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 .
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 allowance or after an Office action under Ex Parte Quayle, 25 USPQ 74, 453 O.G. 213 (Comm'r Pat. 1935). 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, prosecution in this application has been reopened pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 10/31/2025 has been entered.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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 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, 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.
Claims 1 and 6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102a)(1) as being anticipated by CN108991590A, which was provided in an Information Disclosure Statement filed 10/31/2025. A machine translation is provided and used for citations. .
Claim 1: CN108991590A discloses forming a flaky coconut shell charcoal tablet for a hookah that exhibits easy ignition and clean safe combustion (reads on a combustible heat source) (Abs, Summary). The flaky coconut shell charcoal tablet is formed by mixing coconut shell charcoal powder (carbon powder) with volcanic rock powder, potassium nitrate, sodium carboxymethyl cellulose (a claimed organic binder) and glucose (a reducing sugar, see “reducing sugar” for evidence); adding a certain proportion of water; stirring; press-forming the mixture and water into a tablet, and drying the tablet (Summary). The potassium nitrate and glucose read on the claimed ignition accelerator.
It is noted that the open claim language allows for additional components such as volcanic rock powder
In an example (Example 3), a flake-shaped coconut shell hookah was formed comprising a mass fraction of coconut shell charcoal powder (50%), volcanic rock powder (15%), potassium nitrate (15%), sodium carboxymethylcellulose (10%), and glucose (10%). In Example 3, the mass ratio of potassium nitrate to glucose was 15:10, or 3:2, which is a specifically claimed ratio.
Although CN108991590A discloses the product for a different intended use, the disclosed product comprises all components of the claimed composition, is ignitable and combustible, and is therefore capable of functioning as a combustible heat source.
Claim 6: In Example 3, the product ignited in 4 seconds and the combustion continued for 7 minutes (420 seconds).
Claims 2 and 7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as unpatentable over CN108991590A.
Claim 2: CN108991590A discloses a mass percentage of potassium nitrate in the product is 6%-20% and a mass percentage of glucose in the product is 0.5%-10%. Therefore, the potassium nitrate and glucose are present a combined mass percentage of 6.5%-30%, which includes the claimed range or, at least, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to include a claimed combined mass percentage of potassium nitrate and glucose.absent convincing evidence of unexpected results commensurate in scope with the claims.
Claim 7: Since the composition of CN108991590A is intended to be smoked in a hookah (smoking article), a smoking article comprising the composition of Claim 1 would have been obvious.
Claims 4 and 5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as unpatentable over CN108991590A. in view of JPH10179112A, also provided in an Information Disclosure Statement filed 10/31/2025 (machine translation provided and used for citations).
Claim 4: The disclosure of CN108991590A is used as above. CN108991590A does not disclose that the carbon powder comprises graphite. However JPH10179112A discloses a heat source composition for non-combustion-type aerosol generator article (p 2, middle). The heat source composition comprises a carbon powder as a pyrotechnic component, graphite as in an amount between 5 wt% and 20 wt% to reduce the flammability and combustion temperature of the heat source (combustion moderator) but not worsen the ignitability thereof, a potassium salt, a binder such as carboxymethyl cellulose, and flavor and taste components (p 2 and top half of p 3). A combustion moderator is a typical additive in combustible heat source compositions (p 1, third paragraph from bottom). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to add graphite to the composition of CN108991590A in view of JPH10179112A to reduce the flammability and combustion temperature of the heat source but not worsen the ignitability thereof.
CN108991590A discloses an amount of coconut shell charcoal powder of 50%, which is within the claimed range (Example 3).
Claim 5: Carboxymethyl cellulose is a claimed binder.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 3 is 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: CN108991590A and JPH10179112A are the nearest prior art. The prior art fails to disclose a combustible heat source composition as claimed or to provide motivation to replace the glucose of CN108991590A with a sugar alcohol with an expectation of obtaining an advantage.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DENNIS R CORDRAY whose telephone number is (571)272-8244. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 8 AM-5 PM (EST).
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Abbas Rashid can be reached at (571) 270-7457. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/DENNIS R CORDRAY/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1748