Ex Parte SinghDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardJun 1, 201713849759 (P.T.A.B. Jun. 1, 2017) Copy Citation 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. 13/849,759 03/25/2013 Brij N. Singh P21048-US 5084 78833 7590 06/05/2017 DTTKFW YFF EXAMINER YEE & ASSOCIATES P.C. QUIGLEY, THOMAS K P.O. BOX 802333 DALLAS, TX 75380 ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2831 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 06/05/2017 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): ptonotifs @yeeiplaw.com mgamez @ yeeiplaw. com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte BRIJ N. SINGH Appeal 2016-001675 Application 13/849,759 Technology Center 2800 Before CATHERINE Q. TIMM, JENNIFER R. GUPTA, and LILAN REN, Administrative Patent Judges. REN, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellant1 timely appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a rejection2 of claims 1—20. We have jurisdiction. 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We reverse. 1 The real party in interest is identified as Deere & Company of Moline, Illinois. (Appeal Brief filed May 14, 2015 (“App. Br.”), 2.) 2 In this decision, we refer to the Final Office Action mailed February 17, 2015 (“Final Act.”), the Examiner’s Answer mailed October 7, 2015 (“Ans.”), and the Reply Brief filed November 20, 2015 (“Reply Br.”). Appeal 2016-001675 Application 13/849,759 CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER The claims are directed to “a machine that is capable of generating electrical energy from the motion of harvested material.” (Spec. I.)3 Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter: 1 A machine for generating electrical energy, the machine comprising: a housing; a shaft rotatable with respect to the housing; an impeller with blades for rotation with the shaft in response to receipt of material from a chute, wherein the chute makes an angle with respect to a vertical axis; a first generator assembly comprising first stator windings associated with the housing and a first magnet affixed to the shaft, such that if the impeller rotates an electromagnetic signal energizes the first stator windings based on the flow of material through the chute. (Claims Appendix, App. Br. 15 (emphases added).) REFERENCES The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on appeal is: Zhou CN 2465822 Dec. 19,2001 Scribner US 3,771,531 Nov. 13, 1973 Shimizu US 2007/0029799 A1 Feb. 8, 2007 REJECTIONS Claims 1—11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Zhou and Shimizu. Final Act. 2. 3 Application 13/849,759, Machine for Generating Electrical Energy, filed March 25, 2013. We refer to the “’759 Specification,” which we cite as “Spec.” 2 Appeal 2016-001675 Application 13/849,759 Claims 12—20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Zhou, Scribner, and Shimizu. Final Act. 5. OPINION Findings of fact throughout this opinion are supported by a preponderance of the evidence of record. Claim 74 The Examiner finds that Figure 1 of Zhou (reproduced below) illustrates a shaft about which “impeller 6” rotates although the shaft is not labeled in the figure. Final Act. 2. 4 Appellant argues claims 1—3 and 5—11 as a group. App. Br. 6. Claims 2, 3, and 5—11 therefore stand or fall with claim 1. 3 Appeal 2016-001675 Application 13/849,759 Figure 1 is a diagram of Zhou’s power windmill As illustrated in Figure 1 of Zhou, the “power windmill using fall head of grain” includes “bracket (1),” “feeding funnel (2),” “fan (4),” “dust, air outlet (9)” as well as “gravity turbine (6)” which has “driving wheel (7)” and “belt (8).” Zhou claim 1 (machine translation).5 Zhou’s device operates 5 The Zhou reference which includes the original disclosure and corresponding machine translation is not paginated. 4 Appeal 2016-001675 Application 13/849,759 “by gravity turbine driving shaft of the driving wheel drives the belt, thereby rotating the air blowing fan.” Id. Disclosure. The Examiner appears to interpret claim 1 as requiring that the shaft and impeller be capable of rotating at different rates, or that the shaft be capable of rotating without being driven by the impeller. Ans. 4. The claim, however, does not require such separate rotation. Based on the claim language requiring the recited machine to include both “a shaft rotatable with respect to [a] housing” and “an impeller with blades for rotation with the shaft” and in view of the disclosure of the ’759 Specification, we conclude that claim 1 requires the recited shaft, impeller, and blades to be rotatable together. The Examiner’s understanding of the claim language notwithstanding, the Examiner finds that Zhou discloses a shaft but does not explain why the shaft in Zhou is one that is “rotatable with respect to [a] housing” as recited in claim 1. Final Act. 2 (finding that the shaft in Zhou is “not labeled, but impeller 6 rotates about a shaft); Ans. 4 (finding that “the shaft is not labeled in the figures of Zhou, but the impeller rotates about a shaft”). On the record before us, we cannot sustain the Examiner’s rejection of claim 1 and its dependent claims because there has been an insufficient showing that a machine having “a shaft rotatable with respect to [a] housing” as recited in claim 1 is taught or suggested in the prior art. Because independent claim 12 recites a “harvester” having “a shaft rotatable with respect to the housing,” we cannot sustain the rejection of claim 12 and its dependent claims for the same reason. 5 Appeal 2016-001675 Application 13/849,759 DECISION The Examiner’s rejections of claims 1—20 are reversed. REVERSED 6 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation