Appeal No. 2004-0024
Application No. 09/249,922 Page 9
intensity lamp penetrated less than one foot, whereas appellants'
lamp penetrated about 15 feet, we find that as broadly claimed,
any penetration of the dense fog and smoke, even an inch, is
sufficient to meet the claim language that the white light
produced by the lamp penetrated dense smoke and fog. If
appellants wanted the penetration of dense smoke and fog to
distinguish over the prior art, then appellants should have
included language in claim 1 as to the amount of penetration
produced by the white light. We decline to read into claims
limitations not found therein.
From all of the above, we find that Gaus meets the claimed
metal halide arc lamp wherein the lamp produces a point source of
light, said lamp producing a white light capable of penetrating
dense fog and smoke.
Turning to the issue of whether an artisan would have
considered it obvious to have replaced the ignition control of
Gaus with the microprocessor of Cockram, we find that Cockram
relates to a controller for gas discharge lamps, such as, e.g.
mercury vapor lamps or High Intensity Discharge (HID) lamps (col.
1, lines 8-12). Cockram discloses that the controller drives a
HID lamp 18 (col. 3, lines 51-52). Microprocessor 112 operates
according to a program stored in memory 124 (col. 7, lines 32 and
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