Appeal No. 97-2480
Application 08/296,122
In reaching our conclusion on the obviousness issue
raised in this appeal, this panel of the board has carefully
considered appellants’ specification and claim 14, the applied
patent, and the respective viewpoints of appellants and the2
examiner. As a consequence of our review, we make the
determination which follows.
We affirm the examiner’s rejection of claim 14.
Claim 14 is drawn to a method of encasing a meat product
flowing through an encasing machine, the method requiring,
inter alia, moving the encased product exiting the machine
onto a weighing scale, weighing the encased meat product
exiting the machine and comparing the weight thereof to a
predetermined target weight, and increasing or decreasing the
rate of flow of meat product from a pump to compensate for any
variance in weight between the weighed encased product and the
In our evaluation of the applied patent, we have considered all of the2
disclosure thereof for what it would have fairly taught one of ordinary skill
in the art. See In re Boe, 355 F.2d 961, 965, 148 USPQ 507, 510 (CCPA 1966).
Additionally, this panel of the board has taken into account not only the
specific teachings, but also the inferences which one skilled in the art would
reasonably have been expected to draw from the disclosure. See In re Preda
401 F.2d 825, 826, 159 USPQ 342, 344 (CCPA 1968).
3
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007