Appeal No. 2000-1516
Application 08/897,337
agent (if at all) are employed as compared with the amounts
conventionally used with convention[al] creping aids” (col. 1,
lines 58-63). Knight also teaches (col. 3, lines 15-24):
The usual release agents can be employed with the
anionic polymers. These include imidazolines as well
as oils such as mineral oil defoamers and other
deroaming [sic] agents including quaternary surfactants
which have a softening effect on the paper web. It
will be appreciated that, for greater control, the
polymer and release agent will normally be applied
separately.
The amounts used will, of course, depend very much
on the nature of the paper and the degree of softness
to be obtained.
The appellants’ softening agents include imidazonlines
(specification, page 2, line 17).
The appellants argue that there is a difference between
optimizing the amount of Knight’s imidazonlines as a release
agent and optimizing the amount of the imidazolines for transfer
to and further softening of a web (brief, page 3). Consequently,
the appellants argue, it would not have been obvious to one of
ordinary skill in the art to apply Knight’s imidazolines to the
web in an amount within the range recited in the appellants’
claim 1. See id. The appellants argue that because of the
sensitivity of creping adhesives to release agents, the amount of
release agent is maintained at a very low level, see id., but the
appellants do not state what they consider to be the conventional
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