Appeal No. 2002-1630 Page 5
Application No. 09/175,713
[a]n amino-terminal-modified chemokine is “derived from a
chemokine” when the chemokine that has been modified at its
amino terminus has itself been derived from a chemokine by any
kind of alteration, addition, insertion, deletion, mutation,
substitution, replacement, or other modification.
Page 17.
Thus, claim 5 encompasses an amino-terminal-modified chemokine “[that]
has itself been derived from a chemokine by any kind of alteration, addition,
insertion, deletion, mutation, substitution, replacement, or other modification.”
Therefore, we agree with the examiner’s interpretation of claim 5: the claim
encompasses “not only specified chemokines but also species comprising
additions, insertions, deletions, mutations, substitutions, and replacements, as
well as amino-terminal additions of varying lengths and compositions. . . . [Claim
5] encompass[es] all possible alterations to the known chemokine sequences.”
Examiner’s Answer, page 4.
Claim 6, however, is not as broad. Claim 6 is limited to polynucleotides
comprising SEQ ID NO:6 or a related polynucleotide (that is, polynucleotides
encoding the same amino acid sequence, encoding an amino-terminal fragment
thereof, complementary polynucleotides, or polynucleotides that hybridize under
stringent conditions). Thus, claim 6 is limited to polynucleotides having a
significant amount of structural similarity to a specified nucleotide sequence.
2. Written description
The examiner rejected the claims as not adequately described in the
specification. According to the examiner, the claims encompass a very broad
“genus” of chemokines, including the forty-nine enumerated proteins modified in
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