Appeal No. 1996-3112
Application 08/395,170
(a) feeding the wood chips to a primary refiner zone operating at a temperature of
above 145E C and at an energy level of less than about 10 hpd per ton for a time to cause
substantive separation of wood fiber comprising said wood chips without causing
substantial reduction in the average length of said wood fibers to form pulp comprising
said wood fiber having a lignin coating on an outer surface of said fiber;
(b) treating the pulp form [sic, from] step (a) with an enzyme in the substantial
absence of treatment chemicals in an amount and for a time sufficient to weaken the
strength of the lignin coating to form treated pulp; and
(c) further refining the treated pulp in a second refiner zone operating at an energy
of less than about 20 hpd per ton to form a processed pulp comprising wood fiber having a
reduced amount of lignin coating wherein the average length of said wood fiber is at least
about 80% of the average length of wood fiber in said wood chips.
The references relies upon by the examiner are:
Goheen et al. (Goheen) 4,145,246 Mar. 20, 1979
Leatham et al. (Leatham), “Energy Savings In Biochemical Pulping,” 4th International
Conference on Biotechnology in the Pulp and Paper Industry, Raleigh, NC (May 1989).
A reference made of record and discussed by this merits panel is:
Canadian patent (Vaheri) 2,030,186 May 18, 1991
Claims 1 through 10 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103. As evidence of
obviousness, the examiner relies upon Goheen and Leatham. We reverse.
DISCUSSION
Viewing Goheen and Leatham apart from appellant's disclosure of the present
invention, we find no teaching, suggestion or motivation in the references which would have
led one of ordinary skill in the art to combine them in the manner required in order to arrive
at the subject matter of claim 1 on appeal. At best, Leatham would have suggested to one
of ordinary skill in the art to use a fungus in accordance with that disclosure to pretreat
wood chips prior to an initial refining step. We find no teaching or suggestion in Leatham
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