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 final rejection. 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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 12/15/2025 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1, 3-11 have been considered but are moot in view of new grounds of rejections as discussed above.
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.
Claims 1,3-5, & 9-11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable by Yamaguchi et al (US20090020709A1; hereinafter referred to as Yamaguchi) in view of Carr (J. A. Carr et al., “Shortwave infrared fluorescence imaging with the clinically approved near-infrared dye Indocyanine Green,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 115, no. 17, pp. 4465–4470, Apr. 2018; hereinafter referred to as Carr) and further in view of Koyama et al (JP 2019138762 A; hereinafter referred to as Koyama).
Regarding Claim 1, Yamaguchi discloses an image forming apparatus (“The present invention relates to an image processing system, an image processing method, and a computer readable medium.” [0003]) comprising:
an excitation light source that irradiates an observation target with excitation light (“The light emitter 500 emits light to be irradiated from the tip 102 of the endoscope 100. The light generated by the light emitter 500 includes infrared light being excitation light for exciting a luminescence substance,” [0034]);
an imaging part that receives first infrared light and second infrared light split from light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light (“The specific wavelength image obtaining section 212 obtains a specific wavelength image being an image of light from an object such as blood vessels belonging to a specific wavelength region… The specific wavelength region may also be a wavelength region resulting from dividing, into a plurality of regions, a wavelength region to which fluorescence from ICG belongs, and for example may be a long wavelength region, a medium wavelength region, and a short wavelength region, from among the wavelength regions by fluorescence from ICG.” [0040]),
and an image processing unit that generates a composite image by combining a first image and a second image (“FIG. 5 shows an exemplary display screen 310 of the display 300. The display screen 310 displays the blood vessels 330 in the corrected image resulting from correcting the object image, by being overlapped on the blood vessels 320 of the surface image. The blood vessels 320 of the surface image can be recognized by surface observation of the test body 800. The image processing system 10 of the present embodiment can visualize the blood vessels 330 of the corrected image which cannot be recognized by surface observation.” [0068]),
the second image including a specific region having an image density corresponding to the second infrared light received by the imaging part (“the depth calculator 218 may calculate the depth based on the luminance of the image region specified by the object region specifying section 216. For example, the depth calculator 218 may calculate the depth based on the luminance ratio between the image region in the specific wavelength region of the long wavelength region and the image region in the specific wavelength region of the short wavelength region. For example, the depth calculator 218 may calculate the depth based on the maximum luminance or the average luminance in the image region. For example, the depth calculator 218 may calculate the depth based on the change rate in luminance in the end portion of the image region.” [0046], “The object image generator 230 generates the image of the object in accordance with the depth of the object calculated by the depth calculator 218. Specifically, the object image generator 230 corrects the object image in accordance with the depth of the object calculated by the depth calculator 218. That is, the object image generator 230 corrects the spread of the object in the object image by using a correction value.” [0051])
wherein the light from the observation target is a fluorescence of fluorescent reagent Indocyanine green (ICG) (“The ICG injector 700 injects, to a test body 800, indocyanine green being a luminescence substance. Although ICG is taken as an example of the luminescence substance in the present embodiment, fluorescent substances other than ICG may be used as the luminescence substance. ICG emits fluorescence having a broad spectrum” [0024]),
Yamaguchi does not specifically disclose that the first infrared light including light having a wavelength in a short wavelength infrared region, and the second infrared light including light having a wavelength in a wavelength region on a shorter wavelength side than the short wavelength infrared region, the first image indicating a boundary of a specific region corresponding to the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and wherein the image processing unit includes an infrared image combining unit that generates the first image indicating a contour of an image of the specific region by binarizing an amount of the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and combines the first image and the second image.
However, in a similar field of endeavor, Carr teaches real-time fluorescence imaging using ICG at clinically relevant doses, including intravital microscopy, noninvasive imaging in blood and lymph vessels, and imaging of hepatobiliary clearance [Abstract].
