Appeal No. 2003-0163
Application No. 09/400,508
Lee. Claim 3 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Lee in
view of Chang. Claim 4 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable
over Lee in view of Thompson. Claim 5 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as
being unpatentable over Lee in view of Sundstrom. Claims 6-15 stand rejected under
the same bases as the above rejections of claims 1-5 and 16. See answer at pages 8
and 9.2
Rather than reiterate the conflicting viewpoints advanced by the examiner and
appellant regarding the above-noted rejections, we make reference to the examiner's
answer (Paper No. 13, mailed May 10, 2002) for the examiner's reasoning in support of
the rejections, and to appellant's brief (Paper No. 12, filed Feb. 27, 2002) and reply
brief (Paper No. 14, filed Jul. 16, 2002) for appellant's arguments thereagainst.
OPINION
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration to
appellant's specification and claims, to the applied prior art references, and to the
respective positions articulated by appellant and the examiner. As a consequence of
our review, we make the determinations which follow.
At the outset, we note that appellant contends that the claims stand or fall
independently. (Brief at page 5.) Therefore, we will select a single representative claim
2 While we do not sanction the examiner’s brevity and abbreviated statement of the grounds of
rejection, we find this issue moot since appellant elected to group all claims as standing or falling together
at page 5 of the brief.
3
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