Appeal No. 1999-2141
Application No. 08/657,164
in the prior art or by knowledge generally available to one of ordinary skill in the art that
would have led that individual to combine the relevant teachings of the references to arrive
at the claimed invention. See In re Fine, 837 F.2d 1071, 1074, 5 USPQ2d 1596, 1598
(Fed. Cir. 1988). With this as background, we analyze the prior art applied by the
examiner in the rejection of the claims on appeal.
The examiner finds that Lind establishes the amino acid sequence of the $1
isosubunit of taipoxin from the Australian taipan snake. Lind describes the preparation
and isolation of $-taipoxin according to the method of Fohlman. Fohlman states that the "
and $ subunits of taipoxin “are the same size and cannot be separated from each other by
molecular sieve chromatography” ... and “the only method found so far for the separation of
" and $ is electrophoresis at pH 1.9". Fohlman, page 465, column 2; page 467, column 1.
Fohlman teaches the isoelectric point for the $1 and $2 isosubunits of taipoxin to be about
pH 7. Fohlman, page 465.
The examiner finds that both Lind and Fohlman teach ion exchange and gel filtration
methods for the purification of taipoxin, but admits that these publications do not teach the
use of high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and choosing a gradient buffer
comprising the Tris-HCL buffer. Answer, page 4.
To cure the deficiencies of Lind and Fohlman the examiner relies on Scopes for
establishing the selection of elution buffers for ion exchange chromatography. Scopes
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