Patent Description:
Aspects of the present disclosure relate to wireless communications, and more particularly, to techniques for configuring discontinuous reception for different groups of cells.

Wireless communication systems are widely deployed to provide various telecommunication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, broadcasts, etc. These wireless communication systems may employ multiple-access technologies capable of supporting communication with multiple users by sharing available system resources (for example, bandwidth, transmit power, etc.).

New radio (for example, <NUM> NR) is an example of an emerging telecommunication standard.

A control resource set (CORESET) for systems, such as an NR and LTE systems, may comprise one or more control resource (e.g., time and frequency resources) sets, configured for conveying PDCCH, within the system bandwidth. Within each CORESET, one or more search spaces (e.g., common search space (CSS), UE-specific search space (USS), etc.) may be defined for a given UE.

Documents of the prior art are <NPL>), retrieved from the Internet:URL:https://www. org/ftp/TSG_RAN/ WG4_Radio/TSGR4_AHs/TSGR4_AH-<NUM>/Docs/, document <CIT>, document <NPL>, retrieved from the Internet: URL:http://www. org/ ftp/tsg%5Fran/WG1%5FRL1/TSGR1%5F96/Does/R1%2D1903016%2Ezip, and document <CIT>.

The methods and devices of the disclosure each have several innovative aspects, no single one of which is solely responsible for the desirable attributes.

One innovative aspect of the subject matter described in this disclosure can be implemented in a method for a user equipment (UE) to perform wireless communications as according to claim <NUM>.

Aspects of the present disclosure provide an apparatus as according to claim <NUM> and a computer-readable medium as according to claim <NUM> for performing the methods described herein.

The following description and the appended drawings set forth in detail some illustrative features of the one or more aspects.

However, the accompanying drawings illustrate only some typical aspects of this disclosure and are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope.

Aspects of the present disclosure provide apparatus, methods, and computer readable mediums for signaling and processing dynamic control channel resources.

The following description provides examples of discontinuous reception configuration for different groups of cells, and is not limiting of the scope, applicability, or examples set forth in the claims.

For example, as shown in <FIG>, UE 120a may include a Dynamic Control Channel Resource Module <NUM> that may be configured to perform (or cause UE 120a to perform) operations <NUM> of <FIG>. Similarly, base station 110a may include a Dynamic Control Channel Resource Module <NUM> that may be configured to perform (or cause BS 110a to perform) operations <NUM> of <FIG> (e.g., to signal dynamic control channel resources to a UE performing operations <NUM>).

NR access (for example, <NUM> NR) may support various wireless communication services, such as enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) targeting wide bandwidth (for example, <NUM> or beyond), millimeter wave (mmWave) targeting high carrier frequency (for example, <NUM> or beyond), massive machine type communications MTC (mMTC) targeting non-backward compatible MTC techniques, or mission critical services targeting ultra-reliable low-latency communications (URLLC). In addition, these services may co-exist in the same time-domain resource (for example, a slot or subframe) or frequency-domain resource (for example, component carrier).

In some examples, the BSs <NUM> may be interconnected to one another or to one or more other BSs or network nodes (not shown) in wireless communication network <NUM> through various types of backhaul interfaces (for example, a direct physical connection, a wireless connection, a virtual network, or the like) using any suitable transport network. The UEs <NUM> (for example, 120x, 120y, etc.) may be dispersed throughout the wireless communication network <NUM>, and each UE <NUM> may be stationary or mobile.

Wireless communication network <NUM> may also include relay stations (for example, relay station 110r), also referred to as relays or the like, that receive a transmission of data or other information from an upstream station (for example, a BS 110a or a UE 120r) and sends a transmission of the data or other information to a downstream station (for example, a UE <NUM> or a BS <NUM>), or that relays transmissions between UEs <NUM>, to facilitate communication between devices.

The BSs <NUM> may also communicate with one another (for example, directly or indirectly) via wireless or wireline backhaul.

