Appeal No. 2003-1141
Application 09/572,745
Anticipation is established only when a single prior art
reference discloses, expressly or under principles of inherency,
each and every element of a claimed invention. RCA Corp. v.
Applied Digital Data Sys., Inc., 730 F.2d 1440, 1444, 221 USPQ
385, 388 (Fed. Cir. 1984). It is not necessary that the
reference teach what the subject application teaches, but only
that the claim read on something disclosed in the reference,
i.e., that all of the limitations in the claim be found in or
fully met by the reference. Kalman v. Kimberly Clark Corp., 713
F.2d 760, 772, 218 USPQ 781, 789 (Fed. Cir. 1983), cert. denied,
465 U.S. 1026 (1984).
As framed and argued by the appellants (see pages 8 through
14 in the main brief and pages 2 through 4 in the reply brief),
the dispositive issue with respect to the anticipation rejection
of independent claims 1 and 10 and dependent claims 21 and 23 is
whether Muhlhoff meets the limitation in claim 1 requiring the
rotational member to be “disposed between the inlet port and the
exhaust means,” and the corresponding limitation in claim 10
requiring the rotational member to be “disposed between the inlet
port and the rotor.” The appellants do not dispute the
examiner’s finding that Muhlhoff’s rotor section 37 constitutes a
“rotational member” as recited in claims 1 and 10, but do submit
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