HK1117973A - Ack/nack detection in wireless communication - Google Patents

Description

Acknowledgment/negative acknowledgment detection in wireless communications

Technical Field

The present invention relates generally to modern wireless communication systems, and more particularly to improving acknowledgment/negative acknowledgment (ACK/NACK) detection in transmissions of such wireless communication systems.

Background

In a wireless communication system, ACK and NACK signals are used to indicate whether a transmitted data packet has been correctly received. If so, the receiving unit sends an ACK signal to the transmitting unit to transmit a new data block. If not, the receiving unit sends a NACK signal to the transmitting unit to retransmit the previous data block. In general, it is more important to correctly detect a NACK signal than an ACK signal because not detecting a NACK signal may result in errors, while not detecting an ACK signal only results in retransmissions. However, retransmissions may cause delays over the air interface and typically only a certain number of retransmissions per data block are allowed for a given link for a predetermined period of time.

Detection of ACK/NACK signals is an important part of the enhanced uplink (E-UL) standard currently under investigation by the third generation partnership project (3 GPP). One goal of 3GPP, a collaboration of wireless communication standard-establishing entities, is to produce globally applicable technical specifications for third generation wireless communication systems. One of the requirements of these systems is that the enhanced uplink provides significantly reduced air interface delay, improved availability of high bit rates, and increased capacity, with emphasis on interaction, background (e.g., email, text messaging, etc.), and streaming services.

In the enhanced uplink standard, the determination as to whether to transmit an ACK or NACK signal is made by the base station on a per data packet basis. Then, the ACK or NACK signal is correctly detected by the mobile terminal. For example, detecting an ACK signal when a NACK signal is actually transmitted will result in packet errors for higher layers. Thus, it may be desirable to retransmit the entire set of data packets rather than a single data packet (i.e., where an ACK is mistaken for a NACK), thereby increasing air interface delay and reducing uplink capacity. For this reason, it is more important to correctly detect a NACK signal than to correctly detect an ACK signal during the enhanced uplink session.

The enhanced uplink may also be used in soft handover situations where a mobile terminal is connected to several base stations. The set of base stations connected to the mobile terminal during soft handover is called the active set. In soft handover, each base station in the active set sends its own ACK/NACK signal to the mobile station, independently of the other base stations. This means that a soft handover gain is not obtained for the ACK/NACK signal (unlike the case of the downlink data signal). Thus, the signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) of the ACK/NACK signals is averaged by n _bs Is reduced by a factor of (b), wherein n _bs Is the number of base stations in the active set. In addition, for WCDMA (wideband code division multiple access) systems, power control is implemented for the sum of the downlinks. Thus, the signal-to-interference ratio for some downlinks may be very low due to independent fading of those downlinks. This increases the high risk of having unreliable ACK/NACK signal detection during soft handover.

Furthermore, since the uplink is also power controlled in various CDMA systems (e.g. WCDMA, CDMA-2000, etc.), meaning that only a minimum amount of necessary power is used, and since only one base station in the active set is enough to be connected to the mobile terminal, there is also a high risk that a part of the base stations may be briefly disconnected from the mobile terminal. When this happens, a portion of the data packet may not be received at all by those base stations, so that no ACK/NACK signal is even sent. In that case, the mobile terminal interprets the absence of an ACK/NACK signal as a Discontinuous Transmission (DTX). DTX may also occur in the single link case, but the probability of discontinuous transmission is greater in the case of soft handover.

Disclosure of Invention

The present invention is directed to a method and system for improving ACK/NACK detection in a mobile terminal of a wireless communication system. The method and system of the present invention utilizes knowledge of the power of the ACK/NACK signal and the probability of DTX occurrence to increase the probability of correct detection of the ACK signal. The probability of DTX occurrence is determined by observing the transmit power command issued to the mobile terminal. A very large number of power up commands relative to power down commands may indicate a poor quality uplink, meaning that DTX may occur.

