Appeal No. 97-0974
Application No. 08/234,294
independent claim 75 sets forth "a selector for automatically
selecting the sensing mode to be used by the sensor based upon
information from the sensor . . . ." We find no adequate
disclosure in the specification of what is meant by these
limitations and, accordingly, are of the opinion that the
claims on appeal fail to satisfy the requirements of the
second paragraph of § 112.
The appellant contends that sensing modes including
coarse, fine, yaw, pitch and roll positions are described on
page 51 while "roll" and "zoom" modes are described on page
49. Thereafter, the brief asserts:
Page 51, lines 1-7 clearly describes a sensing
system with different sensing modes and a computer
adapted to select different sensing modes based upon
the sensed position of a surgical instrument
relative to a surgical plan, a target area, and/or
another surgical instrument. For example, since the
sensing system is connected to the monitor (247) and
computer (243), as described on page 49, lines 12-
28, the camera can be moved to keep an instrument in
the center of a video image. In other words, the
camera is automatically moved to give the surgeon a
desired and constant view of the instrument. The
different sensing modes can include an automatic
"roll" or "zoom" of the camera (see page 49, lines
19-28), and customize image processing algorithms to
enhance what the surgeon sees (see page 50, lines
11-14). [Pages 3 and 4.]
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