Appeal No. 1996-2756
Application No. 07/987,235
On this record, appellants argue (Brief, page 9) that Weinberg “is completely silent
on the use of any particular region of K-ras. This fact, coupled with the silence of the
secondary reference on the use of these particular portions of K-ras, render the
rejection suspect.” In the regard, we note that the examiner’s statement of the
rejection merely concludes (Answer, page 5) that the antisense oligonucleotides
comprise oligonucleotides to exons II and III, and intron II of the p21 K-ras oncogene.
The examiner, however, provides no support for this conclusion, or explanation as to
why one would necessarily include these particular regions.
Furthermore, the claimed invention is directed to a “molecule which
selectively inhibits the expression of the p21 K-ras oncogene.” According to the
specification (page 7) this molecule “hybridize[s] selectively to a selected gene
family member, and not to other family members, and thereby inhibit[s] selectivity.”
As appellants argue (Brief, page 9) “rather than designing an antisense construct
that specifically targets the ras oncogene, … Weinberg proposes construction of an
artificial proto-oncogene that will escape the indiscriminate effects of a non-specific
antisense message.” In response, without directing our attention to a particular
portion of the reference, the examiner argues (Answer, page 7) that Weinberg
“clearly indicates that it is not always necessary to compensate by the addition of
wild type sequences.” The examiner also directs our attention (id.) to Weinberg’s
disclosure of “antisense sequences which inhibit expression of the unspliced RNA”
and Izant’s teaching
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