Appeal 2007-1230
Application 10/633,935
The Examiner’s rejections are as follows:
1. Claims 1, 2, 4, 5, 7-11, 13-15, 18, 19, and 21-25 are rejected under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Zeng in view of Miraldi.
2. Claims 3 and 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable
over Zeng in view of Miraldi and further in view of Iwanczyk.
Rather than repeat the arguments of Appellant or the Examiner, we
refer to the Briefs and the Answer2 for their respective details. In this
decision, we have considered only those arguments actually made by
Appellant. Arguments which Appellant could have made but chose not to
make in the Briefs have not been considered and are deemed to be waived.
See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(vii).
Regarding representative claim 11,3 the Examiner's rejection
essentially finds that Zeng teaches a gamma camera with every claimed
feature except for coupling a photodetector to an end of each bar detector
strip normal to the elongated dimension as claimed. The Examiner,
however, notes that Zeng leaves the specific arrangement of such coupling
as a choice within the level of the skilled artisan. The Examiner further cites
Miraldi as teaching a gamma camera that optically couples a photodetector
to at least one end of multiple scintillation crystals. In view of the “good
light collection” resulting from this arrangement, the Examiner concludes
2 We note that the Answer contains misnumbered pages. Specifically, the
pages following Page 7 are numbered Pages 2, 2, 3, 4, etc. For clarity, we
have renumbered the pages of the Answer following Page 7 so that all pages
consecutively follow Page 7 (i.e., Page 8, Page 9, etc.). Throughout this
opinion, we refer to the Answer as renumbered.
3 Appellant argues claims 1, 2, 4, 5, 7-11, 13-15, 18, 19, and 21-25 together
as a group (Br. 8-10). Accordingly, we select the broadest independent
claim – claim 11 – as representative. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(vii).
3
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