Appeal No. 2003-1907
Application No. 09/214,893
do not challenge the examiner's legal conclusion that it would
have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to utilize
the fuel cell system of Fletcher in an electrical vehicle.
Rather, the principal argument advanced by appellants is that
"[n]either Fletcher nor Lorenz mention or suggest [sic, mentions
or suggests] to use the dynamic pressure of a relative airstream
with respect to a fuel cell system for cooling purposes in a car"
(page 5 of Brief, second paragraph). Appellants urge that
Rogers, relied upon by the examiner for a teaching of using air
caused by the motion of a vehicle to cool a device in the
vehicle, "has no relation to fuel cell systems at all" (id.). In
essence, it is appellants' argument that there is no teaching in
the cited prior art for cooling the fuel cell system of an
electrical vehicle by arranging the system in the vehicle so that
the relative airstream of the vehicle in motion serves to cool
the fuel cell system.
While appellants' argument has some appeal at first blush,
we must agree with the examiner that inasmuch as it was known in
the art to utilize the airstream generated by a moving vehicle to
cool systems of the vehicle which need cooling, it would have
been a matter of prima facie obviousness for one of ordinary
skill in the art to employ the well-known presence of a cooling
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