Appeal No. 2001-0965
Application 08/751,035
optimize the grind so as to find a level of acceptable starch”
(answer, pages 11-12).
Blum teaches that flour which passes through a 60 mesh
screen has been found satisfactory, but that for optimum results
a flour which passes through a 100 mesh screen (i.e., a flour
having a smaller particle size) is preferred (col. 2, lines 29-
32). Blum also teaches that a finely ground flour can be used
(col. 2, lines 32-33). The examiner has not explained how this
teaching of using flour having a particle size which is in the
range of smaller to much smaller than the appellants’ particle
size would have led one of ordinary skill in the art to obtain
the appellants’ particle size by optimization.
The examiner argues that “it would have been obvious to
those of ordinary skill in the art to perform the well known
mashing and boiling steps in a single vessel and then filter the
resulting wort as done by Blum, using the grist and filter of
The Practical Brewer because the use of a single vessel for
boiling and mashing ‘produces maximum filtration efficiency by
reducing the time required for filtration and by increasing the
ability of the sparge water to remove soluble material form [sic,
from] the spent grain’ (col. 2, lines 5 to 10)” (answer, page 6).
The excerpt from Blum relied upon by the examiner, however,
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