Appeal No. 2006-1003 Application 10/046,535 Rejection over Lin in view of Hoyt and Segraves Hoyt discloses that the acid dye staining of polyamides including nylon 6, 12 can be reduced by chemically blocking a portion of the polyamide’s amine end groups such that the terminal amine group content preferably is less than 25 meq/kg (col. 1, lines 34-41; col. 2, lines 22-35; col. 4, lines, 26-34; col. 5, lines 15-42; col. 6, lines 38-47; col. 7, lines 3-18). Like the appellants (specification, page 12, lines 17-18), Hoyt blocks the amine end groups with lactones (col. 5, lines 15-42). The appellants argue that because Lin does not ascribe any significance to a low amine end group content of either the core or the sheath, there is no suggestion for a person to go searching for a sheath having a low amine end group content (brief, page 8). Hoyt’s disclosure that blocking amine end groups of a polyamide reduces staining (col. 6, lines 38-47) would have fairly suggested, to one of ordinary skill in the art, using a low amine end group content polyamide as Lin’s sheath to obtain that benefit. 7Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 NextLast modified: November 3, 2007