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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 03 February 2026 has been entered.
Status of the Claims
This office action is in response to Applicant’s amendment filed on 08 January 2026:
Claims 1-5 and 10-14 are pending
Claim 1 is amended
Claims 6-9 are cancelled
Response to Amendment
Applicant's amendments to the claims filed 08 January 2026 have been acknowledged.
The rejection to Claims 8-9 under 35 U.S.C. 103 is withdrawn due to cancellation of the claims.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments filed 08 January 2026, with respect to the rejection of Claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive.
On Pages 5-7 of Applicant’s Remarks, Applicant has amended Claim 1 to the limitation “wherein the second surface is attached to the fourth surface such that the first heating element is arranged between the first substrate and the second substrate” which was not previously examined as it was an optional limitation. Applicant argues that Wang and other prior art references of record do not disclose this limitation which is now no longer optional.
Examiner agrees and therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Huang et al (Publication No. US20220132930A1).
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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1, 3-5, 10-12 and 13-14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang et al (Publication No. WO2020108258A1, see Publication No. US12213523B2 for English translation) and Huang et al (Publication No. US20220132930A1).
Regarding Claim 1, Wang discloses a vaporization core (i.e., atomization assembly) for heating and vaporizing an aerosol-generation substrate (i.e., cigarette liquid) (Figs. 1-3; Col. 4, Lines 33-39), comprising:
a first substrate (Porous body 10) comprising a first surface (Liquid absorption surface 11) and a second surface (Atomization surface 12) opposite the first surface (see Fig. 2; Col. 4, Lines 47-50);
the first surface being provided with a first microgroove array (Grooves 30a/b) (Figs. 4-6; Col. 6, Lines 59-66; discloses that the grooves can either penetrate walls as shown by grooves 30a or not penetrate as shown by grooves 30b; there are a plurality of grooves shown which are considered equivalent to an array);
the first microgroove array comprising a plurality of first microgrooves (Figs. 2, 4-6; Col. 6, Lines 59-66; figures show a plurality of grooves; grooves 30 and 30a/b are considered equivalent to each other);
the plurality of first microgrooves being configured to guide a flowing of an aerosol-generation substrate (i.e., cigarette liquid) (Col. 6, Lines 59-66; Col. 7, Lines 1-3; disclosed that grooves are designed to accelerate liquid conduction, which implies it guides the flow of liquid);
the first substrate comprising aluminum oxide (Col. 7, Lines 30-33);
and a first heating element (20) arranged on the second surface (12) (Figs. 1-2; Col. 4, Lines 55-59);
and configured to heat the first substrate to vaporize the aerosol-generation substrate in the plurality of first microgrooves (Col. 7, Lines 4-11 and 58-67; discloses that the grooves store and guide liquid to the atomization surface which heats said liquid).
Wang further discloses that the heating element may be embedded inside the first substrate (10) through direct sintering or a side assembling slot (Col. 7, Lines 58-65).
Wang does not explicitly disclose the following:
a second substrate that is stacked with the first substrate
second substrate comprising a third surface and a fourth surface opposite the third surface;
the second surface is attached to the fourth surface such that the first heating element is arranged between the first substrate and the second substrate;
the third surface being provided with a second microgroove array, the second microgroove array comprising a plurality of second microgrooves.
Regarding (I-III), Huang, directed to an atomization assembly, discloses a porous matrix (i.e., substrate body) for conducting cigarette liquid and a heating layer/element for heating and atomizing the cigarette liquid (Abstract). The atomizing assembly can be manufactured by forming two matrix units (i.e., a first and second substrate) and sandwiching the heating layer/element between the two matrix units (Fig. 10; [0064]; the disclosed process produces an assembly similar to Wang’s singular porous body with slotted heating element). The resulting assembly provides more contact area between the matrix and heating layer for better atomization results, while also have a simple manufacturing process for higher production and quality consistency [0027].
