Appeal No. 1998-0880
Application No. 08/649,909
recognizable 'heart' of the invention." Para-Ordnance Mfg. v.
SGS Importers Int’l, Inc., 73 F.3d 1085, 1087, 37 USPQ2d 1237,
1239 (Fed. Cir. 1995) (citing W. L. Gore & Assocs., Inc. v.
Garlock, Inc., 721 F.2d 1540, 1548, 220 USPQ 303, 309 (Fed.
Cir. 1983), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 851 (1984)).
The Examiner reasons that Nakatani discloses the
multilayered MR device but does not show the ferromagnetic
layers being made out of half metals. The Examiner notes that
Kamiguchi shows a MR device that includes two layers of half
metallic ferromagnetic material separated by at least one
layer of a non-magnetic, electrically insulating material
(answer-pages 3 and 4), and concludes:
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of
ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention
was made to replace the ferromagnetic layers of the
Nakatani and Kitada article with the half metallic
ferromagnetic layers as taught by Kamiguchi et al.
The rational is as follows: one of ordinary skill in
the art would have been motivated to use a half
metallic ferromagnetic layer because half metallic
materials exhibit excellent magnetic properties that
amplify the magnetoresistive effect, thereby
increasing the sensitivity of the MR device.
[Answer-page 4.]
Looking at Kamiguchi, we see nothing that suggests half
metallic materials exhibit properties that amplify the MR
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