Appeal No. 2000-0049
Application 08/826,209
The appellant’s specification discloses (page 5, lines 1-
2) that the thickness of the (111) oriented layer depends on
nucleation density but in practice may be on the order of 0.5-
10 µm. Okamura’s 100 µm exemplified (111) oriented layer
(page 7) is thicker than thicknesses within the appellant’s
disclosed first layer thickness range, and the appellant’s
specification discloses (page 2, line 21 - page 3, line 4)
that as the thickness of a (111) oriented layer increases, the
roughness generally increases. Okamura’s exemplified 100 µm
thickness of the (100) oriented layer (page 7), however, is
larger than the 10-25 µm range of thicknesses of the (100)
oriented layer disclosed in the appellant’s specification
(page 10, line 24 - page 11, line 3).
Thus, we remand the application to the examiner for the
examiner and the appellant to address whether Okamura’s 100 µm
thick (100) oriented layer necessarily is sufficiently thick
to overgrow the surface roughness of Okamura’s 100 µm thick
(111) oriented layer as required by the appellant’s claim 7.
If so, the examiner should consider rejecting the appellant’s
claims 7-9 and 19 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) over Okamura, and
should consider whether the appellant’s claims 10 and 12 would
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