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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments received 30 March 2026, have been fully considered. Claims 1-20 are pending. Claims 1, 7, 8, 13, 16, and 18-20 have been amended.
The examiner acknowledges their mistake in objecting to claim 17 and thanks Applicant for notifying them. The examiner meant to object to claim 18, but in view of Applicant’s amendments all claim objections are withdrawn.
Applicant’s efforts to amend the claims to address rejections under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) are satisfactory; however, the amendments have introduced further issues. See 112(b) rejections below.
Applicant’s efforts to amend the claims to address rejections under 35 U.S.C. 101 are satisfactory, since all claims now positively recite implementing a real-world transformation. Therefore all 101 rejections are withdrawn.
Applicant’s arguments regarding the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 103 have been considered. The examiner agrees with Applicant’s arguments that Collins teachings are directed to a different field, that the statistical methods applied by either reference would involve different technical challenges, data, and objectives, and that the statistical methods described in Collins are not tailored to geosteering. In response, the examiner has introduced new grounds of rejection. See 102 rejections below.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claim 19 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 19 depends from claim 18 and refers to “the step of generating a state likelihood matrix”, which has no antecedent basis. Such a step is recited in claim 16, and for examination purposes it will be assumed that claim 19 should depend from claim 16.
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 1-6, 12-15, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Gee (US 20200300064 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Gee discloses a system for drilling a well (Abstract: "Systems and methods for using stratigraphic heat maps to steer a well being drilled"), the system comprising:
a processor; a memory coupled to the processor, wherein the memory comprises instructions executable by the processor (¶8: “the present disclosure includes a computer system, with the computer system comprising a processor; a memory coupled to the processor, the memory containing instructions executable by the processor”) for:
receiving first information related to a location of a bottom hole assembly (BHA) in a wellbore being drilled (¶7: "a method of geosteering a well is provided, with the method comprising taking measurements at a plurality [of] measured depths (MD) along a borehole of a subject well being drilled"; Fig. 1, bottom hole assembly (BHA) 149; call one of the measurements first information);
receiving second information related to a geological formation associated with the wellbore (¶7: “an offset well log with measurements at a plurality of stratigraphic vertical depths (SVD)” is selected ¶2: the offset wells are in the vicinity so they contain information related to the geological formation associated with the wellbore; ¶7: a plurality of offset well logs can be used: "The plurality of measurements from the multiple offset well logs may be combined into one reference log");
receiving updated information related to an updated location of the BHA in the wellbore (¶7: let this be one of the updated measurements taken at a measured depth along a borehole of the subject well, preferably the most recent measurement);
responsive to the first information, the second information, and the updated information, generating a probability matrix (¶167: Likelihood
P
(
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j
)
is a probability matrix indicating likelihood that the subject wellbore is at a particular stratigraphic depth (SVD) at a target measured depth (MD); ¶163 the stratigraphic heat maps may be involved in obtaining the likelihood; ¶162 the stratigraphic misfit heat maps rely on data logs of the well being drilled and the data logs of reference wells) comprising a plurality of probabilities (indicated at least by subscript
j
), each of the probabilities corresponding to a probability that the updated location corresponds to a location relative to the geological formation (¶167: each
j
corresponds to a likelihood of being at
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j
a stratigraphic location relative to the geological formation);
responsive to the probability matrix, determining a most likely probability of the updated location of the BHA (¶170: the most likely SVD is given by an equation involving
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(
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D
j
)
);
responsive to the most likely probability, determining if one or more drilling parameters are to be adjusted (Abstract: “Based on the use of the heat maps and the location of the wellbore relative to a target, the drill plan can be adjusted or updated and/or one or more drilling parameters or operations may be adjusted to drill the wellbore, such as to drill the wellbore to the target or to maximize the length of the wellbore within a target zone.”); and
sending one or more control signals to adjust the one or more drilling parameters determined to be adjusted (¶7: “the computer system may be coupled to one or more control systems of a drilling rig and may automatically send one or more control signals to such rig control systems to adjust one or more drilling parameters or operations”).
Regarding claim 2, Gee further discloses that the first information comprises measured depth or measurement while drilling information (¶7: the method takes “measurements at a plurality [of] measured depths (MD)”; see also Fig. 14 showing that measured depths are determined; also ¶7: "The measurements on the subject well log…may include…gamma ray intensity, azimuthal gamma, resistivity, azimuthal resistivity…[and] mechanical specific energy.").
Regarding claim 3, Gee further discloses that the second information comprises gamma log, resistivity log, or mechanical specific energy information (¶7: "The measurements on the…offset well log(s) may include…gamma ray intensity, azimuthal gamma, resistivity, azimuthal resistivity…[and] mechanical specific energy.").
Regarding claim 4, Gee further discloses that the updated information comprises measured depth, measurement while drilling information, gamma log, resistivity log, or mechanical specific energy information (¶7: the method takes “measurements at a plurality [of] measured depths (MD)” for the subject well; ¶7: "The measurements on the subject well log…may include…gamma ray intensity, azimuthal gamma, resistivity, azimuthal resistivity…[and] mechanical specific energy.").
