Ex parte HUANG - Page 7




          Appeal No. 2000-1337                                                        
          Application No. 08/955,002                                                  


          of the underlying disclosure.                                               
               The examiner’s criticism of the recitations of the                     
          “primary air flow passage” (claims 1, 6 and 9) and the                      
          “secondary air flow passage” (claims 1, 6 and 9) as being                   
          “intangibles” is also unfounded.  In the context of the                     
          claimed cooktop burner, these air flow passages are simple,                 
          straightforward and readily understood structural features.                 
          Moreover, that these passageways                                            
          might share their delimiting structure with one another and/or              
          other elements of the burner does not pose any indefiniteness               
          problem.                                                                    


               Finally, the observations in the last paragraph of the                 
          examiner’s explanation pertain to the adequacy of the                       
          disclosure rather than the definiteness of the claimed subject              
          matter, and thus have no particular relevance to the rejection              
          at hand.  To the extent that there is a problem with the                    
          disclosure, the examiner is free to deal with it via an                     
          appropriate objection and/or rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 112,               
          first paragraph.                                                            
               In light of the foregoing, we shall not sustain the                    
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