Appeal No. 1999-0551 Page 12
Application No. 08/636,431
page 3) and that reason comes from looking at the disclosures of both Connolly and Zievers as a whole
(Answer, page 6). I agree. Furthermore, Zievers alone teaches each limitation of claim 5 and,
therefore, a reason to combine the teachings of Zievers with those of Connolly is not required to
establish a prima facie case of unpatentability.
With respect to claim 6, Appellant argues that the references do not disclose or suggest the use
of the materials recited in the claim on both the inner and outer surfaces of the filter member sidewall,
with each membrane having a finer porous structure than the filter member (Brief, page 9). This
argument is not persuasive because both Connolly and Zievers describe making the membrane from a
continuous wrapped ceramic yarn coated with a particulate (Connolly, col. 2, lines 45-54; Zievers col.4
3, lines 7-9 and lines 27-32), one of the materials recited in claim 6. As discussed above, both
references also describe that the membranes have a finer porous structure than the sidewall.
I note that the Brief and Reply Brief contain no arguments with respect to the separate
patentability of claims 8 and 9 (Brief, pages 9-10, Reply Brief in its entirety) and, therefore, these
claims stand or fall with claims 1 and 5. I would affirm the Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1-9 as
obvious.
4A colloidal slurry as described by Zievers is a mixture of particulates in liquid.
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