Appeal 2007-1803
Application 10/716,512
Uno JP 09-111412 Apr. 28, 1997
Robelet US 5,769,970 Jun. 23, 1998
Claims 1-7 are rejected under 35 USC 103(a) as being unpatentable
over Robelet in view of Vander Voort and Uno.1 It is the Examiner’s basic
position that Robelet teaches or would have suggested each of the claim 1
constituents and amounts except for oxygen but that it would have been
obvious for one with ordinary skill in this art to provide Robelet's steel with
oxygen in the amount here claimed in view of Vander Voort (Answer 3-5).2
Appellants acknowledge that Robelet teaches adding calcium to
patentee's steel composition (col. 4, ll.18-10) but argue that the reference
contains no teaching or suggestion of the calcium amount required by claim
1. We recognize that the Robelet disclosure is silent regarding calcium
amount. In our view, however, this silence evinces or infers that Robelet
considered one with ordinary skill in this art able to determine effective
amounts of calcium. This evidence or inference leads us to agree with the
Examiner's conclusion that it would have been obvious for an artisan to
determine effective calcium amounts for the Robelet steel compositions,
thereby yielding calcium amounts within the range defined by claim 1. See
KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 127 S.Ct. 1727, 1741, 82 USPQ2d 1385, 1396
(2007) (analysis need not seek out precise teachings directed to specific
1 The arguments in the Brief are directed to independent claims 1 and 4 only,
and these independent claims are argued together rather than separately (Br.
9-19). Accordingly, in assessing the merits of the rejection before us, we
will focus on independent claim 1 since this is the broadest claim on appeal.
2 The Examiner's reliance on Uno involves dependent claim features only
(Answer 4). Since Appellants have not separately argued the dependent
claims, we need not discuss the Uno reference.
3
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