Appeal No. 2003-0089
Application No. 08/976,474
The Examiner relies on the following reference in rejection
the claims:
Ohba et al.(Ohba) 4,267,469 May 12, 1981
Claims 1-6 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as being
anticipated by Ohba.
Rather than reiterate the viewpoints of the Examiner and
Appellants, we refer to the answer (Paper No. 17, mailed April 9,
2002) for the Examiner’s complete reasoning in support of the
rejection, and to the brief (Paper No. 16, filed December 13,
2001) and the reply brief (Paper No. 18, filed June 17, 2002) for
Appellants’ arguments thereagainst.
OPINION
The focus of Appellants’ arguments is that Ohba does not
disclose disabling a spillover protection device while a bias
charge is placed on the photodiode (brief, page 6). Appellants
point out that the equivalent of the claimed “spillover
protection device” must be the “clamping circuit 21" in Ohba
which return the potential on the photodiode to a known constant
voltage (brief, page 7). Appellants, however, argue that there
is no disclosure in Ohba indicating that the clamping circuit is
disabled during the injection step (id.). Appellants further
point to the higher activation voltage of the clamping circuit
3
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007