Appeal No. 2002-1981
Application No. 09/316,580
disclosing a tungsten silicide resistor and maintains that it
would have been obvious to have used the resistor of Kameyama in
Ochiai’s device because it is a widely used resistance material.
Examiner's answer, page 11.
Appellants argue that Ochiai teaches a "sea-of-gate array"
and, therefore, includes no trenches to define islands as
required by claim 7, paragraph (e). See appeal brief, page 12.
Appellants also note that Kameyama discloses a patterned
polycrystalline tungsten silicide resistor thin film which does
not meet the limitation that the silicide layer is "substantially
continuous." Id.
We find that the Examiner's attempt to equate Ochiai's
structure with the claimed trenches which extend through the
device silicon layer and silicide layer and separate the device
silicon layer into islands is clearly based on improper hindsight
reasoning. See W.L. Gore & Assocs. v. Garlock, 721 F.2d at 1553,
222 USPQ at 312-13. The rejection is reversed.
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