In general, in one aspect, the invention is directed to a method for improving detection of ACK or NACK signals in a mobile terminal. The method comprises the following steps: receiving a radio signal, which typically includes an ACK signal or a NACK signal, from a base station connected to the mobile terminal; and estimating the probability of discontinuous transmission. The method also includes the steps of: calculating the minimum ACK signal threshold for enabling the mobile terminal to correctly detect the ACK signal by adopting the probability of discontinuous transmission; and detecting whether an ACK signal is received or whether a NACK signal is received using a minimum ACK signal threshold.

In general, in another aspect, the invention is directed to a receiver with improved ACK or NACK signal detection in a mobile terminal of a wireless communication system. The receiver comprises a front end receiver for receiving radio signals, typically comprising ACK signals or NACK signals, from a base station connected to the mobile terminal. The receiver further comprises a control unit for estimating the probability of a discontinuous transmission and a threshold calculation unit for calculating a minimum ACK signal threshold for the mobile terminal to correctly detect an ACK signal using the probability of a discontinuous transmission. The detector unit detects whether an ACK signal is received or whether a NACK signal is received using a minimum ACK signal threshold.

In general, in yet another aspect, the invention is directed to a method for improving detection of acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement signals in a mobile terminal when the mobile terminal is connected to multiple base stations. The method comprises the step of receiving at the mobile terminal radio signals from a plurality of base stations, each radio signal typically comprising an acknowledgement signal or a negative acknowledgement signal. The method also comprises the following steps: the probability of discontinuous transmission is estimated for each of the base stations and a minimum acknowledgement threshold is calculated for the mobile terminal to correctly detect the acknowledgement signal of a respective one of the base stations using the probability of discontinuous transmission for each of the base stations. Then, a minimum acknowledgment signal threshold for each of the base stations is used to detect whether an acknowledgment signal for a corresponding one of the base stations is received or whether a negative acknowledgment signal for a corresponding one of the base stations is received.

It should be emphasized that the term "comprises/comprising" when used in this specification is taken to specify the presence of stated features, integers, steps or components but does not preclude the presence or addition of one or more other features, integers, steps, components or groups thereof.

Drawings

The above and other advantages of the invention will become apparent from the following detailed description and with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

fig. 1 illustrates a portion of a typical wireless communication system, wherein a mobile terminal may be connected to one base station or to several base stations;

2A-2B illustrate exemplary ACK, NACK, and DTX implementations;

FIG. 3 illustrates a block diagram of a system for implementing improved ACK/NACK signal detection, according to an embodiment of the invention; and

fig. 4A-4B illustrate a flow diagram of a method for achieving improved ACK/NACK signal detection, according to an embodiment of the invention.

Detailed Description

As described above, embodiments of the present invention provide systems and methods for improving ACK/NACK signal detection in a mobile terminal. Fig. 1 illustrates a portion of an exemplary wireless communication system 100 in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. The wireless communication system 100 includes a mobile terminal and several WCDMA base stations, four of which are shown here at 104, 106, 108 and 110. When the mobile terminal 102 is in position a, it may only receive signals from the first base station 104 and therefore connect to that base station 104. However, when the mobile terminal moves to location B, it may receive signals from several other base stations, including base stations 106, 108, and 110. The mobile terminal 102 must then determine which base station 104, 106, 108, and 110 has the strongest signal and hand off to that base station. Such a procedure is commonly referred to as soft handoff and represents a situation in which the mobile terminal 102 is simultaneously connected to the base stations 104, 106, 108 and 110.

For systems such as the wireless communication system 100 and other similar systems, certain requirements have been placed on enhancing the detection of ACK/NACK in the uplink. Since the specific implementation (e.g., amplitude, etc.) of the ACK/NACK signal will be determined independently by each system operator, the signal requirements will be discussed herein in terms of probability. One requirement for implementing enhanced uplink is that the probability P (ACK | NACK) that the mobile terminal detects an ACK signal when a NACK signal is transmitted must be less than some minimum value, e.g.,P(ACK|NACK)＝1×10 ^-4 . Therefore, it is useful to provide an ACK/NACK implementation that maximizes the probability P (ACK | ACK) that the mobile terminal 102 detects a true ACK signal, given that P (ACK | NACK) =1 × 10 ^-4 . In addition, implementations should be able to account for the probability that the mobile terminal 102 may become disconnected from the base stations 104, 106, 108, and/or 110 on the uplink, resulting in neither an ACK nor a NACK signal being transmitted, but a DTX. The mobile terminal 102 should interpret DTX as a NACK signal; however, P (ACK | NACK) =1 × 10 ^-4 It should be based on the probability of DTX (i.e., P (ACK | DTX) =1 × 10) ^-4 ). Furthermore, from a system perspective, it is important that the average power level for the ACK/NACK signals be as low as possible due to the limited amount of transmit power available on the base stations 104, 106, 108, and/or 110.

