Appeal No. 2000-0023
Application 08/967,856
page 13, lines 2 through 4 of their specification, appellants
have defined "treating" as "brushing, spraying, dipping and
the like." We find Brouwer considered with Hagar suggests
"treating" trees ("wood") by spraying with a composition
containing the active agents disclosed in Brouwer and,
therefore, suggests the claimed method. Further, because
killing the fungus would have been expected to prevent the
incursion of Poria per the disclosure in Hagar, the
destruction caused by treating against these organisms would
have prevented damage to trees and, therefore, would have
preserved the "wood" (trees).
To the extent appellants suggest that Hagar is so
unrelated to the claimed invention as to be considered non-
analogous art,
we reject that argument. The test for determining whether a
reference is from a "non-analogous art" is a twofold
determination. First, we determine if the reference is within
appellants' field of endeavor. If it is not, we decide
whether the reference is reasonably pertinent to the
particular problem with which appellants were involved. In re
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