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 .
Priority
This Application is a 371 of PCT/JP2021/030890, and claims foreign priority to JP2020-211979 and JP2020-141876, filed Dec. 22, 2020 and Aug. 25, 2020 in Japan.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on June 16, 2025; Nov. 5, 2024; Sept. 27, 2024; and May 24, 2023 are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner.
Claim Status – Response to Restriction/ Election Requirement
Claims 1-13 are currently pending.
Applicant’s election without traverse of Group I, claims 1-4, in the reply filed on Dec. 29, 2025 is acknowledged.
Claims 1-4 are currently pending and subject to examination. Claims 3-13 are withdrawn.
Applicant is reminded that upon the cancelation of claims to a non-elected invention, the inventorship must be corrected in compliance with 37 CFR 1.48(a) if one or more of the currently named inventors is no longer an inventor of at least one claim remaining in the application. A request to correct inventorship under 37 CFR 1.48(a) must be accompanied by an application data sheet in accordance with 37 CFR 1.76 that identifies each inventor by his or her legal name and by the processing fee required under 37 CFR 1.17(i).
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.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.”
Claim(s) 1, 3 and 4 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Rha et al. (Antioxidants, Vol. 8, Issue 8, August 5, 2019, p. 1-15).
Claim 1 is directed towards a plant extract comprising a kaempferol aglycone in an amount of 1 mg/g or more on a dry-weight basis.
Rha teaches a plant extract from green tea comprising kaempferol aglycone in an amount of 34.71 + 1.19 on a dry weight basis:
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421
620
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Rha, page 7.
Therefore, claim 1 is anticipated.
Claims 3 and 4 are duplicates and are directed towards the plant extract of claim 1, further comprising quercetin in an amount of 0.1 mg/g or more on a dry-weight basis. As shown in Table 2 of Rha presented in the rejection of claim 1, the FLA extract comprises quercetin in an amount of 38.21 mg/g on a dry weight basis. Therefore, claims 3-4 are anticipated.
Claim(s) 1 and 2 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Park et al. (J. Agric. Food Chem., 2006, Vol. 54, Issue 8, p. 2951−2956).
Claim 1 is directed towards a plant extract comprising a kaempferol aglycone in an amount of 1 mg/g or more on a dry-weight basis. Claim 2 is directed towards the plant extract of claim 1, comprising the kaempferol aglycone in an amount of 100 mg/g or more.
Park teaches green tea seeds extracts (GTSE) comprising 20% (w/w) and 95% (w/w) of kaempferol aglycone which are equivalent to 200 mg/g and 950 mg/g on a dry weight basis:
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159
341
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Park, col. 2, p. 2954;
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190
339
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Park, col. 1, p. 2955.
Therefore, claims 1-2 are anticipated.
Duplicate Claims
Applicant is advised that should claim 3 be found allowable, claim 4 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).
Conclusion
No claim is found to be allowable.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to HEATHER DAHLIN whose telephone number is (571)270-0436. The examiner can normally be reached 9-5.
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/HEATHER DAHLIN/Examiner, Art Unit 1629