Appeal 2007-1021
Application 10/834,652
It is the Appellants’ basic contention that Lee contains no teaching or
suggestion of the independent claim feature "an amine-based catalyst active
at ambient temperature" (claims 1, 21, 35)(Appeal Br. 10-14). In response,
the Examiner finds that the catalysts of Lee are active at the ambient
temperatures recited in the appealed claims and cites to lines 52-60 in
column 19 of Lee as support for this finding (Answer 5). The Appellants
reply to the Examiner's finding by asserting "that the Examiner has no basis
for this statement, and that this statement is in conflict with the disclosure
and teachings of Lee" (Reply Br. 3).
The Appellants' arguments and assertions on this matter are incorrect.
In the disclosure cited by the Examiner, Lee teaches that "[t]he starting
components [of his reactant-catalyst composition] may be mixed … and
introduced into the open or closed mold" and that "[t]he mold temperature is
expediently from 20º to 110º C., preferably from 30º to 60º C., in particular
from 45º to 50º C." (col. 19, ll. 52-60). Implicit in the Examiner's above-
noted finding (and not contested by the Appellants) is the fact that these
mold temperatures are necessarily the temperatures at which the catalyzed
reactions begin. In this regard, it is significant that the "ambient
temperature" recitation of the independent claims is expressly defined as
ranging "from room temperature of about 70ºF [i.e., about 21º C] to elevated
temperatures of about 110ºF [i.e., about 43ºC]" (Specification 12, last line).
Therefore, the broadest and even preferred ranges of these
mold/catalyzed-reaction temperatures substantially overlap the ambient
temperature range claimed and disclosed by Appellants. In view of this
overlap, we share the Examiner's finding that the amine-based catalyst of
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