Appeal No. 2003-0353 Page 5
Application No. 09/452,157
For the reasons set forth above, the decision of the examiner to reject claims 1
to 6, 9 to 16, 18 to 24, 28 and 29 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 is reversed.
New ground of rejection
Under the provisions of 37 CFR § 1.196(b), we enter the following new ground of
rejection.
Claims 28 and 29 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, as
being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter
which the appellants regard as the invention.
Claims are considered to be definite, as required by the second paragraph of
35 U.S.C. § 112, when they define the metes and bounds of a claimed invention with a
reasonable degree of precision and particularity. See In re Venezia, 530 F.2d 956, 958,
189 USPQ 149, 151 (CCPA 1976).
Independent claim 28 is indefinite since it fails to recite a complete single
sentence.5 In that regard, claim 28, which as currently worded recites only the same
5 The amendment (Paper No. 23, filed August 5, 2002) submitted to correct this error was not
entered by the examiner (see answer, p. 3).
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