Appeal 2007-1461
Application 10/463,956
441 F.3d 977, 985-86, 78 USPQ2d 1329, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2006) (emphasis
omitted). “On appeal to the Board, an applicant can overcome a rejection by
showing insufficient evidence of prima facie obviousness or by rebutting the
prima facie case with evidence of secondary indicia of nonobviousness.” Id.
(emphasis omitted).
Applying the preceding legal principles to the Factual Findings (FF),
we find no reversible error in the Examiner’s finding of anticipation of
claims 1-3, 7, 13, and 16. Nor have Appellants convinced us of a reversible
error in the Examiner’s obviousness rejections. Our reasons follow.
We determine that “delta value,” as that terminology is used in claim
17, encompasses differences in count values as described by Kychakoff.
First, the words “delta value” merely connote a difference in values, and the
discussion of “delta value” in Appellants’ Specification is merely that, a
discussion: it is not a definition that serves to clearly disavow the broader
plain meaning of the terms (FF 3). There is no dispute that Kychakoff
determines a difference in particle counts that is a “delta value” within the
plain meaning of those words.
Even if the claim were limited to delta values as expressed in
Appellants’ Specification, our decision would not change. Kychakoff
describes the system as displaying the overall average carryover particle
counts as well as displaying the count from each of the detector locations
(FF 9). It is this data that the operator or computer monitors to determine if
there is a localized disturbance (FF 9). Reading the language of Kychakoff
as one of ordinary skill in the art would read it, we determine it is reasonable
to interpret Kychakoff as describing a step of determining a “delta value”
based upon the difference between the local value and the average value
8
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