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 .
Applicant's election with traverse of Group III, claims 17-24, in the reply filed on 11/5/25 is acknowledged. The traversal is on the ground(s) that the special technical features of surface area of at least 40 m2/g BET porous nickel oxide/nickel hydride layer by leaching is the key inventive contribution over the art. This is not found persuasive because this feature while found in claim 1 is not found in elected claims 17-24 as well as the Rausch discloses Raney nickel electrode coatings with specific areas of 20 to 100 m²/g being obtainable by leaching of non-noble metals from a precursor alloy with nickel (see e.g. Abstract and connecting paragraph of Pages 2852-2853).
The requirement is still deemed proper and is therefore made FINAL.
It is noted that claims 22-24 depend upon non-elected claim 16 as amended, however, the Examiner understanding the election of claims 17-24 as well as the original dependency was to claims 17-21, that the claim dependency is a typographical error and should be recited to claim 17 not claim 16. The application is being examined as such and if Applicant disagrees, Applicant is welcome to provide reasonings in the response.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 17-24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Regarding claim 17, the term “the electrode” lacks antecedent basis.
Regarding claims 17-24, the claims depend upon a withdrawn claim 1 which is improper. The Examiner suggest adding the limitations in the current claim to overcome the rejection.
Regarding claim 20, the terms “said nickel salts” and “said vanadium salts” lack antecedent basis as independent claim recites “a nickel salt” and “a vanadium salt” in singular form and not plural form. Clarification is requested.
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.
Claims 17-24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Welch et al. (4,251,478) in combination with Stachurski et al. (4,414,064).
Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches a porous nickel cathode applied to a metal substrate by either flame or plasma spraying nickel bearing particles with leachable alloys or constituents and leaching out these materials to form a porous surface (col. 2, lines 23-34). Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches leaching using an alkali metal hydroxide (col. 8, lines 13-16) (claimed alkaline bath – step 1f). Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches the nickel sprayed to include a leachable second transition metal such as molybdenum along with a thickener (claimed gelling agent) (col. 7, lines 56-65). Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches a subsequent heating step to modify the chemistry and structure of the coating as well as annealing (claimed calcining – step 1c and 1e) at temperatures from 200-600C (col. 8, lines 42-62). Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches flame spraying to build up the thickness with several coats (repeating steps – step 1d) (col. 7, lines 25-30 and col. 9, lines 8-11).
Welch et al. (4,251,478) fails to teach using vanadium as the leachable metal material.
Stachurski et al. (4,414,064) teaches forming hydrogen cathodes consisting of nickel and a leachable second material including vanadium (abstract).
Therefore, it would have been obvious for one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Welch et al. (4,251,478) process to include vanadium as the leachable metal as evidenced by Stachurski et al. (4,414,064) with the expectation of achieving similar success, i.e. a porous nickel cathode material.
Regarding claim 17, the prior art fails to specifically teach a drying step, however, the Examiner takes the position that the claimed drying step at 80-150C would be suggestive as the material is annealed at a higher temperature and hence the drying temperature would be met as the temperature is brought to the claims annealing temperatures of 200-600C and hence would pass through the claimed 80-150C and hence meet the drying limitation. Furthermore, using a drying step is well known in the art prior to annealing or calcining and hence would be utilized by one skilled in the art with the expectation of success absent a showing to the contrary. Also annealing after each layer is applied and dried is commonplace in the art and utilized for its expected results in forming the layers. Regarding the claimed surface area of at least 40m2/G BET (found in claim 1) is taught as a range of 1-100m2/g (Welch et al. (4,251,478) -col. 3, lines 53-56).
Regarding claim 18, Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches when flame spraying using a spraying aid such as an amide of a fatty acid (col. 9, line 1) and teaches a slurry which would be suggestive to include a solvent such as water/alcohol as these are known solvent in forming cathode slurries (col. 7, lines 55-60).
Regarding claim 19, Stachurski et al. (4,414,064) teaches including citrates (claimed citric acid) in the solution (col. 7, lines 31-38). The reference is silent with respect to ethylene glycol, however, the Examiner takes the position that ethylene glycol is a known gelling agent and would be a matter of design choice by one practicing in the art to also utilize this in the solution for the gelling purpose absent a showing of criticality thereof.
Regarding claim 20, Stachurski et al. (4,414,064) uses a NiCl2 – nickel chloride and hence would be suggestive of similar success when using chlorides or salts of the vanadium as well (col. 6, line 10-20).
Regarding claim 21, Stachurski et al. (4,414,064) teaches leaching for 2-100 hours at 50-70C temperatures (col. 7, lines 3-17).
Regarding claim 22, Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches the metal substrate to have a nickel surface or coating nickel thereon if the metal substrate is not nickel (col. 3, lines 20-30). Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches to form the nickel layer by electroplating (col. 6, lines 33-41). The porosity of the applied nickel layer would be less than 1 m2/g BET as it has no porosity. Regarding the inclusion of nickel oxide, the Examiner takes the position that nickel or its oxides would be expected to provide for the nickel interlayer with similar as well as the fact that the formation of the nickel is not said to be in an inert environment and therefore would include some nickel oxide as claimed absent a showing to the contrary.
Regarding claim 23, Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches the nickel layer applied to the substrate can be applied by wire spray and plasma spray (col. 8, lines 28-34).
Regarding claim 24, Welch et al. (4,251,478) teaches nickel particles for the cathode with 0.5-70 micrometers (col. 7, lines 3-11) which is plasma sprayed (col. 2, lines 23-34).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BRIAN K TALBOT whose telephone number is (571)272-1428. The examiner can normally be reached Monday -Friday 7-4PM.
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/BRIAN K TALBOT/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1712