A typical prior art implementation of ACK, NACK and DTX is shown in fig. 2A, where the horizontal lines represent a linear scale (e.g., signal amplitude). In the ideal case, the ACK signal energy should be quite high, while the NACK signal energy should be quite low. DTX is by definition a lack of signal and should therefore be at zero on a linear scale with respect to the ACK and NACK signals, where the NACK signal is closer to DTX than the ACK signal. Thus, in this exemplary implementation, the ACK signal is at X on a linear scale, DTX is at zero, and the NACK signal is at Y.

One drawback of the above implementation is that the ACK and NACK signals tend to be corrupted by noise. If the noise is severe enough, the mobile terminal 102 may not be able to detect whether a NACK signal was transmitted or whether a DTX is present. To overcome this problem, some implementations set the probability P (ACK | NACK) with DTX instead of a NACK signal, such that P (ACK | DTX) =1 × 10 ^-4 And P (ACK | NACK) < 1 × 10 ^-4 . The tradeoff for this design choice is that the minimum threshold for the probability P (ACK | ACK) is reduced, which may result in an increase in the number of unnecessary retransmissions and a degradation in the capacity and throughput of the uplink.

An example of the above degradation can be seen in fig. 2B, where the horizontal axis represents the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of an ACK signal with an energy level 6dB higher than the energy level of the Dedicated Physical Channel (DPCH). In other words, E _C ^ACK ＝E _C ^DPCH +6dB, where E _C ^ACK Is the energy level of the ACK signal per chip, and E _C ^DPCH Is the energy level of the DPCH signal per chip. The vertical axis represents the probability that the mobile terminal 102 detects an ACK signalP (ACK | ACK), assuming that an ACK signal is actually issued. The solid curve 200 represents the probability of correct ACK signal detection for each link when DTX is not taken into account (for NACK signals that are 6dB below the energy level of the DPCH signal). The dashed line 202 represents the probability of correct ACK signal detection for each link when DTX is taken into account. It can be seen that for the same P (ACK | ACK), the signal-to-noise ratio of the ACK signal must be about 2dB higher for the second curve 202. That isThat is, when the mobile terminal 102 considers DTX, the ACK signal-to-noise ratio must be higher than when the mobile terminal does not consider DTX. It is therefore desirable to provide a way of distinguishing DTX from NACK signals whenever possible so that the ACK signal threshold can be set closer to the first curve 200.

According to an embodiment of the invention, a NACK signal can be distinguished from a DTX by observing the Transmit Power Control (TPC) commands. TPC commands are issued by the base stations 104, 106, 108 and/or 110 to the mobile terminal 102 on the downlink for setting the terminal output power. Such downlink TPC commands are conventionally sent as part of a power control scheme in WCDMA systems, such as system 100, in order to control the transmit power of the mobile terminal 102, since it is important in these systems that only the minimum amount of necessary power is transmitted. By determining the number of power up commands versus power down commands issued, it is estimated whether the uplink between the mobile terminal 102 and the base stations 104, 106, 108 and/or 110 is in or out of synchronization. This estimate may then be used by the mobile terminal 102 to determine the probability that a DTX will result from a base station 104, 106, 108, and/or 110.

In general, when the uplink is of sufficient quality, the ratio of up/down commands is close to one (i.e., an equal number of "up" versus "down" commands). On the other hand, if the uplink quality is poor, the number of up commands is typically higher than the number of down commands, as the base stations 104, 106, 108, and/or 110 attempt to improve the link quality or re-establish the link. Thus, increasing the ratio of the decrease commands may be used as a measure of the likelihood that the base station 104, 106, 108, and/or 110 has lost a data packet and will not issue an ACK or NACK signal, but will interpret as a DTX. The higher the number of up commands, the greater the risk that the base station 104, 106, 108 and/or 110 will generate a DTX.

