Appeal No. 96-0294
Application No. 08/168,569
6, 1987
Drozdowicz et al. (Drozdowicz) 4,778,693 Oct. 18,
1988
Harriott et al. (Harriott) 5,273,849 Dec. 28,
1993
Claims 1 through 9 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103
as unpatentable from the disclosure of Drozdowicz. Claims 1
through 9 stand further rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as
being unpatentable from the disclosure of Harriott considered
with Kellogg. Because we are of the opinion that the examiner
has failed to establish that the subject claimed by appellants
would have been prima facie obvious at the time appellants'
invention was made, we shall reverse the examiner's rejection
for reasons set forth below.
OPINION
We agree with the examiner's conclusion that the art on
which he has relied to reject the appealed claims establishes
that at the time appellants' invention was made it was well-
known in the art to repair defects in lithographic masks. We
also agree with the examiner that the art relied on shows that
such repair is effected by laying down opaque solid materials
from gaseous precursors on lithographic masks. However, in
each of the references relied on by the examiner, the mask
repaired included opaque patterns. The masks were designed to
3
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007