Appeal No. 1997-1734
Application No. 08/215,259
pressure on the inside and outside of the sample cartridge
without contamination from impurities outside the cartridge
but inside the pressure vessel (appeal brief, page 5). The
appellants further submit that the claimed invention allows a
plurality of extractions to be performed on a plurality of
different preloaded samples without the need for manually
loading samples or initiating the flow of the supercritical
fluid for each individual sample (appeal brief, page 6).
Additionally, the appellants state that “the critical
temperature of the supercritical fluid is maintained in the
pressure vessel because of the preheated pressure vessel to
provide more efficient extraction of analyte” (id.).
As evidence of unpatentability, the examiner relies upon
the following prior art references:
Gilford 4,058,367 Nov. 15,
1977
Holt 4,533,641 Aug.
6, 1985
Frank et al. (Frank) 5,133,859 Jul. 28,
1992
(filed Mar. 2, 1990)
Claims 7 through 37 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103
as unpatentable over the combined teachings of Frank, Holt,
and Gilford (examiner’s answer, pages 3-4).
5
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007