Appeal No. 2005-1098
Application No. 10/319,149
claims 1-12, read in light of the specification, reasonably
apprise those skilled in the art of the scope of the invention
(id.).
As correctly stated by appellants, the legal standard for
definiteness of claim language is whether a claim reasonably
apprises one of ordinary skill in the art of its scope when read
in light of the specification. See In re Warmerdam, 33 F.3d
1354, 1361, 31 USPQ2d 1754, 1759 (Fed. Cir. 1994). The PMD layer
is described as the “Poly-Metal Dielectric layer 16" on page 4,
ll. 23-24, of the specification, referring to Figure 3. As seen
from Figure 3, the PMD layer 16 is a layer that encompasses or
surrounds more than one metal, e.g., the copper (Cu) metal
interconnect 8 and the contact metal tungsten (W)(see the
specification, page 2, ll. 17-21). Accordingly, from the plain
language of the claim, as read in light of the specification, one
of ordinary skill in this art would have been apprised that the
scope of the contested language defines a dielectric (non-
conductive)2 layer that surrounds the first layer metal
interconnects and a plurality of contacts.
2 See Hackh’s Chemical Dictionary, 3rd ed., p. 270, The
Blakiston Co., Inc., 1953, where “dielectric” is defined as an
“insulator or non-conductor of electricity.”
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