Appeal No. 1996-3982
Application No. 08/315,005
The examiner relies upon a combination of two different combinations of
references to reject the claimed subject matter and establish a prima facie case of
obviousness. With respect to each combination of references, the examiner has
stated that neither the reference to Felder nor Lane exemplifies concentrating the
suspension by supercritical solvent extraction. See Answer, pages 9 and 11. Indeed,
we determine that neither reference discloses nor teaches supercritical solvent
extraction.
Accordingly, Zosel is relied upon as disclosing the separation of materials
through the use of supercritical extraction. See Abstract. We find that the
separation process is taught as “extremely simple in operation” especially on a
commercial scale. See column 1, lines 42-46. We find that “[t]ransfer of organic
compounds is achieved equally satisfactorily in purely inorganic gases such as CO .”
2
See column 4, lines 65-67. Moreover, we find that Zosel discloses that, “if a gas
such as ethylene or carbon dioxide is passed under the conditions of this invention
through the aluminum alcoholate reaction mixture prior to hydrolysis, the organic
impurities which are chiefly olefins are taken up in the supercritical phase
substantially quantitatively while the aluminum alcoholate is obtained in the residue.”
See column 22, lines 51-57. We further find that in example 13, carbon dioxide is
used to separate dodecene from paraffin oil.
However, notwithstanding the above findings, in our view the Zosel reference fails
to disclose or teach that a supercritical extraction of a composition comprising a
liquid hydrocarbon vehicle, thermoplastic resin particles, pigment, a charge additive
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