Appeal No. 1996-1767 Page 6
Application No. 08/220,410
The appellants state that the each of claims 1-16 and 18-
32 are independently patentable, i.e., the claims do not stand
or fall together. (Appeal Br. at 5.) The appellants’
arguments, however, are directed only to independent claims 1,
14, 18, and 25 and dependent claims 15, 16, 23, and 24. They
fail to explain why dependent claims 2-8, 12, 13, 19-22, and
26-31 and independent claim 32 are believed to be separately
patentable. Therefore, we find that claims 1-8, 12, 13, and
32 stand or fall together, with claim 1 as representative of
the group. We also find that claims 18-21 stand or fall
together, with claim 18 as
representative of the group. In addition, we find that claims
25-31 stand or fall together, with claim 25 as representative
of the group. Next, we address the outstanding rejections.
Outstanding Rejections
We begin our consideration of the outstanding rejections
by noting that during patent examination, pending claims are
given their broadest reasonable interpretation. Limitations
from the specification are not to be read into the claims. In
re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d 1181, 1184, 26 USPQ2d 1057, 1059 (Fed.
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