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 .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114 was filed in this application after a decision by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, but before the filing of a Notice of Appeal to the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit or the commencement of a civil action. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114 and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the appeal has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114 and prosecution in this application has been reopened pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant’s submission filed on 6 March 2026 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s cancellation of claims 2 and 8, as well as the addition of claims 26-29, is acknowledged.
Applicant’s arguments, see pages 8-16, filed 6 March 2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1, 3-7, 9-20, and 23-29 under 35 U.S.C. 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of US 20130228086 A1 (hereby referred to as Baldwin) and US 20120237871 A1 (hereby referred to as Zwaldo).
Applicant has amended independent claims 1 and 7 to recite that the polymer is an elastomeric binder in a specified concentration and the low surface energy monomer includes a silicone moiety linked to at least one polymerizable functional group and has a specified concentration. Applicant argues that the previously cited prior art (Ali and Lin) fails to disclose or suggest such a composition. Applicant further argues that the claimed invention (per the most recent amendments) provides numerous advantageous effects, such as selective photopolymerization and development without collapse or deformation. Upon review of the disclosures of Ali and Lin, the Applicant’s arguments are found to be persuasive, as the previously cited art fails to teach or suggest an elastomeric binder having a concentration within the range recited by instant claims 1 and 7, as well as a low surface energy monomer including a silicone moiety having a concentration within the range recited by instant claims 1 and 7. Therefore, the previous rejection is withdrawn. However, a new rejection is presented in view of US 20130228086 A1 (hereby referred to as Baldwin) and US 20120237871 A1 (hereby referred to as Zwaldo), as explained below.
Applicant further presents additional arguments related to the combination of Ali and Lin. Particularly, the Applicant presents several arguments related to the disclosure of Lin and the suitability of combining the teachings of Lin with the disclosure of Ali. As noted above, the rejection in view of Ali and Lin has been traversed by the most recent claim amendments. Furthermore, the rejection made in light of the Applicant’s most recent claim amendments do not rely upon the teachings of Lin, and therefore the additional arguments in regards to the disclosure of Lin are not relevant to the rejection presented below.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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, 3-7, 9-20, and 23-29 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20180134030 A1 (hereby referred to as Ali) in view of US 20130228086 A1 (hereby referred to as Baldwin) and US 20120237871 A1 (hereby referred to as Zwaldo).
Regarding Claims 1, 3-7, 9-20, and 23-29, Ali discloses a method for preparing flexographic printing plates. The method for forming flexographic printing plates comprises the steps of (a) providing a flexographic printing plate precursor, (b) removing the coversheet from the photosensitive layer of the printing plate precursor, (c) laminating a mask element directly in contact with the photosensitive layer, (d) imagewise exposing the photosensitive layer through the mask element, and (e) processing (i.e. developing) the exposed photosensitive layer to remove non-exposed regions (Ali, paragraph 0015-0023). The method may include removing the mask element following exposure but before the processing of step (e) is performed (Ali, paragraph 0115). The flexographic printing plate precursor comprises a backing film (i.e. a substrate), a photosensitive layer on the backing film, and a coversheet directly in contact with the photosensitive layer (Ali, paragraph 0016-0019). An adhesive layer may be present on the backing layer on the surface of the substrate opposite the surface on which the photosensitive layer is coated (Ali, paragraph 0088). The photosensitive layer comprises a thermoplastic binder, at least one monomer, and an initiator sensitive to UV radiation (Ali, paragraph 0089). The thermoplastic binder may be an elastomeric material (Ali, paragraph 0089), such as a polybutadiene latex, an acrylonitrile-butadiene copolymer latex, a polyisoprene latex, or a styrene-butadiene copolymer latex (Ali, paragraph 0090). Ali also discloses that the imageable layer composition may include various additives (Ali, paragraph 0094). The amounts of the various components of the photosensitive layer are determined based on a given utility (Ali, paragraph 0095). By performing steps (a) to (c) of Ali, a relief-forming assembly is formed according to instant claims 7 and 14. The mask element comprises a transparent polymeric carrier sheet, a barrier layer, and a non-silver halide thermally-sensitive imageable layer (Ali, paragraph 0103). The non-silver halide imageable material contains an infrared radiation absorbing compound dispersed within a polymeric binder (Ali, paragraph 0105).
However, Ali does not disclose a photopolymerizable low surface energy monomer in the photosensitive layer. Baldwin teaches a flexographic printing plate and method of making the same. The flexographic printing plate comprises a first photopolymer layer containing a silicone monomer (Baldwin, paragraph 0033). The first photopolymer layer includes an ethylenically unsaturated monomer (Baldwin, paragraph 0045), a photoinitiator (Baldwin, paragraph 0046), a binder polymer (Baldwin, paragraph 0047), and a silicone source (Baldwin, paragraph 0052). The silicone source may be a silicone monomer, such as silicon p-ethyl(meth)acrylate or silicone polyester(meth)acrylate (Baldwin, paragraph 0052). Baldwin provides inventive examples using Tego Rad 2300 and MIRAMER SIP 900, which are silicon p-ethyl acrylate and silicone polyester acrylate monomers, respectively (Baldwin, paragraph 0064; see Table 1). Tego Rad 2300 is described by the instant application as a silicon material suitable for use in the claimed invention (refer to paragraph 038 of the instant application’s specification). The silicone monomer content in the photopolymer composition is between 0.1 to 2% by weight (Baldwin, paragraph 0053). The inventive examples of Baldwin include such monomers in a concentration of 1 wt% (Baldwin, paragraph 0063).
However, the combination of Ali and Baldwin fails to teach the inclusion of the elastomeric binder resin in an amount ranging from 65 wt% to 90 wt% based on dry layer weight. Zwaldo teaches a flexographic printing plate precursor. The precursor includes a substrate and at least one radiation curable layer in which a flexographic relief image can be formed (Zwaldo, paragraph 0036). The radiation curable layer includes a radiation-sensitive layer containing a curable composition (Zwaldo, paragraph 0038). The curable composition comprises one or more polymeric (such as elastomeric) binders, at least one photopolymerizable monomer, and a radiation-sensitive photoinitiator (Zwaldo, paragraph 0038). The polymeric binder may be a natural or synthetic polymer of conjugated diolefin hydrocarbons, including polyisoprene, 1,2-polybutadiene, 1,4-polybutadiene, butadiene/acrylonitrile, butadiene/styrene thermoplastic-elastomeric block copolymers (Zwaldo, paragraph 0040). The content of the polymeric binder in the radiation curable layer is at least 65 weight percent based on the dry layer weight (Zwaldo, paragraph 0040).
Ali, Baldwin, and Zwaldo are analogous art because each reference pertains to flexographic printing plates. It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the instant application to include a low surface energy silicone acrylate monomer in an amount between 0.1 % to 5 % (by weight), as taught by Baldwin, in the composition disclosed by Ali because the inclusion of a silicone acrylate monomer in the curable layer improves the print quality of the plate over time (Baldwin, paragraph 0030 and 0066). Furthermore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the instant application to use an elastomeric binder resin in an amount between 65 wt% and 90 wt% in the curable layer, as taught by Zwaldo, in the composition obtained by combining the teachings of Ali and Baldwin because such resins are soluble, swellable, or dispersible in an organic or aqueous developing solution (Zwaldo, paragraph 0040), which further improves the image quality following development.
Conclusion
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/JAYSON D COSGROVE/Examiner, Art Unit 1737
/JONATHAN JOHNSON/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 1734
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