Appeal No. 2004-2291 Page 3
Application No. 10/318,506
Claims 1 to 6, 11 to 21 and 23 stand provisionally rejected under the judicially
created doctrine of obviousness-type double patenting as being unpatentable over
claims 1 to 7, 9 and 11 to 20 of U.S. Patent No. 6,523,650 B1.
Claims 21 to 24 stand provisionally rejected under the judicially created doctrine
of obviousness-type double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 2 to 5 of U.S.
Patent No. 6,533,083 B1.2
Rather than reiterate the conflicting viewpoints advanced by the examiner and
the appellants regarding the above-noted rejections, we make reference to the answer
(mailed April 14, 2004) for the examiner's complete reasoning in support of the
rejections, and to the brief (filed February 18, 2004) and reply brief (filed May 17, 2004)
for the appellants' arguments thereagainst.
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
2 It is unclear to us why these two obviousness-type double patenting rejections have been
denominated as provisional obviousness-type double patenting rejections.
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