Appeal No. 1998-1552
Application 08/698,982
the art and not from the appellant's disclosure. See, for
example, Uniroyal, Inc. v. Rudkin-Wiley Corp., 837 F.2d 1044,
1052, 5 USPQ2d 1434, 1439 (Fed. Cir.), cert. denied, 488 U.S.
825 (1988).
The claimed invention deals with the problem of the
atherosclerotic narrowing of arteries. According to the
appellant, the prior art methods of removing atherosclerotic
plaque by means of basket knives carried by catheters are
improved upon by his method, in which a radial adjustable
cutting head is operated beyond the unconstricted diameter of
the artery so that it not only removes the plaque from the
lumen of the artery, but also removes some of the wall of the
artery. This limitation is expressed in independent claim 24
as the steps of “enlarging the radial size of the cutting head
beyond that of radial size of the artery” and “displacing the 2
enlarged cutting head to engage and axially cut both wall
tissue and plaque from the artery.” Independent claims 29, 30
and 31 recite similar limitations.
2In keeping with the explanation provided in the
specification, we interpret “radial size of the artery” to
mean the diameter of the artery unconstricted by the plaque.
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