DETAILED ACTION
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 .
Response to Amendment
The amendment filed on June 12, 2026 is acknowledged. Claims 1-5, 7-16 and 18-20 remain pending wherein claims 10 and 11 remain withdrawn. Applicant amended claims 1-4, 8, 9, 12-15 and 18-20.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the patentability of the claims have been considered but they are moot. The new grounds of rejection set forth below are necessitated by the amendment and they do not rely on any matter specifically challenged in the arguments.
Claim Interpretation
The following limitations, unless explicitly defined in the claims, are being interpreted based on their definitions provided in the specification:
“Molecular expression information”: Information representing a three-dimensional chemical structure of a molecule.
“Disassembly path”: A path that requires the least cost to dissemble a molecule until a target disassembly condition is met.
“Target disassembly condition”: A path depth of a disassembly path obtained for each molecule based on at least one disassembly level that is less than a target path depth and there is no disassembly method for the obtained molecules, or a path depth of the disassembly path obtained for each molecule based on at least one disassembly level that is equal to the target path depth.
“Disassembly task”: A process of gradually dissembling a molecule into at least one simpler and easier-to-synthesize molecule according to a disassembly path.
“Cost value reference information”: A synthetic accessibility score, which is a scoring system for quickly assessing the ease of synthesis of a compound based on the complexity and ubiquity of the molecules of the compound.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
Claims 8, 9, 19 and 20 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.
Claims 8 and 19 are indefinite. Nominally, it is unclear how the “neural network” comprises the “first neural network” and the “second neural network”. The nomenclature used in the claims renders the scope of the limitation “neural network” indefinite (i.e. what is considered a “neural network”?; how would one distinguish “first network” from “second network” if they are both part of a single “network”, and how can said single network be considered one network if it is made up of multiple networks?).
Also, in claims 8 and 19, the claims recite a step of updating the first cost dictionary based on the second cost dictionary. The relationship between the first cost dictionary and the second cost dictionary is unclear. The first cost dictionary is limited to the costs associated with the FIRST disassembly paths, which has nothing to do with the second cost dictionary or the second disassembly paths. While the first disassembly paths precede the second disassembly paths, for the purpose of determining the costs associated with the respective paths, the first cost dictionary and the second cost dictionary appear to be unrelated. That said, it is unclear how the first cost dictionary is updated based on the second cost dictionary, as recited in claims 8 and 19.
Claims 9 and 20 are indefinite because the relationship between the predicted cost value information and the cost value information is unclear. According to the claims, both information is based on the molecular expression information of a molecule, which appears to be an inherent property of the molecule (i.e. molecular formula of a molecule does not change, and hence it should be identical for both information). That said, it is unclear how the two information differ such that the predicted information can be used to update the existing information.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-5, 7, 12-16 and 18 are allowed. Moreover, claims 8, 9, 19 and 20 may be allowed if they are amended to overcome the 35 U.S.C. 112(b) rejections set forth above.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Wlodarczyk-Pruszynski et al. (“W-P”) (US 2021/0125691 A1) disclose a method of training a neural network configured to determine a molecular retrosynthetic route (see abstract and [0139]), the method comprising (see [0140] and Fig. 11):
determining a first disassembly path (reaction) for each of a plurality of first molecules (step 1102 in Fig. 11) based on molecular expression information (structure or probability of reaction) of the respective one of the plurality of first molecules (see [0048]);
obtaining and subsequently using a first cost dictionary (“selecting the most promising path/reaction”) based on the first disassembly paths of the first molecules (see [0139]-[0140]), the first cost dictionary comprising the molecular expression information and cost value information corresponding to each of the first molecules (see [0056] and [0081]), wherein the cost value information represents a cost required to disassemble a first molecule according to the first disassembly path of said first molecule (see [0077]-[0081]);
determining molecular expression information of second molecules based on the first disassembly paths of the first molecules (step 1106), each of the second molecules being a molecule that is obtained by disassembling a corresponding first molecule based on the first disassembly path, wherein each of the second molecules is capable of being further disassembled (see step 1108);
obtaining and subsequently using a second cost dictionary based on second disassembly paths of the second molecules (step 1108), the second cost dictionary comprising the molecular expression information and cost value information corresponding to each of the second molecules (see above), wherein the cost value information of each second molecule represents a cost required to disassemble the respective second molecule according to the second disassembly path (see above); and
using the first and second cost dictionaries to train the neural network to generate a retrosynthetic route for a target molecule (step 1110), and to output cost value information corresponding to the retrosynthetic route (see abstract disclosing that synthesis pathways of the target molecule are ranked according to a cost estimation and the ranking is provided to a user).
The method differs from the claimed invention in that W-P does not utilize Tanimoto coefficients to group or cluster molecules into classes, determine the cluster center of each class, and use the cluster center to determine a molecule representative of each class, as recited in independent claims 1 and 12. While W-P discloses the use of Tanimoto coefficients (i.e. Jaccard index) (see [0121]), it is not used for the purpose recited in the claims. Based on the disclosure of W-P and other relevant prior art, there is no motivation to modify the method to arrive at the claimed inventions.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PAUL S HYUN whose telephone number is (571)272-8559. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:30-5:00.
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/PAUL S HYUN/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1796
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