Appeal No. 97-4293
Application No. 08/138,396
The rejections are explained in the Examiner's Answer.
The viewpoints of the appellants in opposition to the
positions taken by the examiner are set forth in the Brief.
OPINION
In reaching our decision on the issues raised in this
appeal, we have carefully assessed the claims, the prior art
applied against the claims, and the respective views of the
examiner and the appellants as set forth in the Answer and the
Brief.
The Rejection Under 35 U.S.C. § 103
In rejections under Section 103, the examiner bears the
initial burden of presenting a prima facie case of obviousness
(see In re Rijckaert, 9 F.3d 1531, 1532, 28 USPQ2d 1955, 1956
(Fed. Cir. 1993)), which is established when the teachings of
the prior art itself would appear to have suggested the
claimed subject matter to one of ordinary skill in the art
(see In re Bell, 991 F.2d 781, 783, 26 USPQ2d 1529, 1531 (Fed.
Cir. 1993)). This is not to say, however, that the claimed
invention must expressly be suggested in any one or all of the
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