Appeal No. 96-0317
Application 08/042,185
references such as the Lindmayer references which are directed toward that art.
Appellants argue that the secondary references relate to the solar cell art where only
an electrically conductive contact is applied on a silicon solar cell, and that there is no
suggestion that the various thermal spray techniques disclosed therein are universally
equivalent or that arc spraying could be substituted for plasma spraying of adhesive layers
on a silicon-containing target material or for applying solderable layers (brief, page 5).
Lindmayer ‘391 teaches that arc spraying and plasma spraying both are suitable for
applying metallic material to a solar cell (col. 2, lines 54-68). In our view, this teaching
would have been sufficient to reasonably suggest, to one of ordinary skill in the art that, that
either of these methods is effective for applying metal layers onto silicon surfaces, whether
in a pattern as in the Lindmayer methods or as a bonding layer as in the Lauterbach
method. Furthermore, Lindmayer ‘391 teaches that a plasma flame can be part of an
electric arc (col. 5, lines 50-64), which would have indicated to one of ordinary skill in the
art that electric arc spraying and plasma spraying are sufficiently similar in nature that an
electric arc process would be a suitable alternative to the plasma spraying process of
Lauterbach.
Lindmayer ‘812 indicates that both arc spraying and plasma spraying can be used
for coating surfaces in general with metallic material (col. 1, lines 64-68), which would have
fairly suggested, to one of ordinary skill in the art, that arc spraying would be effective for
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