Appeal No. 96-1389
Application No. 07/925,615
introduced at and/or prior to the introduction of the material
into the conveyor means for the known and expected result of
providing the required mixing of the material prior to forming
the pile” (answer, page 5). In this regard, the examiner
contends that “spraying devices for adding a liquid to a solid
are notoriously well known in the art” (answer, page 5).
We will not sustain this rejection.
Our court of review has repeatedly cautioned against
employing hindsight by using the applicant’s disclosure as a
blueprint to reconstruct the claimed invention out of isolated
teachings of the prior art. See, e.g., Grain Processing Corp.
v. American Maize-Products Co., 840 F.2d 902, 907, 5 USPQ2d
1788, 1792 (Fed. Cir. 1988). That court has also cautioned
against focusing on the obviousness of the differences between
the claimed invention and the prior art rather than on the
obviousness of the claimed invention as a whole as § 103
requires. See, e.g., Hybritech Inc. v. Monoclonal Antibodies,
Inc., 802 F.2d 1367, 1383, 231 USPQ 81, 93 (Fed. Cir. 1986),
cert. denied, 480 USPQ 947 (1987).
Also appropriate is our reviewing court’s words in In re
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