Multicast ARQ in machine type communication network

摘要

A method of communicating data between a base station and a plurality of terminal devices in a wireless telecommunications system is described. The method comprises transmitting data from the base station to the plurality of terminal devices in a multicast transmission and transmitting response signals from the terminal devices to the base station to indicate whether or not the respective terminal devices have successfully received the multicast transmission. The use of a multicast transmission provides an efficient mechanism for communicating the same data to a plurality of terminal device, for example as might be desired in a machine-type communication network. In combination with this, the use of individual response signals, such as ACK/NACK signalling, from the terminal devices allows the base station, or other entity, to track which terminal devices have indicated successful receipt of the multicast transmission, and to instigate an appropriate re-transmission protocol accordingly.

主权项

1. A method of operating a base station for communicating data in a wireless telecommunications system, the method comprising:
transmitting data to a plurality of terminal devices in a multicast transmission; and receiving response signals from respective ones of the terminal devices transmitted in response to the multicast transmission to indicate whether the respective terminal devices have successfully received the multicast transmission, wherein the wireless telecommunications system operates in downlink over a first frequency bandwidth and in uplink over a second frequency bandwidth, and wherein at least one of the multicast transmission is made using downlink transmission resources on frequencies selected from within a third frequency bandwidth which is smaller than and within the first frequency bandwidth, and the response signals from the terminal devices are received using uplink transmission resources on frequencies selected from within a fourth frequency bandwidth which is smaller than and within the second frequency bandwidth.