Appeal No. 97-3295
Application No. 08/424,759
also fails to cure the aforementioned shortcoming in
Groenewald, and therefore the rejection of claim 7 also is not
sustained.
Spann was added to Groenewald and De Fries in the
rejection of claim 9, which requires that the elongate
structure be wedge-shaped, with triangular ends. Spann is
directed to a body positioner for use in supporting a patient
lying upon an operating room table or the like. It comprises
an elongated body having a plurality of flat surfaces upon
which the patient’s body can be supported (column 1, line 29
et al.). The ends of the body are essentially triangularly
shaped. However, the mere fact that the Groenewald structure
could be modified in the manner proposed by the examiner does
not make such a modification obvious unless the prior art
suggests the desirability of doing so (see In re Gordon, 733
F.2d 900, 902, 221 USPQ 1125, 1127 (Fed. Cir. 1984)). There
must be a motivation stemming from some teaching, suggestion
or inference in the prior art as a whole or from the knowledge
generally available to one of ordinary skill in the art and
not from the appellant's disclosure (see, for example,
6
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007