Appeal No. 2002-0355 Page 5
Application No. 09/291,330
On page 2 of the appellant’s specification it is stated that “[a]ccording to the
principles of this invention, a parallel rotor and stator of a capacitive angle sensor are
structured as ceramic plates having electrode structures on their sides facing away from
each other, with the ceramic plates forming a dielectric.” The advantage of this
arrangement is no additional dielectric element is needed between the plates, as is the
case in the applied prior art references, because the ceramic plates themselves perform
this function. This, from our perspective, clearly establishes that the requirement that the
electrode structure be on the side facing away from the other of the rotor or stator is
“critical” to the invention, and thus proves the examiner’s reasoning to be fatally defective
at the outset.
The electrode structures in Wolfram are located between the disks “facing one
another” (translation, page 4), and to achieve the required separation between the
electrode structures a dielectric layer of PTFE lubricant is applied between them
(translation, page 5). Likewise, the electrode structures on the rotor and stator of
Bollhagen are on the facing sides and are separated by an air gap acting as a dielectric
(column 5, lines 3-6). Thus, one of ordinary skill in the art would have been taught by both
of the applied references to place the electrode structures on the sides of the rotor and
stator facing one another, which is the opposite of that required by claim 1. This being the
case, and considering it is well settled that the mere fact that the prior art structure could be
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