Appeal No. 2002-0514
Application No. 08/886,388 Page 4
adequate notice demanded by due process of law, so that they may
more readily and accurately determine the boundaries of
protection involved and evaluate the possibility of infringement
and dominance. See In re Hammack, 427 F.2d 1378, 1382, 166 USPQ
204, 208 (CCPA 1970).
As the court stated in In re Moore, 439 F.2d 1232, 1235,
169 USPQ 236, 238 (CCPA 1971), the determination of whether the
claims of an application satisfy the requirements of the second
paragraph of Section 112 is
merely to determine whether the claims do, in fact, set
out and circumscribe a particular area with a
reasonable degree of precision and particularity. It
is here where the definiteness of language employed
must be analyzed -- not in a vacuum, but always in
light of the teachings of the prior art and of the
particular application disclosure as it would be
interpreted by one possessing the ordinary level of
skill in the pertinent art. [Footnote omitted.]
In order to satisfy the requirements of the second paragraph of
§ 112, a claim must accurately define the invention in the
technical sense. See In re Knowlton, 481 F.2d 1357, 1366,
178 USPQ 486, 492-93 (CCPA 1973).
Applying these principles to the present case, we agree with
the examiner that the language as used in representative claim 44
introduces uncertainty and inconsistency which would preclude one
skilled in the art from determining the metes and bounds of the
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