Appeal 2007-0173
Application 10/438,024
Appellants provide separate substantive arguments only for claims 4
and 7. Accordingly, claims 1-3, 8 and 9 stand or fall together.
We have thoroughly reviewed each of the arguments advanced by
Appellants. However, we find ourselves in complete agreement with the
Examiner’s reasoned analysis and application of the prior art, as well as his
cogent and thorough disposition of the arguments raised by Appellants.
Accordingly, we will adopt the Examiner’s reasoning as our own in
sustaining the rejection of record, and we add the following for emphasis
only.
Appellants do no dispute the Examiner’s factual determination that
Dick, like Appellants, discloses a method of producing an alkaline metal
chlorite having improved purity by generating chorine dioxide in a first
reaction zone wherein chlorate ions are reduced with methanol, and then
reacting the produced chlorine dioxide with an aqueous solution of an alkali
metal hydroxide and hydrogen peroxide in a second reaction zone under
subatmospheric pressure. As appreciated by the Examiner and stressed by
Appellants, Dick prefers the use of a packed tower reactor under vacuum for
the second reaction zone, rather than the claimed liquid eductor. However,
the Examiner has presented substantial objective evidence in the disclosures
of Fuller and Mason that one of ordinary skill in the art would have found it
obvious to replace the packed tower reactor of Dick with a liquid eductor
with the requisite reasonable expectation of success. Appellants
acknowledge that Fuller demonstrates that a liquid eductor was a known
device for pulling a vacuum, and that Mason evidences that it was known in
the art to employ a liquid eductor as a reaction zone for making an alkaline
metal chlorite by reacting chlorine dioxide and an aqueous base.
Accordingly, since Dick is not restricted to using a packed tower reactor for
3
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Last modified: November 3, 2007