<FIG> shows a block diagram illustrating an example base station (BS) and an example user equipment (UE) in accordance with some aspects of the present disclosure.

The control information may be for the physical broadcast channel (PBCH), physical control format indicator channel (PCFICH), physical hybrid ARQ indicator channel (PHICH), physical downlink control channel (PDCCH), group common PDCCH (GC PDCCH), etc. The data may be for the physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH), etc. The processor <NUM> may process (for example, encode and symbol map) the data and control information to obtain data symbols and control symbols, respectively. The transmit processor <NUM> may also generate reference symbols, such as for the primary synchronization signal (PSS), secondary synchronization signal (SSS), and cell-specific reference signal (CRS). A transmit (TX) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) processor <NUM> may perform spatial processing (for example, precoding) on the data symbols, the control symbols, or the reference symbols, if applicable, and may provide output symbol streams to the modulators (MODs) 232a-232t. Each modulator <NUM> may process a respective output symbol stream (for example, for OFDM, etc.) to obtain an output sample stream. Each modulator may further process (for example, convert to analog, amplify, filter, and upconvert) the output sample stream to obtain a downlink signal. Downlink signals from modulators 232a-232t may be transmitted via the antennas 234a-234t, respectively.

At the UE <NUM>, the antennas 252a-252r may receive the downlink signals from the BS <NUM> and may provide received signals to the demodulators (DEMODs) in transceivers 254a-254r, respectively. Each demodulator <NUM> may condition (for example, filter, amplify, downconvert, and digitize) a respective received signal to obtain input samples. Each demodulator may further process the input samples (for example, for OFDM, etc.) to obtain received symbols. A MIMO detector <NUM> may obtain received symbols from all the demodulators 254a-254r, perform MIMO detection on the received symbols if applicable, and provide detected symbols. A receive processor <NUM> may process (for example, demodulate, deinterleave, and decode) the detected symbols, provide decoded data for the UE <NUM> to a data sink <NUM>, and provide decoded control information to a controller/processor <NUM>.

On the uplink, at UE <NUM>, a transmit processor <NUM> may receive and process data (for example, for the physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH)) from a data source <NUM> and control information (for example, for the physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) from the controller/processor <NUM>. The transmit processor <NUM> may also generate reference symbols for a reference signal (for example, for the sounding reference signal (SRS)). The symbols from the transmit processor <NUM> may be precoded by a TX MIMO processor <NUM> if applicable, further processed by the demodulators in transceivers 254a-254r (for example, for SC-FDM, etc.), and transmitted to the BS <NUM>.

A scheduler <NUM> may schedule UEs for data transmission on the downlink or uplink.

The controller/processor <NUM> or other processors and modules at the UE <NUM> may perform or direct the execution of processes for the techniques described herein. As shown in <FIG>, the controller/processor <NUM> of the UE <NUM> has a Discontinuous Reception Mode Module <NUM> that may be configured to perform operations <NUM> of <FIG>, while the controller/processor <NUM> of the BS <NUM> has a Discontinuous Reception Configuration Module <NUM> that may configure Discontinuous Reception Mode Module <NUM> with discontinuous reception configuration information for at least a first and a second group of cells, as discussed in further detail below. Although shown at the Controller/Processor, other components of the UE or BS may be used to perform the operations described herein.

A control resource set (CORESET) for systems, such as an NR and LTE systems, may comprise one or more control resource (e.g., time and frequency resources) sets, configured for conveying PDCCH, within the system bandwidth. Within each CORESET, one or more search spaces (e.g., common search space (CSS), UE-specific search space (USS), etc.) may be defined for a given UE. According to aspects of the present disclosure, a CORESET is a set of time and frequency domain resources, defined in units of resource element groups (REGs). Each REG may comprise a fixed number (e.g., twelve) tones in one symbol period (e.g., a symbol period of a slot), where one tone in one symbol period is referred to as a resource element (RE). A fixed number of REGs may be included in a control channel element (CCE). Sets of CCEs may be used to transmit new radio PDCCHs (NR-PDCCHs), with different numbers of CCEs in the sets used to transmit NR-PDCCHs using differing aggregation levels. Multiple sets of CCEs may be defined as search spaces for UEs, and thus a NodeB or other base station may transmit an NR-PDCCH to a UE by transmitting the NR-PDCCH in a set of CCEs that is defined as a decoding candidate within a search space for the UE, and the UE may receive the NR-PDCCH by searching in search spaces for the UE and decoding the NR-PDCCH transmitted by the NodeB.

