Appeal No. 98-1012
Serial No. 08/117,342
B page 12, line 2). The antibiotics to which the examiner refers, vancomycin and ansiomycin, suppress
the growth of Gram-positive bacteria and yeast, respectively (col. 5, lines 29-32, and col. 6, lines 58-
62). No agent or inhibitor for suppressing non-coliform Gram-negative bacteria is disclosed.
The mechanism by which Edberg is able to limit microbial competition (col. 7, lines 20-21), and
thereby reduce false-negative results, involves using a primary nutrient for the target microbe to be
detected (col. 7, lines 65-68). In a medium
that supports the growth of E. coli and total coliforms, Edberg introduces two nutrient-indicators B
specific to the E. coli and coliforms and which they use to metabolize and grow (claim 16) and which
they attack, resulting in a detectable change in color (col. 8, lines 17-32). Because other microbes, such
as non-coliform bacteria, cannot metabolize these nutrient-indicators, they will not grow (col. 8, lines
21-22) and the microbial competition that would have occurred in a medium with a general nutrient is6
eliminated. Although Edberg, like the claimed medium, suppresses the growth of non-coliform bacteria,
6 AThe nutrient-indicator actively participates in the growth
of the target microbes by serving as the preferred or primary
nutrient source. Y Competition between target microbes and
other microbes for the available nutrients in the media is
eliminated by the subject invention.@ (column 3, lines 37-51).
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