Appeal No. 2003-1366
Application No. 09/488,075 Page 6
compounds (for example, polymethylsilazanes) as a possible fourth
component in their method (Kotelnikov, page 8), the examiner has
not established that the surface modification oligomer or polymer
silicon-containing agents disclosed by Kotelnikov would be useful
in the disparate semiconductor manufacturing methods of the
primary references while not adversely affecting the properties
of the semiconductors. The examiner’s effort falls short in
failing to establish a particularized suggestion for the proposed
modification of the specific primary references’ semiconductor
fabrication methods in a manner that would have led one of
ordinary skill in the art to arrive at the claimed invention with
a reasonable expectation of success in so doing. See In re
Rouffet, 149 F.3d 1350, 1359, 47 USPQ2d 1453, 1459 (Fed. Cir.
1998). The examiner has not shown how the other references
applied by the examiner in rejecting claims 8, 11-14 and 17
remedy the above-noted shortcomings. It follows that we will not
sustain either of the examiner’s rejections.
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