Appeal No. 2001-0929
Application No. 08/697,321
(Answer, page 12). Claims 2-4 and 8-9 stand rejected under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the references as applied
against claims 1, 5, 10 and 25-32 further in view of Shohet or
Yoshida (Answer, page 18). We reverse all of the examiner’s
rejections on appeal essentially for the reasons stated in the
Brief, Reply Brief, and as set forth below.
OPINION
A. The Rejection over Gruen, Chan and Matossian
The examiner finds that Gruen teaches a pulsed plasma process
for coating conductive work pieces, specifically citing Figures 2-3
of Gruen where ion plating is taught (Answer, pages 4-5). The
examiner recognizes that a “main difference” between Gruen and
claims 27-32 on appeal is that the chamber walls are not taught to
be conductive or biased relative to the workplace (Answer, page 6).
However, the examiner finds that Gruen implies that the chamber
walls are conductive through the disclosure of insulator sleeves
and further cites Chan to show grounding of the conductive chamber
walls when pulsed negative voltage is applied to the generic
workpiece (id.). The examiner also states that Chan shows
implanting with pulsed D.C. “which is now a specifically claimed
difference from Gruen.” Id. Finally, the examiner recognizes that
“ion implanting is a difference from Gruen, who teaches coating and
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