Appeal No. 1999-1834 Page 6
Application No. 08/876,030
of an invention does not amount to a license to resort to the
unbridled use of such terms without appropriate constraints to
guard against the potential use of such terms as the
proverbial nose of wax.2
In Seattle Box, the court set forth the following
requirements for terms of degree:
When a word of degree is used the district court
must determine whether the patent's specification
provides some standard for measuring that degree.
The trial court must decide, that is, whether one of
ordinary skill in the art would understand what is
claimed when the claim is read in light of the
specification.
In Shatterproof Glass Corp. v. Libbey-Owens Ford Co., 758
F.2d 613, 624, 225 USPQ 634, 641 (Fed. Cir. 1985), the court
added:
If the claims, read in light of the specifications
[sic], reasonably apprise those skilled in the art
both of the utilization and scope of the invention,
and if the language is as precise as the subject
matter permits, the courts can demand no more.
2 See White v. Dunbar, 119 U.S. 47, 51-52 (1886) and
Townsend Engineering Co. v. HiTec Co. Ltd., 829 F.2d 1086,
1089-91, 4 USPQ2d 1136, 1139-40 (Fed. Cir. 1987).
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