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 .
Request for Continued Examination
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. 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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on January 26th 2026 has been entered.
DETAILED ACTION
Status of the Claims
Claims 1, 3, and 6-9 are pending and are examined on their merits.
35 U.S.C. § 103 Rejections Overcome by Amendment
Applicant’s amendments in the response filed on January 26th 2026 are acknowledged. Applicant has amended the claims to be directed towards a granular formulation of the composition. As neither Long nor Tortillard provide any suggestion of solid/granulated formulations, the amendments have overcome the previous 103 rejections of the claims and said rejections are thereby withdrawn.
Duplicate Claims
Applicant is advised that should claim 1 be found allowable, claim 6 will be objected to under 37 CFR 1.75 as being a substantial duplicate thereof. When two claims in an application are duplicates or else are so close in content that they both cover the same thing, despite a slight difference in wording, it is proper after allowing one claim to object to the other as being a substantial duplicate of the allowed claim. See MPEP § 608.01(m).
35 U.S.C. § 103 Rejections Necessitated by Amendment
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.
Claims 1, 3, and 6-9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Messina (U.S. Patent No. 9,572,348 issued on February 21st 2017) in view of Long (GB2213724A published on August 23rd 1989), EFSA (European Food Safety Authority (EFSA); Brancato et al., Review of the existing maximum residue levels for denathonium benzoate according to Article 12 of Regulation (EC) No 396/2005. EFSA J. 2018 Mar 22;16(3):e05232), and Blum (U.S. Patent No. 5,891,919 issued on April 6th 1999).
Claims 1, 3, and 6-9 are directed towards an insect-repellent composition (see claims 1, 7, 8, 9) comprising:
0.01 – 25 % denatonium benzoate (see claims 1, 3, 6, 7, 9)
1 – 25 % of a carrier selected from sodium lauryl sulfate, polyvinyl acetate, polyvinyl pyridine, polyvinyl pyrrolidone, styrene acrylic, alkoxylates, kaolin clay, clove, cinnamon, cator oil, peppermint, garlic, and walnut shells (see claims 1, 7, 8)
In a granular formulation (See claims 1, 7, 8)
Messina teaches the following composition:
PNG
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175
299
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Greyscale
(Messina, col. 16).
As each of Messina’s Mint oil, Castor oil, and Cinnamon oil concentration ranges carry significant overlap with applicant’s 1-25% range, one of ordinary skill in the art would consider applicant’s carrier concentration ranges to be prima facie obvious (See MPEP 2144.05(I)).
Messina further teaches denatonium benzoate as one of the “other ingredients” (Messina, col. 17). Messina does not teach a particular concentration for the denatonium benzoate, but one of ordinary skill in the art would have a reasonable expectation of success in developing a composition wherein the denatonium benzoate concentration is within applicant’s range of 0.01% to 25%, because such a range encompasses the typical concentrations of denatonium compounds used in repellent compositions. For example, see:
Long, who teaches a repellent composition with a denatonium benzoate concentration of 0.125 g/L (0.0125 wt%) (Long, claim 4)
EFSA, who describes the application of a 0.11 g/L (0.011 wt%) denatonium benzoate composition (EFSA, pg. 9)
Blum teaches a concentration of 0.01 to 15% denatonium capsaicinate in repellent compositions (Blum, col. 4).
One of ordinary skill in the art developing a repellent composition similar to Messina’s, comprising denatonium benzoate would therefore have a reasonable expectation of success in optimizing the denatonium benzoate concentration to the range of 0.01-25%, a concentration range well-supported in the art for denatonium compounds in repellent compositions, and the described denatonium concentration range is therefore prima facie obvious.
Regarding the granular formulation, Messina teaches that the above composition can be in a granular form (Messina, col. 17). As each of the limitations of claims 1, 3, and 6-9 are obvious, claims 1, 3, and 6-9 are therefore prima facie obvious.
Conclusion
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/A.J.S./Examiner, Art Unit 1629
/JEFFREY S LUNDGREN/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 1629