Appeal No. 1999-1911
Application No. 08/659,308
flange 48 of the applicator. Any surplus
liquid which might drip from the brush and
which might normally deposit on the shelf
30 would not be deposited and remain on the
annular bead 36. This leaves the bead
36 clean at all times for sealing contact
with the flange 48. [Column 3, lines
26-33; emphasis added.]
The test for obviousness is what the combined teachings
of the references would have suggested to one of ordinary
skill in the art. In re Young, 927 F.2d 588, 591, 18 USPQ2d
1089, 1091 (Fed. Cir. 1991) and In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413,
425, 208 USPQ 871, 881 (CCPA 1981). It is our view, from a
collective assessment of the above noted reference teachings,
that it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in
the art to incorporate into the container of Nardone a neck
that has a bottle opening that includes a sharp edge adapted
to engage and deform Nardone’s sealing disk 4 to improve the
sealing action thereof, following the teachings of Reinhard
and Lerner. In our opinion, the incentive on the part of one
having ordinary skill in the art for making this modification
would have simply been to gain the art recognized benefits of
increased sealing pressure and enhanced self-cleaning that
flow from utilization of such a sealing interface, as readily
6
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