Appeal 2007-1026
Application 10/405,819
The combination of Examples 1 and 2 thus discloses a
method wherein embryogenic tissue is cultured in maintenance
medium containing gibberellin and lacking abscisic acid, then
later cultured in development medium lacking gibberellin, thus
meeting the limitations of claim 1. The examples utilized
Douglas fir, but the method is disclosed to be useful for pine.
Therefore claim 1 is anticipated.
(Answer 3.)
To find anticipation, “[a] single reference must describe the claimed
invention with sufficient precision and detail to establish that the subject
matter existed in the prior art.” Verve LLC v. Crane Cams Inc., 311 F.3d
1116, 1120, 65 USPQ2d 1051, 1054 (Fed. Cir. 2002). “[T]he reference must
describe the applicant’s claimed invention sufficiently to have placed a
person of ordinary skill in the field of the invention in possession of it.”
In re Spada, 911 F.2d 705, 708, 15 USPQ2d 1655, 1657 (Fed. Cir. 1990).
In this case, we are persuaded by the Examiner’s arguments that Pullman’s
disclosure is adequate to put the skilled worker in possession of the claimed
invention.
Example 2 discloses an experimental condition in which embryos are
cultured in a development medium lacking GA (col. 16, l1. 13, 20), as
required by claim 1. Although Pullman does not describe the hormone
content of the maintenance medium utilized in this example, Example 1
states explicitly states that GA “and/or” ABA are beneficial in the
maintenance media (col. 14, ll. 62-64). In other words, there are only three
preferred choices for the maintenance medium: 1) GA alone; 2) ABA alone;
and 3) GA and ABA. These choices were tested in Example 7 (cols. 19-20;
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