Appeal No. 2006-0869
Application No. 09/847,883
include “solutions of alcohols ... especially isopropanol and water” (col. 7, ll. 18-26). On
this record, the examiner has not established that the “alcohols” taught by Morin would
have been considered generic to acetylenic diols as required by the claims on appeal
(Answer, page 10). On this record, Wilkinson teaches acetylenic diols as a separate
class of surfactants from acetylenic alcohols in his system (abstract; page 3, ll. 44 et
seq.). Wilkinson is directed to compounds which exhibit surface active properties and
are soluble in liquid/supercritical carbon dioxide, namely compounds which act as
surfactants by lowering the surface tension between carbon dioxide and carbon dioxide-
phobic substances (abstract; page 3, ll. 44-46; and Example 4 on page 7). Wilkinson
specifically teaches that surfactant technology is well developed for aqueous based
systems but is not well understood for carbon dioxide applications, and thus aqueous
surfactants are generally not suitable, having limited or no utility, for carbon dioxide
based systems (page 2, ll. 9-15, 25-27, 41-42, and 55-58). As correctly argued by
appellants (Brief, pages 8-9), the behavior of acetylenic diols under supercritical
conditions in a carbon dioxide based system, in a like manner to the teachings of
Wilkinson discussed above, would have provided no reasonable teaching, suggestion or
motivation to use these acetylenic diols as the surfactant or solvent in place of the
alcohol in the aqueous based system of Morin. Accordingly, we disagree with the
examiner’s argument that “the environment in which the cleaning takes place is
irrelevant since Wilkinson does demonstrate that surfactants such as acetylenic diols
are useful in clean room type applications” (Answer, page 10). We determine that
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