Ex Parte Witthoft - Page 6

                Appeal No. 2007-0737                                                                            
                Application No. 10/290,606                                                                      

                provide increased resistance to deformation in the lateral direction.”  (Col. 2,                
                ll. 19-24.)  The container can also be constructed to have “a bottom 32 of                      
                relatively thin thickness in comparison to the thickness of the sidewall 30.”                   
                (Col. 2, ll. 37-39.)                                                                            
                       3) Burnham discloses a receptacle for holding refrigerated units of ice                  
                cream for individual servings.  The receptacle comprises two hinged parts                       
                which, “when disposed face-to-face define an enclosure of predetermined                         
                shape for holding a molding of hardenable substance.”  (Col. 1, ll. 17-21.)                     
                “The enclosure is comprised of a thin wall yieldably flexible plastic such as                   
                to enable displacing a portion of the wall inwardly of the part containing the                  
                frozen substance when the parts have been separated from each other to                          
                enable ejecting the hardenable substance therefrom.”  (Col. 1, ll. 23-28.)                      
                       In addition to showing what was conventional at the time the                             
                application was filed, these disclosures also establish that the ordinary                       
                skilled worker was familiar with making deformable containers to discharge                      
                hardened foods, and was capable of making several different designs,                            
                including designs in which 1) the sides were made more rigid than the                           
                deformable bottom by varying the material thickness (e.g., Donovan), 2) the                     
                sides and deformable bottom were of the same deformability (Burnham),                           
                and 3) the sides were made more rigid by adding structure to increase their                     
                resistance (Donovan).  Thus, making a deformable container using different                      
                design strategies was commensurate with the level of ordinary skill in the art                  
                at the time the claimed invention was made.                                                     




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