Appeal No. 95-3273
Application 08/136,856
plastic which can be cut with a pair of scissors. A
ceramic piezoelectric element is, except for its
electrical characteristics, about like a piece of
stone, and it can be cut with a diamond saw. [Reply
Brief at 3.]
We do not agree that the term "thin film" as used in claim 1
would have been understood by the artisan to necessarily mean a
sheet of plastic-like material that is capable of being cut with
scissors. While this is an accurate description of a PVDF film,5
which is appellant's only disclosed example of a suitable
piezoelectric film material, it is improper to read limitations
from examples given in the specification into the claims.
Constant v. Advanced Micro-Devices, Inc., 848 F.2d 1560, 1571,
7 USPQ2d 1057, 1064 (Fed. Cir. 1988). On the record before us,
we believe the artisan would have construed the term "thin film"
in claim 1 broadly to mean "[a] thin sheet or coating of
material," which is the broader of the two definitions given for
"film" in McGraw-Hill Electronics Dictionary 208 (1994 ed.). As
a result, the phrase "thin film of piezoelectric material" is
broad enough to read on Rokurota's piezoelectric element 38,
which may have a thickness of, for example, 0.3 millimeters
(col. 4, lines 54-55). We note that since 0.3 millimeters is the
5As appellant correctly notes in the reply thereto, the
Supplemental Examiner's Answer mischaracterized their position to
be that the term "thin film of piezoelectric material" must be
construed to mean a PVDF film.
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