Appeal No. 1998-1778 Page 11
Application No. 08/521,358
Claim 6
We agree with the appellants' arguments that the combined
teachings of the applied prior art (i.e., Terve, Olin, Kenway,
Steltz and Ishii) would not have suggested the subject matter
of claim 6 to one of ordinary skill in the art. Claim 6
requires an operational unit containing an electrically
operated device and a low voltage membrane switch to be sealed
against humidity and exposed for operation by a person in the
toilet compartment and otherwise protected against
unauthorized human access. However, these limitations are not
suggested by the applied prior art. In our view, the only
possible suggestion for combining the applied prior art in the
manner proposed by the examiner to meet the above-noted
limitations stems from hindsight knowledge derived from the
appellants' own disclosure. The use of such hindsight
knowledge to support an obviousness rejection under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103 is, of course, impermissible. It follows that we cannot
sustain the examiner's rejection of claim 6.
Claim 25
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