The minimum threshold for the ACK signal may then be adjusted for individual links (or, if in a soft handover situation, for each link in the active set) according to the likelihood of DTX for that link and also as a function of the ACK and NACK signal power. In one embodiment, the ACK/NACK signal power may be signaled by the base station 104, 106, 108, and/or 110, for example, as an offset to the standard power control DPCH signal (i.e., a portion of the transmitted control bits may be used to represent the ACK and NACK offsets). It is also possible to estimate the ACK/NACK signal power in the mobile terminal 102. In either case, by adjusting the ACK signal threshold according to the probability of DTX, the probability P (ACK | ACK) may be increased while still maintaining the desired probability P (ACK | NACK). Thus, the number of unnecessary retransmissions may be reduced, thereby increasing the overall capacity and throughput of the link.

Referring now to fig. 3, a block diagram of a receiver portion 300 of a mobile terminal is illustrated that is capable of estimating the probability of DTX and adjusting the ACK signal threshold accordingly when the mobile terminal is connected to a base station in an enhanced uplink session. Receiver portion 300 includes a number of functional components including an antenna 302 through which radio signals are received and a front end receiver 304 that subsequently down-converts the radio signals to baseband. The receiver section 300 also includes a RAKE receiver 306 for despreading data in the radio signal and a channel estimator/SIR estimator 308 for estimating the channel response and signal-to-interference ratio of the signal. There is also a TPC detector 310 for detecting transmit power commands in the radio signal and a control unit 312 for determining the probability of DTX from the ratio of power up to power down commands. The threshold calculation unit 314 calculates a minimum threshold for detecting an ACK signal for each link. The ACK/NACK signal detector/power offset estimator 316 determines whether the detected ACK/NACK signal is reliable. Finally, the block scheduler 318 schedules data packets to be transmitted, whether new or previously transmitted, and the front end transmitter 320 transmits the data packets via the antennas 302. Other functional components not specifically identified herein may also be present in receiver portion 300 without departing from the scope of the present invention.

In operation, downlink signals, which may contain radio signals from a single base station or, in the case of soft handoff, from multiple base stations, are received through the antenna 302 along with any noise that may be present on the downlink. The wireless electrical signal is then downconverted to a baseband signal in the front end receiver 304 and fed to the channel estimator/SIR estimator 308.

Channel estimator/SIR estimator 308 employs Dedicated Physical Channel (DPCH) pilots for eachChannel filter tap for estimating DPCH by base stationAnd DPCH signal-to-noise ratio SIR _DPCH . The channel filter taps in the case of soft handover may be denoted asWhere h denotes the RAKE finger k of the downlink i, and L is the number of RAKE fingers of the downlink i. In a single base station, there is certainly only a single downlink (i.e., i = 1). The DPCH signal-to-noise ratio can be described asWherein the content of the first and second substances,represents the energy of each chip's DPCH, anIndicating interference on the DPCH. This information is then forwarded to the RAKE receiver 306.

RAKE receiver 306 despreads data in the radio signal, including any ACK/NACK signals in the radio signal, using the channel filter taps and DPCH signal-to-noise ratio information. The ACK/NACK signal output from the RAKE receiver 306 is fed to the ACK/NACK signal detector/power offset estimator 316 along with all other data output from the RAKE receiver 306 (e.g., voice/video data, web browsing data, etc.).

