Appeal 2007-1689
Application 10/431,627
The Examiner responds the claims are directed to an apparatus for
polynucleotide synthesis, and “the apparatus of Penhasi . . . comprises all
essential structural elements of the claimed invention” and “is capable of
providing conditions necessary for polynucleotide synthesis” (Answer 6-7).
The Examiner contends “[t]here does not appear to be any structure
inherently associated with ‘polynucleotide synthesizer,’” arguing “a vessel is
capable of allowing a variety of functions to be performed” (id. 8).
We add the following to the Examiner’s findings with respect to
Penhasi. Penhasi would have disclosed to one of ordinary skill in this art
that the invention disclosed therein “relates in general to an apparatus for
automatically performing chemical processes and more particularly to an
apparatus for automatically determining the amino acid sequence in proteins
and/or peptides containing an N number of amino acid units regardless of
the amino acid chain length” (Penhasi col. 1, ll. 33-37). Penhasi
acknowledges the fundamental characteristic of proteins and peptides is their
exact sequence of the amino acid units; the synthesis of the exact amino
sequence and the determination of whether that sequence has been achieved
is difficult manually; and automation of the process requires precautions
with the synthesizer with respect to a number of sources of contamination to
maintain purity, leading to a number of objectives in these respects for the
disclosed synthesizer apparatus (id. col. 1, l. 41, to col. 4,
l. 42).
We find Appellants acknowledge it was known in the art that
“polynucleotide synthesis remains a complex, multi-step process that
requires a series of high efficiency chemical reactions” involving “the
4
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Next
Last modified: September 9, 2013