DETAILED ACTION
Applicant’s Response
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 December 12, 2025, has been entered.
Claim 71 is amended.
The applicant contends:
(1) Claim 1 requires the support top and bottom plates of the second support portion to be insulated from each other, but Seshimo’s showerhead (31) does not provide insulation between the upper and lower portions (p. 8).
(2) Seshimo is silent regarding the claim 1 stipulation that the first and second support portions be insulated from each other (p. 8).
(3) Agarwal only discloses upper (108) and lower (136) electrode plates, where the instant invention recites three discharge electrodes: the first support portion, the support top plate, and the support bottom plate. Seshimo, too, fails to disclose three insulated plates (p. 9).
In response,
(1) The examiner observes that Seshimo’s diffusion space (35), being a volume of air, necessarily provides a modicum of insulation between the top and bottom plates of the showerhead.
(2) The examiner accepts this characterization as it narrowly applies to Seshimo but notes that the composite prior art apparatus includes an electrode plate situated atop Seshimo’s support members (37). As modeled by Figure 6 of Fukuoka, analogous support members (6) bear an electrode plate (4) constituting the discharge electrode of the claimed “first support portion.” These support members provide an insulating effect between the two portions.
(3) Although the Applicant’s specification broadly refers to insulation between the support top and bottom plates, there is no structural description of the form, location, nature, or extent of the insulative act. Further, there is no indication that the two support plates are electrically isolated such that they function as independent electrodes. The presented argument, it seems, is incommensurate with both the scope of the claim set and the metes of the disclosure itself.
Ultimately, applying Agarwal’s schema of power application to Seshimo’s apparatus yields an embodiment in which the first and second support portions respectively operate as discharge electrodes, which the examiner understands to satisfy the terms of claim 71.
Lastly, on page 9 of the 12/12/25 remarks, both the penultimate and final paragraphs conclude with the following quote: “the first support portion, the support top plate, and the support bottom plate serve as three discharge electrodes which are insulated from each other.” The examiner cannot locate support for this language in either the disclosure or claim set; as such, the provenance of the quotation is indeterminate.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Claim 71 and its dependents are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention. The final paragraph of claim 71 uses the prepositional verb “arranged on” to describe the relationship between “a part of the gas supply part” and each “support part,” but this term seems inapt. It appears that the gas supply part (20) composes the structure of the second support portion (4112), whereas the diction of “arranged on” implies structural independence between two features. The examiner suggests clarifying the nature of the “part” of the “part of the gas supply part,” as well as stipulating that the gas supply part is a component of the second support portion more specifically.
Further, it should be noted that the penultimate paragraph of claim 71 introduces the feature of the gas supply part as containing only a single subcomponent: the “one gas outlet.” The final paragraph proceeds to assert that “at least a part of the gas supply part is arranged on each of the plurality of support parts,” as well as clarifying that “the at least one gas outlet is formed in each of the plurality of support parts.” This language overdetermines the invention. That is, the “part of the gas supply part” appears to denote the gas outlet, but the same paragraph recites the gas outlet independently. This matter can be resolved simply by reciting the location and function of the gas outlet while deleting reference to the gas supply part from the final paragraph. To advance prosecution, the examiner will accept the prior art disclosure of a gas outlet formed in a second support portion as satisfying the contested limitation.
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 of this title, 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 71 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Seshimo et al., US 2018/0182652, in view of Agarwal et al., US 2010/0248488, and Fukuoka et al., US 2004/0069230.
Seshimo discloses coating equipment for coating a workpiece, comprising a reaction chamber device (8) provided with a reaction chamber (22) (Fig. 1). Within said chamber, Seshimo disposes a multi-layered support, each support layer comprising a first support portion (31) disposed atop a second support portion (35) via an insulating member (37) (Fig. 3). The second support portion comprises top and bottom plates which structure a space for temporarily storing gas, and gas outlets (36) are formed within the bottom plate to supply gas to a subjacent workpiece [0035-36]. Although the apparatus may be configured for capacitive plasma, Seshimo is silent regarding this particular operation [0039].
In supplementation, Agarwal discloses an exemplary capacitive plasma system comprising a first support portion (136) configured as a discharge electrode for a pulse power supply (144) and a second support portion (108) for feeding gas to the workpiece disposed on the first support portion (Fig. 1). Both of the first and second support portions are configured to serve as discharge electrodes for respective RF power supplies (148, 140) [0028]. It would have been obvious to configure Seshimo’s capacitive system in accordance with the paradigm established by Agarwal to achieve plasma generation, as applying a known technique to a known device to yield predictable results is within the scope of ordinary skill. In view of Agarwal’s guidance, one would be motivated to couple an RF power supply to Seshimo’s second support portion and two RF supplies to the first support portion, as modeled by Figure 1 of Agarwal.
