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, 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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 9, 2025, has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see p. 6, filed December 9, 2025, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1-2, 4-11, and 13-17 under 35 USC 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 Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn.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 Lee et al. (US 2023/0049476 A1), Shan et al. ("Promoting Si-graphite composite anodes with SWCNT additives for half and NCM811 full lithium ion batteries and assessment criteria from an industrial perspective," Frontiers in Energy 13(4), pp. 626-635, December 2019), and Predtechenskiy et al. ("New perspectives in SWCNT applications: Tuball SWCNTs. Part 1. Tuball by itself—All you need to know about it," Carbon Trends 8 100175, July 2022).
Applicant contends that the rationale in the rejection of claim 2 is untenable, as a D5 of 3.6 µm would be unreasonably close to the D10 value of 3.85 µm. However, the rationale in the rejection specifically says that particle size distribution should be narrowed, not that D5 should be increased while all other variables remain the same. Narrowing particle size necessarily includes increasing D5 and D10.
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, 2, 4-13, and 17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee et al. (US 2023/0049476 A1) in view of Shan et al. ("Promoting Si-graphite composite anodes with SWCNT additives for half and NCM811 full lithium ion batteries and assessment criteria from an industrial perspective," Frontiers in Energy 13(4), pp. 626-635, December 2019), as evidenced by Predtechenskiy et al. ("New perspectives in SWCNT applications: Tuball SWCNTs. Part 1. Tuball by itself—All you need to know about it," Carbon Trends 8 100175, July 2022).
Regarding claim 1, Lee teaches a negative electrode comprising a carbon-coated SiOx negative active material comprising Mg and a conductive material (Lee Example 1, [0240]-[0244]). The SiOx composite is made by mixing 15 kg of Si and 11 kg of SiO2 (Lee [0240]), giving x~0.77, which falls within the range of the instant claim. The silicon-containing active material has a D50 of 6 µm and a D5 of approximately 3 µm (based on a D10 of 3.85 µm and a Dmin of 1.96 µm; see Lee Table 1 and Fig. 1) for a D5/D50 of 0.5, each of which falls within the ranges of the instant claim.
Lee does not teach that the conductive material includes single-walled carbon nanotubes. Shan teaches that adding SWCNTs to Si/C anodes significantly improves performance (Shan Abstract). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant invention to add the SWCNTs of Shan to the anode material of Lee in order to improve lifespan and rate characteristics.
Shan teaches that the SWCNTs are from OCSiAl LLC (Shan 2.1 Materials and characterization). OCSiAl SWCNTs for battery applications have a BET surface area 500-1000 m2/g (Predtechenskiy Table 1), which falls within the range of the instant claim.
Regarding claim 2, modified Lee does not teach that D5/D50 is 0.6 or more. Lee teaches that it is desirable to have a narrow particle size distribution (i.e., D5 is close to D50) so that particle size may be controlled and agglomeration may be reduced (Lee [0047]). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant invention to further narrow the particle size distribution, including to values of D5/D50 greater than 0.6, in order to control particle size and reduce agglomeration.
Regarding claim 4, the silicon-containing active material of Example 1 has a D50 of 6 µm (Lee Table 1), which falls within the range of the instant claim.
Regarding claim 5, the silicon-containing active material of Example 1 has a D5 of approximately 3 µm (based on a D10 of 3.85 µm and a Dmin of 1.96 µm; see Lee Table 1 and Fig. 1), which falls within the range of the instant claim.
Regarding claim 6, the silicon-containing active material of Example 1 has a Dmax of 18.36 µm (Lee Table 1), which falls within the range of the instant claim.
Regarding claim 7, the silicon-containing active material of Example 1 is made with 26 kg of SiOx (Lee [0240]) and 3 kg of Mg (Lee [0241]) and comprises 5% carbon (Lee Table 1). The material is therefore approximately 10 wt% Mg, which falls within the range of the instant claim.
Regarding claim 8, the metal comprises Mg (Lee [0241]).
Regarding claim 9, the silicon-containing active material of Example 1 comprises 5 wt% carbon (Lee Table 1), which falls within the range of the instant claim.
Regarding claim 10, the SWCNTs have lengths of 5 µm (Predtechenskiy Table 1), which falls within the range of the instant claim.
Regarding claim 11, the SWCNTs have diameters of 1.6 nm (Predtechenskiy Table 1), which falls within the range of the instant claim.
Regarding claim 13, Shan teaches that the SWCNTs should constitute 0.2 wt% of the negative electrode active material layer (Shan Abstract). Adding this to the negative electrode active material layer of Lee Example 1 (80 wt% active material; Lee [0247]) would give a Si-based active material:SWCNT ratio of 99.75:0.25, which falls within the range of the instant claim.
Regarding claim 17, the negative electrode is incorporated into a secondary battery (Lee [0245]-[0250]).
Claim(s) 14 and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee in view of Shan and Predtechenskiy as applied to claim 14 above, and further in view of Xiong et al. (“SiOx-based graphite composite anode and efficient binders: practical applications in lithium-ion batteries”, RSC Advances 11, pp. 7801-7807, February 2021).
Regarding claim 14, modified Lee does not teach that the electrode further contains a carbon-containing negative electrode active material. Xiong teaches that adding graphite (which is a negative electrode active material) to SiOx anodes is a known means to overcome expansion problems (Xiong Introduction). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant invention to add the graphite of Xiong to Example 1 of modified Lee in order to overcome expansion problems with the SiOx material.
Regarding claim 15, Xiong teaches that adding graphite to SiOx anodes is a known means to overcome expansion problems (Xiong Introduction) and gives an example using graphite with a particle size of 22 µm (Xiong 3. Results and discussion). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant invention to add the graphite of Xiong to Example 1 of modified Lee in order to overcome expansion problems with the SiOx material, which would give a DGr/DSiO of 22/6=3.67, which falls within the range of the claim 15.
Claim(s) 16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee in view of Shan and Predtechenskiy as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Ma et al. (“New developments in particle characterization by laser diffraction: size and shape”, Powder Technology 111(1-2), pp. 66-78, August 2000).
Modified Lee does not disclose a particle size as measured by SEM surface or cross-section analysis. Lee teaches that the particles preferably have a narrow size distribution (Lee [0047]) as measured by laser beam diffraction (Lee [0028]-[0030]). Ma teaches that non-spherical particles may give misleading diffraction results (Ma Introduction, 4th paragraph). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant invention to use spherical or nearly spherical particles in the negative electrode of modified Lee in order to avoid incorrect or misleading measurements. This would necessarily give the approximately same particle size results for each of laser diffraction, SEM surface analysis, and SEM cross-sectional analysis, which would be 6 µm for Example 1 of modified Lee, which falls within the ranges of the instant claim.
Conclusion
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/J.A.C/ Examiner, Art Unit 1722
/NIKI BAKHTIARI/ Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 1722