DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim(s) 1, 6-7, 9 and 16-17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over de la Cruz US 7,048,855 in view of Shintani et al. US 6,454,942.
Claims 1 and 6, de la Cruz teaches a method of preparing a filter element, comprising: providing a core tube (col. 5, lines 55-60), and rolling a membrane around the core tube (col. 5, lines 42-67); wherein the membrane consists essentially of an asymmetric porous substrate (col. 5, lines 24-67) comprising an exposed outer knitted side and an opposite side having a porous structure (the porous substrate being a knitted material, where one surface is modified for casting a membrane thereupon, the recited opposite side having a porous structure, thus the other side of the substrate from where the membrane is cast is an exposed outer knitted side, the knitted material inherently having peaks and valleys, the valleys being flow channels in a direction parallel to the surface of the porous substrate, the presence of the one surface being modified makes the porous substrate asymmetric), a filter layer (the membrane cast on the porous substrate) formed directly (col. 6, lines 48-57) on the side of the porous substrate that has the porous structure (col. 10, lines 12-27), and the porous substrate has a mean pore size no greater than 300 microns (abstract, col. 9, lines 11-33). De la Cruz does not expressly teach the outer knitted side having exposed and open flow channels.
Shintani teaches a method of preparing a spiral wound filter element with a core tube, and a membrane with a porous support of knitted fabric (col. 2, lines 36-65). Shintani teaches the knitted fabric does not require being rigidified by impregnating it with an epoxy or melamine resin in an amount nearly half its weight (col. 1, lines 40-46), instead the knitted fabric provides the advantages of the knitted fabric maintaining structure and rigidity for a long time without increasing flow resistance in channels and without impairing productivity of permeate (col. 2, lines 36-44). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use the porous substrate of Shintani in place of that of de la Cruz. Providing the porous substrate of Shintani in de la Cruz, namely the porous substrate (5) (fig. 7, 9) where the porous substrate is a double tricot knitted fabric with channels at both surfaces and where de la Cruz teaches one side of the porous substrate has a membrane cast thereon, will provide for the side of the porous substrate on the other side from the membrane to be the exposed outer knitted side and that side will have exposed and open flow channels as the flow channels are open in that there is no structure within the channel to impede flow and the channels are exposed in that at least one of the longitudinal ends of the channels must be exposed to allow permeate to exit the channels.
Claims 7, 16 and 17, de la Cruz further teaches the membrane has a thickness of ~432 micron (example 3).
Claim 9, de la Cruz teaches a filter element, comprising: a core tube (col. 5, lines 55-60), a membrane rolled around the core tube (col. 5, lines 42-67); wherein the membrane consists essentially of an asymmetrical porous substrate (col. 5, lines 24-67) comprising an exposed outer knitted side and an opposite side having a porous structure (the porous substrate being a knitted material, where one surface is modified for casting a membrane thereupon, the recited opposite side having a porous structure, thus the other side of the substrate from where the membrane is cast is an exposed outer knitted side, the knitted material inherently having peaks and valleys, the valleys being flow channels in a direction parallel to the surface of the porous substrate, the presence of the one surface being modified makes the porous substrate asymmetric), a filter layer (the membrane cast on the porous substrate) formed directly (col. 6, lines 48-57) on the side of the porous substrate that has the porous structure (col. 10, lines 12-27), and the porous substrate has a mean pore size no greater than 300 microns (abstract, col. 9, lines 11-33), and a feed spacer, the feed spacer is rolled around the core tube (abstract). De la Cruz does not expressly teach the outer knitted side having exposed and open flow channels.
Shintani teaches a spiral wound filter element with a core tube, and a membrane with a porous support of knitted fabric (col. 2, lines 36-65). Shintani teaches the knitted fabric does not require being rigidified by impregnating it with an epoxy or melamine resin in an amount nearly half its weight (col. 1, lines 40-46), instead the knitted fabric provides the advantages of the knitted fabric maintaining structure and rigidity for a long time without increasing flow resistance in channels and without impairing productivity of permeate (col. 2, lines 36-44). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use the porous substrate of Shintani in place of that of de la Cruz. Providing the porous substrate of Shintani in de la Cruz, namely the porous substrate (5) (fig. 7, 9) where the porous substrate is a double tricot knitted fabric with channels at both surfaces and where de la Cruz teaches one side of the porous substrate has a membrane cast thereon, will provide for the side of the porous substrate on the other side from the membrane to be the exposed outer knitted side and that side will have exposed and open flow channels as the flow channels are open in that there is no structure within the channel to impede flow and the channels are exposed in that at least one of the longitudinal ends of the channels must be exposed to allow permeate to exit the channels.
Claim(s) 2-5, 12, 14 and 18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over de la Cruz US 7,048,855 in view of Shintani et al. US 6,454,942 and Irie et al. US 2004/0124134.
