Appeal No. 2002-0376
Application No. 09/072,137
respective positions articulated by appellants and the examiner. As a consequence of
our review, we make the determinations which follow.
35 U.S.C. § 102
Appellants argue that the examiner has unduly burdened appellants by applying
essentially the same art. We make no findings relative to the number of rejections
made by the examiner since this is a procedural matter beyond our scope of review.
Appellants argue none of the applied prior art is as relevant to the claimed
invention as the admitted prior art in the background of the invention. (See brief at
pages 6-7.) We agree with appellants. Appellants argue that the present invention uses
a predetermined standard density as an objective threshold to determine when the
compaction process is complete. Appellants argue that the objective standard density
is determined prior to performing the compaction process and is compared to the actual
density of the integrated circuit device during the compaction process for determining
when to stop the compaction process. (See brief at page 7.) Appellants contrast this
with the use of a density gradient which compares the actual density to the prior density
as a measure of the rate of change of the density and appellants maintain that they
were the artisans that discovered the problem with using the density gradient. (See
brief at pages 7-8.) Appellants argue that the examiner has relied upon prior art
4
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007