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 .
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election without traverse of claims 1-6 in the reply filed on 3/27/2026 is acknowledged.
Claims 7-9 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected invention, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 3/27/2026.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Myers (US 9,272,230).
With regards to claim 1, Myers teaches a household plant essential oil extractor, characterized by comprising a plant essential oil separation device (strainer basket 110 with filters; separates oil from plant matter), a plant essential oil collection device (trough 106; collects oil as solvent is evaporated away), and a heat absorption cup body (housing 102; has general shape of a cup and is heated by heat source 104)), wherein the plant essential oil separation device is detachably arranged inside the heat absorption cup body and is configured for filtering a plant essential oil inside the heat absorption cup body (with filter 111), and the plant essential oil collection device is detachably arranged on the plant essential oil separation device (can be detached and is on the bottom/outside of the separation device) and is configured for collecting the filtered plant essential oil (oil goes through filter and collects in the bottom of the trough) (fig 1 and 2; abstract; see whole document).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-6 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The closest prior art is Myers as discussed above.
As to claim 2, Myers teaches that the separation device can have a funnel shape (110 in fig 1) with a filter (111) (column 3, lines 24-37). Myers differs from the claim in that the filter is not arranged within an inlet of the funnel and there is no filter tube on the outlet. The prior art does not provide a motivation to arrive at this claimed arrangement. The separation device is already neatly in the cup body. There is no motivation to add an outlet tube to Myers which teaches outletting directly into the interior. There is no special separation that would benefit from a tube to transport the outflow. Additionally, the funnel and filter arrangement of Myers appears similar to a standard coffee filter arrangement. The sides of the funnel body provide structure and support to the filter as well as a reservoir for unfiltered material as it collects to pass through the filter. There is no motivation to switch to a filter screen in the inlet and a filter tube on the outlet which would require reconfiguration of the filter material (stronger) and an addition of some prefilter reservoir (job no longer performable by the funnel walls if the filter is rearranged as claimed).
Claims 4-6 depend on claim 2 and are allowable for at least the same reasons.
With regards to claim 3, the claims recite more components than exist in Myers to be mapped to. For example, when mapping above, there is nothing left to be the base component, main body, heat dissipation device, and heat conductive cup as claimed in addition to the already recited components. Given that Myers teaches an already functional compact home use oil extraction device, the prior art would need to teach some reason to add all these components. There is simply no teaching or motivation to arrive at the claimed configuration.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DONALD R SPAMER whose telephone number is (571)272-3197. The examiner can normally be reached Monday to Friday from 9-5.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Michael Marcheschi can be reached at (571)272-1374. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/DONALD R SPAMER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1799
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