Aspects of the present disclosure provide apparatus, methods, and computer readable mediums for configuring discontinuous reception modes at a user equipment for different groups of cells (e.g., in an interband carrier aggregation scenario in which one group of cells serving a user equipment operates in a first set of frequency resources and another group of cells serving the user equipment operates in a second set of frequency resources). As will be described, the techniques presented herein may allow for the use of more sparse "regular" periodic control channel resources, allowing a UE to conserve power by staying in a low power state longer (e.g., unless dynamic control channel resources are indicated in the regular control channel resources).

The techniques presented herein may be applied in various frequency resources, such as frequency bands utilized for NR. For example, for the higher band referred to as FR4 (e.g., <NUM> - <NUM>), an OFDM waveform with very large subcarrier spacing (<NUM> - <NUM>) is required to combat severe phase noise. Due to the large subcarrier spacing, the slot length tends to be very short. In a lower band, referred to as FR2 (<NUM> to <NUM>) with <NUM> SCS, the slot length is 125µSec, while in FR4 with <NUM>, the slot length is <NUM>.

In some discontinuous reception (DRX) procedures where carrier aggregation is configured, the carriers or serving cells may be configured with an identical DRX configuration and follow an identical DRX state machine for transitioning between awake and sleep states. Using an identical DRX configuration for different carriers, however, may be power inefficient. For example, in a scenario in which FR1 and FR2 bands are aggregated to serve a user equipment, FR2 bands may be used for offloading large data bursts, and FR1 bands may otherwise be used for other data transmissions (e.g., data bursts with smaller payloads), as transmissions in the FR2 band may provide higher throughput than transmissions in the FR1 band. However, transmissions in the FR2 band may have higher power consumption than transmissions in the FR1 band. Because of the power requirements for reception of data on higher frequency and higher bandwidth frequency resources (such as FR2 bands), maintaining active operations on the FR2 bands while operating on the FR1 bands may not be power efficient. In another example, traffic can vary within a burst. When traffic load reduces, the network can halt UE monitoring of the physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) on some serving cells to reduce power consumption.

Aspects of the present disclosure provide for configuring UEs for discontinuous reception using a common configuration while allowing for different groups of serving cells to be configured with different DRX inactivity timers and DRX monitoring period timers (e.g., the DRX on duration timer). Generally, the use of a common configuration may entail the use of the same configuration parameters to configure different groups of serving cells, where each of the groups of serving cells are associated with a discrete set of configuration parameters. By configuring DRX using a common configuration (e.g., same configuration parameters) while allowing for the use of different timers for different groups of cells, aspects of the present disclosure may provide for power savings by allowing the UE to enter a sleep state with respect to serving cells operating on higher throughput, higher power consumption bands after traffic slows down on these cells before the UE enters a sleep state with respect to serving cells operating on lower throughput, lower power consumption bands. Further, by configuring UEs with a common configuration (e.g., same configuration parameters), scheduling complexity may be reduced, as UEs may start DRX at the same time.

<FIG> illustrates example operations <NUM> for wireless communication by a UE, in accordance with some aspects of the present disclosure. For example, operations <NUM> may be performed by a UE 120a of <FIG> to perform discontinuous reception (DRX) operations with respect to different groups of serving cells, which operate on different frequency resources. The different frequency resources may include different ranges of frequencies, different pluralities of frequency bands, or other different sets of resources on which the UE may communicate in a wireless communication network.

