Appeal 2007-2217
Application 11/231,232
1. Claims 1-4, 7-15, and 17-21 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b)3
as being anticipated by Schofield.
2. Claim 6 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over
Schofield in view of O’Farrell.
3. Claims 5 and 16 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Schofield in view of Pabla.
Rather than repeat the arguments of Appellants or the Examiner, we
refer to the Briefs and the Answer4 for their respective details. In this
decision, we have considered only those arguments actually made by
Appellants. Arguments which Appellants could have made but did not make
in the Briefs have not been considered and are deemed to be waived. See 37
C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(vii).
OPINION
The Anticipation Rejection
We first consider the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1-4, 7-15, and
17-21 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as being anticipated by Schofield.
Anticipation is established only when a single prior art reference discloses,
expressly or under the principles of inherency, each and every element of a
3 Since the Schofield reference was published on December 24, 2002 -- after
the effective filing date of the present application -- the reference qualifies as
prior art under § 102(e), not § 102(b). Nevertheless, we consider the
Examiner’s error harmless as it does not affect our assessment of the merits
of the anticipation rejection.
4 An Examiner’s Answer was first mailed Jan. 29, 2007 which was revised
on Mar. 28, 2007. We refer to the revised Answer throughout this opinion.
3
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