Appeal No. 2004-2354
Application No. 09/923,991 Page 15
Weller’s teachings respecting a side impact protection device is
not persuasive of any suggestion in the references’ teachings
leading one of ordinary skill in the art to such a modification.
Rather, the examiner’s conclusion that the claimed structure
would have been obvious based on the combined teachings of the
disparate disclosures of the applied references appears to be
based upon improper hindsight reasoning. See W. L. Gore & Assoc.
v. Garlock, Inc., 721 F.2d 1540, 1553, 220 USPQ 303, 312-13 (Fed.
Cir. 1983). (“To imbue one of ordinary skill in the art with
knowledge of the invention in suit, when no prior art reference
or references of record convey or suggest that knowledge, is to
fall victim to the insidious effect of a hindsight syndrome
wherein only that which the inventor taught is used against its
teacher.”) Accordingly, the examiner’s rejection of claim 24
under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) is reversed.
§ 103(a) Rejection over Jordan and Moore
Dependent claims 5, 6, 11 and 13 require that the matrix of
claim 1 includes a plurality of matrix elements shaped as either
cylinders, hemispheres or pyramids. Dependent claim 15 requires
hemispheres disposed in pairs connected at the convexities and
dependent claim 17 requires pyramids disposed in pairs connected
at the apexes.
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