Appeal No. 2005-0711
Application No. 09/943,644
positive, concrete evidence of record which justifies a
combination of primary and secondary references.”).
As correctly argued by appellants on pages 8-9 of the Brief,
Kaneko teaches that the optical material which may form the core
or cladding “may be any optical material having a clear
relationship between the irradiation amount of light and the
refractive index corresponding to the irradiation amount of
light” (col. 10, ll. 30-35; see also col. 9, ll. 6-17). On this
record, the examiner has not established that PFCB-based
copolymers, such as those of Smith or Babb, possess this “clear
relationship” between the irradiation amount of light and the
refractive index. Therefore we determine that the examiner has
not established any motivation or suggestion for employing the
PFCB-based copolymers of Smith or Babb as the core material in
the core/clad arrangement of an optical waveguide disclosed by
Kaneko. See In re Regel, supra.
For the foregoing reasons and those stated in the Brief, we
determine that the examiner has failed to establish a prima facie
case of obviousness based on the reference evidence.
Accordingly, the rejections under section 103(a) over Smith or
Babb in view of Kennedy, Fischbeck, Shacklette, Shah and Kaneko
are reversed.
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