Appeal No. 1997-2016 Page 8
Application No. 08/196,126
construed as the same as or very close to "vertical face."). We reach this conclusion based
upon our review of appellants’ specification, which indicates, at page 3, that a semiconductor
substrate "is covered on both sides by glass substrates for obtaining a functional sensor" and,
at page 4, that "a problem occurs, if one or several of the substrates which have to be aligned
with high precision to one another is or are not transparent" and of the accompanying2
drawings, which illustrate round substrates having the same diameter (Figures 1 and 3).
Hentz is specifically directed to an apparatus and method for aligning and adhering a
plurality of extremely small semiconductor devices (10) to a significantly larger substrate (18)
and thus lacks the limitation in claim 9 that the substrates aligned and deposited one upon
another have "approximately same surface area." With respect to claim 10, even if the base
(30) and collars (60) are considered an alignment means as claimed for aligning substrates (18),
Hentz still lacks a means for transporting the aligned substrates (18) to a second working area
and for depositing the aligned substrates one upon another, as also required in claim 10. In
fact, Hentz discloses no structure for transporting an aligned substrate (18) from its position on
the base (30). While Hentz does disclose means for moving the tubes (26) vertically to thereby
transport the small devices (10) toward or away from the substrate (18), these devices
2One of ordinary skill in the art would understand from these two statements that the transparent substrates
(2, 4) cover the non-transparent substrate but do not extend to any significant degree beyond the periphery thereof;
otherwise, alignment marks disposed on the outer transparent substrates beyond the periphery of the non-transparent
substrate could be used in conjunction with alignment marks within the periphery of the non-transparent substrate to
align all three substrates.
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