Appeal No. 2005-0878
Application No. 09/911,620
102(b). Therefore we affirm the examiner’s rejection of claim 19
under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) over Eberl.
As noted on page 7 of the Brief and page 2, ¶(6), of the
Answer, claim 20 does not depend on claim 19 but depends on claim
15, which ultimately depends on claim 1. Since the examiner has
not established that every limitation of claim 20 has been
described by Eberl within the meaning of section 102(b), we
cannot sustain the rejection of claim 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b)
over Eberl.
B. The Rejection under § 103(a)
The examiner finds that Brickman discloses a breast
prosthesis 40, 80 having hook material 42, 44 positioned on the
front surface 46, where the hook material is configured to engage
loop material 76, 77 positioned in a bust cup 30 for releasable
attachment (Answer, page 3). The examiner finds that Brickman is
silent in regard to any hook-and-loop fastener material on the
rear surface of the breast prosthesis for attachment of a comfort
pad (id.). Therefore the examiner applies Eberl for its teaching
of detachably coupling a “comfort” pad 3b and 4 to a breast
prosthesis 1 using hook-and-loop fasteners 7 (Answer, page 4).
From these findings, the examiner concludes that it would have
been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have used the
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