Ex Parte Shareef et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 21, 2017

13431950 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 21, 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.
13/431,950 03/27/2012 Iqbal A. Shareef 2147US 7654
91286 7590 09/25/2017
Harness, Dickey & Pierce, P.L.C. (Lam)
P.O. Box 828
Bloomfield Hills, MI 48303
EXAMINER
KENDALL, BENJAMIN R
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
1718
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/25/2017 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):
s stevens @ hdp .com
troymailroom @hdp. com
eofficeaction @ appcoll.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte IQBAL SHAREEF,
EVANGELOS SPYROPOULOS, and MARK TASKAR1
Appeal 2016-007959
Application 13/431,950
Technology Center 1700
Before BRADLEY R. GARRIS, JEFFREY T. SMITH, and
JEFFREY R. SNAY, Administrative Patent Judges.
GARRIS, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134, Appellants appeal from the Examiner’s
rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) of claims 1—4, 7, 9, 10, and 23 as
unpatentable over Cruse (US 2012/0227817 Al, Sept. 13, 2012) in view of
Mardian (US 2003/0194862 Al, Oct. 16, 2013) or Shajii (US 2007/0042508
Al, Feb. 22, 2007) or Yakasovic Saavedra (US 7,100,800 B2, Sept. 5, 2006)
(hereinafter “Saavedra”). Claims 5 and 11—22 have been canceled and,
1 Lam Research Corporation is identified as the real party in interest. App.
Br. 3.
Appeal 2016-007959
Application 13/431,950
contrary to Appellants’ belief, claims 6 and 8 as well as claim 24 have been
withdrawn (see, e.g., App. Br. 3 and Final Action 2). We have jurisdiction
under 35 U.S.C. § 6.
We REVERSE.
Appellants claim a plasma processing system for supplying a
processing gas to a plurality of plasma chambers, the system comprising a
regulator 220, an accumulator 204 connected to the regulator, and a shared
manifold 206 connected to the accumulator, wherein “the regulator is
configured to regulate supply of the processing gas to the accumulator to
maintain a stable pressure of the processing gas supplied to the accumulator”
(sole independent claim 1, Fig. 2).
A copy of representative claim 1, taken from the Claims Appendix of
the Appeal Brief, appears below.
1. A plasma processing system for supplying a processing gas to a
plurality of plasma chambers, the plasma processing system comprising:
a regulator configured to receive the processing gas;
an accumulator connected to the regulator, wherein
the regulator is configured to regulate supply of the processing gas to
the accumulator to maintain a stable pressure of the processing gas supplied
to the accumulator;
a shared manifold connected to the accumulator, wherein the
accumulator is configured to (i) while supplying a first portion of the
processing gas to the shared manifold, receive a second portion of the
processing gas from the regulator and accumulate the processing gas, and
(ii) absorb at least portions of spikes and dips in pressures within the shared
manifold; and
a plurality of mass flow controllers connected to the shared manifold,
wherein the accumulator is connected between the regulator and the plurality
of mass flow controllers, and wherein the plurality of mass flow controllers
control flow of portions of the processing gas out of branches of the shared
manifold to the plurality of plasma chambers.
2
Appeal 2016-007959
Application 13/431,950
In rejecting claim 1, the Examiner finds that Cruse teaches a plasma
processing system comprising a regulator in the form of valve 206 with a
filter connected to the regulator/valve and a shared manifold connected to
the filter (Final Action 4—5 (citing Fig. 2A, 134)). The Examiner
additionally finds that Cruse does not disclose an accumulator connected to
the regulator/valve but concludes that it would have been obvious “to
modify the gas feed filter location of Cruse to include the accumulator of
Mardian/Shajii/[]Saavedra” (id. at 5—6).
Appellants argue “there is no suggestion i[n] Cruse that the valve 206
is used to regulate pressure and/or has structure and/or logic devices
necessary to regulate pressure” (App. Br. 7).
In response, the Examiner states that “a valve is a regulator, since it
quite literally regulates the flow of fluid” (Ans. 12), that the claim recitation
of the regulator function (i.e., “configured to regulate supply of the
processing gas to the accumulator to maintain a stable pressure of the
processing gas supplied to the accumulator” (claim 1)) “do[es] not impart
any additional structure” (id.), and that “since the structure of the prior art
[including valve 206 of Cruse] teaches all structural limitations of the claim,
the same is considered capable of meeting the functional limitations
[including the recited regulator function]” (id. at 13).
Appellants reply by arguing that the regulator function recited in
claim 1 imparts a structural limitation (Reply Br. 4) and that “the Examiner
has not shown that the prior art structure (i.e. the valve 206 of Cruse)
inherently possesses the alleged functionally defined limitation[]” (id. at 11).
Appellants are correct that the functional recitation concerning the
claimed regulator requires Cruse’s valve 206 to be structurally capable of
performing the recited function. The Examiner points out that a valve
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Appeal 2016-007959
Application 13/431,950
“literally regulates the flow of fluid” (Ans. 12) but fails to provide any
evidence or rationale establishing that valve 206 is structurally capable of
regulating supply of the processing gas “to maintain a stable pressure of the
processing gas supplied to the accumulator” as required by claim l.2
For this reason alone, we do not sustain the § 103 rejection of claims
1—4, 7, 9, 10, and 23 as unpatentable over Cruse in view of Mardian or Shajii
or Saavedra.
The decision of the Examiner is reversed.
REVERSED
2 We observe that Cruse discloses a system embodiment having a pressure
controller 510 to control the pressure of gases provided to premix tanks
512A-D (see, e.g., 1 50, Fig. 5) and that Appellants’ Figure 1 shows a prior
art system having a regulator 102 to regulate the input pressure for mass
flow controllers 104, 106, and 108 connected to shared manifold 110 (Spec.
14). However, the Examiner does not cite to and rely on these disclosures
in rejecting the claims on appeal. As a consequence, we have not considered
such disclosures in our assessment of the Examiner’s rejection.
4