Regarding claim 5, Gee further discloses that the second information comprises information from an offset well or from a portion of the wellbore that has already been drilled (the second information is from one or more offset wells; see rejection of claim 1).
Regarding claim 6, Gee further discloses that the instructions for generating a probability matrix comprise instructions for: assigning a probability that the updated information corresponds to each of a plurality of states (the values are probabilities that the updated information would be observed at a given SVD; see rejection of claim 1).
Regarding claim 12, Gee further discloses that the system comprises instructions for controlling drilling by a drilling rig in accordance with the one or more control signals (Gee, ¶7: in response to analysis, the system may "adjust one or more drilling parameters or operations, such as to automatically adjust drilling to drill to the target geological zone." See rejection of claim 1).
Regarding claim 13, many of the limitations of claim 13 are found in claim 1 (though different syntax is used) and are rejected for the same reasons. Note that the “information relating to a location of a bottom hole assembly (BHA)” in claim 13 can be identified with the “updated information” in claim 1. Additionally, Gee discloses advancing the wellbore by a drilling rig responsive to the determining of the BHA location having the highest probability (¶7: “the computer system may be coupled to one or more control systems of a drilling rig and may automatically send one or more control signals to such rig control systems to adjust one or more drilling parameters or operations, such as to automatically adjust drilling to drill to the target geological zone”).
Regarding claim 14, Gee further discloses that the step of generating a probability matrix comprises assigning a probability to each of a plurality of possible states (that is, SVDs), wherein each of the plurality of possible states corresponds to a possible location of the BHA relative to the geological formation (see rejection of claim 1).
Regarding claim 15, Gee further discloses that the probability matrix comprises probabilities that a given set of measurements (the updated measurements) would be observed in a given candidate state (a particular SVD; see rejection of claim 1).
Regarding claim 20, Gee further discloses that advancing the wellbore further comprises adjusting a direction of drilling or one or more drilling parameters responsive to the particular BHA location (see Abstract and rejection of claim 1, noting from ¶7 that “some or all of the steps are automatically performed by a computer system”).
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 17-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gee (US 20200300064 A1) in view of “Bayesian statistics” on Wikipedia.org, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayesian_statistics, with Wayback Machine Publication data of 14 November, 2020, having the link: https://web.archive.org/web/20201114003311/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayesian_statistics (hereinafter “Stat”).
Regarding claim 17, Gee does not explicitly disclose that the probability matrix comprises a Bayesian state space matrix or an emission matrix. However, Gee does use Bayesian methods (see ¶132-¶133, for example).
Stat teaches that Bayesian methods have seen increasing use within statistics in the 21st century, in part because of improved computing power (pg. 2, at the top).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of Stat with the invention of Gee by using Bayesian statistics for the probability matrix generation, thus making the probability matrix comprise a Bayesian state space matrix (where the “states” are SVD values). Doing so would make use of a common modern statistical framework.
Regarding claim 18, Gee in view of Stat teaches the limitations of claim 17, and Gee further discloses that the step of generating a probability matrix further comprises assigning the probability to each of the plurality of possible states (being at any of the SVDs) responsive to an obtained information relating to the location of the BHA (the updated information, which may include MD and gamma intensity, resistivity, etc. data; see rejection of claim 1) and to information relating to the geological formation (probabilities are determined by comparing the updated information to offset well log data; see rejection of claim 1).
Examiner’s Note Regarding Subject Matter Eligibility
Claims 7-11 and 16 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Regarding claim 7, Gee does not disclose applying a Viterbi algorithm to the probability matrix.
Collins teaches a statistical method for estimating an actual operational state of a machine at some time given information related to the machine as it performs operations (Abstract). As part of this method, Collins teaches applying a Viterbi algorithm (¶19: “Processing the data from the plurality of messages using the statistical process may comprise using a Viterbi Algorithm to process the data using the computational model to estimate the actual operational state of the machine of interest”). However, Collins does not apply the Viterbi algorithm to a geosteering operation, and the examiner finds that it would not have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to adopt the Viterbi algorithm of Collins to the geosteering operation of Gee. Therefore, claim 7 is distinguishable over the prior art of record.
Regarding claims 8-11, these claims depend from claim 7 and are therefore also distinguishable over the prior art of record.
Regarding claim 16, claim 16 recites applying a Viterbi algorithm to the probability matrix. Therefore, claim 16 is distinguishable over the prior art of record for the same reasons as given above regarding claim 7.
Claim 19 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Regarding claim 19, claim 19 depends from claim 16 and is therefore also distinguishable over the prior art of record.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ETHAN WESLEY EDWARDS whose telephone number is (571)272-0266. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 7:30am-5pm.
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ETHAN WESLEY EDWARDS
Examiner
Art Unit 2857
/E.W.E./Examiner, Art Unit 2857
/ANDREW SCHECHTER/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2857
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