Appeal No. 2003-0746
Application No. 09/898,437
decision, appellant’s specification attaches no criticality to
the choice of flocculating materials. Chung evidences that the
claimed materials were known in the art as flocculating agents.
Appellant also submits that we overlooked the claims in
concluding that the claims do not preclude the addition of
aluminum-containing chemicals. According to appellant, the
recitation of the Markush group effectively confines the metal
ions to zinc and manganese ions. However, the “comprising”
language of the claims “opens” the claims to the addition of
compounds in addition to the recited zinc and manganese ions. As
for appellant’s statement that “claims are interpreted from the
specification and prosecution estoppel applies” (page 3 of
request, penultimate paragraph), it is well settled that
limitations from the specification are not to be read into the
claims. In re Etter, 756 F.2d 852, 225 USPQ 1 (Fed. Cir.),
cert. denied, 474 U.S. 828 (1985).
Appellant also contends that “[c]ontrary to the Board’s
statement, Chung does not disclose bentonite and a
polyacrylamide” (page 4 of request, 2nd paragraph). We addressed
this argument at the sentence bridging pages 6 and 7 of the
decision. We recognized that Chung does not expressly disclose a
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