Appeal No. 1998-0338 Application No. 08/350,865 Appellant is not permitted to engage "in a post hoc attempt to redefine the claimed invention by impermissibly incorporating language appearing in the specification into the claims." In re Paulsen, 30 F.3d 1475, 1480, 31 USPQ2d 1671, 1674 (Fed. Cir. 1994). Claim 14 refines the “stress transferring” means to be “a volume of oxide, . . . contacting a planar upper surface of said foundation layer.” To read the limitations of claim 14 into claim 12 would make claim 14 redundant with claim 12. The claim 12 language is broader than claim 14 and only requires the “stress transferring” means to be “directly under said [upper] conductive plate, . . . [and] disposed between said conductive plugs.” This is clearly shown in APA, and requires no holes in the lower conductive plate. Appellant’s specification supports this analysis wherein it states “In some embodiments, there are no openings in the first [lower] plate but rather a relatively wide elongated volume of oxide between the first plate and the second plate transfers stress without cracking and prevents the oxide mesh from cracking.” 7Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 NextLast modified: November 3, 2007