Carr also teaches the first infrared light including light having a wavelength in a short wavelength infrared region, and the second infrared light including light having a wavelength in a wavelength region on a shorter wavelength side than the short wavelength infrared region (“Recording the emission spectra on a system sensitive to both NIR and SWIR light, such as an InGaAs detector-based system, shows that ICG emission extends well into the SWIR region (Fig. 1) (44). We show that, with all corrections performed by us (Fig. S1), the emission spectrum of ICG approximates the mirror image of its absorption spectrum as predicted by the Franck–Condon principle (or mirror image rule) (45). Furthermore, we show that, under diffuse 808-nm excitation, it is even possible to detect emission from an aqueous solution of ICG on an InGaAs SWIR camera beyond 1,500 nm, although the emission of ICG peaks at 820 nm.” [Results and Discussion], see Fig. 1A below for ICG Emission wavelengths picked up by the system).
PNG
media_image1.png
571
481
media_image1.png
Greyscale
It would have been obvious to an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Yamaguchi as outlined above with the first infrared light including light having a wavelength in a short wavelength infrared region, and the second infrared light including light having a wavelength in a wavelength region on a shorter wavelength side than the short wavelength infrared region as taught by Carr, because contrast and resolution of fine vasculature structures can be greatly improved while using FDA-approved ICG contrast by simply switching the detection wavelength from traditional NIR imaging using a silicon camera to detection beyond 1,300 nm on an InGaAs SWIR camera [High-Contrast SWIR Fluorescence Imaging in Vivo Using ICG].
Yamaguchi in view Carr does not specifically teach the first image indicating a boundary of a specific region corresponding to the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and wherein the image processing unit includes an infrared image combining unit that generates the first image indicating a contour of an image of the specific region by binarizing an amount of the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and combines the first image and the second image.
However, in a similar field of endeavor, Koyama teaches an appearance inspection apparatus that captures an infrared image of a subject by an imaging unit such as a camera and performs image inspection [0002,0011].
Koyama also teaches the first image indicating a boundary of a specific region corresponding to the first infrared light received by the imaging part (“the light of the illumination 3a is red or infrared light having long wavelengths different from those of the illumination 3b, the low-reflection abnormal object F1 is also easily distinguished, and the low-reflection abnormal object F1 can be detected with higher accuracy“ [0036],“the scanning unit 55 may specify the coordinates having the pixel value of the abnormal object F by binarizing the separation data and dividing the pixel value of the abnormal object F and the surrounding pixel values, or may specify the coordinates at which the pixel value changes steeply by edge extraction of the separation data. Then, the scanning unit 55 may perform contour extraction with the specified coordinates as a starting point, and specify the center coordinates in the contour line as the position of the abnormal object F.” [0044])
and wherein the image processing unit includes an infrared image combining unit that generates the first image indicating a contour of an image of the specific region by binarizing an amount of the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and combines the first image and the second image (“the scanning unit 55 may specify the coordinates having the pixel value of the abnormal object F by binarizing the separation data and dividing the pixel value of the abnormal object F and the surrounding pixel values, or may specify the coordinates at which the pixel value changes steeply by edge extraction of the separation data. Then, the scanning unit 55 may perform contour extraction with the specified coordinates as a starting point, and specify the center coordinates in the contour line as the position of the abnormal object F.” [0044], “the generation unit 54 combines the position coordinates indicating the abnormal object F and the annotation information of the abnormal object F stored in the storage unit 56 with the image data, or the display device 6 overlays and displays the position coordinates indicating the abnormal object F and the annotation information of the abnormal object F stored in the storage unit 56 on the image data.” [0047])
It would have been obvious to an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Yamaguchi in view of Carr as outlined above with the first image indicating a boundary of a specific region corresponding to the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and wherein the image processing unit includes an infrared image combining unit that generates the first image indicating a contour of an image of the specific region by binarizing an amount of the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and combines the first image and the second image as taught by Koyama, because it allows for improving the inspection efficiency of the object to be inspected [0004].
Regarding Claim 3, Yamaguchi discloses the imaging part includes a splitting unit that splits the light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light into a component of the first infrared light and a component of the second infrared light ("Spectroscopic filters can alternatively be provided in association with optical axes resulting from division of incident light by means of a half mirror or the like. Alternatively, if a plurality of CCDs are provided for each of the optical axes, each component light image can be synchronously captured. Still alternatively, if respective spectroscopic filters for infrared light and RGB components are provided for each single CCD pixel, a single CCD may capture the image of each component light synchronously." [0029]).
