Appeal No. 1998-1273
Application No. 08/624,148
“Keefer teaches the claimed countercurrent gas flow and
adsorbent” and teaches a purge gas with recycling (Answer,
page 4). However, the examiner has not particularly pointed
out where the claimed order of countercurrent depressurizing
and pressurizing steps with countercurrent purging steps was
disclosed or suggested by Keefer (i.e., the steps of claim 1,
part (c), steps (2) through (5)).
The examiner has also not presented any convincing
evidence or reasoning for the motivation set forth justifying
the proposed combination of Dandekar and Keefer, i.e.,
“because doing so recovers the non-reacted gases and makes the
process more economically efficient.” Answer, page 4. The
motivation to combine references may come from the references
themselves, the knowledge of those skilled in the art, or the
nature of the problem to be solved. See Micro Chemical Inc.
v. Great Plains Chemical Co., 103 F.3d 1538, 1546, 41 USPQ2d
1238, 1244-45 (Fed. Cir. 1997). Here the examiner has not
identified where the suggestion to combine the references as
proposed can be found, why one of ordinary skill in the art
would have been motivated to recover non-reacted gases, and
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