the active phase of a periodic sensing cycle, and sense in the passive phase of the sensing cycle, a reflection of the RF pulse signal reflected from an object. The RF pulse signal is defined by a waveform for carrying communication data between electronic devices. The sensed RF pulse signal is at least a portion of the transmitted or reflected RF pulse signal, wherein the portion is equal to or greater than a threshold value for the object being within a sensing range of the first electronic device. The electronic device may also receive a communication signal from another electronic device during the passive phase.

Abstract: Aspects of the present application relate to mobile communication devices having active device components and passive device components and, more particularly, to operation of the passive device components to form a backscatter signal from a received forward signal. Forming the backscatter signal may include generating the backscatter signal from the received forward signal without decoding a plurality of sub-signals in the received forward signal, the backscatter signal being a time-domain function of a contiguous subset of the time-domain plurality of sub-signals in the received forward signal. Upon receipt of the backscatter signal, a reception point may obtain information about the mobile communication device that contains the passive device components. Such information may relate to timing, position and identity.

Abstract: A method for an apparatus comprises obtaining a frequency modulation parameter corresponding to a frequency change rate of a frequency-modulated subcarrier; generating an Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM)-based waveform signal comprising a plurality of frequency-modulated subcarriers, the plurality of frequency-modulated subcarriers modulated according to the obtained frequency modulation parameter; and outputting the OFDM-based waveform signal. A plurality of modulated symbols may be generated from a sequence of bits and the modulated symbols may be precoded, according to the frequency modulation parameter, to generate precoded symbols. The OFDM-based waveform signal may then be generated from the precoded symbols. A corresponding method for detecting and decoding the waveform signal is also provided.

Abstract: Some embodiments of the present disclosure provide for configuring devices to passively identify themselves even while not actively engaged in accessing a network. Upon receipt of a sensing signal, passive device components of a given device form a backscatter signal that is an altered version of the sensing signal. The source of the sensing signal, or an appropriately configured network node, upon receipt of the backscatter, may identify the given device by the nature of the alteration. The source of the sensing signal, or the appropriately configured network node, may then be considered to have gained information on the existence of the given device as well as a general location for the given device. The network may enlist the help of other devices to sense the environment and, by doing so, may ultimately achieve a greater degree of resolution of the sensed environment.

Abstract: Some embodiments of the present disclosure provide a manner for sensing devices (UEs) to collaborate with base stations to sense an environment. The UEs may obtain observations based on sensing signals transmitted in the environment and provide the observations to a dedicated processing node. The processing node is configured to process the received observations to coherently combine the observations to generate an enhanced observation. In addition to distributing the sensing to multiple UEs, the processing of the observations may also be distributed.

Abstract: Systems and methods of integrated sensing and communication are provided. These involve using a communications network for the exchange of both communications signals and sensing signals. A device on the network, which might be a user equipment or a network device, uses a first set of channels to transmit sensing signals for use in cooperative sensing involving a multiple devices, which may include user equipment and/or network devices, for sensing a target that is not registered in the network, such as a building. The device uses a second set of channels to transmit a communications signal. The second set of channels includes at least one channel not included in the first protocol stack.

Abstract: Systems and methods for the generation of sensing signals and sensing signal configurations for a wireless communication network are provided. In an embodiment, a sensing node identifier (ID) associated with a network entity is determined. This sensing node ID is used to determine a sensing signal configuration, which includes a resource configuration and a symbol sequence. The resource configuration is selected from a set of physical resources associated with a wireless communication network. The symbol sequence is based on the sensing node ID and is specific to the network entity in the wireless communication network. A sensing signal can be transmitted according to the sensing signal configuration.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for integrated communication and sensing. For example, an electronic device may transmit a radio frequency (RF) pulse signal in the active phase of a periodic sensing cycle, and sense in the passive phase of the sensing cycle, a reflection of the RF pulse signal reflected from an object. The RF pulse signal is defined by a waveform for carrying communication data between electronic devices. The sensed RF pulse signal is at least a portion of the transmitted or reflected RF pulse signal, wherein the portion is equal to or greater than a threshold value for the object being within a sensing range of the first electronic device. The electronic device may also receive a communication signal from another electronic device during the passive phase.

