Appeal 2007-0121
Application 10/324,594
application of Khare against this claim. In light of the above, particularly
our determination in favor of the Examiner’s obviousness position as to
claim 1, we shall affirm the Examiner‘s rejection of claims 11-17 and 38
over Nelson and Khare.
Claims 18-26
Appellants argue these claims together as a group. Thus, we select
claim 18 as the representative claim.
Claim 18 is drawn to a sorbent composition, which sorbent
composition includes a perlite of a specified mean particle size and a
reduced-valence promoter metal component.
Appellants do not contest the Examiner’s determination that it would
have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use the reduced
valence promoter of Khare in the sorbent of Nelson. Rather, Appellants
contest the Examiner’s obviousness rejection of representative claim 18
based on the assertion that the combined teachings of Nelson and Khare
would not have suggested use of perlite particles of the size claimed.
Appellants contend that Nelson does not recognize that the perlite particle
size is a result effective parameter that should be optimized for use in the
sorbent.
The Examiner, on the other hand, contends that the claimed perlite
particle sizes would have been arrived at by one of ordinary skill in the art
by optimization; that is, by determining the workable and/or effective
particle sizes of the perlite to be used in forming the sorbent through routine
experimentation.
Hence, the issue raised for our review with respect to representative
claim 18 is: Whether it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in
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