Appeal No. 2000-0075
Application 08/969,941
appellants regard as their invention. Accordingly, it is our
view that claims 1 through 32 and 54 through 58 run afoul of
the requirements of 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, which
specifies that the claims presented must particularly point
out and distinctly claim the subject matter “which the
applicant regards as his invention.”
Given the foregoing, under the provisions of 37 CFR
§ 1.196(b), we enter the following new ground of rejection
against appellants’ claims 1 through 32 and 54 through 58:
Claims 1 through 32 and 54 through 58 are rejected under
35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, for the reasons explained
above, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point
out and distinctly claim that which appellants regard as their
invention. In particular, we note that there is no structure
described in appellants’ specification that corresponds to the
“means utilizing the force. . .” as currently set forth in
claims 1 and 54 on appeal. Thus, the scope and content of
that “means” clause in claims 1 and 54 is entirely
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