Appeal No. 2005-0001
Application No. 09/268,902
into consideration, in reaching our decision, appellant’s arguments set forth in the
brief1 along with the examiner’s rationale in support of the rejection and
arguments in rebuttal set forth in the examiner’s answer.
With full consideration being given to the subject matter on appeal, the
examiner’s rejections and the arguments of appellant and examiner, for the
reasons stated infra, we sustain the examiner’s rejection of claims 1 through 38
and 40 through 44 under 35 U.S.C. § 103. We reverse the examiner’s rejection
of claims 39 and 45 under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
Grouping of the Claims
At the outset, we note that appellant states, on page 7 of the brief that:
Appellants [sic Appellant] contend[s] that the claims of the
present invention do not stand or fall together. In particular, the
following groups of claims are separately patentable:
Group 1: Claims 1, 40, 41 stand together.
Group 2: Claims 2-5, 42 and 44 stand together.
Group 3: Claims 6-11, 13, 15-26, 28 and 30-35 stand together.
Group 4: Claims 12, 14, 27 and 29 stand together.
Group 5: Claims 36-38 stand together.
Group 6: Claim 39 stands alone.
Group 7: Claim 43 stands alone.
Group 8: Claim 45 stands alone.
37 C.F.R. § 1.192(c) (7) (July 1, 2003) as amended at 62 Fed. Reg. 53196
(October 10, 1997), which was controlling at the time of appellant’s filing of the
brief, states:
1 This decision is based upon the brief submitted November 6, 2003.
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