Regarding Claim 4, Yamaguchi discloses the splitting unit further splits the light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light into light having a visible light wavelength ("Spectroscopic filters can alternatively be provided in association with optical axes resulting from division of incident light by means of a half mirror or the like. Alternatively, if a plurality of CCDs are provided for each of the optical axes, each component light image can be synchronously captured. Still alternatively, if respective spectroscopic filters for infrared light and RGB components are provided for each single CCD pixel, a single CCD may capture the image of each component light synchronously." [0029]).
Regarding Claim 5, Yamaguchi discloses the image processing unit further includes a visible light image processing unit that generates a visible light image corresponding to the light having a visible light wavelength received by the imaging part (“The specific wavelength image obtaining section 212 obtains a specific wavelength image being an image of light from an object such as blood vessels belonging to a specific wavelength region. The specific wavelength region may be any wavelength region, and for example may be a red region with its center being an R component of visible light, a green region with its center being a G component, and a blue region with its center being a B component. The specific wavelength region may also be a wavelength region resulting from dividing, into a plurality of regions, a wavelength region to which fluorescence from ICG belongs, and for example may be a long wavelength region, a medium wavelength region, and a short wavelength region, from among the wavelength regions by fluorescence from ICG.” [0040]),
and the visible light image is added to the image obtained by combining the first image and the second image at a specific ratio to incorporate visible light information into the composite image to generate a new composite image (“the absorption of light belonging to the long wavelength region is smaller than the absorption of light belonging to a short wavelength region, among the fluorescence emitted from ICG inside the blood vessels. Therefore, the depth of the blood vessels can be estimated from the brightness ratio among the blood vessel images respectively included in the long wavelength region, the medium wavelength region, and the short wavelength region.“ [0042]).
Regarding Claim 9, Yamaguchi discloses all limitations noted above except that the second infrared light is 750 nm or more and less than 900 nm, and the first infrared light is 900 nm or more and 1600 nm or less.
However, in a similar field of endeavor, Carr teaches that the second infrared light is 750 nm or more and less than 900 nm, and the first infrared light is 900 nm or more and 1600 nm or less (“Recording the emission spectra on a system sensitive to both NIR and SWIR light, such as an InGaAs detector-based system, shows that ICG emission extends well into the SWIR region (Fig. 1) (44). We show that, with all corrections performed by us (Fig. S1), the emission spectrum of ICG approximates the mirror image of its absorption spectrum as predicted by the Franck–Condon principle (or mirror image rule) (45). Furthermore, we show that, under diffuse 808-nm excitation, it is even possible to detect emission from an aqueous solution of ICG on an InGaAs SWIR camera beyond 1,500 nm, although the emission of ICG peaks at 820 nm.” [Results and Discussion], see Fig. 1A below for ICG Emission wavelengths picked up by the system).
PNG
media_image1.png
571
481
media_image1.png
Greyscale
It would have been obvious to an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Yamaguchi as outlined above with the second infrared light is 750 nm or more and less than 900 nm, and the first infrared light is 900 nm or more and 1600 nm or less as taught by Carr, because contrast and resolution of fine vasculature structures can be greatly improved while using FDA-approved ICG contrast by simply switching the detection wavelength from traditional NIR imaging using a silicon camera to detection beyond 1,300 nm on an InGaAs SWIR camera [High-Contrast SWIR Fluorescence Imaging in Vivo Using ICG].
Regarding Claim 10, Yamaguchi in view of Carr discloses all limitations noted above except that the binarization of the amount of the first infrared light uses a threshold value to convert the amount of the first infrared light into two values of black and white.
