Appeal No. 1999-0253
Application No. 08/636,206
OPINION
A. The Rejection under Section 112, ¶1
The examiner finds that the original specification
supports allowing the stent to radially expand but finds no
support for the claimed alternative of “radially expanding at
least the portion of the stent in the tube” (Answer, page 4).
In other words, the claims on appeal recite both active and
passive steps of radially expanding the stent while the
examiner asserts that the original specification fails to
reasonably convey these two different types of expansion to
one of ordinary skill in the art (Answer, pages 11-12). We
disagree.
As correctly argued by appellants (Brief, pages 3-4;
Reply Brief, pages 1-2), the original specification teaches
that the invention is not limited to the embodiment shown but
is “applicable to any kind of expandable stent having a
discontinuous wall.” Specification, page 5, ll. 2-5.
Appellants assert that active sense expandable stents were
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