Appeal No. 2005-0911 Page 8
Application No. 09/923,113
filled with viscous putty or grease, over simple air chamber cushions, such as that of
Tindall, would certainly have commended the use of such a viscous medium in the
tubular cushion of Tindall to achieve said advantages.
Finally, the appellant’s argument on page 6 of the brief that Tindall’s teaching
that the tubular cushions may be filled with air at atmospheric or greater pressure as
desired to give the cushions any desired resistance teaches away1 from the proposed
modification to fill Tindall’s tubular cushions with viscous medium is not well taken. The
ability of a deformable grip filled with viscous medium to maintain its deformed shape for
a period of time as taught by McCall is in no way inconsistent with Tindall’s teaching of
a desired resistance.
1 “A reference may be said to teach away when a person of ordinary skill, upon [examining] the
reference, would be discouraged from following the path set out in the reference, or would be led in a
direction divergent from the path that was taken by the applicant.” In re Gurley, 27 F.3d 551, 553, 31
USPQ2d 1130, 1131 (Fed. Cir. 1994). Simply that there are differences between two references is
insufficient to establish that such references "teach away" from any combination thereof. See In re
Beattie, 974 F.2d 1309, 1312-13, 24 USPQ2d 1040, 1042 (Fed. Cir. 1992).
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