Lastly, Seshimo’s schematic renderings do not appear to show a proper electrode plate constituting the first support portion such that it can serve as the claimed “discharge electrode.” Fukuoka, however, discloses an analogous system of stacked, multi-layer supports where the first support portion (4) is constituted by a conductive plate which, in turn, is disposed upon a conductive second support portion (34) which feeds gas to a workpiece below ([0072-73]; Fig. 6). It would have been obvious to constitute Seshimo’s first support portion as an electrode in order to establish a capacitive relationship with the electrode of the second support portion, thereby inducing the electric field necessary to ionize the processing gas.
Claims 88-90 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Seshimo in view of Agarwal and Fukuoka, and in further view of Gorin et al., US 4,264,393.
Claim 88: Seshimo is silent regarding the matter of spacing between two support parts but Gorin, disclosed previously and of analogous construction to Seshimo’s apparatus, suggests a spacing of 0.5 inches, which is equivalent to nearly 13 millimeters (3, 45-47). This spacing is within the claimed range. It would have been obvious to adopt this spacing within Seshimo’s system, as it has been held that where the general conditions of a claim are disclosed, discovering the optimum or workable ranges involves only routine skill in the art (In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 105 USPQ 233).
Claim 89: Gorin does not address the diameter of the gas outlets, but given the similarity of the dimension of Gorin’s support part (307 mm) to Applicant’s support part, the examiner understands that one of ordinary skill would have been capable of deriving the claimed aperture size via routine experimentation, as a change in size is generally recognized as being within the level of ordinary skill in the art (In re Rose, 105 USPQ 237 (CCPA 1955)).
Claim 90: Gorin attests that the support part may be 12” x 12”, i.e., 307 mm x 307 mm, but the “ultimate size is a matter of design choice to accomplish the specific task.” Further, Gorin states that the “area of the plates 12, 14 is somewhat arbitrary and can be made as large as necessary to accommodate the required size of the workpiece” (3, 47-56). In view of the preceding, the examiner understands that one of ordinary skill, through routine experimentation responsive to variable constraints such as workpiece size, would have been capable of arriving at the claimed dimensions.
Claim 93 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Seshimo in view of Agarwal and Fukuoka, and in further view of Engle, US 4,289,598.
Seshimo does not address the connectivity of the support posts bearing the support parts. Remedying the deficiency is Engle, who situates a workpiece frame (30) within a plasma reactor (10) (Fig. 2). A series of electrodes (34) are situated within the frame and electrically coupled to the adjacent posts, wherein a Teflon member (48), i.e., the “insulating part,” is disposed at the bottom end of a frame to electrically isolate the frame from the reaction chamber (3, 30-36; 3, 65ff; Fig. 4).
Claim 95 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Seshimo in view of Agarwal and Fukuoka, and in further view of Bolden, II et al., US 2009/0288773, and Suzuki et al., US 2008/0241379.
Seshimo is silent regarding the material composition of the chamber. In supplementation, Bolden nominates stainless steel as an optimal material choice for a processing chamber operating under vacuum conditions [0024]. Further, Suzuki attests that polishing the inner surface of a chamber to below 0.5 microns inhibits the adhesion of extraneous deposits, which the examiner understands to render obvious the claimed threshold [0088]. As such, it would have been obvious to compose the reaction chamber of polished stainless steel, as it has been held to be within the general skill of a worker in the art to select a known material on the basis of its suitability for the intended use as a matter of obvious design choice (In re Leshin, 125, USPQ 416).
Conclusion
The following prior art is made of record as being pertinent to Applicant’s disclosure, yet is not formally relied upon: Kinoshita et al., US 5,795,452. Kinoshita provides a reaction chamber (1) comprising a discharge device (6) and a gas supply part (4), whereby a multi-layered support bears workpieces at a preset spacing (7, 44ff; Fig. 4).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to NATHAN K FORD whose telephone number is (571)270-1880. The examiner can normally be reached on 11-7:30 PM. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Parviz Hassanzadeh, can be reached at 571 272 1435. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571 273 8300.
/N. K. F./
Examiner, Art Unit 1716
/KARLA A MOORE/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1716