Channel filter taps from channel estimator/SIR estimator 308And the DPCH signalNoise ratio SIR _DPCH Is also provided to the TPC detector 310 for use in setting the transmit power of the mobile terminal. For each link i, the TPC detector 310 decodes the power up or power down commands from the received information and provides the power up/down commands to the front end transmitter 320 accordingly. The TPC detector 310 also provides power up/down commands to the control unit 312 for estimating the probability P that DTX will occur for the base station ⁱ _DTX 。

The control unit 312 may estimate the probability P of a DTX occurrence as a function of the ratio of power up to power down commands in a predetermined number of slots n in many ways ⁱ _DTX . In one embodiment, the control unit 312 considers the ratio R of power up to power down commands in the last 50 to 200 slots (i.e., n =50 to 200) _i . The control unit 312 then uses the mobile terminal with the highest quality uplink (i.e. the minimum ratio R) to it _i ) Of base station R _i To define a probability P ⁱ _DTX The reference value of (1). For example, the reference probability P ⁱ _DTX For having the minimum ratio R _min Can be set to P ⁱ _DTX =0.1, then for having a higher ratio R _i And other base stations. An exemplary probability scheme for a soft handover situation is provided as follows:

the probability value chosen in equation (1) is based on the fact that: in uplinks with high quality, the power up commands account for less than 60% of the total number of power commands in soft handover, while uplinks with poor quality have close to 100% power up commands. In the case of a single base station, a slightly different scheme is applied due to the lower probability of DTX, e.g.:

the probability values shown in equations (1) and (2) are provided as examples only, and other probability values and/or ranges of values may of course be used without departing from the scope of the present invention. For example, in some cases, an optimized value may be provided based on system simulation or laboratory test results. Other parameters may also be predetermined and used in conjunction with the probability values and/or ranges of values. These values may be determined by the control unit 312 each time according to the ratio R _i The calculations, or they may be stored in a look-up table in the mobile terminal.

In embodiments where the mobile terminal includes a Doppler estimator (not shown), the ratio R _i May be a function of doppler spread, as well as the number of slots n. In that case, the input from the doppler estimator may be used to adapt the ratio R according to the speed of the mobile terminal _i The value of (c), and other parameters. For example, a larger number of time slots (e.g., n = 300) should be used for slow moving mobile terminals, while a smaller number of time slots should be used for fast moving mobile terminals (e.g., n = 50). Furthermore, in the high speed case, the ratio R is due to the greater uncertainty of the power up/down estimation in the high speed case _i Should be higher than the low speed case.

Probability P of DTX occurrence ⁱ _DTX Then from the control unit 312 to a threshold calculation unit 314 for determining a minimum threshold for detecting an ACK signal for each link. In one embodiment, the calculation unit 314 employs the probability P ⁱ _DTX Along with estimates of power offsets for ACK and NACK signals and DPCH signal-to-noise ratioTogether, a minimum threshold for the ACK signal for each link is determined. For example, a minimum threshold T for ACK signals for each link _ACK Can be calculated asThe following:

in the formula

And

in the formula phi ^-1 (-) is the inverse of the Gaussian Cumulative Distribution Function (CDF), and "·" denotes the content of the parentheses in equations (4) and (5), β _NACK *E _C ^DPCH _i Is the multiplication of the power offset of the NACK signal by the power level of the DPCH, and I _{ACK/NACK msg} Is the interference present on the ACK/NACK signal. Last variable I _{ACK/NACK msg} Interference from the DPCH may be done in a manner known to those skilled in the artTo obtain the compound. Therefore, by adopting equation (3), the minimum threshold T of the ACK signal for each link _ACK Can be based on the probability P of DTX occurrence ⁱ _DTX To be adjusted. Thus, the threshold for the ACK signal for each link may be set to approximate the first curve 200 in FIG. 2, where P is ⁱ _DTX Low.

Thereafter, a minimum threshold T of ACK signal for each link _ACK Is provided to an ACK/NACK detector/power estimator 316 for detecting the ACK signal. In addition, the ACK/NACK detector/power estimator 316 also determines whether the detected ACK or NACK signal is reliable. In one embodiment, the ACK/NACK detector/power estimator 316 examines the DPCH signal-to-noise ratio SIR _DPCH To determine the reliability of the ACK or NACK signal. For example, if the DPCH signal-to-noise ratio is too low, the overall signal quality may be too low for reliable ACK or NACK signal detection. Thus, for links with DPCH signal-to-noise ratios below a certain threshold, a NACK signal is considered detected.

