Appeal No. 2006-0500
Application No. 10/094,709
The appellants further argue that “nothing in Nakasone et al
or Johansen et al would have suggested the modifications of ‘the
admitted prior art’ necessary to arrive at the presently claimed
invention” (brief, page 10). However, beyond contending that
Nakasone “is completely inapposite to this field” (brief, page
9), the appellants have not identified with any reasonable
specificity an alleged deficiency of this rejection. That is,
the appellants have not proffered any particular reason why the
examiner’s proposed combination of the admitted prior art with
either Nakasone or Johansen would not have been obvious. Nor
have the appellants specified any claim limitation which would
not be satisfied by this proposed combination.
Under these circumstances, it is our determination that the
examiner has established a prima facie case of obviousness which
the appellants have failed to successfully rebut with argument or
evidence of nonobviousness. See In re Oetiker, 977 F.2d 1443,
1445, 24 USPQ2d 1443, 1444 (Fed. Cir. 1992). Accordingly, we
hereby sustain the examiner’s Section 103 rejection of claims 1-9
and 14-19 as being unpatentable over the admitted prior art in
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