Ex Parte Orsley et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Oct 16, 2017

13828190 (P.T.A.B. Oct. 16, 2017)

United States Patent and Trademark Office
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.
13/828,190 03/14/2013 Timothy James Orsley SP12-371 1845
22928 7590 10/18/2017
TORNTNO TNmRPORATFD
EXAMINER
SP-TI-3-1 CHIN, EDWARD
CORNING, NY 14831
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2813
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
10/18/2017 ELECTRONIC
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.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address(es):
u sdocket @ corning .com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte TIMOTHY JAMES ORSLEY and
WILLIAM RICHARD TRUTNA
Appeal 2016-008067
Application 13/828,1901
Technology Center 2800
Before MARK NAGUMO, WESLEY B. DERRICK, and
CHRISTOPHER L. OGDEN, Administrative Patent Judges.
DERRICK, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from the Examiner’s
decision rejecting under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) claims 1-9 and 16 over
De Graaf2 and Wilkins3 and of claims 10—15 in further view of Park.4 We
have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6.
We REVERSE.
1 Coming Incorporated is identified as the real party in interest. App. Br. 2.
2 De Graaf et al., WO 2006/114726 A2, published November 2, 2006.
3 Wilkins et al., US 2008/0093732 Al, published April 24, 2008.
4 Park et al., EP 2 392 852 A2, published December 7, 2011.
Appeal 2016-008067
Application 13/828,190
THE INVENTION
The subject matter of the claims on appeal relates to a lighting device
comprising a chip-on-board light emitting diode (LED) light source disposed
within a sealed phase transfer fluid chamber, a distributed color conversion
medium, and a glass containment plate. Specification filed March 14, 2013
(“Spec.”), Abstract.
Claim 1—reproduced below with emphasis—is representative.
1. A lighting device comprising a chip-on-board (COB)
light emitting diode (LED) light source, a phase transfer fluid
disposed in a hermetically sealed phase transfer fluid chamber,
a phase transfer fluid wicking structure, a distributed color
conversion medium, and a glass containment plate, wherein:
the color conversion medium is distributed in two
dimensions over an emission field of the lighting device within
the glass containment plate;
the COB LED light source comprises a thermal heat sink
framework and at least one LED the at least one LED contained
within the hermetically sealed phase transfer fluid chamber in
which the phase transfer fluid is disposed;
the glass containment plate is positioned over the
hermetically sealed phase transfer fluid chamber, contains the
distributed color conversion medium, and defines high
operating temperature regions TH of the lighting device;
the thermal heat sink framework of the light source
defines low operating temperature regions Tc of the lighting
device; and
the phase transfer fluid wicking structure is transparent
to at least a portion of the operating wavelength bandwidth of
the LED and is configured within the hermetically sealed phase
transfer fluid chamber to
(i) encourage the transport of phase transfer fluid along a
fluid transport path extending from low operating temperature
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Application 13/828,190
regions Tc of the lighting device to high operating temperature
regions Th of the lighting device within the fluid chamber,
(ii) permit vaporization of the transported phase transfer
fluid in the high operating temperature regions Th of the
lighting device, and
(iii) receive condensed phase transfer fluid vapor in the
low operating temperature regions Tc of the lighting device for
return transport to the high operating temperature regions TH of
the lighting device via the phase transfer fluid wicking
structure.
Appeal Brief filed November 2, 2015 (“Appeal Br.”), (Claims App’x) 12-13
(emphasis added).
DISCUSSION5
We are persuaded that the Examiner has failed to meet the Office’s
burden of establishing the unpatentability of the claims. For any ground of
rejection, “the [EJxaminer bears the initial burden ... of presenting a prima
facie case of unpatentability.” In re Oetiker, 977 F.2d 1443, 1445 (Fed. Cir.
1992).
Claim 1 requires, inter alia, a color conversion medium distributed
within a glass containment plate which is positioned over a hermetically
sealed phase transfer fluid chamber that contains within it an FED and phase
transfer fluid wicking structure. The Specification describes “the subject
matter of the present disclosure” as providing “packaged chip-on-board
5 In our discussion, we refer to the Specification, the Final Office Action
issued February 23, 2015 (“Final Act.”), the Appeal Brief, the Examiner’s
Answer issued June 23, 2016 (“Ans.”), and the Reply Brief filed August 23,
2016 (“Reply Br.”).
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Application 13/828,190
(COB) LED arrays . . . where a color conversion medium is distributed
within a glass containment plate, rather than silicone.” Spec. 1 6. The
subject matter claimed is further described as an improvement in that, inter
alia, the glass containment plate “helps to define a hermetically sealed phase
transfer fluid chamber that can be used to help remove heat from the LED
array.” Id. 17.
The Examiner relies on De Graaf for disclosing, inter alia, a lighting
device comprising a chip-on-board (COB) LED light source with a phase
transfer fluid disposed in a hermetically sealed phase transfer fluid chamber
that provides phase transfer fluid wicking by capillary action. Final Act. 3^4
(citing Fig. 3). In De Graaf’s device relied on by the Examiner, the LED is
not within a hermetically phase transfer fluid chamber sealed chamber in
which the phase transfer fluid is disposed. Final Act 4; De Graaf, Fig. 3.
Rather, the device has a phase transfer fluid disposed in channel 12 within a
plate 15 and a light-emitting portion in die 26 glued to plate 15 to obtain
optical and thermal contact with the die of the LED device 20 and, on the
opposite side, die 26 is glued to slug 21. De Graaf, Fig. 3, 8,1. 29-9,1. 7.
