Appeal No. 94-3287
Application 07/835,152
All of the claims on appeal are rejected under 35 USC § 103
as being unpatentable over Umemura.3
We refer to the Briefs and to the Answers for a complete
exposition of the respective viewpoints advocated by the
appellants and the examiner concerning the above-noted rejection.
For the reasons which follow, we will not sustain this
rejection.
The problem addressed by the here claimed invention relates
to autoignition in a process for the manufacture of maleic
anhydride. This problem is solved by providing the feed flow
channel of the process reactor with an ignition inhibiting
component selected from the group consisting of acid sites and
trivalent phosphorus which acts as an autoignition suppression
agent. Specifically, the agent is deposited on the interior wall
of the feed flow channel and suppresses autoignition of the n-
3 The examiner dropped his previous rejection in the final Office action
based on Umemura under 35 USC § 102 in favor of a new rejection in the Answer
based on Umemura under 35 USC § 103. As correctly indicated on pages 15 and 16 of
the Reply Brief, the examiner on pages 2 and 3 of the Answer has erroneously
identified claim 27 as being previously rather than newly rejected under § 103.
However, this error is harmless since the appellants have not been prejudiced
thereby.
4
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007