Operations <NUM> begin, at block <NUM>, by receiving first discontinuous reception (DRX) configuration parameters for communications with a first group of cells and second DRX configuration parameters for communications with a second group of cells. The first DRX configuration parameters and the second DRX configuration parameters share common starting time parameters (e.g., specify a same starting time parameter in the first and second DRX configuration parameters), as discussed above, such that DRX cycles start at the same time for the first and the second groups of cells.

At block <NUM>, the UE monitors for communications by the cells operating in a first set of frequency resources based on the first DRX configuration parameters. The first set of frequency resources may include, for example, frequency range including a first set of frequency bands. The first set of frequency resources may be, for example, a frequency band that supports higher throughput using higher frequencies relative to a second set of frequency resources used for communications with the second group of cells.

At block <NUM>, the UE monitors for communications by the cells operating in a second set of frequency resources based on the second DRX configuration parameters. The second set of frequency resources may include, for example, frequency range including a second set of frequency bands. The second set of frequency resources may be, for example, a frequency band that supports lower throughput using lower frequencies relative to the first set of frequency resources used for communications with the first group of cells, as discussed above.

In some embodiments, DRX may be configured such that all serving cells use the same DRX timing parameters. For example, DRX may be configured such that the first set of cells and the second set of cells use a same (or common) short DRX cycle timer duration (this is required by the claimed invention), a same long DRX cycle timer duration, and/or a same starting offset.

Various techniques may be used to manage the short DRX cycle timer. According to the invention a common short DRX cycle timer is configured for all serving cells, regardless of the frequency band on which the serving cells operate. The short DRX cycle may be started and restarted when a DRX inactivity timer associated with one of the first group of cells or the second group of cells expires and the other inactivity timer is not running. By using a common short DRX cycle timer, a UE operates with the same type of DRX cycle for all serving cells, regardless of the frequency band on which the serving cells operate. Thus, a UE may be in a short DRX cycle or a long DRX cycle for both the first group of serving cells (which may operate on a lower frequency band, such as FR1) and the second group of serving cells (which may operate on a higher frequency band, such as FR2). Using a common short DRX cycle timer may keep a UE in a short DRX cycle, which may have higher power consumption than a long DRX cycle, for a longer amount of time with respect to serving cells operating on higher bandwidths in scenarios in which there is more traffic on serving cells operating on lower bandwidths. However, where data transmission is more frequently scheduled on serving cells operating on higher frequency bands than on serving cells operating on lower frequency bands, timers for the group of serving cells operating on the lower frequency bands may stop running before timers for the group of serving cells operating on the higher frequency bands.

In another embodiment, which is not encompassed by the wording of the claims, but is considered as useful for understanding the invention, each group of serving cells may be associated with its own short DRX cycle timer. The short DRX cycle timer associated with each group of serving cells may be started and restarted by expiry of the inactivity timer associated with that group of serving cells. Configuring a UE with different short DRX cycle timers for different groups of serving cells may provide for increased power savings, as the UE may enter more power efficient states (e.g., a long DRX cycle) with respect to serving cells operating on higher frequency bands prior to entering more power efficient states with respect to serving cells operating on lower frequency bands. However, the DRX cycle start time may diverge over time when a UE is configured with different short DRX cycle timers for different groups of serving cells.

