Non-Final Rejection
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . This application was filed with claims 1-13, which are pending.
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.
Claims 1 and 4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by JP H06-012678 (“JP ‘678”).1
Regarding claim 1, JP ‘678 describes in Fig. 1 or 3 a semiconductor laser device comprising: a semiconductor laser element 1 including an emitter that emits light; a lens 2 that transmits the light emitted from the emitter; a driver 13 or 22 that supports the lens in a state in which a position and an orientation of the lens are changeable; a detector 11 or 20 that detects an intensity distribution of the light emitted from the emitter and transmitted through the lens; and a controller 16 or 21 that, based on a detection result of the detector, controls at least one of the position or the orientation of the lens by driving the driver to cause the intensity distribution of the light detected by the detector to be a predetermined light intensity distribution. [0046]-[0057].
Regarding claim 4, driver 13 or 22 is an electromagnetic coil, i.e. a magnetic actuator. [0046], [0054].
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, 2, and 4-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over WO 2019/155668 (“WO ‘668”) in view of JP 2003-46173 (“JP ‘173”), and further in view of JP ‘678.
Regarding claim 1, WO ‘668 discloses in embodiment 6, Figs. 11-14, [0060]-[0069], a semiconductor laser device comprising: a semiconductor laser element 110 including an emitter 1041-1043 that emits light; a lens 2 that transmits the light emitted from the emitter. Part of the point of this laser is to achieve a stable high output power. [0067]-[0068]. The specific application is not given, but other embodiments are used for laser processing, which generally needs a stable high output power.
WO ‘668 does not disclose a driver that supports the lens in a state in which a position and an orientation of the lens are changeable; and a detector that detects an intensity distribution of the light emitted from the emitter and transmitted through the lens; and a controller that, based on a detection result of the detector, controls at least one of the position or the orientation of the lens by driving the driver to cause the intensity distribution of the light detected by the detector to be a predetermined light intensity distribution.
JP ‘173 teaches that in laser processing apparatus it is important to stabilize the laser beam quality. [0003]-[0004]. This is done by measuring the light intensity distribution of the laser beam with a detector. [0006]-[0008]; [0058]-[0060]. It is further stated that the position of a collimating lens in the resonator can be changed based on the sensed signal to keep the light intensity at predetermined levels. [0071]-[0072]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to include these features as controlling the position of the lens based on the sensed values allows one to change the beam as needed so that you can get the results you expect.
There must necessarily be some kind of driver to support the lens in a state where you can change the position or orientation of the lens. The lens cannot float in space and have its position changed without something acting on it. However, JP ‘678 teaches such a driver as in the above 102 rejection. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to select such an actuator as a simple substitution of one known element for another to yield predictable results. MPEP 2143 I.B. JP ‘173 teaches moving the lens, but does not give any specifics whatsoever, but JP ‘678 does give specifics as to how this may be done. A person of ordinary skill could use JP ‘678 actuator and the result would have been predictable because JP ‘678 is doing the exact same thing, moving a lens to control the beam.
Regarding claim 2, WO ‘668 also includes in Fig. 11 a rotating member 11 that is an optical member that switches a fast axis direction and a slow axis direction of the light output from the lens.
Regarding claim 4, again it would have been obvious to use the JP ‘678 driver, a magnetic actuator.
Regarding claim 5, WO ‘668 lens 2 makes the beams parallel in the fast axis direction. [0062]. It is therefore a fast axis collimator.
Regarding claim 6, WO ‘668 uses an array of lasers 110. [0062].
Claim 3 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over WO ‘668, JP ‘173, and JP ‘678 as applied to claim 1, and further in view of the admitted prior art.
In WO ‘668 the lens 2 makes the beams parallel in the fast axis, i.e. collimates them. [0062]. WO ‘668 also has rotator 11 as discussed above re: claim 2. These are not combined together, in contact as claimed. Applicant admits that its BTU 220, which is a combined collimating lens and rotating lens, was already known in the art. Page 8 line 34 to page 9 line 4, citing PTL 2 from the specification, from 2000 (“An example of BTU 220 is the optical luminous flux converter disclosed in the foregoing PTL 2.”). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art that these two lenses of WO ‘668 could be replaced by the combined lens as a simple substitution of one known element for another to yield predictable results. MPEP 2143 I.B. The fast axis corrector and rotator were known separately in WO ‘668, but were also known as combined as admitted in the specification. A person of ordinary skill could have instead used the combined lens system and the result of the substitution would have been predictable as the combined device does essentially the same thing as the separate lenses.
Claims 7-13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over WO ‘668, JP ‘173, and JP ‘678 as applied to claim 1, and further in view of JP 2014-138021 (“JP ‘021”).
It is shown that there may be a driver for a lens, but not that it is capable of adjusting the five axes as claimed—parallel to the emission direction, parallel to the arrangement direction (perpendicular to emission direction), orthogonal to both of those, rotation around that orthogonal axis, and rotation around the emission axis. JP ‘021 teaches a system with laser 10 and collimating lens 11 on adjusting stage 13. [0022]-[0023]. Fig. 4 shows a laser array 50a-c emitting through the lens and X, Y, and Z directions. JP ‘021 teaches that the lens can be moved in all these claimed axes; in the X, Y, and Z directions (corresponding to the first three), and rotating around all of these in θx, θy, θz (corresponding to the latter two, along with another rotation direction). [0047]-[0052]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art that being able to adjust with so many degrees of freedom in so many different axes would allow for very precise alignment.
Regarding claim 8, the claim is essentially combining claims 2, 5, 6, and 7. Additionally, in WO ‘668 the plurality of emitters is in a line orthogonal to the emission direction as seen in Fig. 9. It is also apparent that since the point is to control the intensity distribution of the beams, detection would be of all of the beams. The features of claims 2, 5, and 6 are shown by WO ‘668, and those of claim 7 would have been obvious over JP ‘021 for the reasons given above.
Claims 9-13 are functional language claiming how exactly the controller moves the lens to correct the beam when the beam is corrected to be a certain way. The person of ordinary skill would recognize again in view of JP ‘021 that the lens can be moved in many different ways, in all of the axes that are claimed, and the person of ordinary skill would understand how moving the lens will affect the beam. The skilled artisan would therefore have been capable of correcting the beams in all of these ways. That is, the combined device is capable of performing all of this functional language, to do the actual corrections based on the detected beam, knowing how the beam is affected by the lens, and knowing where it is supposed to be.
Conclusion
Other references are cited with lenses or optical elements moved in a laser cavity to alter the beam.
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/JAMES A MENEFEE/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2828
1 The references cited in the rejections were provided in applicant’s IDS. Translations were provided and are used, except for the WIPO document, for which a translation is provided with this action.