Appeal 2007-1024
Application 10/231,144
On appeal, an Applicant bears the burden of showing that the
Examiner has not established a legally sufficient basis for combining the
teachings of the prior art. Applicants may sustain their burden by showing
that where the Examiner relies on a combination of disclosures, the
Examiner failed to provide sufficient evidence to show that one having
ordinary skill in the art would have done what Applicant did. United States
v. Adams, 383 U.S. 39 (1966).
ANALYSIS
There are four (4) prior art rejections on appeal. We begin our
analysis of the rejections on appeal by reviewing the invention of
Applicant’s claims - specifically, binders having contact angles satisfying
the formula θB – θA ≥ 15o.
Neither Applicant nor the Examiner has directed our attention to a
reference that identifies a numerical value for the contact angles of the
binders in dispute. For example, Applicant’s Appeal Brief provides an
Evidence Appendix that identifies only a single exhibit, which is a definition
of the term “contact angle” from semiconductorglossary.com. (Appeal Br.
Evidence Appendix). We therefore look to Applicant’s specification for
guidance.
As discussed in the findings of fact, Applicant’s specification teaches
that binder A is preferably PVDF, PTFE or modified PVDF. Applicant’s
specification teaches that preferred binder B’s include polymers having
acrylonitrile units and -(CH2)n- portions wherein 6 ≤ n. Acrylonitrile-
butadiene copolymer and acrylic ester-acrylonitrile copolymer are polymers
falling within the scope of Applicant’s preferred binder B. Accordingly, in
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