CTNF 18/160,902 CTNF 86568 DETAILED ACTION Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114 07-42-04 AIA 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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 04/17/2026 has been entered. Drawings Previous objection is withdrawn in view of the Applicant’s amendment filed on 04/17/2026. Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 07-20-aia AIA 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. 07-21-aia AIA 4. Claim s 1, 3, 6-8, 14 and 18-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhang, “Transmission compensated primary reflection retrieval in the data domain and consequences for imaging,” Geophysics (2019) in views of Beylkin, “Discrete radon Transform,” IEEE Transaction on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing, Vol. ASSP-35 No. 2 (1987) (hereinafter Beylkin), Ravasi, WO/2017/160162 (hereinafter Ravasi), Grobbe et al., US-PGPUB 2019/0293832 (hereinafter Grobbe) and Wang, US Pat no. 5,719,822 (hereinafter Wang) Regarding Claims 1 and 14 . Zhang discloses determining an internal multiples-free seismic dataset ( Abstract ), comprising: obtaining a seismic dataset based on a seismic survey, wherein the seismic dataset comprises a plurality of space-time gathers in a space-time domain ( Introduction, seismic data; Fig. 4, 7-8, 15 ), and wherein the seismic survey uses a seismic source and a plurality of seismic receivers to detect a time-series of samples of earth motion caused by a plurality of seismic waves propagating through a subsurface ( page Q31, Examples section ), determining a first truncation operator, wherein the first truncation operator mutes samples of each trace after a first predetermined intercept time; determining a second truncation operator, wherein the second truncation operator mutes samples of each trace before a second predetermined intercept time ( Abstract, truncation in time domain after each convolution or correlation; Theory section in discussing temporal truncations, Fig. 1 ); and applying, Marchenko internal multiple attenuation on the seismic dataset using the first truncation operator and the second truncation operator to determine a second transformed seismic dataset (Abstract, internal multiple reflections are removed; Introduction section page Q28, revised Marchenko equations ), determining a seismic image of the subsurface using the internal multiples-free seismic dataset ( Examples section starting on page Q31 and the figures therein ) Zhang does not disclose transforming, by a computer processor, the seismic dataset from the space-time domain into an intercept time-ray-parameter (t-p) domain using a forward Radon transform to produce a transformed seismic dataset, transforming, by the computer processor, the second transformed seismic dataset from the t-p domain into the space-time domain using an inverse Radon transform to produce an internal multiples-free seismic dataset in the space-time domain, wherein the inverse Radon transform comprises a Hilbert transform time operator. and does not disclose performing, using a drilling system comprising a drill bit attached to a drillstring, a drilling operation through the subsurface based on the presence of hydrocarbon. Ravasi discloses using the redatumed geophysical data to decide where to drill ( page 17, lines 1-6 ) implemented using a computer ( Page 15, lines 21-24 ) and Marchenko redatuming ( page 1 ) and internal multiples ( pages 18-19 ) Grobbe discloses a drilling operation comprising a drill bit attached to a drillstring ( Abstract; Fig. 1, Paragraphs [0021], [0039], [0046] ) Beylkin discloses transforming the seismic dataset into an intercept time-ray-parameter (t-p) domain using a forward Radon transform to produce a transformed seismic dataset ( page 163, left column, sections, I and II, section VIII; Figs. 5-6; Abstract ) Wang discloses applying the inverse Radon transform to the data in radon domain, wherein the inverse radon transform comprises a Hilbert transform time operator ( Col. 7, lines 1-11, Col. 5, lines 13-67, Col. 6, lines 1-67 ) At the time of the invention filed, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to use the teaching of Ravasi, Grobbe and Beylkin in Zhang and transform, by a computer processor, the seismic dataset into an intercept time-ray-parameter (t-p) domain using a forward Radon transform to produce a transformed seismic dataset, transform, by the computer processor, the second transformed seismic dataset from the t-p domain into