Appeal No. 96-1410
Application No. 08/321,384
Claims 7, 9, 11 and 12, which depend from claim 1, have been
rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Meyer
alone or with additional prior art. With regard to the question
of obviousness of these claims, we conclude that the examiner has
not presented any evidence to support the conclusion that it2
would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to
modify Meyer to provide a positive density gradient from the
topsheet layer to the transport/transfer layer. Accordingly, the
examiner's rejection of claims 7, 9, 11 and 12 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103 is also reversed.
Lastly, we turn to the rejection of claim 19 as being
anticipated by Meyer. We will sustain this rejection of claim
19, noting simply that the appellants' argument that Meyer does
not disclose the "positive density gradient" is not germane to
claim 19 since such a limitation is not recited in this claim and
that the appellants have not otherwise contested the correctness
of this rejection.
2The conclusion that the claimed subject matter is obvious
must be supported by evidence, as shown by some objective
teaching in the prior art or by knowledge generally available to
one of ordinary skill in the art that would have led that
individual to arrive at the claimed invention. See In re Fine,
837 F.2d 1071, 1074, 5 USPQ2d 1596, 1598 (Fed. Cir. 1988).
9
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007