Appeal 2006-2173
Application 09/519, 999
have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art, as suggested by
Chung. The location of the secondary bags "around" the liquid containing
bag called for in appealed claim 29 does not preclude the location of the
bags above the liquid containing bag. In other words, the secondary bags
that are located above the liquid containing bag of Ooyama would still be
considered to be "around" the liquid containing bag.
Claims 10, 11, 13-15, 18, 30, and 31 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§103(a) as obvious over Ooyama and Hoffman. We select claim 10 as
representative of the rejected claims.
As indicated above in the discussion of claim 21, the Examiner asserts
that Hoffman teaches that it was known to provide a heating element in the
liquid holding portion of a container for the purpose of heating the liquid to
hydrate a separate permeable compartment. Appellant argues that the
Hoffman reference fails to disclose that the heating element is installed in
the liquid containing bag (Br. 15). Appellant recognizes that Hoffman
discloses that interior chamber 23 faces the liquid to be heated. However,
Appellant asserts that chamber 24 is directed to the outside of the container;
therefore the heating element is not part of the interior bag. This argument is
not persuasive because a portion of the heating element 23 disclosed by
Hoffman is attached to part of the liquid containing portion of the container
as described by the Examiner. Thus, we are in agreement with the Examiner
that it would have been obvious to include an internal heating element in the
liquid containing portion of Ooyama.
Claims 16-17 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as obvious over
Ooyama, Hoffman and Yoshio. Appellant has not specifically challenged
the Examiner's motivation for combining the teachings of Yoshio with
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