DETAILED ACTION
Claim 1 is pending. Claim 1 has been amended and claims 2-9 have been canceled.
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 .
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.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claim 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee et al. (U.S. 2018/0246404) in view of Kawata et al. (U.S. 5,376,497).
With regard to claim 1, Lee et al. teaches an I-line negative photoresist composition, comprising at least one selected from the group consisting of compounds represented by Chemical Formulas 1 to 5 [0036]:
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[0037] in which R can be acryloyl, specifically, Example 1 comprises 100 g (parts by weight) of a phenol polymer resin composed basically of 4-hydroxy-3-methyl benzoic acid having an average molecular weight of 5,000 as a basic resin, 4 g (parts by weight) of the compound of Substitution Example 1, 10 g (parts by weight) of tetramethoxymethyl glycoluril as a crosslinking agent, 4 g (parts by weight) of 2-(4-methoxy-phenyl)-4,6-bis(trichloromethyl)-1,3,5-triazine as a photoacid generator, 0.6 g (parts by weight) of tributylamine as an acid diffusion inhibitor, and a solvent mixture comprising 150 g (parts by weight) of ethyl lactate and 700 g (parts by weight) of propyleneglycol methyl ether acetate [0068].
Lee et al. does not teach 5 to 100 parts by weight of a compound represented by Formula 1.
However, Kawata et al. teaches a positive resist composition comprising in admixture (a) 100 parts by weight of an alkali-soluble phenolic resin; (b) 1-100 parts by weight of a photosensitive agent formed of a quinonediazide sulfonic acid ester; (c) 1-100 parts by weight of a hydroxy compound having a structure that at least part of its hydroxyl group(s) (--OH) has been modified by at least one conversion reaction selected from the group consisting of esterification with sulfonic acid (--OSO2R), esterification with carboxylic acid (--OCOR) and etherification (--O--R), in which R means an alkyl, substituted alkyl, alkenyl, substituted alkenyl, aryl, substituted aryl, aralkyl or substituted aralkyl group, and (d) sufficient solvent to dissolve the foregoing composition components [col 2 lines 10-23] in which the hydroxy compound having a structure that at least part of its hydroxyl group(s) has been converted into a sulfonic ester group and/or a carboxylic ester group can be synthesized by reacting a hydroxy compound with a sulfonic acid halide and/or a carboxylic acid halide in the presence of a basic catalyst in the manner similar to the synthesizing method of the quinonediazide sulfonic acid ester [col 4 lines 25-35] wherein a specific example of the hydroxy compound includes the following formulae (II) and (17):
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[col 5 lines 1-21] and
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[col 10 line 20] and a specific example of the carboxylic acid halide include acryloyl chloride [col 15 line 43]. Kawata et al. also teaches with respect to the hydroxyl groups of the hydroxy compound, the proportion modified by at least one conversion reaction selected from the group consisting of esterification with sulfonic acid, esterification with carboxylic acid and etherification (hereinafter referred to as "percent capping") is generally within a range of 1-100%, preferably 10-100%, more preferably 20-100% on the average [col 15 line 63-col 16 line 2] such that when formula (II) is defined as: R1-R6 are hydrogen atoms, R7 is a hydroxyl group, and R8 is an alkyl group having 1 carbon atom and there is 100% capping with acryloyl chloride it is equivalent to Lee’s Formula 5; and when there is 100% capping of the compound of formula (17) with acryloyl chloride it is equivalent to a compound represented by Formula 1 of instant claim 1 which is obtained by a reactive monomer (X-R) substitution reaction of 1,1,1-tris(4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-ethyl-4-isopropylbenzene and having a molecular weight of 586, absent any evidence to the contrary. Kawata et al. further teaches it is an object of this invention to provide a positive resist composition well balanced among various properties such as sensitivity, rate of residual film, resolution, etc. Another object of this invention is to provide a positive resist small in dimensional change according to exposure, i.e., excellent in so-called exposure latitude, in particular, in minute processing to 1 µm or smaller in line width [col 1 lines 50-57].
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the specific teachings of Lee et al. to include the compound of Kawata et al. and arrive at the instant claims through routine experimentation of substituting equally suitable compounds for the sought invention in order to achieve optimum lithographic properties.
Response to Arguments
Due to the amendment filed December 28, 2025 of instant claim 1, the 103 rejection over Murata in view of Lee has been withdrawn. Applicant’s arguments with regard to this rejection have been considered but are moot due to the amendment of instant claim 1. However, Lee is still being used as prior art because it continues to teach the claimed composition sans formula 1.
Due to the amendment to the abstract, the objection has been withdrawn.
Due to the amendment of instant specification, the objections have been withdrawn.
Due to the amendment of instant claim 1 and cancelation of instant claims 2-9, the objections have been withdrawn.
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 ANNA E MALLOY whose telephone number is (571)270-5849. The examiner can normally be reached 8:00-4:30 EST M-F.
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/Anna Malloy/Examiner, Art Unit 1737
/MARK F. HUFF/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 1737
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