In some embodiments, the power offset β of the ACK/NACK signal for the minimum threshold determination _ACK And beta _NACK For example, may be provided from the base station to the ACK/NACK detector/power estimator 316 in the DPCH. In other embodiments, the ACK/NACK detector/power estimator 316 also estimates the power offset of the ACK/NACK signal. In the case of the latter case, it is preferred,estimated power offset for ACK/NACK signalsAndthis can be obtained by the following formula:

if ACK is detected (6)

And

if NACK and P are detected ^j _DTX In the formula < 0.3 (7),andis the power offset estimate for the ACK/NACK signal for link i at time j and is the filter coefficient (typically 0.95-0.98).

If the power offset of the ACK/NACK signal is estimated, the ACK/NACK detector/power estimator 316 employs the newly estimated power offsetAndand (4) self-updating. In general, the estimated power offset of the detected ACK signalWill be updated, however, the power offset of the detected NACK signalMay not be updated depending on the probability P of DTX occurrence ⁱ _DTX . For example, if the probability P ⁱ _DTX If it is too large, the NACK power offset is not updated.

Thereafter, the ACK/NACK detector/power estimator 316 forwards the detected ACK/NACK signal to the block scheduler 318 for use in scheduling the next data packet to be transmitted. If the ACK/NACK detector/power estimator 316 detects an ACK signal due to a previous transmission, the block scheduler 318 schedules a new data packet to be transmitted. On the other hand, if a NACK signal is detected, the block scheduler 318 schedules a retransmission of the previous data packet. The transmission is then performed by the front-end transmitter 320 in a manner known to those skilled in the art.

A flowchart 400 of a method that may be used to implement ACK/NACK signal detection in a mobile terminal according to an embodiment of the invention is shown in fig. 4A. Although the method 400 is described with respect to only a single base station, it may of course be used when a mobile terminal is connected to multiple base stations in a soft handover situation (as shown in fig. 4B) without departing from the scope of the invention. The method begins at step 402, where a mobile terminal receives a signal from a base station that is currently connected to the mobile terminal. Thereafter, in step 404, the mobile terminal determines the transmit power up/down ratio of the link of the involved base station in the manner described above. If the mobile terminal includes a doppler estimator (and is therefore shown as a dashed line), the doppler spread of the mobile terminal is determined in step 406. In step 408, the mobile terminal uses the power up/down ratio to calculate the probability that a DTX will occur for the link. When available, the doppler spread can also be used to adjust the probability of DTX accordingly.

Thereafter, in step 410, the mobile terminal calculates a minimum threshold for the ACK signal for the link concerned using the probability of DTX and the power offset for the ACK/NACK signal. The power offset may be provided to the mobile terminal from the base station or the mobile terminal may estimate the power offset in the manner described above. In step 412, the mobile terminal detects the ACK/NACK signal of the involved link and determines the reliability of the detection. A NACK signal is considered if the detection of the link is not reliable. At step 414, a determination is made as to whether an ACK signal for the link is detected. If the answer is "yes," the mobile terminal updates the ACK signal power offset for the link with the ACK signal (step 416) and transmits a new data packet (step 418). If the answer is "no", the mobile terminal updates the NACK signal power offset for the link with a NACK signal (step 420) and retransmits the previous data packet (step 422).

Fig. 4B illustrates a flow diagram 400' of a method that may be used to implement ACK/NACK signal detection in a mobile terminal in a soft handover situation, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. The method 400' is otherwise similar to the method 400 of fig. 4A, except that multiple links are involved. The method begins at step 402', where the mobile terminal receives signals from all base stations (i.e., the active set) involved in soft handoff. Thereafter, in step 404', the mobile terminal determines the transmit power up/down ratio of the link for each of the involved base stations in the manner described above. If the mobile terminal includes a doppler estimator (also shown as a dashed line), the doppler spread of the mobile terminal is determined in step 406'. In step 408', the mobile terminal employs the power up/down ratio R _i To calculate the probability P that DTX will occur for each link ⁱ _DTX . When available, doppler spread can also be used to adjust the probability P accordingly ⁱ _DTX 。

