Appeal No. 2000-0180
Application No. 08/539,943
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given
careful consideration to appellant’s specification and claims,
to the applied prior art references, and to the respective
positions articulated by appellant and the examiner. As a
consequence of our review, we have made the determinations
which follow.
Prior to our treatment of the examiner’s rejections on
appeal, we note that on page 4 of the brief appellant has
indicated, under the heading “GROUPING OF CLAIMS,” that claims
1, 3, 4 and 13 stand or fall together, and that claims 5
through 12 and 14 likewise stand or fall together.
Accordingly, in our discussions below we will focus on
independent claims 1 and 5, deciding the issues on appeal on
the basis of those claims alone. As desired by appellant,
claims 3, 4 and 13 will stand or fall together with claim 1,
while claims 6 through 12 and 14 will stand or fall with claim
5.
Looking first at the examiner’s rejection of claim 1
under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Samson in
5
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