However, in a similar field of endeavor, Koyama teaches that the binarization of the amount of the first infrared light uses a threshold value to convert the amount of the first infrared light into two values of black and white (“The conversion unit 52 converts the other separation datum (for example, the B-data) into a gray scale (step S8). The generation unit 54 generates an image datum by synthesizing both the separated datum converted into the gray scale and one of which is black-and-white-inverted (step S9)” [0026], “the light of the illumination 3a is red or infrared light having long wavelengths different from those of the illumination 3b, the low-reflection abnormal object F1 is also easily distinguished, and the low-reflection abnormal object F1 can be detected with higher accuracy“ [0036],“the scanning unit 55 may specify the coordinates having the pixel value of the abnormal object F by binarizing the separation data and dividing the pixel value of the abnormal object F and the surrounding pixel values, or may specify the coordinates at which the pixel value changes steeply by edge extraction of the separation data. Then, the scanning unit 55 may perform contour extraction with the specified coordinates as a starting point, and specify the center coordinates in the contour line as the position of the abnormal object F.” [0044], Binarizing an image inherently requires a threshold value)
It would have been obvious to an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Yamaguchi as outlined above with the binarization of the amount of the first infrared light uses a threshold value to convert the amount of the first infrared light into two values of black and white as taught by Koyama, because it allows for improving the inspection efficiency of the object to be inspected [0004].
Regarding Claim 11, Yamaguchi discloses an image forming apparatus (“The present invention relates to an image processing system, an image processing method, and a computer readable medium.” [0003]) comprising:
an excitation light source that irradiates an observation target with excitation light (“The light emitter 500 emits light to be irradiated from the tip 102 of the endoscope 100. The light generated by the light emitter 500 includes infrared light being excitation light for exciting a luminescence substance,” [0034]);
an imaging part that receives first infrared light and second infrared light split from light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light (“The specific wavelength image obtaining section 212 obtains a specific wavelength image being an image of light from an object such as blood vessels belonging to a specific wavelength region… The specific wavelength region may also be a wavelength region resulting from dividing, into a plurality of regions, a wavelength region to which fluorescence from ICG belongs, and for example may be a long wavelength region, a medium wavelength region, and a short wavelength region, from among the wavelength regions by fluorescence from ICG.” [0040]),
and an image processing unit that generates a composite image by combining a first image and a second image (“FIG. 5 shows an exemplary display screen 310 of the display 300. The display screen 310 displays the blood vessels 330 in the corrected image resulting from correcting the object image, by being overlapped on the blood vessels 320 of the surface image. The blood vessels 320 of the surface image can be recognized by surface observation of the test body 800. The image processing system 10 of the present embodiment can visualize the blood vessels 330 of the corrected image which cannot be recognized by surface observation.” [0068]),
the second image including a specific region having an image density corresponding to the second infrared light received by the imaging part (“the depth calculator 218 may calculate the depth based on the luminance of the image region specified by the object region specifying section 216. For example, the depth calculator 218 may calculate the depth based on the luminance ratio between the image region in the specific wavelength region of the long wavelength region and the image region in the specific wavelength region of the short wavelength region. For example, the depth calculator 218 may calculate the depth based on the maximum luminance or the average luminance in the image region. For example, the depth calculator 218 may calculate the depth based on the change rate in luminance in the end portion of the image region.” [0046], “The object image generator 230 generates the image of the object in accordance with the depth of the object calculated by the depth calculator 218. Specifically, the object image generator 230 corrects the object image in accordance with the depth of the object calculated by the depth calculator 218. That is, the object image generator 230 corrects the spread of the object in the object image by using a correction value.” [0051])
Yamaguchi does not specifically disclose that the first infrared light including light having a wavelength in a short wavelength infrared region, and the second infrared light including light having a wavelength in a wavelength region on a shorter wavelength side than the short wavelength infrared region, wherein the second infrared light has a wavelength of 750 nm or more and less than 900 nm, the first infrared light has a wavelength of 900 nm or more and 1600 nm or less, and the wavelengths of the first infrared light and the second infrared light do not overlap each other, the first image indicating a boundary of a specific region corresponding to the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and wherein the image processing unit includes an infrared image combining unit that generates the first image indicating a contour of an image of the specific region by binarizing an amount of the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and combines the first image and the second image.
However, in a similar field of endeavor, Carr teaches real-time fluorescence imaging using ICG at clinically relevant doses, including intravital microscopy, noninvasive imaging in blood and lymph vessels, and imaging of hepatobiliary clearance [Abstract].
