Appeal No. 1997-3169
Application 08/211,791
Appellants argue that their statement that no reference of
record provides a teaching of a process for coating particles
obtained by fragmentation from a solidified liquid precursor on a
substrate with a metal oxide, or the product produced thereby,
addressed the combined teachings of the references as a whole
(request, page 1). Stating that no single reference provides
such a teaching, however, does not address the combined teachings
of the references.
Appellants argue that we misapprehended the significance of
the metal oxide layer being coated on the particles after they
are separated in fragments from a solidified layer on the
substrate (request, page 1). Itoh, appellants argue, is silent
as to the timing of the coating with metal oxide (request,
page 2). The teaching by Itoh, however, that the coating
improves the resistance against chalking and discoloring of the
pigment, would have fairly suggested, to one of ordinary skill in
the art, coating a pigment after fragmentation so that the entire
surface of the pigment is provided with such resistance. The
inquiry under 35 U.S.C. § 103 is not merely what references
expressly teach, but what inferences one of ordinary skill in the
art reasonably would draw from them. See In re Lamberti, 545
F.2d 747, 750, 192 USPQ 278, 280 (CCPA 1976); In re Preda, 401
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