Appeal No. 2005-0789
Application No. 10/410,000
III. The rejection of claim 13 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
obvious Bickford or Watson in view of Haydu
The examiner’s position for this rejection is set on pages
5-6 of the answer. Appellants’ response is set forth page 6 of
the brief and page 3 of the reply brief.
Appellants provide the same arguments as discussed above
with regard to each of the references of Bickford and Watson
(for example, appellants’ argument on page 6 of the brief is
that Haydu, alone or in combination with Bickford, does not
teach or suggest using a plating solution containing up to about
0.4M of supporting electrolyte)1.
Hence, for the same reasons that we are not convinced by
such arguments with regard to the previously discussed
rejections, we are not convinced by such arguments with regard
to this rejection. Hence, for the same reasons that we affirmed
the aforementioned anticipation rejection over Bickford and the
obviousness rejection over Watson, we affirm this rejection.
In view of the above, we affirm the rejection of claim 13
under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being obvious over Bickford or Watson
in view of Haydu.
1 We also wish to point out that conducting the claimed process using a
plating solution having a supporting electrolyte in the amount of “up
to about 0.4M” has not been shown to be critical (e.g., shown to
achieve unexpectedly superior results). We note that where general
conditions of the appealed claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is
not inventive to discover optimum or workable ranges by routine
experimentation, and appellants have the burden of proving any
criticality. In re Boesch, 617 F.2d 272, 276, 205 USPQ 215, 218-19
(CCPA 1980); In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA
1955). Here, appellant’s have not met this burden.
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