Appeal 2007-0088
Application 10/191,297
The Appellants invented a pyrogenically produced oxide doped by
erbium and a method for the production thereof. The oxide and method are
defined in representative claims 1 and 4 as follows:
1. A pyrogenically produced oxide of at least one of a metal and
metalloid doped by an aerosol with erbium oxide, comprising a base
component which is a pyrogenically produced oxide, said base component
being doped with erbium oxide in an amount of 0.000001 to 40 wt%, the
BET surface of the doped oxide being from 1 to 1000 m2/g.
4. A method for production of a pyrogenic oxide doped by an aerosol
with erbium oxide according to Claim 1, comprising feeding an aerosol into
a flame for production of pyrogenic oxide, said aerosol being formed from
an erbium salt solution by atomization of said erbium salt solution through
an aerosol generator, mixing the aerosol homogeneously before reaction
with a gas mixture fed into the flame, to form an aerosol-gas mixture,
reacting the aerosol-gas mixture in a flame and separating formed pyrogenic
oxides doped with erbium oxide from a gas stream.
The references set forth below are relied upon by the Examiner as
evidence of obviousness:
Berkey US 5,236,481 Aug. 17, 1993
Mangold US 6,328,944 B1 Dec. 11, 2001
Claims 1-4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Mangold in view of Berkey.
On this record, it is undisputed that Mangold discloses all of the
features recited in claims 1 and 4 except the use of erbium as the oxide
dopant. In Mangold, the dopants may be metals and/or non-metals,
preferably transition metals such as cerium (col. 2, ll. 50-58). Also
undisputed on this record is the fact that Berkey teaches using erbium as a
dopant (col. 2, ll. 15-33).
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