Appeal No. 1996-2437
Application No. 08/121,255
1430, 1433, 7 USPQ2d 1129, 1132 (Fed. Cir. 1988); In re Prater,
415 F.2d 1393, 1404, 162 USPQ 541, 550 (CCPA 1969). "Claims are
to be given the broadest reasonable interpretation." In re
Pearson, 494 F.2d 1399, 1404, 181 USPQ 641, 645 (CCPA 1974).
Appellant contends (Request, page 3) that the recitation in
claims 1 and 8 that at least two second electrodes are arranged
so that the corresponding discharge regions form a continuous
space means that "at least two sets of second electrodes are
spaced close enough to each other that the two parallel discharge
regions formed about the two sets of second electrodes overlap,
thus forming one continuous space over the lengths of the two
sets of second electrodes." Although we agree that a continuous
space "over the lengths of the two sets of second electrodes"
would require more than passages connecting adjacent units, the
claims only recite that the space for at least two units is
continuous, which broadly interpreted means connected.
Appellant's interpretation reads limitations from the
specification into the claims.
Similarly, appellant asserts (Request, page 3) that claims 5
and 18 recite that the discharge region "forms a continuous space
over all of the second electrodes," and that claim 19 recites
that the discharge region "forms a continuous space over a
plurality of second electrodes," but the claims do not require
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