Appeal No. 2001-1621 Page 2
Application No. 09/111,308
BACKGROUND
The appellants' invention relates to systems and methods for ablating myocardial
tissue for the treatment of cardiac conditions (specification, p. 1). A copy of the claims
under appeal is set forth in the appendix to the appellants' brief.
Claims 50 to 60 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as being anticipated by
U.S. Patent No. 5,263,4932 to Avitall.
Rather than reiterate the conflicting viewpoints advanced by the examiner and
the appellants regarding the above-noted rejection, we make reference to the final
rejection (Paper No. 15, mailed March 22, 2000) and the answer (Paper No. 22, mailed
October 25, 2000) for the examiner's complete reasoning in support of the rejection,
and to the brief (Paper No. 21, filed September 11, 2000) and reply brief (Paper No. 23,
filed December 18, 2000) for the appellants' arguments thereagainst.
OPINION
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration to
the appellants' specification and claims, to the applied prior art reference, and to the
respective positions articulated by the appellants and the examiner. As a consequence
2 Issued November 23, 1993.
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