Appeal No. 2000-0178
Application 08/686,630
impermissible hindsight derived from appellants’ own teachings to
combine Nazmy and the American Machinist article. Like
appellants, we consider that the teachings of the references
relied upon by the examiner when considered as a whole would have
led one of ordinary skill in the art away from attempting any
modification of the coarse-grained, low ductility blade portion
(1) in Nazmy by a laser shock peening process like that disclosed
in the American Machinist article, particularly since the
American Machinist article itself indicates that the laser shock
peening process therein is “not yet practical for treating large
surface areas” (page 64).
As for the examiner’s attempt to justify combination of the
applied references on the basis that one skilled in the art would
have considered the intermetallic material of Nazmy (i.e., gamma
titanium aluminide) to be a titanium alloy like that treated by
the laser peening process of the American Machinist article, our
review of the record of this application indicates that those
skilled in this art would have in fact recognized several
significant property differences between a titanium metal alloy
and an intermetallic material based on titanium. More
specifically, while an intermetallic material may technically be
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