Patent ID: 8031583

Claim:
A method for transmitting data within a communication system, the method comprising the steps of: determining a carrier bandwidth from a set of two or more carrier bandwidths; receiving data to be transmitted over a radio frame, wherein the radio frame is comprised of a plurality of subframes; placing data within a subframe in the radio frame to produce a subframe of data, wherein the subframe of data comprises either a plurality of OFDM symbols or a plurality of single carrier FDMA symbols, at least two of the OFDM symbols or at least two of the single carrier FDMA symbols in the subframe having different symbol durations; wherein the radio frame and subframe have the same duration for each of the carrier bandwidths in the set of two or more carrier bandwidths, and wherein the OFDM symbols or single carrier FDMA symbols in the subframe comprise a plurality of subcarriers and wherein the plurality of symbols and subcarriers in the subframe are grouped into resource blocks such that the carrier bandwidth is divided into an integer number of resource blocks; wherein the at least two OFDM or single carrier FDMA symbols in each of the plurality of subframes differ in cyclic prefix duration by one sample duration corresponding to the smallest carrier bandwidth in the set of two or more carrier bandwidths, wherein the subframe duration of each of the plurality of subframes is a same duration; placing the data within resource blocks in the subframe; and transmitting the subframe of data over the radio frame and in the determined carrier bandwidth.