Appeal No. 2000-1541
Application 08/608,954
represent that the document discloses that nicotinic acid has a vasodilating effect. The
second synopsis relied upon by the examiner appears at page 8, lines 8-30 which in
actuality is two different documents. The first document is represented to describe a study
involving a patient who after forty years of alopecia showed hair growth after intravenous
procaine therapy. The second document is represented to describe a composition which
contains a synergistic combination of a number of ingredients including procaine which is
“apparently applied topically to improve hair characteristics, but not necessarily hair
growth.”
Simply put, the evidence relied upon by the examiner does not support the
conclusion that persons of ordinary skill in this art understood at the time of the present
invention that topical application of procaine and nicotinic acid would serve to stimulate
hair growth on the scalp. Any attribution in Szegö that active agents are useful in
stimulating scalp or hair bulbs is for the active agent of that reference, not nicotinic acid per
se. The so-called admissions set forth in the specification relied upon by the examiner, at
best, establish that intravenously administered procaine resulted in hair growth in a single
individual. The examiner has not established on this record that the evidence relied upon
reasonably teaches that topical application of nicotinic acid and procaine would
expectedly result in stimulating hair growth or that merely administering to the scalp
4
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007