Appeal No. 1996-4200
Application No. 08/330,341
the claimed bulk terminals all connected to the second
terminal, the examiner is of the opinion (Answer, page 4) that
it is well known in the art to do this "for purposes of
convenience." The examiner does not offer any comments
concerning the obviousness of interconnecting the gate and
source terminals of transistors 1 and 3.
Appellants argue (Brief, pages 11, 14 and 15) that it
would not have been obvious to the skilled artisan to apply
the digital sense amplifier teachings of Van Zeghbroeck to the
analog comparator teachings of Leipold. Even if they are
combined, "Van Zeghbroeck does not teach all of the MOSFETs
having a bulk terminal connected to said second terminal for
the supply voltage as claimed in claim 1" (Brief, page 11),
and "[t]he changes to the circuit of Leipold et al. necessary
to create an operative circuit with MOSFETs of the same
channel type [claims 1 and 4] from Van Zeghbroeck would not
have been obvious from the cited Leipold et al. and Van
Zeghbroeck references because neither reference shows or
suggests the necessary changes to the circuit" (Brief, pages
12, 13 and 15). Although the examiner never addressed the
gate and source terminal connections of the first and third
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