Carr also teaches the first infrared light including light having a wavelength in a short wavelength infrared region, and the second infrared light including light having a wavelength in a wavelength region on a shorter wavelength side than the short wavelength infrared region, wherein the second infrared light has a wavelength of 750 nm or more and less than 900 nm, the first infrared light has a wavelength of 900 nm or more and 1600 nm or less, and the wavelengths of the first infrared light and the second infrared light do not overlap each other (“Recording the emission spectra on a system sensitive to both NIR and SWIR light, such as an InGaAs detector-based system, shows that ICG emission extends well into the SWIR region (Fig. 1) (44). We show that, with all corrections performed by us (Fig. S1), the emission spectrum of ICG approximates the mirror image of its absorption spectrum as predicted by the Franck–Condon principle (or mirror image rule) (45). Furthermore, we show that, under diffuse 808-nm excitation, it is even possible to detect emission from an aqueous solution of ICG on an InGaAs SWIR camera beyond 1,500 nm, although the emission of ICG peaks at 820 nm.” [Results and Discussion], see Fig. 1A below for ICG Emission wavelengths picked up by the system).
PNG
media_image1.png
571
481
media_image1.png
Greyscale
It would have been obvious to an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Yamaguchi as outlined above with the first infrared light including light having a wavelength in a short wavelength infrared region, and the second infrared light including light having a wavelength in a wavelength region on a shorter wavelength side than the short wavelength infrared region wherein the second infrared light has a wavelength of 750 nm or more and less than 900 nm, the first infrared light has a wavelength of 900 nm or more and 1600 nm or less, and the wavelengths of the first infrared light and the second infrared light do not overlap each other, as taught by Carr, because contrast and resolution of fine vasculature structures can be greatly improved while using FDA-approved ICG contrast by simply switching the detection wavelength from traditional NIR imaging using a silicon camera to detection beyond 1,300 nm on an InGaAs SWIR camera [High-Contrast SWIR Fluorescence Imaging in Vivo Using ICG].
Yamaguchi in view Carr does not specifically teach the first image indicating a boundary of a specific region corresponding to the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and wherein the image processing unit includes an infrared image combining unit that generates the first image indicating a contour of an image of the specific region by binarizing an amount of the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and combines the first image and the second image.
However, in a similar field of endeavor, Koyama teaches an appearance inspection apparatus that captures an infrared image of a subject by an imaging unit such as a camera and performs image inspection [0002,0011].
Koyama also teaches the first image indicating a boundary of a specific region corresponding to the first infrared light received by the imaging part (“the light of the illumination 3a is red or infrared light having long wavelengths different from those of the illumination 3b, the low-reflection abnormal object F1 is also easily distinguished, and the low-reflection abnormal object F1 can be detected with higher accuracy“ [0036],“the scanning unit 55 may specify the coordinates having the pixel value of the abnormal object F by binarizing the separation data and dividing the pixel value of the abnormal object F and the surrounding pixel values, or may specify the coordinates at which the pixel value changes steeply by edge extraction of the separation data. Then, the scanning unit 55 may perform contour extraction with the specified coordinates as a starting point, and specify the center coordinates in the contour line as the position of the abnormal object F.” [0044])
and wherein the image processing unit includes an infrared image combining unit that generates the first image indicating a contour of an image of the specific region by binarizing an amount of the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and combines the first image and the second image (“the scanning unit 55 may specify the coordinates having the pixel value of the abnormal object F by binarizing the separation data and dividing the pixel value of the abnormal object F and the surrounding pixel values, or may specify the coordinates at which the pixel value changes steeply by edge extraction of the separation data. Then, the scanning unit 55 may perform contour extraction with the specified coordinates as a starting point, and specify the center coordinates in the contour line as the position of the abnormal object F.” [0044], “the generation unit 54 combines the position coordinates indicating the abnormal object F and the annotation information of the abnormal object F stored in the storage unit 56 with the image data, or the display device 6 overlays and displays the position coordinates indicating the abnormal object F and the annotation information of the abnormal object F stored in the storage unit 56 on the image data.” [0047])
It would have been obvious to an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Yamaguchi in view of Carr as outlined above with the first image indicating a boundary of a specific region corresponding to the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and wherein the image processing unit includes an infrared image combining unit that generates the first image indicating a contour of an image of the specific region by binarizing an amount of the first infrared light received by the imaging part, and combines the first image and the second image as taught by Koyama, because it allows for improving the inspection efficiency of the object to be inspected [0004].
