Appeal No. 2005-2663 Page 8
Application No. 10/140,323
Appellant does not dispute that the claim as currently written is indefinite. The
amendment that was submitted to rectify the indefiniteness has not been entered. We
therefore affirm the rejection of claim 7 under 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph.
3. Written description
The examiner rejected claims 5 and 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 112, first paragraph,
as lacking adequate descriptive support in the specification. The examiner argues that
specific limitations in these claims are new matter:
8. Claim 5, last two lines, recites the new amended limitation of “and
component [j] . . . by nodes j”, [which] has not been found in the instant
specification. It is noted that the instant specification discloses “a data
structure component [i] which is an array indexed by the nodes i of G”
(page 28, [117]).
9. Claim 20, line 2, recites the limitation[s] of biotic and abiotic
environmental stress, which have not been found in the instant
specification.
Examiner’s Answer, pages 5-6
Regarding claim 5, Appellant argues that the holding variable j was used in
original claim 7. Appeal Brief, page 10. Appellant also argues that
the letters “i” and “j” are used in the context of this patent application as
holding variables for the purpose of incrementing through a recursive
algorithm. These letters have no special significance other than to
facilitate the repetitive action of the recursive algorithm as the value
represented by the holding variable (i, j, or any other convenient symbol)
increments with each repetition.
Id., pages 10-11. Regarding claim 20, Appellant argues that the specification describes
exemplary types of biotic and abiotic stresses and therefore adequately describes the
limitation at issue.
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