Appeal No. 2005-2545
Application No. 10/447,582
the racks 46 in the storage area, (2) the temporary rack 46 on the housing and (3) the
individual specimen carriers 38 on the conveyor track. Boje teaches (see column 1)
that the automated aspects of this system afford substantial efficiencies in the storing
and testing of laboratory specimens.
As conceded by the examiner (see page in the answer), Boje does not respond
to the limitations in independent claim 32, or the corresponding limitations in
independent claims 41, 42 and 49, relating to the probe arrays which are disposed on a
substrate coupled to a housing, including those limitations which define the scanner,
carrier, transporter in terms of the probe arrays. The corresponding structures in the
Boje system are test tubes, and the scanners (i.e., test stations), carriers (i.e., racks 46)
and transporter (i.e., robotic unit 32, conveyor track 36 and specimen carriers 38)
disclosed by Boje are constructed to accommodate such test tubes.
Besemer, which is cited and incorporated by reference on page 1 of the
appellant’s specification, describes probe arrays 110, substrates/chips 120 and
housings/packages 300 of the sort disclosed and claimed by the appellants, and
teaches that these structures are designed to be analyzed by a scanning system (see
column 15, lines 44-56).
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