the space-time domain using an inverse Radon transform to produce an internal multiples-free seismic dataset in the space-time domain, wherein the inverse Radon transform comprises a Hilbert transform time operator, and perform, using a drilling system comprising a drill bit attached to a drillstring, a drilling operation through the subsurface based on the presence of hydrocarbon, with optimal computation efficiency. Regarding Claims 3 and 16 . Ravasi discloses determining, using a seismic interpretation workstation, a drilling target within a hydrocarbon reservoir based on the seismic image ( page 17, lines 1-6, usage of r e datumed geophysical data to decide where to drill) Regarding Claims 6-8 and 18-20. Beylkin discloses determining a transformed gather, wherein the transformed gather comprises a seismic trace for each of a plurality of ray-parameters, by transforming a space-time gather among the plurality of space-time gathers from a space-time domain to the t-p domain using a t- p transform, determining a muted gather by muting each trace of the transformed gather based on a first (Claims 7, 19: second) predetermined intercept time, and inverting the muted gather using an inverse t-p transform, (Claims 8, 20: wherein determining a muted gather further comprises muting at least one trace based on a ray-parameter value of the at least one trace ( pages 169-170, applying the inverse DRT to the “masked” tau-p ) 07-22-aia AIA Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhang, “Transmission compensated primary reflection retrieval in the data domain and consequences for imaging,” Geophysics (2019) in views of Beylkin, “Discrete radon Transform,” IEEE Transaction on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing, Vol. ASSP-35 No. 2 (1987), Ravasi, WO/2017/160162, Grobbe, US-PGPUB 2019/0293832 and Wang, US Pat no. 5,719,822 as applied to Claim 1 above, and further in view of Daly, US-PGPUB 2010/0157733 (hereinafter Daly) Regarding Claim 5 . The modified Zhang does not disclose the seismic dataset comprises a calibrated seismic dataset. Daly discloses a calibrated seismic dataset ( Paragraph [0018] ) At the time of the invention filed, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to use the teaching of Daly in Zhang and have a calibrated seismic dataset, so as to perform accurate seismic operation . ------------------------- ---------------------- 07-21-aia AIA Claim s 1, 3, 6-8, 14 and 18-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Dukalski et al., “Overburden-borne internal demultiple formula,” Geophysics (2022) (cited by the Applicant) (hereinafter Dukalski) in views of Beylkin, “Discrete radon Transform,” IEEE Transaction on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing, Vol. ASSP-35 No. 2 (1987), Ravasi, WO/2017/160162, Wang, US Pat no. 5,719,822 and Grobbe, US-PGPUB 2019/0293832 . Regarding Claims 1 and 14. Dukalski discloses determining an internal multiples-free seismic dataset ( Abstract ), comprising: obtaining a seismic dataset based on a seismic survey, wherein the seismic dataset comprises a plurality of space-time gathers ( page V239, “MDD versus the formula in practic e), and wherein the seismic survey uses a seismic source and a plurality of seismic receivers to detect a time-series of samples of earth motion caused by a plurality of seismic waves propagating through a subsurface ( pages V229-230, at least the section Elementary scattering relations, which discusses source/receivers ) determining, by the computer processor ( page V241, “processor”, right column, last paragraph; V242, left column, top paragraph, “processor” ), a first truncation operator, wherein the first truncation operator mutes samples of each trace after a first predetermined intercept time in a transform domain, determining, by the computer processor, a second truncation operator, wherein the second truncation operator mutes samples of each trace before a second predetermined intercept time in the transform domain ( page V239, “MDD versus the formula in practice, truncated at t=0 and t max ); and applying, by the computer processor, Marchenko internal multiple attenuation on the transformed seismic dataset using the first truncation operator and the second truncation operators to determine the internal multiples-free seismic dataset ( Abstract; Page V236, “Numerical Data Example,” section ) forming, by a computer processor, a seismic image based, at least in part, on the internal multiples-free seismic dataset ( page V236, Figures