Ex Parte Tinnemans

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Mar 14, 2014

11471727 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 14, 2014)

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.
11/471,727 06/21/2006 Patricius Aloysius Jacobus Tinnemans 1857.4560000 2564
26111 7590 03/14/2014
STERNE, KESSLER, GOLDSTEIN & FOX P.L.L.C.
1100 NEW YORK AVENUE, N.W.
WASHINGTON, DC 20005
EXAMINER
WHITESELL GORDON, STEVEN H
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2882
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
03/14/2014 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 PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
________________

Ex parte PATRICIUS ALOYSIUS JACOBUS TINNEMANS
________________

Appeal 2011-012344
Application 11/471,727
Technology Center 2800
________________

Before TERRY J. OWENS, PETER F. KRATZ, and
KAREN M. HASTINGS, Administrative Patent Judges.

OWENS, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Appeal 2011-012344
Application 11/471,727

2

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
The Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s
rejection of claims 1-6 and 8-20. We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
The Invention
The Appellant claims a lithographic apparatus and method. Claim 1 is
illustrative:
1. A lithographic apparatus, comprising:
an array of individually controllable elements configured to modulate
a radiation beam;
a projection system configured to project the modulated radiation
beam onto a target portion of a substrate;
a measuring system configured to measure a separation between an
image plane of the projection system and the target portion of the substrate;
a memory coupled to the control system, the memory being
configured to store pre-calculated adjusted patterns; and
a control system configured to determine a projected pattern to be
formed by the array of individually controllable elements, the determination
including selection of a pattern from the pre-calculated adjusted patterns
stored in the memory, the selection based on the measured separation
between the image plane of the projection system and the target portion of
the substrate such that the image plane of the projected pattern is shifted by
an amount so as to focus the projected pattern onto the target portion of the
substrate in response to the measured separation between the target portion
of the substrate and the image plane.

The References
Boonman US 2002/0167651 A1 Nov. 14, 2002
Markle US 2002/0171816 A1 Nov. 21, 2002
Lin US 6,486,939 B2 Nov. 26, 2002
Bjorklund US 2003/0210383 A1 Nov. 13, 2003
Ludwig US 2005/0031221 A1 Feb. 10, 2005
Appeal 2011-012344
Application 11/471,727

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The Rejections
The claims stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as follows: claims 1,
3-6, 8, 9, 11-17, and 19 over Bjorklund in view of Boonman and Markle,
claims 2, 10, and 20 over Bjorklund in view of Boonman, Markle, and
Ludwig and claim 18 over Bjorklund in view of Boonman, Markle, and Lin.
OPINION
We reverse the rejections.
Each of the Appellant’s independent claims requires selecting, based
upon a measured separation between a projection system’s image plane and
a substrate’s target portion, a projected pattern from pre-calculated adjusted
patterns such that the projected pattern’s image plane is shifted by an
amount which focuses the projected pattern onto the substrate’s target
portion. For a suggestion of that claim requirement the Examiner relies
upon the combined disclosures of Bjorklund, Boonman and Markle (Ans. 4-
6).
Bjorklund uses electrically actuated transducer arrays (2C) operating
under computer control using standard adaptive optics algorithms to process
surface local curvature data from an optical wavefront sensor (13) (¶0040;
Fig. 3).
Boonman uses a stored wafer surface height map to position a wafer
substrate table and projection system for each exposure and, to adjust the
projection system’s focal plane shape, uses manipulators which adjust
projection system elements’ vertical, horizontal and/or rotational position
(¶¶ 0054, 0060, 0062-63, 0068, 0070).
Appeal 2011-012344
Application 11/471,727

4
Markle improves line edge placement accuracy by transferring n
different patterns (n ≥ 2) stored in high speed memory into an image
transducer having an array of microelements that form a discretized planar
reflective surface and using 2n - 1 partial exposures to obtain a complete
exposure of a pattern element (¶¶ 0013-14, 0018, 0039, 0041, 0044, 0046-
47).
The Examiner argues that “[i]t would have been obvious to an artisan
of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made to incorporate
the memory as taught by Markle in the control system utilizing the selection
process as taught by Bjorklund in view of Boonman, because storing
patterns could allow for reducing the time to reproduce patterns necessary to
expose a substrate having similar correction requirements of previously
exposed substrates, thereby reducing computing time to generate a map for a
single wafer” (Ans. 6).
Setting forth a prima facie case of obviousness requires establishing
that the applied prior art would have provided one of ordinary skill in the art
with an apparent reason to modify the prior art to arrive at the claimed
invention. See KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007).
The Examiner has not established that it would have been apparent to
one of ordinary skill in the art from the references that combining their
disclosures “could allow for reducing the time to reproduce patterns
necessary to expose a substrate having similar correction requirements of
previously exposed substrates” (Ans. 6). Thus, the record indicates that the
Examiner’s reason for combining the references is based upon the
Appellant’s disclosure rather than the references and that, therefore, the
Appeal 2011-012344
Application 11/471,727

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Examiner used impermissible hindsight in rejecting the Appellant’s claims.
See In re Warner, 379 F.2d 1011, 1017 (CCPA 1967) (“A rejection based on
section 103 clearly must rest on a factual basis, and these facts must be
interpreted without hindsight reconstruction of the invention from the prior
art”).
Accordingly, we reverse the rejections.
DECISION/ORDER
The rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 103 of claims 1, 3-6, 8, 9, 11-17,
and 19 over Bjorklund in view of Boonman and Markle, claims 2, 10, and 20
over Bjorklund in view of Boonman, Markle, and Ludwig and claim 18 over
Bjorklund in view of Boonman, Markle, and Lin are reversed.
It is ordered that the Examiner’s decision is reversed.
REVERSED

sld