The slug 21 is fixed to a heat spreading board 23 which draws heat away to
cooling flanges 25. Id. at 7,1. 33-8,1. 1. The plate 15 is in thermal contact
with conducting columns 33, 34, which are in contact with cooler 24. Id. at
8,11. 24-26. In operation, the liquid within plate 15 is “transported, by
means of capillary force, from the ends 31, 32 and to that area 35 of the
channel 12 that is adjacent to the die 26, where the liquid is again
evaporated.” Id. at 8,11. 28-31.
The Examiner relies on Wilkins for disclosing a chip 18 that is
contained within a hermetically sealed phase transfer fluid chamber. Final
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Application 13/828,190
Act. 4 (citing Wilkins 113). The Examiner further finds De Graaf and
Wilkins to be in the same or similar field of endeavor. Id.
The Examiner concludes that “[i]t would have been obvious to
combine DeGraaf [sic] and Wilkins. DeGraaf [sic] and Wilkins may be
combined by forming the LED chip surrounded by transfer fluid as disclosed
in Wilkins, in order to keep the chip cool.” Final Act. 4.
The Examiner further determines that “[o]ne having ordinary skill in
the art would be motivated to combine De Graaf and Wilkins in order to
increase the surface area of heat transfer, i.e., to increase the effectiveness of
the cooling effect of heat transfer with phase change.” Ans. 2-3 (citing
Wilkins | 15). In doing so, the Examiner relies on Wilkins’ statement that
“[t]he use of working fluids in other proposed approaches to the cooling of
high power chips typically relies on the conversion of a liquid to a vapor”
and concludes that “De Graaf and Wilkins may be combined by filling the
chamber of De Graaf with phase transfer fluid, as disclosed in Wilkins.” Id.
at 3.
Appellants contend, inter alia, that the relied on plate 15 from
De Graaf is not a containment plate positioned over a hermetically sealed
phase transfer fluid chamber that contains at least one LED. Appeal Br. 7-
10. Appellants contend further that Wilkins does not disclose an LED in a
fluid chamber, and that Wilkins does not disclose phase transfer fluids. Id.
at 9. Appellants further contend that there is no proper basis for combining
De Graaf and Wilkins to arrive at the claimed subject matter in which the
glass containment plate is positioned over a hermetically sealed chamber
containing phase transfer fluid. Id. at 8-10; Reply Br. 4-5.
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Application 13/828,190
Appellants’ arguments highlight that the Examiner has failed to set
forth the requisite articulated reasoning to support a prima facie case of
obviousness. In particular, we find the Examiner’s conclusory reasoning to
fill the LED-containing chamber of De Graaf with a phase transfer fluid in
order to increase the cooling wholly inadequate where the front and rear
surfaces of die 26 are in thermal contact with plate 15 and, via slug 21 and
heat spreading board 23, cooling flanges 25, respectively (De Graaf, Fig. 3)
and there is no explanation how adding a phase transfer fluid within the
structure would increase cooling (Final Act. 4; Ans. 2-3). Further, as to the
motivation “to combine De Graaf and Wilkins in order to increase the
surface area of heat transfer” (Ans. 2-3), there is no explanation how De
Graaf s structure is modified in a way that increases the surface area, or how
a phase transfer fluid within the structure would have a cooling effect on the
chip (Final Act. 4; Ans. 2-3). In this regard, the Examiner’s reasoning that
Wilkins describes prior art uses of a phase transfer fluid in stating that “[t]he
use of working fluids in other proposed approaches to the cooling of high
power chips typically relies on the conversion of a liquid to a vapor”
(Wilkins 115) falls short because there is no sufficient explanation how the
structure of the relied on combination would have rendered obvious a phase
transfer cooling fluid in a chamber that also contains the FED. Final Act. 4;
Ans. 2-A.
Similarly, the Examiner’s reliance on the “uppermost portion of
enclosure 15 enclosing the chamber functions as a cap or containment plate
over the chamber” or, alternatively, on reasoning that “ceramic plate 30 also
may read on the chamber containment plate” (Ans. 4), falls short because
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Application 13/828,190
there is not sufficient reasoning for these elements forming a hermetically
sealed phase transfer fluid chamber that includes the LED.
We find lacking, therefore, the requisite basis for a prima facie case of
obviousness. See, e.g., Beldenlnc. v. Berk-TekLLC, 805 F.3d 1064, 1073
(Fed. Cir. 2015) (“[Ojbviousness concerns whether a skilled artisan not only
could have made but would have been motivated to make the combinations
or modifications of prior art to arrive at the claimed invention.”). On this
record, accordingly, the Examiner’s articulated reasoning falls short of that
necessary for a prima facie case. See In re Warner, 379 F.2d 1011, 1017
(CCPA 1967) (“The Patent Office has the initial duty of supplying the
factual basis for its rejection. It may not. . . resort to speculation, unfounded
assumptions or hindsight reconstruction to supply deficiencies in its factual
basis.”); In re Sporck, 301 F.2d 686, 690 (CCPA 1962); see also Oetiker,
977 F.2d at 1445.
We decline to scour the record in the first instance for facts that might
support a prior art rejection of the claim on appeal, as our primary role is
review, not examination de novo.
DECISION
The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1-16 is REVERSED.
REVERSED
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