Appeal No. 1998-0915
Application No. 08/441,194
that it would have been obvious to metallize these subgrain
boundaries or dope them to eliminate the potential barrier
effect of such boundaries.
We do not agree with the examiner’s basic assumption that
a plurality of resistors in Ipposhi must contain subgrain
boundaries located within the resistors as recited in claims 1
and 2. Each of the resistors 4 in the bridge circuit of
Ipposhi can be separately formed to individually have no
subgrain boundaries within them as taught by Ipposhi. Note
that Ipposhi specifically discloses that “each piezo
resistance 4 is formed on a region of the single crystal layer
provided with no crystal sub-grain boundaries 51" [column 8,
lines 58-60]. We see no reason why the interconnection of
these resistances 4 would require the introduction of any
additional subgrain boundaries. As noted above, Ipposhi
specifically excludes the presence of subgrain boundaries
occurring within the resistance elements as recited in claims
1 and 2. Any attempt to modify Ipposhi to include such
subgrain boundaries would defeat the very purpose of Ipposhi,
and would represent a hindsight attempt to reconstruct the
claimed invention.
7
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007