Appeal No. 94-2033
Application No. 07/982,141
contaminated with sulfur." Again, see parent application Serial
No. 07/473,006, Paper No. 12, page 3. On this basis, the
previous merits panel concluded that appellant's claimed method
would have been obvious from a consideration of Lentz alone.
We have taken a step back and reevaluated the patentability
of appellant's claimed method, taking into account (1) the
disclosures of Lentz, Horner and Petro; (2) the statements in
appellant's specification relied on by the previous merits panel;
and (3) the vigorous arguments by appellant in this appeal that
the examiner and the previous merits panel "misconstrued . . .
the alleged admissions in applicant's specification" (Appeal
Brief, page 9, first full paragraph).
In the Background section of the specification, appellant
refers to
an obstacle to the economical synthesis of certain
aromatic amino compounds which are used for making dye-
forming couplers for color photography inasmuch as
their precursor nitro compounds are made from sulfur-
containing compounds. [Specification, page 1, lines 28
through 32, emphasis added].
Appellant does not acknowledge or admit that all aromatic amine
precursors are contaminated with sulfur, or that the nitro
aromatic reactants disclosed by Lentz are contaminated with
sulfur. Likewise, we have carefully reviewed the specification,
page 10, line 33 through page 11, line 21. Again, appellant does
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