Patent ID: 9356759
Filing Date: 2016-05-31
CPC Classification: H04L,H04W

Claim Text:
1. A method, comprising: signaling, by a first network node in a network to a transmission unit owner node, identifying one or more remaining wireless time slot-frequency pairings of a current transmission unit assigned to the first network node that will not be used by the first network node during the current transmission unit, wherein a transmission unit includes a plurality of wireless time slot-frequency pairings for transmitting information, and wherein the current transmission unit was assigned to the first network node prior to the occurrence of the current transmission unit; reassigning, by the transmission unit owner node in response to said signaling, said one or more remaining wireless time slot-frequency pairings to a second network node in the network to use during the current transmission unit; and requesting, by the second network node from the transmission unit owner node, additional wireless time slot-frequency pairings; wherein the first network node and second network node are children network nodes of the transmission unit owner node; wherein the second network node communicates with said transmission unit owner node in a particular time slot-frequency pairing including a particular frame time for sending from the second network node to the transmission unit owner node a data frame, a particular acknowledgement time for sending from the transmission unit owner node to the second network node an ACK message acknowledging successful receipt of the data frame, and a particular acknowledgment of the acknowledgment time for sending from the second network node to the transmission unit owner node an ACK-ACK message acknowledging successful receipt of the ACK message.