Thereafter, in step 410', the mobile terminal adopts the probability P ⁱ _DTX And the power offset of the ACK/NACK signal calculates a minimum threshold of the ACK signal of each link. The power offset may be provided to the mobile terminal from the base station, or the mobile terminal may estimate the power offset in the manner described above. In step 412', the mobile terminal detects the ACK/NACK signal of each link andthe reliability of the detection is determined. A NACK signal is considered if the detection of a given link is not reliable. At step 414', a determination is made as to whether an ACK signal for any link is detected. If the answer is toIf a link is "yes," the mobile terminal updates the ACK signal power offset for the link with the ACK signal in step 416'. In this regard, probabilities with low DTX, e.g., P, may also be employed ⁱ _DTX NACK signal of any link < 0.3 to update NACK power offset. Thereafter, at step 418', a new data packet is transmitted. If the answer is 'no' for a link, the mobile terminal updates the NACK signal power offset for the link with a NACK signal (step 420 ') and retransmits the previous data packet (step 422').

While the invention has been described with reference to one or more specific embodiments, those skilled in the art will recognize that many changes may be made thereto without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention. It is therefore contemplated that each of the foregoing embodiments and obvious variations thereof will fall within the spirit and scope of the claimed invention, which is set forth in the following claims.

Claims (34)

1. A method for improving detection of acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement signals in a mobile terminal, comprising:

receiving radio signals from a base station connected to the mobile terminal, the radio signals typically comprising acknowledgement signals or negative acknowledgement signals;

estimating the probability of a discontinuous transmission;

employing the probability of the discontinuous transmission to calculate a minimum acknowledgement signal threshold for the mobile terminal to correctly detect the acknowledgement signal; and

employing the minimum acknowledgement signal threshold to detect whether the acknowledgement signal is received or whether a negative acknowledgement signal is received.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising transmitting a data packet corresponding to the received acknowledgement signal or the negative acknowledgement signal to the base station.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the data packet corresponding to the acknowledgement signal is transmitted only when the received acknowledgement signal is determined to be reliable.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining a reliability of the detected acknowledgement signal or negative acknowledgement signal.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein said step of estimating said probability of discontinuous transmission comprises determining a ratio of transmit power up commands to transmit power down commands received from said base station.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein said step of estimating said probability of discontinuous transmission further comprises assigning a predetermined probability to said probability of discontinuous transmission if said ratio of transmit power up commands to transmit power down commands is greater than a predetermined value.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of calculating the acknowledgment signal minimum threshold further employs a power offset of the acknowledgment signal and the negative acknowledgment signal.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the power offset is provided to the mobile terminal from the base station.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein the power offset is estimated by the mobile terminal.

10. The method of claim 8, further comprising updating the mobile terminal with the power offset estimate.

11. The method of claim 4, wherein the step of determining the reliability of the detected acknowledgement signal or the negative acknowledgement signal is performed using a signal-to-noise ratio of a dedicated physical channel of the wireless telecommunication signal.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the step of determining the reliability of the detected acknowledgement signal or the negative acknowledgement signal further comprises automatically assuming that the radio signal comprises a negative acknowledgement signal when the signal-to-noise ratio is below a predetermined level.

13. The method of claim 1, further comprising adjusting the probability of the discontinuous transmission for doppler spread.

14. A receiver with improved acknowledgment or negative acknowledgment signal detection in a mobile terminal of a wireless communication system, comprising:

a front end receiver for receiving a radio signal from a base station connected to the mobile terminal, the radio signal typically comprising an acknowledgement signal or a negative acknowledgement signal;

a control unit for estimating a probability of discontinuous transmission;

a threshold calculation unit for calculating a minimum acknowledgement signal threshold for the mobile terminal to correctly detect the acknowledgement signal using the probability of the discontinuous transmission; and

a detector unit for detecting whether the acknowledgement signal is received or whether a negative acknowledgement signal is received using the minimum acknowledgement signal threshold.

15. The receiver of claim 14, further comprising a signal block scheduler for scheduling transmission of data packets corresponding to the received acknowledgement signal or the negative acknowledgement signal.

16. The receiver of claim 15, wherein the signal block scheduler is configured to schedule the transmission of data packets corresponding to the acknowledgement signal only if the received acknowledgement signal is determined to be reliable.

