Appeal 2007-1888
Application 10/258,067
least the five steps specified in appealed claims 1 and 11, including treating
the carpet textile in any manner with the composition and then further
treating the treated textile with steam (Jones, e.g., col. 3, ll. 35-46, col. 4,
l. 48, to col. 5, l. 38, col. 8, ll. 33-43, and col. 9, ll. 8-21). We find Jones
discloses a stain resistant and water- and oil- repellent composition useful in
the method that can contain, among other things, polymers and copolymers
of methacrylic acid (id., e.g., col. 3, l. 48, to col. 4, l. 19, and col. 4,
ll. 33-42); sulphonated novolak resins (id., e.g., col. 4, ll. 20-28); and anionic
or nonionic fluorochemicals (id., e.g., col. 3, ll. 13-34). Jones discloses that
the heat treatment of the treated textile, which can be accomplished with
steam, improves exhaustion of the fluorochemical onto the fiber which
improves method efficiency and can cure or fix the fluorocarbon to the
textile (id., e.g., col. 5, ll. 12-28).
We find Nguyen and Jones would have disclosed the same anionic or
nonionic fluorochemicals, methacrylic polymers, and sulphonated novolak
resins in the treatment compositions (Nguyen, e.g., col. 7, l. 58, to col. 8,
l. 3, and col. 4, ll. 11-14 and 30-35; Jones, e.g., col. 3, ll. 13-28, and col. 4,
ll. 3-8, 20-28, and 33-42).
We determine the combined teachings of Nguyen and Jones, the scope
of which we determined above, provide convincing evidence supporting the
Examiner’s case that the claimed invention encompassed by method claim 1
and product claim 11, as we interpreted this claim above, would have been
prima facie obviousness of to one of ordinary skill in the textile treatment
arts familiar with the application of compositions comprising water- and oil-
repellent agents. The textile treatment compositions disclosed by Nguyen
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