Ex Parte Martin et alDownload PDFBoard of Patent Appeals and InterferencesJul 24, 201210006875 (B.P.A.I. Jul. 24, 2012) Copy Citation UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARKOFFICE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O. Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www.uspto.gov APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 10/006,875 12/05/2001 Paul Martin 00041-DV3 5118 38393 7590 07/24/2012 CHEVRON U.S.A. INC. LAW - INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY GROUP P.O. BOX 2100 HOUSTON, TX 77252-2100 EXAMINER DUONG, THANH P ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 1774 MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE 07/24/2012 PAPER Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________________ BEFORE THE BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS AND INTERFERENCES ____________________ Ex parte PAUL MARTIN, T. GLENN SCOTT, JENNIFER L. PHAN, JAMES F. STEVENS, and CURTIS L. KRAUSE ____________________ Appeal 2011-008783 Application 10/006,875 Technology Center 1700 ____________________ Before RICHARD M. LEBOVITZ, JEFFREY B. ROBERTSON, and RAE LYNN P. GUEST, Administrative Patent Judges. ROBERTSON, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appeal 2011-008783 Application 10/006,875 2 STATEMENT OF CASE Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from a rejection of claims 1- 5 and 13-24. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We AFFIRM. THE INVENTION The claims are directed to a method and apparatus for heating a catalyst bed for start-up and for providing heat to a catalyst bed during transient operation to maintain desired reaction temperatures. (Spec. 2, ll. 29-31.) Claims 16 and 18, reproduced below, are illustrative of the claimed subject matter: 16. A method for heating a catalyst bed to a desired temperature, comprising: providing a catalyst bed in communication with an electrical heating element wherein the electrical heating element is a face heater; and heating the electrical heating element so as to maintain the desired temperature of the catalyst bed. 18. The method of claim 16, wherein the desired temperature is the desired reaction temperature during transient operation. (Appeal Brief, Claims Appendix 12.1) THE REJECTIONS I. The Examiner rejected claims 1-5, 16-20, and 22-24 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as anticipated by Yoshizaki et al. (US 5,582,805, issued December 10, 1996). (Examiner’s Answer, dated January 3, 2011 (“Ans.”), 3-5.) 1 Appeal Brief filed October 18, 2010, hereinafter “App. Br.” and Claims App’x, respectively. Appeal 2011-008783 Application 10/006,875 3 II. The Examiner rejected claims 16, 17, and 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as anticipated by Brunson et al. (US 5,512,251, issued April 30, 1996). (Ans. 5.) III. The Examiner rejected claims 13-21 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Bayer et al. (US 5,562,885, issued October 8, 1996) in view of Helmers (US 2,443,423, issued June 15, 1948). (Ans. 5-6.) ISSUES Rejection I The Examiner found that Yoshizaki discloses a metallic honeycomb catalyst carrier and a circular electrically conductive heater, which corresponds to the catalyst bed with a face heater as recited in the claimed method of claim 16. (Ans. 4, citing Yoshizaki, e.g., Col. 15, ll. 4-6; Figs. 8, 15.) Appellants contend that Yoshizaki does not disclose the face heater recited in the claims because the electrical heating element in Yoshizaki is a band heater that heats from the outside edge of the catalyst carrier, which will require longer heat up times and greater energy input. (App. Br. 6.) Appellants contend that the face heater of the present invention heats the face of the catalyst bed and therefore requires less time and energy to heat the catalyst bed for start-up. (App. Br. 6.) Appellants also argue that Yoshizaki’s “electrical heating element” is a “circular electrically conductive heater” or a “winding heater,” but not a face heater. (App. Br. 7.) Appeal 2011-008783 Application 10/006,875 4 Rejection II The Examiner found that Brunson discloses a method for heating a monolithic catalyst bed to start-up temperature with an electrical heating element of a face heater, which corresponds to “heating the electrical heating element so as to maintain the desired temperature of the catalyst bed,” as recited in claim 16. (Ans. 5, 9, citing Brunson, e.g., Col. 1, ll. 4-11; Col 2, ll. 15-20, Col. 7, ll. 43-59; Fig. 3.) Appellants argue that Brunson does not teach or suggest maintaining the desired temperature of the catalyst bed as required by claim 16 of the present invention. (App. Br. 8.) Rejection III With respect to claims 15 and 18, the Examiner found that Bayer in view of Helmers discloses or suggests all of the recited steps, but fails to explicitly disclose heating during transient operation of the catalyst bed to maintain the desired temperature of the catalyst bed. (Ans. 6.) The Examiner concluded that it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made, based on common knowledge, “to provide heat, as needed, during operation of the converter or [in] order to further achieve high efficiency.” (Ans. 6.) Appellants argue that the Examiner has not provided an explicit basis to support the position that providing heat would have been a matter of common knowledge. (App. Br. 9.) Appeal 2011-008783 Application 10/006,875 5 Therefore, the dispositive issues on appeal are: (1) Whether the Examiner erred in finding that Yoshizaki discloses “wherein the electrical heating element is a face heater,” as recited in claim 16? (2) Whether the Examiner erred in finding that Brunson discloses “heating the electrical heating element so as to maintain the desired temperature of the catalyst bed,” as recited in claim 16? (3) Whether the Examiner erred in concluding that the Bayer in view of Helmers renders obvious “wherein the desired temperature is the desired reaction temperature during transient operation,” as recited in claim 18? PRINCIPLES OF LAW 35 U.S.C. § 102 “To anticipate a claim, a prior art reference must disclose every limitation of the claimed invention, either explicitly or inherently.” In re Schreiber, 128 F.3d 1473, 1477 (Fed. Cir. 1997). 