17. The receiver of claim 14, wherein the detector unit further determines the reliability of the detected acknowledgement signal or negative acknowledgement signal.

18. The receiver of claim 14, wherein the control unit is configured to estimate the discontinuous transmission probability by determining a ratio of transmit power up commands to transmit power down commands received from the base station.

19. The receiver of claim 18, wherein the control unit is further configured to assign a predetermined probability to the discontinuous transmission probability when the ratio of transmit power up commands to transmit power down commands is greater than a predetermined value.

20. The receiver of claim 14, wherein the threshold calculation unit calculates the acknowledgement signal minimum threshold by also employing power offsets of the acknowledgement signal and the negative acknowledgement signal.

21. The receiver of claim 20, wherein the threshold calculation unit receives the power offset from the base station.

22. The receiver of claim 20, wherein the threshold calculation unit is configured to estimate the power offset.

23. The receiver of claim 22, wherein the threshold calculation unit is further configured to update the mobile terminal with the power offset estimate.

24. The receiver of claim 17, wherein the detector unit determines the reliability of the detected acknowledgement signal or the negative acknowledgement signal by employing a signal-to-noise ratio of a dedicated physical channel of the radio signal.

25. The receiver of claim 24, wherein the detector unit is configured to automatically assume that the radio signal contains a negative acknowledgement signal when the signal-to-noise ratio is below a predetermined level.

26. The receiver of claim 14, wherein the control unit is configured to adjust the probability of the discontinuous transmission for doppler spread.

27. A method for improving detection of acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement signals in a mobile terminal when the mobile terminal is connected to a plurality of base stations, comprising:

receiving at the mobile terminal radio signals from the plurality of base stations, each radio signal typically comprising an acknowledgement signal or a negative acknowledgement signal;

estimating, for each of the base stations, a probability of a discontinuous transmission;

employing said probability of discontinuous transmission for each of said base stations to calculate a minimum acknowledgement signal threshold for said mobile terminal to correctly detect said acknowledgement signal for a respective one of said base stations; and

employing the minimum acknowledgement signal threshold for each of the base stations to detect whether the acknowledgement signal is received for a respective one of the base stations or whether a negative acknowledgement signal is received for a respective one of the base stations.

28. The method of claim 27, further comprising transmitting to the base stations data packets corresponding to the acknowledgement signal when received from any of the base stations or corresponding to the negative acknowledgement signal when no acknowledgement signal is received from any of the base stations.

29. The method of claim 28, wherein the step of transmitting a data packet corresponding to the acknowledgement signal is performed only when the acknowledgement signal received from any one of the base stations is determined to be reliable.

30. The method of claim 27, further comprising determining the reliability of each detected acknowledgement signal or negative acknowledgement signal received from the base station.

31. The method of claim 27 wherein said step of estimating said probability of discontinuous transmission for each of said base stations comprises determining a ratio of transmit power up commands to transmit power down commands received from each of said base stations, and assigning a predetermined probability to said probability of discontinuous transmission for a corresponding one of said base stations when said ratio of transmit power up commands to transmit power down commands for each of said base stations is greater than a predetermined value.

32. The method of claim 27 wherein said step of calculating said acknowledgment signal minimum threshold for each of said base stations further employs a power offset for said acknowledgment signal and said negative acknowledgment signal, said power offset being provided to said mobile terminal from a corresponding one of said base stations.

33. The method of claim 27, wherein the step of calculating the acknowledgement signal minimum threshold for each of the base stations further employs a power offset for the acknowledgement signal and the negative acknowledgement signal, wherein the power offset is estimated by the mobile terminal, and wherein the mobile terminal is updated with the power offset estimate.

34. The method of claim 30, wherein said step of determining for each of said base stations the reliability of said detected acknowledgment signal or said negative acknowledgment signal is performed using a signal-to-noise ratio of a dedicated physical channel for a radio signal from a corresponding one of said base stations, and further comprising automatically assuming that said radio signal from a corresponding one of said base stations contains a negative acknowledgment signal when said signal-to-noise ratio is less than a predetermined level.