Claim 2, de la Cruz in view of Shintani further teaches the method of claim 1 further comprising: rolling an envelope of the membrane around the core tube (see above), but does not teach folding the membrane with the filter layer surface facing inward, and inserting a membrane feed spacer within the membrane as folded to provide an envelope of the membrane.
Irie teaches a method of preparing a filter element comprising providing a core tube (5), folding a membrane (1) with a filter layer surface facing inward and inserting a membrane feed spacer (2) within the membrane as folded to provide an envelope of the membrane and rolling the envelope of the membrane around the core tube (fig. 1-6). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use the construction of Irie because it enables winding the membrane to be smoothly conducted while eliminating wrinkling or breakage (abstract).
Claims 3-4, Irie further teaches providing a filter sheet, the filter sheet comprising a backing layer and a backing layer associated filter layer and folding the filter sheet, inserting a filter sheet feed spacer within the filter sheet as folded to provide an envelope of the filter sheet and rolling the envelope of the filter sheet around the core tube, wherein a plurality of envelopes of the membrane and a plurality of envelopes of the filter sheet are rolled around the core tube in an alternating manner (fig. 1-6, an envelope with two membranes enclosing a feed side passage material (2), alternating a plurality of envelopes with two filter sheets enclosing permeation side passage material (4) and being wound alternating)
Claim 5, Irie further teaches providing a filter sheet, the filter sheet comprising a backing layer and a backing layer associated filter layer, providing a feed spacer (10) and stacking the membrane, the filter sheet and the feed spacer in order and the rolling them around the core tube (fig. 1-6, par 61).
Claims 12 and 14, de la Cruz in view of Shintani teaches the filter element of claim 9 but does not teach a filter sheet comprising a backing layer and a backing layer associated filter layer.
Irie teaches multiple envelopes wound around the core tube (par 76). De la Cruz also teaches multiple leaves (col. 18, lines 28-31). Irie, therefore, further teaches a filter sheet, wherein the filter sheet comprises a backing layer and a backing layer associated filter layer (providing a second membrane and considering the second membrane to be the recited filter sheet), the filter element comprises a plurality of the filter sheets and a plurality of the membranes, the plurality of filter sheets and membranes are layered around the core tube in an alternating manner (fig. 1-6, an envelope with two membranes enclosing a feed side passage material (2), alternating a plurality of envelopes with two filter sheets enclosing permeation side passage material (4) and being wound alternating). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use the construction of Irie because it enables winding the membrane to be smoothly conducted while eliminating wrinkling or breakage (abstract).
Claim 18, de la Cruz in view of Shintani teaches the filter element of claim 9 but does not specifically teach the membrane is folded with the filter layer surface facing inward.
Irie teaches a filter element comprising, a membrane (1) folded with a filter layer surface facing inward (fig. 1-6). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use the construction of Irie because it enables winding the membrane to be smoothly conducted while eliminating wrinkling or breakage (abstract).
Claim(s) 11 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over de la Cruz US 7,048,855 in view of Shintani et al. US 6,454,942 as applied to claim 9 above and further in view of Pulek et al. US 6,391,200.
Claim 11, de la Cruz in view of Shintani teaches the filter element of claim 9 but does not teach a lead porous substrate but does teach a feed spacer rolled around the core tube (de la Cruz abstract).
Pulek teaches a filter element (110) with a feed spacer (20), the feed spacer is rolled around the core tube and a lead porous substrate (the diffusion medium 20 on the far left), the lead porous substrate is rolled around the core tube (fig. 10). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use the feed spacer with the lead porous substrate of Pulek because the feed spacer of Pulek allows for and assists in the longitudinal, circumferential and/or axial flow of the contaminated fluid within the filter between the innermost layer of the filter medium and the core and/or between adjacent layers of the filter medium, minimizing pressure drop across the filter and assisting in dispersing the filtration function (col. 4, lines 8-43).
Claim(s) 13 and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over de la Cruz US 7,048,855 in view of Shintani et al. US 6,454,942 and Pulek et al. US 6,391,200 as applied to claim 11 above and further in view of Irie et al. US 2004/0124134.
De la Cruz in view of Shintani and Pulek teach the filter element of claim 11 but do not teach a further filter sheet with a backing layer and filter layer.
Irie teaches multiple envelopes wound around the core tube (par 76). De la Cruz also teaches multiple leaves (col. 18, lines 28-31). Irie, therefore, further teaches a filter sheet, wherein the filter sheet comprises a backing layer and a backing layer associated filter layer (providing a second membrane and considering the second membrane to be the recited filter sheet), the filter element comprises a plurality of the filter sheets and a plurality of the membranes, the plurality of filter sheets and membranes are layered around the core tube in an alternating manner (fig. 1-6, an envelope with two membranes enclosing a feed side passage material (2), alternating a plurality of envelopes with two filter sheets enclosing permeation side passage material (4) and being wound alternating). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use the construction of Irie because it enables winding the membrane to be smoothly conducted while eliminating wrinkling or breakage (abstract).
