Ex Parte Akram - Page 6




             Appeal 2007-2304                                                                                    
             Application 10/209,004                                                                              


                                                    Claim 8                                                      
                   Claim 8, in addition to requiring the above-discussed reduced current                         
             leakage, requires planarizing a contact to make it substantially coplanar with a                    
             surface of an insulating material.                                                                  
                   Sandhu’s prior art figure 1 shows such a structure (contact 3 substantially                   
             coplanar with the insulating material on each side of it).  The Appellant argues that               
             one of ordinary skill in the art would not have been motivated to use the prior art                 
             configuration disclosed by Sandhu when Sandhu teaches away from it (Br. 11).                        
             Sandhu teaches that he seeks to provide increased density, decreased contact                        
             resistance between an electrode and a barrier layer, and reduced degradation of the                 
             barrier layer compared to the prior art device (col. 2, lines 33-38), but he does not               
             disclose that the prior art device is not functional.  Hence, Sandhu and Hosaka                     
             would have led one of ordinary skill in the art, through no more than ordinary                      
             creativity, to use Hosaka’s method when making the prior art device disclosed by                    
             Sandhu to improve the prior art device in the manner taught by Hosaka, i.e., to                     
             remove surface roughness and distortions in the lower electrode (1) and round the                   
             corner portions of the lower electrode’s side surface to prevent degradation of the                 
             quality of the thin insulating film formed on the lower electrode and to obtain good                
             electrical characteristics (Hosaka 3).                                                              
                   Regardless, the Appellant points out that the Appellant’s contact (64; fig.                   
             6B) is substantially coplanar with the surface of the insulating material (60) even                 
             though the contact has a barrier layer (66) thereon (Br. 5).  Because the Appellant’s               
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