Appeal No. 2002-1366
Application No. 09/069,628
examiner has misinterpreted what the claim requires. Claim 1 does not require that the
monoclonal antibody be specific for a portion of a Bacillus spore, namely the spore
crystal protein, but that the monoclonal antibody is specific for the complete spore of an
individual species of Bacillus. The examiner has not indicated where, and we do not
find where DeGreve describes a monoclonal antibody to a complete Bacillus spore.
The rejection of the claims for anticipation in view of DeGreve is reversed.
35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
Claims 1-5 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as obvious over Walker in
view of Ladner.
In rejecting claims under 35 U.S.C. § 103, the examiner bears the initial burden
of presenting a prima facie case of obviousness. See In re Rijckaert, 9 F.3d 1531,
1532, 28 USPQ2d 1955, 1956 (Fed. Cir. 1993). A prima facie case of obviousness is
established when the teachings from the prior art itself would appear to have suggested
the claimed subject matter to a person of ordinary skill in the art. In re Bell, 991 F.2d
781, 783, 26 USPQ2d 1529, 1531 (Fed. Cir. 1993). An obviousness analysis requires
that the prior art both suggest the claimed subject matter and reveal a reasonable
expectation of success to one reasonably skilled in the art. In re Vaeck, 947 F.2d 488,
493, 20 USPQ2d 1438, 1442 (Fed. Cir. 1991). With this as background, we analyze
the prior art applied by the examiner in the rejection of the claims on appeal.
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