Appeal No. 2000-1985
Application No. 09/124,091
OPINION
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration to
appellants’ specification and claims, to the applied prior art references, and to the
respective positions articulated by appellants and the examiner. As a consequence of
our review, we make the determinations which follow.
The examiner maintains that it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill
in the art to incorporate a mono-directional transistor and an RESURF transistor as
taught by the AAPA into the circuit of Takahashi and that the selection of the relative
voltage values would be a design expedient. (See answer at page 4.) We disagree
with the examiner.
Appellants argue that the AAPA teaches only the use of one type of transmission
gate or transistor in each of the prior art multiplexers. (See brief at page 7.) Similarly,
the examiner admits that Takahashi teaches the use of a single type of bidirectional
transmission gates connected to the input/output ports.
Appellants argue that there is no teaching or suggestion in the applied prior art
wherein the first transistor is a mono-directional transistor and the second transistor is a
bidirectional transistor as recited in independent claim 9. We agree with appellants that
the examiner’s proposed modification is not based upon the teachings and suggestions
in the applied prior art, but is based upon impermissible hindsight reconstruction to
modify the teachings of Takahashi. (See brief at page 8.) Therefore, we will not
sustain the examiner’s rejection of independent claim 9 and dependent claims 10-21.
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