Appeal No. 1999-0212
Application No. 08/230,526
distal portions for receiving fiducial markers, and fiducial
markers attachable to the bar. The examiner is of the view
that all of the subject matter recited in claim 1 is taught by
Guthrie, except for the removable connection of the U-shaped
bar to the forward projection of the mouthpiece. However, it
is the examiner’s position that, in view of the teachings of
Gill, one of ordinary skill in the art would have found it
obvious to modify the Guthrie apparatus by removably
connecting the U-shaped bar to the projection extending from
the mouthpiece. The appellants dispute this conclusion on the
basis that “[n]othing in the references teaches or suggests”
five listed features of claim 1 (Brief, page 6), and that the
references fail to show the required forwardly extending
projection and teach away from the claimed removable
connection (Brief, pages 9 and 10). We are not persuaded by
these arguments that the position taken by the examiner is in
error.
From our perspective, Figure 5 of Guthrie clearly shows
all of the features of the invention except for the removable
attachment of the U-shaped bar and the forward projection from
the mouthpiece. With regard to the forward projection, we
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