Appeal No. 2007-0048 Page 8
Application No. 10/234,608
assembly. Appellant (Brief, p. 4) argues that Gibson is directed to insulated
electric thermal storage heaters and not combinable with Lowry which teaches
insulated overhead doors. This argument is not persuasive because one of
ordinary skill in the art reading Gibson would understand Gibson’s thermal
insulation panels to be relevant to insulating articles generically and not limited to
electric thermal storage heaters. “[E]lectric thermal storage heaters” is recited at
column 1, lines 29-30, as an example of an application for panels of microporous
thermal insulation material. Gibson explicitly discloses aerogel as one example
of a known thermal insulative material. Thus, one of ordinary skill in the art
reading Gibson is informed that aerogel is a known thermal insulative material.
That information would provide one of ordinary skill in the art with a suggestion to
use aerogel as the thermal insulative material that Lowry discloses can be
incorporated within the slat assembly of the overhead door as well as with a
reasonable expectation of success in doing so.
Appellant (Brief, p. 6) also argues that “[s]ince Lowry certainly fails to
clearly show or suggest aerogel as an insulation material for an overhead door
…, it fails to function in a manner that would induce one to look to Gibson.” This
argument is also not persuasive. “A reference is reasonably pertinent if, even
though it may be in a different field of endeavor, it is one which, because of the
matter with which it deals, logically would have commended itself to an inventor’s
attention in considering his problem.” In re GPAC, Inc., 57 F.3d 1573, 1578, 35
USPQ2d 1116, 1121 (Fed. Cir. 1995) (quotations and citations omitted). If a
reference’s disclosure relates to the same problem as the claimed invention, “that
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