Appeal No. 2002-1148
Application 09/471,662
bias on the sputter target. Kaufman argues that because it is
sometimes necessary to carry out an ion beam process such as ion
beam implanting at an elevated potential, King’s parenthetical
statement, “or other target potential”, is not an explicit
teaching of a negative bias (declaration, pages 3-4). It is not
clear whether the ion beam implanting referred to by Kaufman is
the implantation of sputtered ions disclosed by King (abstract).
Regardless, even if there are ion beam processes that can be
carried out using a positive biased sputter target, King would
have fairly suggested, to one of ordinary skill in the art, using
a negative biased sputter target in Ceasar’s apparatus to obtain
increased ion acceleration and energy as discussed above.
The ion beam energy range disclosed by King as being useful
with the target having ground or other potential is 0.5-50 keV
(500-50,000 eV), which is higher than the upper limit of about
50 eV recited in the appellants’ claim 1. However, the relevant
issue regarding the appellants’ apparatus claims is not whether
the applied prior art would have fairly suggested, to one of
ordinary skill in the art, operation of a sputtering apparatus at
an ion beam energy of about 50 eV or less but, rather, whether
the applied prior art would have fairly suggested, to one of
ordinary skill in the art, a sputtering apparatus which is
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