US-12628113-B2 - Positioning

Abstract

Certain examples of the present disclosure relate to an apparatus ( 110 ) comprising means for: receiving Ultra-Wideband, UWB, Reference Signal, RS, configuration information ( 503 ), wherein the UWB RS configuration information comprises information for configuring a transmission or a reception of a UWB RS 508 by the apparatus ( 110 ) to or from at least one node of a Radio Access Network, RAN 120 ; and based at least in part on the received UWB RS configuration information ( 503 ), causing transmission or reception of the UWB RS 508 to or from the at least one node of the RAN 120.

Inventors

• Oana-Elena BARBU
• Benny Vejlgaard
• JOHANNES HARREBEK
• Ryan Keating

Assignees

• NOKIA TECHNOLOGIES OY

Dates

Publication Date

20260512

Application Date

20210830

Claims (20)

1. 1 . An apparatus comprising: at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the apparatus to perform the following operations: receiving Ultra-Wideband (UWB) Reference Signal (RS) configuration information, wherein the UWB RS configuration information comprises information for configuring a transmission or a reception of a UWB RS by the apparatus to or from at least one node of a Radio Access Network (RAN), wherein the UWB RS configuration information is received from a Location Management Function (LMF) via a serving Next Generation Node B (gNB) while the apparatus is in a Radio Resource Control (RRC) idle state, and wherein the UWB RS configuration information specifies (i) a Gaussian monocycle pulse type, (ii) a pulse width of 1 nanosecond, (iii) a bandwidth of 499.2 megahertz centered at 6.8 gigahertz, (iv) a periodicity of 20 milliseconds, (v) a transmission time offset of four Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiplexing (OFDM) symbols from a frame start, and (vi) a one-millisecond transmission window; receiving, on paging resources offset by four slots relative to standard paging, a trigger identified as an nr-UWB-RequestLocationInformation message; and based at least in part on the received UWB RS configuration information and responsive to the trigger, causing, using a UWB transceiver that shares a reference clock locked to New Radio (NR) and without transitioning the apparatus out of the RRC idle state, the transmission of exactly three identical UWB RS bursts within the one-millisecond window to exactly two Transmission Reception Points (TRPs) consisting of the serving gNB and one neighbor gNB, each burst conforming to the specified pulse type, width, bandwidth, center frequency, periodicity, and OFDM-symbol offset, wherein the UWB RS configuration information further indicates that the two TRPs perform Time of Arrival (TOA) and Angle of Arrival (AoA) measurements on the UWB RS and report results to the LMF.
2. 2 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein each of the three Ultra-Wideband Reference Signal bursts comprises a preamble of 128 pulses followed by a 32-pulse payload encoding a fixed sequence identifier for the bursts.
3. 3 . The apparatus of claim 2 , wherein the three identical Ultra-Wideband Reference Signal bursts are emitted with equal inter-burst spacing of approximately 333 microseconds within the one-millisecond transmission window, with a tolerance of ±5 microseconds.
4. 4 . The apparatus of claim 3 , wherein the apparatus applies a transmit-power backoff of 10 decibels relative to a pre-configured maximum power for the Ultra-Wideband Reference Signal.
5. 5 . The apparatus of claim 4 , wherein, prior to causing the transmission, the apparatus verifies that the shared reference clock is phase-aligned to a New Radio frame boundary within ±100 nanoseconds and defers transmission until the alignment is within said bound.
6. 6 . The apparatus of claim 5 , wherein the computer program instructions further cause the apparatus to perform the following operation: transmitting, after the three bursts, a confirmation message to the Location Management Function via the serving Next Generation Node B that includes a local timestamp for each burst and identifiers for the serving Next Generation Node B and the neighbor Next Generation Node B.
7. 7 . The apparatus of claim 6 , wherein each of the three UWB RS bursts comprises a time-hopping sequence of length thirty-two with a chip interval of two nanoseconds, the time-hopping code being identical across the three bursts and specified in the UWB RS configuration information.
8. 8 . A system comprising: an apparatus; at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the apparatus to perform the following operations: receiving Ultra-Wideband (UWB) Reference Signal (RS) configuration information, wherein the UWB RS configuration information comprises information for configuring a transmission or a reception of a UWB RS by the apparatus to or from at least one node of a Radio Access Network (RAN), wherein the UWB RS configuration information is received from a Location Management Function (LMF) via a serving Next Generation Node B (gNB) while the apparatus is in a Radio Resource Control (RRC) idle state, and wherein the UWB RS configuration information specifies (i) a Gaussian monocycle pulse type, (ii) a pulse width of 1 nanosecond, (iii) a bandwidth of 499.2 megahertz centered at 6.8 gigahertz, (iv) a periodicity of 20 milliseconds, (v) a transmission time offset of four Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiplexing (OFDM) symbols from a frame start, and (vi) a one-millisecond transmission window; receiving, on paging resources offset by four slots relative to standard paging, a trigger identified as an nr-UWB-RequestLocationInformation message; and based at least in part on the received UWB RS configuration information and responsive to the trigger, causing, without transitioning the apparatus out of the RRC idle state and using a UWB transceiver that shares a reference clock locked to New Radio (NR), the transmission of exactly three identical UWB RS bursts within the one-millisecond window to exactly two Transmission Reception Points (TRPs) consisting of the serving gNB and one neighbor gNB, each burst conforming to the specified pulse type, width, bandwidth, center frequency, periodicity, and OFDM-symbol offset, wherein the UWB RS configuration information further indicates that the two TRPs perform Time of Arrival (TOA) and Angle of Arrival (AoA) measurements on the UWB RS and report results to the LMF.
