Appeal No. 1997-0846
Application No. 08/474,950
component. Appealed claim 37 defines the spacer broadly in
terms of a water soluble thermoplastic polymer which retains
its shape at the printed wiring board fabrication and
soldering temperatures encountered, but additionally requires
that the spacer have a central aperture extending
therethrough. Appealed dependent claims 40 and 41 define the
spacer as a toroid.
Appealed claims 2 through 4 stand rejected under 35
U.S.C.
§ 112, second paragraph, as indefinite. Apparently, the
examiner considers that the claim language "selected" renders
the claims indefinite under this section of the statute. See
appellant's brief at page 4. However, we agree with appellant
that the claims do, in fact, set out and circumscribe a
particular area with a reasonable degree of precision and
particularity. Hence, we do not sustain the examiner's
rejection of appealed claims 2 through 4 under this section of
the statute.
We now turn to the examiner's obviousness rejection of
the appealed claims as unpatentable over Baechtold in view of
4
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