Appeal 2007-2206
Application 10/181,977
height of the truncated pyramid, which is between 30° and 45°.” Claim 7
depends on claim 1 and requires that the protruberances be 0.05 to 0.5 mm
in height. Claim 9 also depends from claim 1 and requires that the series of
protruberances recited in claim 1 form a background pattern, and be
combined with a second, taller series of protruberances “in order to
constitute a main pattern.”
The Examiner concedes that Roussel “fails to disclose the height of
the protuberances, the base as a truncated pyramid or a second series of
protuberances” (id. at 4). To meet these limitations, the Examiner cites
Laurent as disclosing an embossed absorbent paper having two series of
protrusions, with the first series of protrusions being higher than the second
series of protrusions, “the second protrusions forming a background for the
first protrusions (figure 5). The first protrusions correspond to Appellant’s
‘second series of protuberances’ and the second protrusions correspond to
Appellant's ‘first series of protuberances’” (id.). The Examiner states that
“[t]he second protrusions have frusta, i.e. truncated cone or pyramid shape,
with a height of less than 0.5 mm” (id.).
The Examiner concludes that one of ordinary skill would have
considered it obvious “to use Laurent’s frusta pyramid projections with
heights of less than 0.5 mm as the truncated polygon protuberances of
Roussel in order to change the aesthetic look of the absorbent article” (id. at
5). The Examiner states that the artisan of ordinary skill “would have been
motivated to use Laurent’s frusta pyramid because of the visual
attractiveness of the projections (see col. 2, line 7 of Laurent),” and to add
Laurent’s series of higher “first projections” to Roussel’s sheets in order to
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