Appeal No. 97-0642
Application 08/242,318
35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
Level of ordinary skill
The references are evidence of the knowledge and level of
ordinary skill in the art. See In re Oelrich, 579 F.2d 86,
91, 198 USPQ 210, 214 (CCPA 1978) ("the PTO usually must
evaluate both the scope and content of the prior art and the
level of ordinary skill solely on the cold words of the
literature"); In re GPAC Inc., 57 F.3d 1573, 1579,
35 USPQ2d 1116, 1121 (Fed. Cir. 1995) (the Board did not err
in adopting the approach that the level of skill in the art
was best determined by the references of record). In
addition, those of ordinary skill in the art must be presumed
to know something about the art apart from what the references
expressly disclose. In re Jacoby, 309 F.2d 513, 516,
135 USPQ 317, 319 (CCPA 1962).
Grouping of claims
Inasmuch as the Examiner's statement of the rejection
appears to err in including claims 28-37 in the rejection over
Sklarew, Horodeck, and Kato (Appellant's Issue E), and since
Appellant does not mention the rejection of claims 28-37 over
Sklarew, Horodeck, Kato, and Capps (which would be Issue F),
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