Abstract: Some embodiments of the present disclosure provide a user equipment (UE) having active device components and passive device components. Responsive to receiving downlink (DL) transmissions in time division duplexing (TDD) mode, the active device components perform DL decoding while the passive device components perform passive transmission of ACK/NACK data. Such passive transmission may involve encoding the ACK/NACK data in an altered version of received radio frequency (RF) signals and using so-called backscatter communications to reflect the received RF signals, with alteration, using the same frequency resources used to receive the DL transmissions.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for integrated communication and sensing. For example, an electronic device may transmit a radio frequency (RF) pulse signal in the active phase of a periodic sensing cycle, and sense in the passive phase of the sensing cycle, a reflection of the RF pulse signal reflected from an object. The RF pulse signal is defined by a waveform for carrying communication data between electronic devices. The sensed RF pulse signal is at least a portion of the transmitted or reflected RF pulse signal, wherein the portion is equal to or greater than a threshold value for the object being within a sensing range of the first electronic device. The electronic device may also receive a communication signal from another electronic device during the passive phase.

Abstract: Some embodiments of the present disclosure provide a transmit point that transmits a downlink chirp sensing waveform (DL CSW) signal. A device receives the DL CSW signal and obtains a cloned chirp sensing waveform. The cloned chirp sensing waveform includes a parameter that can be uniquely associated with the device. The device transmits a UL cloned CSW signal based on the cloned chirp sensing waveform. The transmit point receives the UL cloned CSW signal and processes the UL cloned CSW signal to estimate a pose for the device and associate the estimated pose with the identity of the device.

Abstract: Some embodiments of the present disclosure provide for use of a linear chirp signal as a basis for a sensing signal. Modification of the linear chirp signal by a signature function can allow a receiver of the sensing signal to determine an identity for a source of the sensing signal. Accordingly, upon processing the received sensing signal to obtain path parameter estimates, the receiver can direct a transmission of an indication of the path parameter estimates to the source of the sensing signal. Aspects of the present application relate to performing multi-node, multi-path channel estimation on the basis of processing the received sensing signal. Conveniently, the processing is performed with low complexity.

Abstract: A method and User Equipment (UE) for estimating locations of obstacles to signal transmission in a wireless communication network is disclosed. The method involves at the UE in communication with the network, in response to receiving a reference signal from a neighboring node via a non-line-of-sight (NLoS) transmission, transmitting an identification of the neighboring node to network equipment implementing the wireless communications network to facilitate estimating locations of the obstacles to signal transmission based on estimates of the location of the UE and the neighboring node.

Abstract: Some embodiments of the present disclosure provide a user equipment (UE) having active device components and passive device components. Responsive to receiving downlink (DL) transmissions in time division duplexing (TDD) mode, the active device components perform DL decoding while the passive device components perform passive transmission of ACK/NACK data. Such passive transmission may involve encoding the ACK/NACK data in an altered version of received radio frequency (RF) signals and using so-called backscatter communications to reflect the received RF signals, with alteration, using the same frequency resources used to receive the DL transmissions.

Abstract: According to aspects of the disclosure, there is provided a method for a UE to select or be assigned or configured with a spreading sequence that is based on one or more communication parameters such as receiver type, receiver capability, SE, TBS, MCS, traffic load, PAPR requirement, MCL, number of layers, overloading, reliability requirement, transmission power consumption, number of active UEs, and transmission latency constraint, etc. In some embodiments, the spreading sequence may be related to a performance metric associated with an above parameter (PAPR, BLER, etc.). In some embodiments, this is achieved by associating spreading sequences with parameters or performance metrics, or both. In some instances the spreading sequences may be arranged or ordered in a manner to reduce signaling overhead (e.g., signaling an index is more efficient than signaling a value of a metric, and ordering correlates the index to the value).