Appeal No. 2001-0321
Application 08/888,671
rejection. See In re Hoch, 428 F.2d 1341, 1342 n.3, 166 USPQ
406, 407 n.3 (CCPA 1970). It is also noted that the
publication date of the EDN reference (January 20, 1994) is
well subsequent to the effective filing date to which the
instant application appears on the record to be entitled,3
which would make the reference meaningless in terms of
demonstrating common knowledge in the art at the time the
appellants’ invention was made. Given these circumstances, we
have not considered the EDN reference in evaluating the
propriety of the examiner’s conclusion of obviousness.
II. The combined teachings of Nakajima and the Fair-Rite
reference
3On its face, the record indicates that the instant
application (1) is a continuation of Application 08/570,936,
filed December 12, 1995, now abandoned, which is a division of
Application 08/026,203, filed March 2, 1993, now U.S. Patent
No. 5,543,831, granted August 6, 1996, which is a continuation
of Application 07/642,749, filed January 18, 1991, now
abandoned, and (2) is derived, via its U.S. parent
applications, from Japanese Application 315106, filed November
20, 1990.
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