In some embodiments, the DRX active time during which a UE monitors for transmissions on the physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) may be managed on a per-serving cell basis. A serving cell may be in active time when its associated DRX monitoring period timer (e.g., DRX on duration timer) and/or DRX inactivity timer is running. In some embodiments, the monitoring period timer may be, for example, a timer used to specify an amount of time for which a UE monitors for transmissions on a particular channel, such as a timer for monitoring transmissions from a cell on the PDCCH. A UE may enter an active time when a scheduling request has been triggered by the UE and the UE is waiting for an uplink grant from a serving cell. In some embodiments, UE may enter an active time state for serving cells that are configured with the first DRX configuration parameters and not configured with the second DRX configuration parameters (e.g., a secondary DRX monitoring period timer and a secondary DRX inactivity timer) when a scheduling request is triggered. In some embodiments, where serving cells operating on a first frequency band (e.g., FR1) and serving cells operating on a second frequency band (e.g., FR2) belong to different physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) groups, a UE may enter an active state with respect to serving cells in the same PUCCH group as the serving cell to which the UE triggered a scheduling request. A UE may also enter a DRX active time during a random access channel (RACH) procedure in which the UE has transmitted a Radio Resource Control (RRC) Connection Request (i.e., RACH msg3) and is waiting for a response from the serving cell (i.e., RACH msg4).

The short DRX cycle timer may also be managed based on receipt of a DRX media access control (MAC) control element (CE) from one of a plurality of serving cells. In some embodiments, when a DRX MAC CE is received, the UE may halt a DRX monitoring period and inactivity timer, regardless of the cell from which the DRX MAC CE is received, and the UE may restart a DRX short cycle timer. In some embodiments, when the UE receives a DRX MAC CE, the UE may halt the DRX monitoring period and inactivity timer for the group of cells in which the serving cell that the UE received the DRX MAC CE from belongs. For example, if a DRX MAC CE is received from a cell in the second group of cells (e.g., cells operating on the FR2 band), the second set of timers associated with the second group of cells may be halted, and the first set of timers associated with the first group of cells may not be affected. If a single short DRX cycle timer is configured, receipt of a DRX MAC CE from a cell in one of the groups of cells may halt a short DRX cycle timer based on whether an inactivity timer associated with the other group of cells is running. For example, if a DRX MAC CE is received from a cell in the second group of cells, the short DRX cycle timer may be started or restarted if the inactivity timer associated with the first group of cells is not running. In some embodiments not encompassed by the wording of the claims, if separate short DRX cycle timers are configured, receipt of a DRX MAC CE may start or restart the short DRX cycle timer for cells in the same group of cells from which the DRX MAC CE was received. In some embodiments, the DRX MAC CE may include an explicit field indicating the group of cells for which the information carried in the DRX MAC CE is applicable.

Persistent or semi-persistent CSI reporting may be configured based on the differing DRX configurations for the first and second groups of serving cells. Typically, a network may configure CSI reporting such that a UE multiplexes CSI reports from different serving cells in the same PUCCH or PUSCH occasions to reduce transmission power; however, because a UE need not report CSI while it is not in an active time state, and because a UE may exit an active time state with respect to the first and second groups of cells at different times, some preconfigured PUCCH resources may not be needed. For example, when a UE enters a sleep state with respect to a second group of cells (e.g., serving cells operating on the FR2 band) and the UE is active with respect to a first group of cells (e.g., serving cells operating on the FR1 band), the UE may report CSI for the first group of cells and may halt CSI reporting for the second group of cells; however, PUCCH resources for the CSI report may be allocated for CSI reports from both the first and second groups of cells. In some embodiments, to manage CSI reporting, CSI from different groups of cells may not be multiplexed in the same PUCCH resource if a UE is configured with first and second DRX configuration parameters. In some embodiments, when a UE enters a sleep state with respect to one group of cells, a CSI report may include padding bits for cells that the UE is not monitoring in the allocated PUCCH resource. In some embodiments, the network may preconfigure a coding rate to use when the UE enters a sleep state with respect to one of the first or second groups of serving cells before entering a sleep sate with respect to the other of the first or second groups.

