Appeal No. 1999-2202
Application No. 08/733,620
are rejected as being unpatentable over Barnes in view of Ohno,
and claims 8-11 are rejected as being unpatentable over Barnes in
view of Mintz.1
OPINION
The rejections which the examiner has formulated and
advanced on this appeal cannot be sustained for the reasons which
follow.
Concerning the section 102 rejection, the examiner contends
that Barnes teaches “positioning magnetic fields externally of an
RF coil” and that “the magnetic means in Barnes while utilized to
create magnetron discharges also will confine the plasma such
that the coil is reduced in sputtering” (answer, page 11;
emphasis deleted). The deficiency of the examiner’s position is
apparent. As revealed by a comparison of appellants’ Figure 8
with Barnes’ Figure 3 (to which the examiner refers in support of
his position), appellants’ magnetic fields encompass their coil
(which is located in the peripheral area of the chamber) whereas
Barnes’ magnetic fields do not even approach his coil (which is
located in the central area of the chamber). Viewed from this
1
1 Because they depend from claim 6, claims 8-11 clearly
should have been rejected over Barnes in view of Ohno and further
in view of Mintz. The examiner’s error in this matter is
harmless in light of our disposition of the subject appeal.
3
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