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 .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of 35 U.S.C. 112(a):
(a) IN GENERAL.—The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor or joint inventor of carrying out the invention.
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112:
The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor of carrying out his invention.
Claims 1-15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph, as failing to comply with the written description requirement. The claims contain subject matter which was not described in the specification in such a way as to reasonably convey to one skilled in the relevant art that the inventor or a joint inventor, or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the inventors, at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention. The amended claims present a variety of instances of new matter such as “background voxels”, “by a predetermined radial distance”, and “creating a perivascular region for radiomics feature extraction”. The specification only discloses the mention of merging “background points” in paragraph 71, and while this would allow for the previously recited, “background features” to be enabled. “Background voxels” is more specific and not covered by the specification. For, “predetermined radial distance”, there is no recitation of any “predetermined radial distance” in the specification or drawings. Further, neither the terms radial nor predetermined appear at all within the specification, as such, how can this term be anything but new matter? There is no recitation of radial or predetermined anywhere within the application. For, “creating a perivascular region for radiomics feature extraction”, firstly perivascular is not recited anywhere within the specification or drawings. Secondly, there are two issues with “perivascular region”, “perivascular region” could mean either “perivascular spaces” or “region around the blood vessel”. Now, the “perivascular spaces” definition would essentially have the claim claiming that this image processing technique is being used to create fluid filled spaces around blood vessels which would be far from the scope of the invention. The second definition is equally problematic, Paragraph 79 of the specification states that, “Due to the dilation operation on the vascular lumen image in the process of extracting the voxel feature map, some pixels considered to be plaques may exceed the range of the vascular lumen, and by taking the intersection of the potential plaque and the vascular lumen image, the misjudgment can be eliminated and plaques outside the vascular lumen can be excluded” which would explicitly exclude creating a perivascular region as areas outside the blood vessels in the CCTA images are excluded to avoid misjudgment. So, the specification would actually teach away from the claim language by noting that the perivascular region is purposefully excluded. As such, for these reasons, these claims recite new matter, and the dependent claims inherit these issues, and are similarly rejected.
Response to Amendment
The amendments, entered 3/19/2026, have been entered in full, and they have been fully considered. These amendments overcome the current 103 rejection, but they have new matter which means they are subject to a rejection under 112(a).
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see pages 6-8, filed 3/19/2026, with respect to the rejections of claims 1-15 under 35 U.S.C. 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new grounds of rejection is made in view of 35 U.S.C. 112(a).
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.
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CONOR AIDAN. O'MALLEY
Examiner
Art Unit 2675
/CONOR A O'MALLEY/Examiner, Art Unit 2675
/ANDREW M MOYER/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2675
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