<FIG> illustrates an example timeline <NUM> of DRX operations for serving cells operating on different bandwidths, according to an aspect of the present disclosure. As illustrated, a UE uses a common DRX cycle timer <NUM> and starting offset such that the UE begins DRX operations at the same dime. During a DRX cycle, a monitoring period timer (e.g., a DRX on duration timer), a DRX inactivity timer, and a PDCCH monitoring timer may have a longer duration for serving cells operating in lower frequency bands (e.g., the FR1 band) than for serving cells operating in higher frequency bands (e.g., the FR2 band). For example, drx-onDurationTimer <NUM> for cells operating in the FR1 band may be longer than drx-onDurationTimer2 <NUM> for cells operating in the FR2 band; drx-InactivityTimer <NUM> for cells operating in the FR1 band may be longer than drx-InactivityTimer2 <NUM> for cells operating in the FR2 band; and the PDCCH monitoring timer <NUM> for cells operating in the FR1 band may be longer than the PDCCH monitoring timer <NUM> for cells operating in the FR2 band. As illustrated, the UE may enter a sleep state with respect to serving cells on the higher frequency bands before entering a sleep state with respect to serving cells on the lower frequency bands, which may reduce power consumption at the UE from reducing the amount of time the UE is actively monitoring for data with respect to higher frequency, higher power consumption bands that are used for transmission of large data bursts.

The processing system <NUM> includes a processor <NUM> coupled to a computer-readable medium/memory <NUM> via a bus <NUM>. In certain aspects, the computer-readable medium/memory <NUM> is configured to store instructions (e.g., computer-executable code) that when executed by the processor <NUM>, cause the processor <NUM> to perform the operations illustrated in <FIG>, or other operations for configuring discontinuous reception for different groups of cells. In certain aspects, computer-readable medium/memory <NUM> stores code <NUM> for receiving first discontinuous reception (DRX) configuration parameters for communications with a first group of cells and second DRX configuration parameters for communications with a second group of cells; code <NUM> for monitoring for communications by cells operating in first frequency resources based on the first DRX configuration parameters; and code <NUM> for monitoring for communications by cells operating in second frequency resources based on the second DRX configuration parameters. In certain aspects, the processor <NUM> has circuitry configured to implement the code stored in the computer-readable medium/memory <NUM>. The processor <NUM> includes circuitry <NUM> for receiving first discontinuous reception (DRX) configuration parameters for communications with a first group of cells and second DRX configuration parameters for communications with a second group of cells; circuitry <NUM> for monitoring for communications by cells operating in first frequency resources based on the first DRX configuration parameters; and circuitry <NUM> for monitoring for communications by cells operating in second frequency resources based on the second DRX configuration parameters.

The techniques described herein may be used for various wireless communication technologies, such as NR (for example, <NUM> NR), 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE), LTE-Advanced (LTE-A), code division multiple access (CDMA), time division multiple access (TDMA), frequency division multiple access (FDMA), orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA), single-carrier frequency division multiple access (SC-FDMA), time division synchronous code division multiple access (TD-SCDMA), and other networks.

For clarity, while aspects may be described herein using terminology commonly associated with <NUM>, <NUM>, or <NUM> wireless technologies, aspects of the present disclosure can be applied in other generation-based communication systems.

In 3GPP, the term "cell" can refer to a coverage area of a Node B (NB) or a NB subsystem serving this coverage area, depending on the context in which the term is used. A BS may provide communication coverage for a macro cell, a pico cell, a femto cell, or other types of cells. A macro cell may cover a relatively large geographic area (for example, several kilometers in radius) and may allow unrestricted access by UEs with service subscription. A femto cell may cover a relatively small geographic area (for example, a home) and may allow restricted access by UEs having an association with the femto cell (for example, UEs in a Closed Subscriber Group (CSG), UEs for users in the home, etc.).

