Appeal No. 96-0499
Application 07/891,671
459, 467 (CCPA 1966), and to provide a reason why one having ordinary skill in
the pertinent art would have been led to modify the prior art or to combine
prior art references to arrive at the claimed invention. Such reason must
stem from some teaching, suggestion or implication in the prior art as a whole
or knowledge generally available to one having ordinary skill in the art.
Uniroyal, Inc. v. Rudkin-Wiley Corp., 837 F.2d 1044, 1051, 5 USPQ2d 1434, 1438
(Fed. Cir.), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 825 (1988); Ashland Oil, Inc. v. Delta
Resins & Refractories, Inc., 776 F.2d 281, 293, 227 USPQ 657, 664 (Fed. Cir.
1985), cert. denied, 475 U.S. 1017 (1986); ACS Hosp. Sys., Inc. v. Montefiore
Hosp., 732 F.2d 1572, 1577, 221 USPQ 929, 933 (Fed. Cir. 1984). These
showings by the examiner are an essential part of complying with the burden of
presenting a prima facie case of obviousness. Note In re Oetiker, 977 F.2d
1443, 1445, 24 USPQ2d 1443, 1444 (Fed. Cir. 1992).
With respect to representative, independent claim 13, the examiner
cites Riesland as teaching a fluorescent lamp in which a transformer secondary
winding acts to reduce the lamp current in the secondary circuit [rejection
mailed April 14, 1994]. The examiner notes that Riesland has no teaching
about maintaining the filament voltage of the lamps substantially constant,
however, the examiner cites Munson as teaching this condition [Id. at pages 2-
3]. The examiner also recognizes that neither of the references teaches the
claimed feature of increasing the number of turns of the secondary winding for
reducing the current in the secondary winding. The examiner attempts to show
that the laws of physics dictate that increasing the number of turns in a
secondary winding would have the same effect as the reduction of the power
4
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007