Appeal No. 2006-0316
Application 10/428,930
synonymous with the open-ended term “comprising.” See generally, In re Bertsch, 132 F.2d
1014, 1019, 56 USPQ 379, 384 (CCPA 1942); cf. In re Baxter, 656 F.2d 679, 686-87, 210 USPQ
795, 802-03 (CCPA 1981) (“As long as one of the monomers in the reaction is propylene, any
other monomer may be present, because the term ‘comprises’ permits the inclusion of other
steps, elements, or materials.”).
The arguments with respect to the interpretation of the term “glazing” advanced by
appellants and the examiner notwithstanding, we determine that the claim language specifies at
least the step of localized heating of an outer area of an outside surface of a preform to any
extent with any plasma impinging thereon, the plasma being substantially free of injected silica
particles and produced by a plasma torch, with a gas, which is substantially free of silica
particles, injected at any point between the plasma torch and said locally heated outer area of the
outside surface of the preform, thereby reducing the power of the plasma in this area. The terms
“injected” and “injecting” and the term “impinging” are used in the written description in the
specification and in the claims in their ordinary, dictionary meaning in context of “[t]o force or
drive” or “[t]o introduce into” and of “[t]o collide or strike,” respectively.3
The term “substantially free” is a term of degree with respect to “silica particles” in the
“plasma” and “gas,” which is not defined or described by general guidelines and examples in the
written description in the specification. In the absence of such guidance to enable one of
ordinary skill in the art to determine the extent to which a plasma or a gas can contain silica
particles and be still “substantially free” thereof, we give the term “substantially free” its
broadest reasonable ordinary meaning of from free to largely but not wholly free. Thus, the
claim language specifies that the “plasma” and the “gas” are largely but not wholly free of silica
particles. See Morris, 127 F.3d at 1054-55, 44 USPQ2d at 1027; York Prods., Inc. v.
Central Tractor Farm & Family Ctr., 99 F.3d 1568, 1572-73, 40 USPQ2d 1619, 1622-23 (Fed.
Cir. 1996) (“In this case, the patent discloses no novel use of claim words. Ordinarily, therefore,
‘substantially’ means ‘considerable in . . . extent,’ American Heritage Dictionary Second
College Edition 1213 (2d ed. 1982), or ‘largely but not wholly that which is specified,’
3 See The American Heritage Dictionary Of The English Language 880, 902 (4th ed., Boston,
Houghton Mifflin Company. 2000); see also The American Heritage Dictionary, Second College
Edition 766 (Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1982).
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