Appeal No. 1999-0403
Application 08/804,095
they should be rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 112, second
paragraph, and not over the prior art. In re Steele, 305 F.2d
859, 862, 134 USPQ 292, 295 (CCPA 1962). However, in the
present case, in order to avoid piecemeal appellate review, we
will interpret claim 7 as being directed to a protective cover
per se, and proceed to consider the prior art rejections of
claims 7-10 on that basis. Cf. Ex parte Ionescu, 222 USPQ4
537, 540 (Bd. App. 1984).
Anticipation under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) is established only
when a single prior art reference discloses, either expressly
or under principles of inherency, each and every element of a
claimed invention. See RCA Corp. v. Applied Digital Data
Systems, Inc., 730 F.2d 1440, 1444, 221 USPQ 385, 388 (Fed.
Cir. 1984), cert. dismissed sub nom., Hazeltine Corp. v. RCA
Corp., 468 U.S. 1228 (1984). However, the law of anticipation
does not require that the reference teach specifically what an
appellant has disclosed and is claiming but only that the
claims on appeal “read on” something disclosed in the
4We appreciate that appellant urges a different
interpretation of claim 7.
5
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