Appeal No. 2003-1825 Page 3
Application No. 09/672,492
OPINION
We have reviewed the record, including all of the arguments
advanced by the examiner and appellant in support of their
respective positions. This review leads us to conclude that the
examiner’s § 102 rejection and § 103 rejection are well-founded.
Accordingly, we will sustain the examiner’s rejections for the
reasons set forth in the answer and add the following for
emphasis.
§ 102(b) Rejection
A prior art reference anticipates the subject matter of a
claim when the reference discloses every feature of the claimed
invention, either explicitly or inherently (see Hazani v. Int'l
Trade Comm'n, 126 F.3d 1473, 1477, 44 USPQ2d 1358, 1361 (Fed.
Cir. 1997) and RCA Corp. v. Applied Digital Data Sys., Inc.,
730 F.2d 1440, 1444, 221 USPQ 385, 388 (Fed. Cir. 1984));
however, the law of anticipation does not require that the
reference teach what the appellants are claiming, but only that
the claims on appeal "read on" something disclosed in the
reference (see Kalman v. Kimberly-Clark Corp., 713 F.2d 760, 772,
218 USPQ 781, 789 (Fed. Cir. 1983), cert. denied, 465 U.S. 1026
(1984)).
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