Appeal No. 2002-1850
Application 08/288,574
OPINION
In reaching our conclusion on the issues raised in this
appeal, this panel of the board has carefully considered
appellant’s specification and claims, the applied patent, the
affidavit of Hans-Werner Meixner executed January 26, 2002 (Paper
No. 42), the declaration of Dr. Horst-Christian Langowski
executed September 26, 1997 (attachment to Paper No. 20) and the
respective viewpoints of appellant and the examiner. As a
consequence of our review, we make the determinations found
below.
At the outset, it is worthy of considering the background
disclosure in appellant’s specification (pages 2 through 4)
wherein U.S. Patent No. 4,155,212 to Marchese is brought to our
attention. As explained by appellant (page 2), the Marchese
patent teaches elastic netting to force and press meat into an
approximately round cross-sectional shape, i.e., a very great
tension is applied to the meat in a radial direction by
expandable rubber netting. Appellant points out (page 2) that
netting is not packaging within the meaning of the present
invention, but also notes that Marchese teaches various envelopes
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