Appeal 2006-2228
Application 10/231,678
The three product classes of machine, manufacture, and composition
of matter have traditionally required physical structure or substance. “The
term machine includes every mechanical device or combination of
mechanical powers and devices to perform some function and produce a
certain effect or result.” Corning v. Burden, 56 U.S. 252, 267 (1853); see
also Burr v. Duryee, 68 U.S. 531, 570 (1863) (“a machine is a concrete
thing, consisting of parts, or of certain devices and combination of devices”).
Machines do not have to have moving parts. In modern parlance, electrical
circuits and devices, such as computers, are referred to as machines. The
intangible “carrier wave” or a “propagated signal” embodiment of claim 35
has no concrete tangible physical structure, and does not itself perform any
functions. Therefore, such an intangible does not fit within the definition of
a “machine.”
A “manufacture” and a “composition of matter” are defined in
Diamond v. Chakrabarty, 447 U.S. 303, 308, 206 USPQ 193, 196-97
(1980):
[T]his Court has read the term “manufacture” in § 101 in accordance
with its dictionary definition to mean “the production of articles for
use from raw or prepared materials by giving to these materials new
forms, qualities, properties, or combinations, whether by hand-labor
or by machinery.” American Fruit Growers, Inc. v. Brogdex Co.,
283 U.S. 1, 11 (1931). Similarly, “composition of matter” has been
construed consistent with common usage to include “all compositions
of two or more substances and ... all composite articles, whether they
be results of chemical union, or of mechanical mixture, or whether
they be gases, fluids, powders or solids.” Shell Development Co. v.
Watson, 149 F. Supp. 279, 280 (D.C. 1957) (citing 1 A. Deller,
Walker on Patents § 14, p. 55 (1st ed. 1937). [Parallel citations
omitted.]
6
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Next
Last modified: September 9, 2013