Appeal No. 2006-0593 Page 4
Application No. 09/895,611
OPINION
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration to
the appellant's specification and claims, to the applied prior art, and to the respective
positions articulated by the appellant and the examiner. On the basis of this review, for
the following reasons, we conclude that the examiner’s rejections should be sustained.
The teachings of the references relied upon by the examiner are not in dispute in
this appeal. Rather, the dispositive issue in this appeal is the meaning of “a means for
rotating said shaft about a third axis that is substantially orthogonal both to the first
axis and to the second axis” as set forth in independent claims 3 and 6. Specifically,
the appellant contends that von der Heide does not anticipate the subject matter of
claims 3, 4, 6 and 7 because
although the axes of the device in von der Heide that
produce rotation in the direction of the arrows 110 and 111
will always be orthogonal to one another, the axis that
produces the rotation shown in FIG. 9 in a clockwise
direction, will not always be orthogonal to the axis that
produces the rotation in the direction of arrow 110. In fact,
rotation in the direction of arrow 111 will sometimes cause
the axis that produces the rotation in the direction of arrow
110 to be parallel to the axis that produces the rotation
shown in FIG. 9 in a clockwise direction [brief, page 12].
Likewise, with respect to Pitavy, the appellant urges that
in Pitavy et al., although the y and z axes will always be
orthogonal to one another and the x and y axes will always
be orthogonal to one another, rotation about the y axis will
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