Appeal No. 2004-1895
Application No. 09/681,515
The full text of the examiner’s rejections and response to
the argument presented by appellants appears in the answer (Paper
No. 19), while the complete statement of appellants’ argument can
be found in the main and reply briefs (Paper Nos. 17 and 20).
OPINION
In reaching our conclusion on the obviousness issues1 raised
in this appeal, this panel of the board has carefully considered
appellants’ specification and claims,2 the applied teachings,3
and the respective viewpoints of appellants and the examiner. As
1 The test for obviousness is what the combined teachings of
references would have suggested to one of ordinary skill in the
art. See In re Young, 927 F.2d 588, 591, 18 USPQ2d 1089, 1091
(Fed. Cir. 1991) and In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425, 208 USPQ
871, 881 (CCPA 1981).
2 Contrary to the examiner’s indication in the answer (page
2), the copy of claim 1 in the main brief (page 9) is in error
due to the typographic omission of --having-- after “housing”.
3 In our evaluation of the applied prior art, we have
considered all of the disclosure of each document for what it
would have fairly taught one of ordinary skill in the art. See
In re Boe, 355 F.2d 961, 965, 148 USPQ 507, 510 (CCPA 1966).
Additionally, this panel of the board has taken into account not
only the specific teachings, but also the inferences which one
skilled in the art would reasonably have been expected to draw
from the disclosure. See In re Preda, 401 F.2d 825, 826, 159
USPQ 342, 344 (CCPA 1968).
3
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