Appeal No. 2007-0517
Application No. 10/768,647
expressly or inherently, each and every element of claim 12. In particular
Applicant argues that the Examiner failed to demonstrate that Roslund teaches a
piece of splicing material having the fluid permeability of at least about 25% as
great as the fluid permeability of the absorbent materials being spliced together.
(Id. at 14-15).
The Examiner contends that the Applicant’s claimed spliced region only
requires that the spliced region fall within the splicing material. From this, the
Examiner concludes that holes within a splicing material could constitute
Applicant’s spliced region. The Examiner then contends that Roslund renders
Applicant claim 1 unpatentable as Roslund teaches a splicing material formed with
cement strip having holes, the holes constituting Applicant’s spliced region having
a fluid permeability at least about as great as the absorbent materials being spliced
together. (Examiner’s Answer, p. 6).
As to Applicant claim 12, the Examiner states that Roslund teaches that the
absorptive capacity of the splicing region is “dependent upon the total area of the
openings while at the same time keeping the area of the openings within practical
limits to make a strong seam.” (Id. at p. 7). The Examiner contends that one of
permeability of Roslund’s splicing region and states:
In addition to the reasons set forth in Appellant’s Reply Brief and
Appeal Brief, the rejections of the claims on appeal are in error for the
reasons set forth above. Therefore, Appellant’s again request that the
Examiner’s rejections of claims 1-12 be reversed.
(Second Reply Brief, p. 4).
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