Patent ID: 8018890
Filing Date: 2011-09-13
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. An apparatus, comprising: a transceiver adapted for use in a hop by hop (HbH) relay network and configured to reduce ARQ overhead by coupling HARQ and ARQ feedback signaling in each hop of said HbH relay network; wherein each hop is treated as an equivalent link in a regular network; wherein at the physical layer (PHY), each hop performs HARQ independently from other hops; and wherein on top of HARQ, ARQ is coupled with per-hop HARQ and a new buffered state is added when a block is locally ACKed, and different ACKs are distinguished such that a HbH local ARQ ACK or HARQ-generated ACK will lead to said buffered state, and wherein in said buffered state, if an ARQ NACK comes, said block goes back to a retransmission state.