Appeal No. 2004-0750 Page 3
Application No. 09/992,223
OPINION
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration to
the appellants’ specification and claims, to the applied prior art references, and to the
respective positions articulated by the appellants and the examiner. As a consequence
of our review, we make the determinations which follow.
The appellants’ invention is directed to a manner of determining an amount of
NOx stored in an exhaust gas aftertreatment device in a lean-burn engine in order to
calculate when the device must be purged of NOx in order for the engine to continue
operating in the desired manner. As recited in claim 1, the amount of NOx stored in the
treatment device is determined by the steps of “estimating NOx storage efficiency of the
device based on a percent NOx capacity filled,” and “calculating the amount of NOx
stored in the device based on said estimated NOx storage efficiency of the device.” It is
the examiner’s view that these steps would have been obvious1 to one of ordinary skill
in the art from the system described in Kubo, considering that although Kubo “fail[s] to
specifically disclose that the NOx storage efficiency is based on a percent NOx storage
capacity filled, instead of an available storage capacity,” the Kubo system “is merely
1The test for obviousness is what the combined teachings of the prior art would have suggested to
one of ordinary skill in the art. See, for example, In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425, 208 USPQ 871, 881
(CCPA 1981). In establishing a prima facie case of obviousness, it is incumbent upon the examiner to
provide a reason why one of ordinary skill in the art would have been led to modify a prior art reference or
to combine reference teachings to arrive at the claimed invention. See Ex parte Clapp, 227 USPQ 972,
973 (Bd. Pat. App. & Int. 1985). To this end, the requisite motivation must stem from some teaching,
suggestion or inference in the prior art as a whole or from the knowledge generally available to one of
ordinary skill in the art and not from the appellant's disclosure. See, for example, Uniroyal, Inc. v. Rudkin-
Wiley Corp., 837 F.2d 1044, 1052, 5 USPQ2d 1434, 1439 (Fed. Cir.), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 825 (1988).
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007