9. 9 . The system of claim 8 , wherein each of the three Ultra-Wideband Reference Signal bursts comprises a preamble of 128 pulses followed by a 32-pulse payload encoding a fixed sequence identifier for the bursts.
10. 10 . The system of claim 9 , wherein the three identical Ultra-Wideband Reference Signal bursts are emitted with equal inter-burst spacing of approximately 333 microseconds within the one-millisecond transmission window, with a tolerance of ±5 microseconds.
11. 11 . The system of claim 10 , wherein the apparatus applies a transmit-power backoff of 10 decibels relative to a pre-configured maximum power for the Ultra-Wideband Reference Signal.
12. 12 . The system of claim 11 , wherein, prior to causing the transmission, the apparatus verifies that the shared reference clock is phase-aligned to a New Radio frame boundary within ±100 nanoseconds and defers transmission until the alignment is within said bound.
13. 13 . The system of claim 12 , wherein the computer program instructions further cause the apparatus to perform the following operation: transmitting, after the three bursts, a confirmation message to the Location Management Function via the serving Next Generation Node B that includes a local timestamp for each burst and identifiers for the serving Next Generation Node B and the neighbor Next Generation Node B.
14. 14 . The system of claim 13 , wherein each of the three UWB RS bursts comprises a time-hopping sequence of length thirty-two with a chip interval of two nanoseconds, the time-hopping code being identical across the three bursts and specified in the UWB RS configuration information.
15. 15 . A method performed by a user equipment (UE), the method comprising: receiving Ultra-Wideband (UWB) Reference Signal (RS) configuration information, wherein the UWB RS configuration information comprises information for configuring a transmission or a reception of a UWB RS by the UE to or from at least one node of a Radio Access Network (RAN), wherein the UWB RS configuration information is received from a Location Management Function (LMF) via a serving Next Generation Node B (gNB) while the UE is in a Radio Resource Control (RRC) idle state, and wherein the UWB RS configuration information specifies (i) a Gaussian monocycle pulse type, (ii) a pulse width of 1 nanosecond, (iii) a bandwidth of 499.2 megahertz centered at 6.8 gigahertz, (iv) a periodicity of 20 milliseconds, (v) a transmission time offset of four Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiplexing (OFDM) symbols from a frame start, and (vi) a one-millisecond transmission window; receiving, on paging resources offset by four slots relative to standard paging, a trigger identified as an nr-UWB-RequestLocationInformation message; and based at least in part on the received UWB RS configuration information and responsive to the trigger, causing, without transitioning the UE out of the RRC idle state and using a UWB transceiver that shares a reference clock locked to New Radio (NR), the transmission of exactly three identical UWB RS bursts within the one-millisecond window to exactly two Transmission Reception Points (TRPs) consisting of the serving gNB and one neighbor gNB, each burst conforming to the specified pulse type, width, bandwidth, center frequency, periodicity, and OFDM-symbol offset, wherein the UWB RS configuration information further indicates that the two TRPs perform Time of Arrival (TOA) and Angle of Arrival (AoA) measurements on the UWB RS and report results to the LMF.
16. 16 . The method of claim 15 , wherein each of the three Ultra-Wideband Reference Signal bursts comprises a preamble of 128 pulses followed by a 32-pulse payload encoding a fixed sequence identifier for the bursts.
17. 17 . The method of claim 16 , wherein the three identical Ultra-Wideband Reference Signal bursts are emitted with equal inter-burst spacing of approximately 333 microseconds within the one-millisecond transmission window, with a tolerance of ±5 microseconds.
18. 18 . The method of claim 17 , further comprising applying a transmit-power backoff of 10 decibels relative to a pre-configured maximum power for the Ultra-Wideband Reference Signal.
19. 19 . The method of claim 18 , wherein, prior to causing the transmission, the UE verifies that the shared reference clock is phase-aligned to a New Radio frame boundary within ±100 nanoseconds and defers transmission until the alignment is within said bound.
20. 20 . The method of claim 19 , further comprising transmitting, after the three bursts, a confirmation message to the Location Management Function via the serving Next Generation Node B that includes a local timestamp for each burst and identifiers for the serving Next Generation Node B and the neighbor Next Generation Node B, and wherein each of the three UWB RS bursts comprises a time-hopping sequence of length thirty-two with a chip interval of two nanoseconds, the time-hopping code being identical across the three bursts and specified in the UWB RS configuration information.

