Appeal No. 97-4258
Application No. 08/429,966
the term “treated” explicitly is provided, and we can find
nothing in the reference from which to conclude that it
encompasses compounding a drug “into” the filament.
It therefore is our conclusion that Pinchuk fails to
disclose or teach all of the subject matter recited in claim
14, and thus cannot be considered to be anticipatory thereof.
The Section 102 rejection of independent claim 14, and of
dependent claims 15, 16, 18, 35 and 36 therefore is not
sustained.
The Section 103 Rejection
In rejecting claims under 35 U.S.C. § 103, the examiner
bears the initial burden of presenting a prima facie case of
obviousness (see In re Rijckaert, 9 F.3d 1531, 1532, 28 USPQ2d
1955, 1956 (Fed. Cir. 1993)), which is established when the
teachings of the prior art itself would appear to have
suggested the claimed subject matter to one of ordinary skill
in the art. See In re Bell, 991 F.2d 781, 783, 26 USPQ2d
1529, 1531 (Fed. Cir. 1993)).
As we explained above, Pinchuk provides no explicit
6
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007