Appeal No. 1998-2904
Application 08/715,256
selectively group the individual gate electrodes 22 into respective groups 23 in Figure 2 and
as shown in Figures 3a through 3c. The specification as a whole makes clear to the artisan
that each individual gate electrode 22 must inherently be selectively addressable by the gate
circuit 28 to achieve the individual, selective grouping function itself. Although this is not shown
directly in the figures associated with the written specification, it is clearly indicated to the
artisan in the written specification itself. Thus, we are in agreement with the view expressed by
appellants at page 5 of the principal brief on appeal that “the person of ordinary skill in the art
would understand each drawn line 29 to schematically represent parallel electrical contact lines
or equivalent arrangements, such as well known addressing means, enabling the voltages on
the gate electrodes of a row to be imposed independently of each other.” The books and
publications noted and discussed at pages 5 through 7 of the principal brief on appeal support
this conclusion. In view of the foregoing and in view of our conclusion that a reasonable degree
but not an undue amount of experimentation would have been required of the artisan to make
and use the claimed invention, we must therefore reverse the rejection of claims 1 through 18
under the enablement provision of
35 U.S.C. § 112.
The examiner has not separately set forth any line of reasoning as to the assertion that
the best mode has not been set forth within the first paragraph of 35 U.S.C. § 112. The
examiner's line of reasoning does not assert that the inventors knew of a better mode of
carrying out the claimed invention than they disclosed in the specification and that the
4
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007