Description

RELATED APPLICATION This application was originally filed as PCT Application No. PCT/US2021/048207, filed on Aug. 30, 2021, which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. TECHNOLOGICAL FIELD Examples of the present disclosure relate to positioning. Some examples, though without prejudice to the foregoing, relate to Ultra-Wide Bandwidth, UWB, based positioning in New Radio, NR. BACKGROUND A wireless network (e.g., a Next Generation Radio Access Network, NG-RAN) comprises a plurality of network nodes including: terminal nodes (e.g., User Equipment, UE), access nodes (e.g., gNodeBs, gNBs), wherein communication between the terminal nodes and access nodes is wireless. The conventional framework for positioning in 5th Generation, 5G, NR (i.e., to determine the position of a UE—either via an Uplink, UL, positioning procedure or a Downlink, DL, positioning procedure) involves the transmission of Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiplexing, OFDM, based Reference Signals. Such OFDM-based RSs can be either OFDM-based Sounding Reference Signals, SRS, transmitted by the UE for UL positioning; or OFDM-based Position Reference Signals, PRS, transmitted by gNBs for DL positioning. Such OFDM-based RSs are received, detected and measured by the gNBs (for UL positioning) or UE (for DL positioning). A Location Management Function, LMF, receives the measurements from the gNBs or UE. Such measurement information is received by the LMF via an Access and mobility Management Function, AMF, over a backhaul interface (e.g., NLs interface). The LMF then uses such received measurement information to compute the position of the UE. A NR Positioning Protocol A, NRPPa, carries positioning information between the NG-RAN nodes and the LMF over a NG control plane interface (e.g., NG-C interface). In some circumstances it may be desirable to provide an improved apparatus and method for positioning. In some circumstances it may be desirable to improve accuracy in determining a position of a terminal node. In some circumstances it may be desirable to reduce power consumption in determining a position of a terminal node. The listing or discussion of any prior-published document or any background in this specification should not necessarily be taken as an acknowledgement that the document or background is part of the state of the art or is common general knowledge. One or more aspects/examples of the present disclosure may or may not address one or more of the background issues. BRIEF SUMMARY The scope of protection sought for various embodiments of the invention is set out by the claims. According to various, but not necessarily all, examples of the disclosure there are provided examples as claimed in the appended claims. Any examples and features described in this specification that do not fall under the scope of the independent claims are to be interpreted as examples useful for understanding various embodiments of the invention. According to at least some examples of the disclosure there is provided an apparatus comprising means for: receiving Ultra-Wideband, UWB, Reference Signal, RS, configuration information, wherein the UWB RS configuration information comprises information for configuring a transmission or a reception of a UWB RS by the apparatus to or from at least one node of a Radio Access Network, RAN; andbased at least in part on the received UWB RS configuration information, causing transmission or reception of the UWB RS to or from the at least one node of the RAN. According to various, but not necessarily all, examples of the disclosure there is provided a method comprising: receiving Ultra-Wideband, UWB, Reference Signal, RS, configuration information, wherein the UWB RS configuration information comprises information for configuring a transmission or a reception of a UWB RS to or from at least one node of a Radio Access Network, RAN; andbased at least in part on the received UWB RS configuration information, causing transmission or reception of the UWB RS to or from the at least one node of the RAN. According to various, but not necessarily all, examples of the disclosure there is provided computer program instructions for causing an apparatus to perform: receiving Ultra-Wideband, UWB, Reference Signal, RS, configuration information, wherein the UWB RS configuration information comprises information for configuring a transmission or a reception of a UWB RS by the apparatus to or from at least one node of a Radio Access Network, RAN; andbased at least in part on the received UWB RS configuration information, causing transmission or reception of the UWB RS to or from the at least one node of the RAN. According to various, but not necessarily all, examples of the disclosure there is provided an apparatus comprising: at least one processor; andat least one memory including computer program instructions;the at least one memory and the computer program instructions configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the