Appeal No. 1997-1520
Application No. 08/365,464
We cannot sustain the rejection of claims 4 and 11 under § 103 over Stephenson in
view of Ito and Crawford. Appealed claims 4 and 11 specify that the
binder is carrageenan, and the examiner finds that "Crawford teaches a non-woven
composite web which contains carrageenan as a binder . . . for the purpose of providing
surgical dressings or other non-woven products" (page 6 of answer, third full paragraph).
However, the flaw in the examiner's's rejection is that Crawford does not provide any
teaching or suggestion that carrageenan can be used to bind a dye to a
substrate material. Accordingly, we see no reason why one of ordinary skill in the art would
have been motivated to replace the polyurethane copolymer of Stephenson with the
carrageenan of Crawford.
In conclusion, based on the foregoing, we will sustain the examiner's § 102 rejection
of claims 1, 2, 6, 8, 9, 12 and 13 over Stephenson, the rejection of claims 1, 2, 5-9 and 12-
14 under § 103 over Stephenson in view Ito, and the rejection of claims 3 and 10 under §
103 over Stephenson in view of Ito and Ohlson. However, we are constrained to reverse
the examiner's rejection of claims 4 and 11 under § 103 over Stephenson in view of Ito and
Crawford. Accordingly, the examiner's decision rejecting the appealed claims is affirmed-
in-part.
7
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007