Appeal No. 2005-2531
Application No. 10/148,759
Fahrenkrug et al. (Fahrenkrug) 5,376,198 Dec. 27, 1994
Palumbo 6,106,925 Aug. 22, 2000
Under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a):
Claims 1, 3-12 and 14 are rejected as being
unpatentable over Fahrenkrug; and claims 1, 3-8, 13 and
14 are rejected as being unpatentable over Palumbo.
OPINION
For the reasons which follow, neither of these rejections
can be sustained.
As correctly indicated by the appellants in their brief, the
examiner’s expositions of these rejections as presented in the
final Office action1 do not identify any claim difference
relative to the applied prior art and correspondingly do not
identify any teaching or suggestion in the Fahrenkrug and Palumbo
prior art which would have motivated those skilled in this art to
provide the apertured elastic members of these references with
the asserted difference, thereby resulting in subject matter
corresponding to that of appealed independent claim 1. It
follows that the examiner, in formulating these rejections, has
failed to comply with established legal precedents and guidelines
1The “Grounds of Rejection” section of the answer (see page
3) contains only statements of these rejections without
explanatory expositions.
3
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