Interference No. 105,019
Correa v. Roberts
Correa's claims 5 and 6 are reproduced below:
5. Disposable intimate feminine absorbent according to claim 1, in which
said lateral cuff has between approximately 2% to around 35 % of the width of
said absorbent core.
6. Disposable intimate feminine absorbent according to claim 1, in which
said lateral cuff has between approximately 5% to around 15% of the width of said
absorbent core.
Correa asserts, and Roberts admits, that none of Roberts' claims 14-16, 18-20, 22 and 23
gives any indication of what the width of the lateral cuff should be, either in dimensions or in
terms relative to the width of the absorbent core. Evidently, the requirement that the barrier cuff
width must be within a certain range of the core width is the only difference asserted by Correa
between its claims 5 and 6 and Roberts' claims as prior art. Regarding additional prior art which
potentially may be combined with any claim of Roberts to arrive at Correa's claim 5 or claim 6,
Correa cites to Patent No. 5,308,346 ("the "Sneller" reference), a reference disclosing a sanitary
napkin invention which provides a raised barrier on the edges of side flaps to help control or
prevent leakage and which specifies the width of the barrier element. Correa indicates that the
barrier shown in Sneller has a width of about 15mm but dismisses this reference, however, on the
ground that "it does not refer to any core width or state any ideal or preferred cuff width relative
to the width of the core," and that "Sneller's drawings are not to scale and cannot be used to
derive ratios of cuff width to core width." In short, Correa's position is that because Sneller does
not specify the width of the core, it is not known whether the 15mm wide barrier is within 2% to
35% of the width of the absorbent core as is recited in Correa's claim 5, or within 5% to 15% of
the width of the absorbent core as is recited in CorTca's claim 6.
- 24 -
Page: Previous 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007