Appeal No. 1998-2248
Application No. 08/552,407
construed to define the scope and meaning of each contested
limitation. See Gechter v. Davidson, 116 F.3d 1454, 1460 n.3,
43 USPQ2d 1030, 1035 n.3 (Fed. Cir. 1997). Accordingly, we
must construe claim 1 on appeal to define its scope and
meaning.
The examiner is correct in stating that use of the
transitional language “comprising” is “open-ended” and means
that the named elements are essential, but other elements may
be added and still be within the scope of the claim. See
Vehicular Technologies Corp. v. Titan Wheel International Inc.,
212 F.3d 1377, 1383, 54 USPQ2d 1841, 1845 (Fed. Cir. 2000);
Genentech Inc. v. Chiron Corp., 112 F.3d 495, 501, 42 USPQ2d
1608, 1613 (Fed. Cir. 1997). However, in claim 1 on appeal,
the “named elements” that are listed as essential include steps
(c) and (d), where step (c) produces a titanium dioxide-rich
fraction from the hydrocyclone classification and step (d)
requires that this recovered titanium dioxide-rich fraction be
returned to the chlorination reactor. Accordingly, we
determine that the claimed transitional language “comprising”
is restricted by the named steps requiring that the recovered
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