Claims 6-7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yamaguchi in view of Carr and further in view of Koyama as applied to Claims 1 & 5 above, and further in view of Kang et al (US20180000401A1; hereinafter referred to as Kang)
Regarding Claim 6, Yamaguchi in view of Carr and further in view of Koyama discloses all limitations noted above except that the imaging part includes an optical system that corrects a focus shift of the light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light in a range of from visible light to short wavelength infrared light.
However, in a similar field of endeavor, Kang teaches a device for observing an SLN by detecting near-infrared (NIR) fluorescence caused by a fluorescent material such as indocyanine green [0002].
Kang also teaches that the imaging part includes an optical system that corrects a focus shift of the light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light in a range of from visible light to short wavelength infrared light (“an an imaging system for simultaneously observing a wide range of spectra from visible light (400 to 700 nm) to NIR light (700 to 900 nm), a chromatic aberration correction is required to adjust the focus on the focal plane of an image obtaining chip such as a CCD sensor” [Kang 0014] , “the axial chromatic aberration is corrected without any increase in cost, caused as the separate VIS and NIR imaging system is used, and installation of a complicated optical module, so that it is possible to precisely control the focuses of the two images at the same time” [Kang 0097].
It would have been obvious to an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Yamaguchi in view of Koyama as outlined above with the imaging part includes a filter that cuts the excitation light from the light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light as taught by Kang, because it can provide a high accuracy [0017].
Regarding Claim 7, Yamaguchi in view of Carr and further in view of Koyama discloses all limitations noted above except that the imaging part includes a filter that cuts the excitation light from the light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light.
However, in a similar field of endeavor, Kang teaches that the imaging part includes a filter that cuts the excitation light from the light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light (“a light-shielding filter 42 may be installed to prevent the laser excitation light in the NIR wavelength band from being penetrated into the multispectral image processing system 50 through the path of secondary lights reflected from the object to be observed and to allow light in the other wavelength bands to be transmitted therethrough” [0076]).
It would have been obvious to an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Yamaguchi in view of Carr and further in view of Koyama as outlined above with the imaging part includes a filter that cuts the excitation light from the light from the observation target irradiated with the excitation light as taught by Kang, because it can provide a high accuracy [0017].
Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yamaguchi in view of Carr and further in view of Koyama as applied to Claim 1 above, and further in view of Shino et al (US20220309619A1; hereinafter referred to as Shino)
Regarding Claim 8, Yamaguchi in view of Carr and further in view of Koyama discloses all limitations noted above except that the image processing unit generates the composite image in which a brightness signal of a region outside the specific region in the first image is corrected to zero.
However, in a similar field of endeavor, Shino teaches an image processing apparatus and an image processing method for performing image processing on images that are prone to shine, such as images taken with an endoscope [0001].
Shino also teaches that the image processing unit generates the composite image in which a brightness signal of a region outside the specific region in the first image is corrected to zero (“a mask image generation unit that specifies a region having a luminance value higher than a specific value as a mask region from a target image to be processed, further generates a mask image by setting the luminance value of a region other than the mask region to zero in the image,” [0010]).
It would have been obvious to an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Yamaguchi in view of Carr and further in view of Koyama as outlined above with the image processing unit generates the composite image in which a brightness signal of a region outside the specific region in the first image is corrected to zero as taught by Shino, because it can suppress the disappearance of edges in the image when correcting portions of an image [0008].
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to STEVEN MALDONADO whose telephone number is 703-756-1421. The examiner can normally be reached 8:00 am-4:00 pm PST M-Th Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at
http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Christopher Koharski can be reached on (571) 272-7230. Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/Steven Maldonado/
Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3797
/CHRISTOPHER KOHARSKI/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3797
Prosecution Insights