A UE may also be referred to as a mobile station, a terminal, an access terminal, a subscriber unit, a station, a Customer Premises Equipment (CPE), a cellular phone, a smart phone, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a wireless modem, a wireless communication device, a handheld device, a laptop computer, a cordless phone, a wireless local loop (WLL) station, a tablet computer, a camera, a gaming device, a netbook, a smartbook, an ultrabook, an appliance, a medical device or medical equipment, a biometric sensor/device, a wearable device such as a smart watch, smart clothing, smart glasses, a smart wrist band, smart jewelry (for example, a smart ring, a smart bracelet, etc.), an entertainment device (for example, a music device, a video device, a satellite radio, etc.), a vehicular component or sensor, a smart meter/sensor, industrial manufacturing equipment, a global positioning system device, or any other suitable device that is configured to communicate via a wireless or wired medium. MTC and eMTC UEs include, for example, robots, drones, remote devices, sensors, meters, monitors, location tags, etc., that may communicate with a BS, another device (for example, remote device), or some other entity. A wireless node may provide, for example, connectivity for or to a network (for example, a wide area network such as Internet or a cellular network) via a wired or wireless communication link.

Some wireless networks (for example, LTE) utilize orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) on the downlink and single-carrier frequency division multiplexing (SC-FDM) on the uplink. For example, a subband may cover <NUM> (for example, <NUM> RBs), and there may be <NUM>, <NUM>, <NUM>, <NUM>, or <NUM> subbands for system bandwidth of <NUM>, <NUM>, <NUM>, <NUM> or <NUM>, respectively.

A subframe contains a variable number of slots (for example, <NUM>, <NUM>, <NUM>, <NUM>, <NUM>,.

A scheduling entity (for example, a BS) allocates resources for communication among some or all devices and equipment within its service area or cell. In some examples, a UE may function as a scheduling entity and may schedule resources for one or more subordinate entities (for example, one or more other UEs), and the other UEs may utilize the resources scheduled by the UE for wireless communication. In some examples, a UE may function as a scheduling entity in a peer-to-peer (P2P) network, or in a mesh network.

As used herein, the term "determining" may encompass one or more of a wide variety of actions. For example, "determining" may include calculating, computing, processing, deriving, investigating, looking up (for example, looking up in a table, a database or another data structure), assuming and the like. Also, "determining" may include receiving (for example, receiving information), accessing (for example, accessing data in a memory) and the like.

As used herein, "or" is used intended to be interpreted in the inclusive sense, unless otherwise explicitly indicated. For example, "a or b" may include a only, b only, or a combination of a and b. As used herein, a phrase referring to "at least one of" or "one or more of" a list of items refers to any combination of those items, including single members. For example, "at least one of: a, b, or c" is intended to cover the possibilities of: a only, b only, c only, a combination of a and b, a combination of a and c, a combination of b and c, and a combination of a and b and c.

Various modifications to the implementations described in this disclosure may be readily apparent to persons having ordinary skill in the art, and the generic principles defined herein may be applied to other implementations without departing from the scope of this disclosure. Thus, the claims are not intended to be limited to the implementations shown herein, but are to be accorded the widest scope consistent with this disclosure, the principles and the novel features disclosed herein.

Additionally, various features that are described in this specification in the context of separate implementations also can be implemented in combination in a single implementation.

Claim 1:
A method for a user equipment, UE (<NUM>), to perform wireless communications,
configuration parameters for communications with a first group of cells and second DRX configuration parameters for communications with a second group of cells, wherein the first DRX configuration parameters and the second DRX configuration parameters share common starting time parameters; monitoring (<NUM>) for communications by the first group of cells operating in first frequency resources based on the first DRX configuration parameters; monitoring (<NUM>) for communications by the second group of cells operating in second frequency resources based on the second DRX configuration parameters; and
characterised in that
the first and second DRX configuration parameters include a common short DRX cycle timer (<NUM>) such that the UE (<NUM>) operates in a same DRX cycle for the first group of cells operating in the first frequency resources and the second group of cells operating in the second frequency resources, wherein the first and second DRX configuration parameters include different timers for an ON duration timer (<NUM>, <NUM>) and/or an inactivity timer (<NUM>, <NUM>) for the first group of cells operating in the first frequency resources and the second group of cells operating in the second frequency resources.