35 U.S.C. § 103 The obviousness analysis “need not seek out precise teachings directed to the specific subject matter of the challenged claim, for a court can take account of the inferences and creative steps that a person of ordinary skill in the art would employ.” KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007). The obviousness analysis cannot be confined by “. . . overemphasis on the importance of published articles and the explicit Appeal 2011-008783 Application 10/006,875 6 content of issued patents. The diversity of inventive pursuits and of modern technology counsels against limiting the analysis in this way.” Id. at 419. FACTUAL FINDINGS (FF) 1. Yoshizaki discloses a metallic honeycomb catalyst carrier having an upstream or downstream end face provided with a circular electrically conductive heater, which may have any other shape. (Col. 15, ll. 1-14; Fig. 15.) 2. Yoshizaki discloses that one such shape for the electrically conductive heater is in the form of a winding heater, which uniformly heats the end face of the carrier to promote reactions over the carrier. (Col. 15, ll. 14-18; Fig. 16.) 3. Helmers discloses an improved method and apparatus for carrying out endothermic catalytic conversions which enable the attainment of a substantially constant temperature from the inlet to the outlet of a bed of solid granular contact catalysts with a heating element. (Col. 2, ll. 1-28.) ANALYSIS We select claims 16 and 18 as representative of the arguments made by Appellants pursuant to 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(vii). Issue One, Rejection I We are not persuaded by Appellants’ arguments that the heater disclosed in Yoshizaki does not anticipate Appellants’ claimed “face heater.” Yoshizaki discloses a circular electrically conductive heater, which Appeal 2011-008783 Application 10/006,875 7 includes other shapes, such as a winding heater, and which serves to uniformly heat the end face of a catalyst bed. (FF 2.) While Yoshizaki’s heater is not specifically termed a “face heater,” the heater of Yoshizaki acts to heat the face of the catalyst bed in the same manner as described in Appellants’ Specification. (Spec. 12, ll. 5-20; describing a “face heater [as] an electrical heating element formed . . . along the face of the catalyst bed,” and stating that “other illustrative embodiments may be utilized to provide sufficient heat transfer to the catalyst bed face.”) Appellants contend that Yoshizaki’s heater requires longer heat times and energy input than the claimed face heater (App. Br. 6), but did not identify structural differences between the claimed face heater and that of Yoshizaki that would distinguish the two. Accordingly, we agree with the Examiner that Yoshizaki anticipates Appellants’ claimed face heater. Issue Two, Rejection II With respect to Rejection II, Appellants merely repeat the limitations of the rejected claims and then assert without setting forth substantive arguments that Brunson does not disclose such elements. As such, we affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claim 16. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(vii); see also In re Lovin, 652 F.3d 1349, 1357 (Fed. Cir. 2011) (“we hold that the Board reasonably interpreted Rule 41.37 to require more substantive arguments in an appeal brief than a mere recitation of the claim elements and a naked assertion that the corresponding elements were not found in the prior art.”). Appeal 2011-008783 Application 10/006,875 8 Issue Three, Rejection III With respect to Rejection III, we are also unpersuaded by Appellants’ arguments. Initially, we note that the Examiner only appears to rely on common knowledge in rejecting claims 15 and 18. (Ans. 6.) Accordingly, we limit our discussion to representative claim 18. The Examiner provided sufficient evidence that one of ordinary skill in the art would have been aware that it would have been necessary to provide heat, as needed, during the transient operation of an apparatus and method for heating a catalyst bed and thus maintain the desired reaction temperature during transient operation as recited in claim 18. A skilled artisan often uses his or her ordinary skill, creativity, and common sense to make necessary modifications to methods or apparatus explicitly disclosed by the prior art. See KSR, 550 U.S. at 418- 419. The Examiner’s reasoning is further supported by Helmers, which discloses maintaining a substantially constant temperature to ensure a substantially constant rate of reaction from the inlet to the outlet of a catalyst bed via a heating element. (FF 3.) Therefore, we agree with the Examiner that one having ordinary skill in the art would have the requisite skill and common sense to provide heat, as needed, to maintain a desired reaction temperature during transient operation of a catalytic converter. CONCLUSIONS The Examiner did not err in finding that Yoshizaki discloses “wherein the electrical heating element is a face heater,” as recited in claim 16. The Examiner did not err in finding that Brunson discloses “heating the electrical heating element so as to maintain the desired temperature of the catalyst bed,” as recited in claim 16. Appeal 2011-008783 Application 10/006,875 9 The Examiner did not err in concluding that Bayer in view of Helmers renders obvious “wherein the desired temperature is the desired reaction temperature during transient operation,” as recited in claim 18. DECISION We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1-5, 16-20, and 22-24 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as anticipated by Yoshizaki. We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 16, 17, and 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as anticipated by Brunson. We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 13-21 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Bayer in view of Helmers. No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1). AFFIRMED rvb Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation