Appeal No. 2002-1524 Page 4
Application No. 09/423,526
1051, 1054 (Fed. Cir. 1987). Nor does anticipation require that the reference teach
what the applicant is claiming, but only that the claim on appeal "read on" something
disclosed in the reference, i.e., all limitations of the claim are found in the reference.
See Kalman v. Kimberly-Clark Corp, 713 F.2d 760, 772, 218 USPQ 781, 789 (Fed. Cir.
1983), cert. denied, 465 U.S. 1026 (1984).
The first of the Section 102 rejections is that claim 12 is anticipated by Sparks.
In arriving at this conclusion, the examiner finds, inter alia, that the lower portion of the
leaf spring element 21a (Figure 5), which engages the end face of valve seat 18a,
corresponds to the “closing body” recited in the claim, and the upper portion of the leaf
spring element 21a to the “spring element” (Answer, pages 3 and 8). The appellants’
only argument in rebuttal to the rejection is that the Sparks device does not include a
separate closing member mounted on a leaf spring (Brief, page 7; Reply Brief, page 2).
However, as explained below, it is our view that this argument is based upon a limitation
that is not in the claim, and therefore it is not persuasive.
Although the appellants’ invention is disclosed as having a closing body that is
separate from the leaf spring member which supports it, claim 12 is not so limited. The
claim does not establish that the closing body is separate from the leaf spring, but
requires only that it be “connected to” one end of a leaf spring, which in turn is
“connected” on its other end to the armature (see lines 5 and 11). The claimed
structure thus reads on element 21a of Sparks, in that the “closing body” described by
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