in the “Numerical Data Example,” section ). Dukalski does not disclose transforming, by a computer processor, the seismic dataset into an intercept time-ray-parameter (t-p) domain using a forward Radon transform to produce a transformed seismic dataset and does not disclose performing, transforming, by the computer processor, the second transformed seismic dataset from the t-p domain into the space-time domain using an inverse Radon transform to produce an internal multiples-free seismic dataset in the space-time domain, wherein the inverse Radon transform comprises a Hilbert transform time operator, using a drilling system comprising a drill bit attached to a drillstring, a drilling operation through the subsurface based on the presence of hydrocarbon. Ravasi discloses using the redatumed geophysical data to decide where to drill ( page 17, lines 1-6 ) implemented using a computer ( Page 15, lines 21-24 ) and Marchenko redatuming ( page 1 ) and internal multiples ( pages 18-19 ) Grobbe discloses a drilling operation comprising a drill bit attached to a drillstring ( Abstract; Fig. 1, Paragraphs [0021], [0039], [0046] ) Beylkin discloses transforming, by a computer processor, the seismic dataset into an intercept time-ray-parameter (t-p) domain using a forward Radon transform to produce a transformed seismic dataset ( page 163, left column, sections, I and II, section VIII; Figs. 5-6; Abstract ) Wang discloses applying the inverse Radon transform to the data in radon domain, wherein the inverse radon transform comprises a Hilbert transform time operator ( Col. 7, lines 1-11, Col. 5, lines 13-67, Col. 6, lines 1-67 ) At the time of the invention filed, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to use the teaching of Ravasi, Grobbe, Wang and Beylkin in Dukalski and transform, by a computer processor, the seismic dataset into an intercept time-ray-parameter (t-p) domain using a forward Radon transform to produce a transformed seismic dataset and does not disclose performing, transform, by the computer processor, the second transformed seismic dataset from the t-p domain into the space-time domain using an inverse Radon transform to produce an internal multiples-free seismic dataset in the space-time domain, wherein the inverse Radon transform comprises a Hilbert transform time operator, using a drilling system comprising a drill bit attached to a drillstring, a drilling operation through the subsurface based on the presence of hydrocarbon, with optimal computation efficiency. Regarding Claims 3 and 16 . Ravasi discloses determining, using a seismic interpretation workstation, a drilling target within a hydrocarbon reservoir based on the seismic image ( page 17, lines 1-6, usage of r e datumed geophysical data to decide where to drill) Regarding Claims 6-8 and 18-20. Beylkin discloses determining a transformed gather, wherein the transformed gather comprises a seismic trace for each of a plurality of ray-parameters, by transforming a space-time gather among the plurality of space-time gathers from a space-time domain to the t-p domain using a t-p transform, determining a muted gather by muting each trace of the transformed gather based on a first (Claims 7, 19: second) predetermined intercept time, and inverting the muted gather using an inverse t-p transform, (Claims 8, 20: wherein determining a muted gather further comprises muting at least one trace based on a ray-parameter value of the at least one trace) ( pages 169-170, applying the inverse DRT to the “masked” tau-p ) ( pages 169-170, applying the inverse DRT to the masked tau-p ) Response to Arguments Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims have been considered but are moot in view of new grounds of rejections. 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If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. /HYUN D PARK/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2857 Application/Control Number: 18/160,902 Page 2 Art Unit: 2857 Application/Control Number: 18/160,902 Page 3 Art Unit: 2857 Application/Control Number: 18/160,902 Page 4 Art Unit: 2857 Application/Control Number: 18/160,902 Page 5 Art Unit: 2857 Application/Control Number: 18/160,902 Page 6 Art Unit: 2857 Application/Control Number: 18/160,902 Page 7 Art Unit: 2857 Application/Control Number: 18/160,902 Page 8 Art Unit: 2857 Application/Control Number: 18/160,902 Page 9 Art Unit: 2857 Application/Control Number: 18/160,902 Page 10 Art Unit: 2857
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