Appeal No. 2003-0312
Application No. 08/871,199 Page 2
directly incident radiation, and discarding detected pixel values
less than the threshold value, to eliminate scattered radiation
before processing (specification, pages 12 and 14). In
addition, the method includes accumulating charge resulting from
radiation hits at or above the threshold (specification, page
37). An understanding of the invention can be derived from a
reading of exemplary claim 61, which is reproduced as follows:
61. A semiconductor radiation imaging device for imaging
high-energy radiation, comprising an array of pixel cells
including an array of pixel detectors which directly generate
charge in response to incident radiation and a corresponding
array of individually addressable pixel circuits, wherein each
pixel circuit is associated with a respective pixel detector for
accumulating charge directly resulting from radiation incident on
said pixel detector and comprises threshold circuitry and charge
accumulation circuitry, said threshold circuitry being configured
to discard radiation hits on said pixel detector below a
predetermined threshold and said charge accumulation circuitry
being configured to accumulate charge directly resulting from a
plurality of successive radiation hits on said respective pixel
detector at or above said predetermined threshold.
The prior art references of record relied upon by the
examiner in rejecting the appealed claims are:
Tower 4,811,371 Mar. 7, 1989
Hack et al. (Hack) 5,153,420 Oct. 6, 1992
Kramer et al. (Kramer) 5,379,336 Jan. 3, 1995
Fouilloy et al. (Fouilloy) 5,387,933 Feb. 7, 1995
Sugawa 5,401,952 Mar. 28, 1995
Claim 61 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Fouilloy in view of Hack.
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