Appeal No. 2003-0548 Page 8
Application No. 09/370,599
of the reply brief and column 3, lines 12-19 and the sentence
bridging columns 7 and 8 of Sato.5
Appellants’ argument with the examiner’s obviousness
determination focuses on appellants’ denotation of the transport
chamber (123, figure 7) of Sato as corresponding to appellants’
first transport chamber whereas the examiner refers to that
transport chamber (123, figure 7) of Sato as corresponding to
appellants’ second transport chamber. See the sentence bridging
pages 3 and 4 of the answer. We agree with the examiner’s
assessment in that the designation of a particular transport
chamber as a “first” or “second” transport chamber in
representative claim 40 does not, by itself, require that those
particular transport chambers be arranged in any particular
connecting sequence with the other structural elements recited in
representative claim 40. In other words, the mere
characterization of a claimed apparatus element by a particular
5 Moreover, appellants have not established on this record
that a functional limitation such as the relative degree of
vacuum maintained in a particular chamber constitutes a
structural distinguishing limitation for the claimed apparatus.
See In re Yanush, 477 F.2d 958, 959, 177 USPQ 705, 706 (CCPA
1973); In re Finsterwalder, 436 F.2d 1028, 1032, 168 USPQ 530,
534 (CCPA 1971); In re Casey, 370 F.2d 576, 580, 152 USPQ 235,
238 (CCPA 1967); and In re Lundberg, 244 F.2d 543, 546-47, 113
USPQ 530, 533 (CCPA 1957).
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007