Appeal No. 2001-1074 Page 11
Application No. 08/989,056
ordinary skill in the art to use the four port system of
Engelder with the mask of Galleher. However, in the rejection
before us in this appeal, the examiner has not presented any
evidence establishing that it would have been obvious at the
time the invention was made to a person of ordinary skill in
the art to supply four friction engaging port caps instead of
the two friction engaging port caps taught by Engelder. In
that regard, there is no evidence that it would have been
obvious to close each of Engelder's ports provided by nipples
33 and 34 with a friction engaging port cap especially since
the ports provided by Engelder's nipples 33 and 34 are open
when the mask is in use.
For the reasons set forth above, the combined teachings
of Galleher and Engelder are insufficient to establish the
obviousness of the subject matter of claim 1. We have also
reviewed the references additionally applied in the rejections
of claims 4 to 6, 8 and 9 (i.e., Niemeyer, Schnoor and Nutter)
but find nothing therein which makes up for the deficiencies
of Galleher and Engelder discussed above. Accordingly, the
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007