Appeal No. 96-1707
Application 08/221,999
combined, the claimed invention would not be achieved. (See brief at pages 13-14.) We
disagree. Appellant argues that the claimed invention "provides a structure with two heads
having different sized gaps on and in contact with the same surface of a substrate." (See
brief at page 14.) The admitted prior art teaches the desire and need for 2 heads on the
same substrate wherein the heads are oriented in the same manner as the prior art
stacked individual heads. The admitted prior art also discloses the known deficiencies in
the individual and combined stacked heads which would have motivated skilled artisans to
modify the design by forming the stacked arrangement on the same plane as taught by
Jones. The result would have been to form both heads on the same surface of the
substrate as discussed above. With respect to the different gap sizes, we note that the
language of the claims 7 and 11 merely set forth the presence of two gaps and not the size
of the gaps. Moreover, the type of head would have dictated the size of the gap as
discussed above.
With respect to appellant's argument to secondary considerations concerning the
IEEE article, we agree with both the appellant's and the Examiner's statements.
Appellant argues that the evidence of publication should be considered by the Examiner.
We agree and find that the Examiner did consider the evidence, but the Examiner did not
find the evidence submitted to be persuasive in light of the prima facie case of
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