Appeal No. 99-0717 Page 6
Application No. 08/597,095
F.2d 86, 91, 198 USPQ 210, 214 (CCPA 1978) ("[T]he PTO usually
must evaluate ... the level of ordinary skill solely on the
cold words of the literature."). Of course, every patent
application and reference relies to some extent upon knowledge
of persons skilled in the art to complement that which is
disclosed therein. In re Bode, 550 F.2d 656, 660, 193 USPQ
12, 16 (CCPA 1977). Persons skilled in the art, moreover,
must be presumed to know something about the art apart from
what the references disclose. In re Jacoby, 309 F.2d 513,
516, 135 USPQ 317, 319 (CCPA 1962). With this in mind, we
address the appellants’ arguments regarding the obviousness of
claim 1 and of claims 2-10.
Obviousness of Claim 1
The appellants make two basic arguments regarding claim
1. These will be addresses seriatim. First, the appellants
allege that there is “no disclosure whatever in Ishii
concerning the use of a data structure to define and implement
the neural network.” (Appeal Br. at 10.) During patent
examination, pending claims must be given their broadest
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