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 11/24/25 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Applicant argues that, in De la Cruz, one of ordinary skill would understand that any knitted material used would be an ordinary knit as opposed to a tricot knit since De la Cruz does not distinguish between the peaks and valleys of knitted structures relative to woven structures, nor does she distinguish between one side of the knitted structure and the other. Applicant’s argument is not commensurate in scope to the rejection. The rejection does not state what kind of a knit De la Cruz is using, only that she teaches the use of an appropriate knitted material. Even so, De la Cruz expressly teaches, “A more common type of backing material that has been used for many years as a permeate carrier is an epoxy-impregnated tricot…” (col. 1, lines 63-65) and “A popular permeate carrier in use today is comprised of a tricot material, which is a knitted fabric, e.g. polyester, that is generally epoxy or melamine-coated.” (col. 2, lines 44-46). Thus, taking the disclosure of De la Cruz as a whole, one of ordinary skill in the art would readily recognize that a tricot knitted fabric would be included in the category of “appropriate kitted or woven materials” recited in col. 10, lines 12-27. However, De la Cruz does not expressly state a tricot knit is used and therefore the rejection does not state that De la Cruz teaches a tricot knit. The disclosure of De la Cruz would teach and suggest that a tricot knit could be used. Applicant also states the knitted material used in example 3 results in the production of a symmetrical composite membrane. Example 3 is directed to a porous substrate where a membrane is bonded to each side of the porous substrate and thus forms a symmetrical composite. However, De la Cruz also teaches where only one side of the porous support has a membrane bonded thereto. Col. 10, lines 12-19 states,
“Although a nonwoven fibrous support material is preferred, appropriate knitted or woven materials might be employed through modification of one or both surfaces by supplementation, as nonwoven fibrous felt a few mils in thickness would adequately bridge the peaks and valleys inherent in a woven or knitted structure and provide a substrate of sufficient thickness and the desired porosity for casting a semipermeable membrane directly thereupon.” (emphasis added)
Applicant argues that there is no disclosure in De la Cruz of an asymmetric knitted structure. Applicant’s argument is not commensurate in scope the claim language. The claims do not recite an asymmetric knitted structure. The claims recite an asymmetric porous substrate comprising an exposed outer knitted side. Thus, the porous substrate is required to be asymmetric but the claim does not require an asymmetric knitted structure.
Applicant argues that there is no disclosure in De la Cruz of a knitted structure having open flow channels. De la Cruz states that peaks and valleys are inherent in a knitted structure. A “valley” will inherently form a flow channel as the membrane would contact the “peaks” and not dip into the “valley” thus leaving the “valley” as an open flow channel.
Applicant argues that it would not have been obvious to combine tricot fabric as in Shintani with De la Cruz. As stated above, one of ordinary skill in the art would readily recognize that a tricot knitted fabric would be included in the category of “appropriate kitted or woven materials” recited in col. 10, lines 12-27.
Applicant argues that even if a tricot knit material were substituted for the “appropriate knitted or woven materials” the combination would not result in the claimed invention because the knit material is modified and therefore the membrane would not consist essentially of the porous substrate and the filter layer. As stated in De la Cruz, col. 10, lines 12-27,
“Although a nonwoven fibrous support material is preferred, appropriate knitted or woven materials might be employed through modification of one or both surfaces by supplementation, as nonwoven fibrous felt a few mils in thickness would adequately bridge the peaks and valleys inherent in a woven or knitted structure and provide a substrate of sufficient thickness and the desired porosity for casting a semipermeable membrane directly thereupon…It could be suitably bonded, as by heat or solvent or adhesive, to an underlying permeate carrier material so as to become an integral part thereof upon which casting can be carried out.” (emphasis added).
As clearly stated by De la Cruz, the knitted structure is modified on one surface with a fibrous felt such that the felt and knitted structure are bonded and become integral. The porous support comprises the knitted structure integrally bonded to the fibrous felt and the filter layer (semipermeable membrane) is cast directly on the porous support. Therefore, the membrane consists essentially of an asymmetric porous substrate and a filter layer. The claim language recites the porous support “comprising”; thus, the structure of the porous support is not limited to just or essentially just the knitted structure, which is what applicant appears to be arguing.
Applicant argues that the references do not teach the porous substrate having the recited mean pore size. De la Cruz teaches the porous support having a mean pore size between 1-300 microns. The combination of the knitted structure and fibrous felt make up the porous substrate and De la Cruz teaches the substrate, corresponding to the recited porous support, should have the desired porosity (col. 10, lines 12-27).
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
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/BENJAMIN M KURTZ/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1779