Though Huang does not specify a first, second, third and fourth surface, one ordinarily skilled can easily designate the second and fourth surfaces as the surfaces of the first and second substrate units that face the heating layer/element, wherein the first and third surfaces are outer surfaces of the first and second substrate units that face away from the heating layer/element. This would align with Wang’s (first) substrate, wherein the first surface is the atomization surface opposite the heating element, and the second surface wherein the heating element is facing/disposed on (see rejection above for element mapping).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinarily skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify the atomization assembly disclosed by Wang to embed a heating element by constructing an additional second substrate and disposing the heating element between the first and second substrates by sandwiching said heating element between the second and fourth surfaces of the first and second substrates respectively (i.e., inner surfaces of the substrates) as disclosed by Huang, as both are directed to an atomizing assembly with an embedded heating element layer, where Wang teaches the advantage of using two substrates to construct the assembly so that the manufacturing process is simplified and consistent in producing an assembly with high contact area for better atomization results [0027].
Regarding (IV), it should be noted that Wang discloses the blind holes/grooves extend along the absorption surface of the porous body towards the atomization surface to increase the contact and absorption efficiency of the cigarette liquid (Col. 4, Lines 60-67; Col. 5, Lines 1-9).
In the case of Modified Wang, the second substrate is also a porous body like the first substrate, wherein one ordinarily skilled in the art can recognize the substrate’s third surface to be equivalent to the first substrate’s first surface as they are both facing outwards, opposite to the heating element, and can absorb cigarette liquid. Since the first surface incorporates holes/grooves to improve absorption towards the heating element, one ordinarily skilled in the art would find it obvious that a similar set of grooves can be added to the second substrate’s third surface, and reasonably expect that said grooves will help the second substrate improve liquid absorption and guide liquid from the third surface to the fourth surface wherein the heating element is adjacently disposed to.
Regarding Claim 3, Wang further discloses a cross section of each first microgroove of the plurality of first microgrooves is V-shaped (see annotated Fig. 6; grooves are shown to be angled such that it has a V-shape).
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Regarding Claim 4, Wang further discloses each first microgroove of the plurality of first microgrooves comprises a blind groove (see Figs. 5-6; grooves are shown to not extend through the entire substrate, which is considered equivalent to being a blind groove).
Regarding Claim 5, Wang further discloses the first heating element is configured to generate a temperature field when heating the first substrate (Fig. 7; Col. 5, Lines 59-67; Col. 6, Lines 1-5; discloses that the heating element has different heating regions with varying heating concentration; the varying heating concentration is considered equivalent to a temperature field);
and first microgrooves of the plurality of first microgrooves with different densities are provided corresponding to different temperature areas (Fig. 7; Col. 5, Lines 59-67; Col. 6, Lines 1-5 and 59-67; Col. 7, Lines 12-19; discloses that the holes have varying densities that corresponds with the different heating/temperature regions A/B; discloses that the holes can be exchanged for grooves with varying density and therefore are considered equivalent).
Regarding Claim 10, Wang further discloses the first surface comprises a first area (A) and a second area (B) adjacent to the first area (see Fig. 7; Col. 5, Lines 59-67; Col. 6, Lines 1-5);
the second surface comprises a third area corresponding to the first area, and the first heating element is arranged and covered only on the third area (Figs. 7, 10; Col. 6, Lines 1-5; discloses that first area is opposite of the heating element which implies the second surface area which has the heating element is equivalent to a third area corresponding to the first area).
Wang discloses holes and does not explicitly disclose the first microgrooves extend from the first area (A) to the second area (B). However, Wang does note that the hole structures can be replaced with groove structures (see Fig. 6; Col. 5, Lines 59-67).
Therefore, one ordinarily skilled in the art would be motivated by Wang’s disclosure to replace the holes with a plurality of microgrooves such that said microgrooves extend from the first area to the second area, with a reasonable expectation that the resulting substrate will still be capable of guiding and heating an aerosolizing liquid via the microgrooves and heating elements.
Regarding Claim 11, Wang further discloses an electronic cigarette atomizer (Fig. 15; Col. 9, Lines 40-42; the atomizer is considered equivalent to a vaporization assembly). The atomizer comprises a liquid storage cavity (Fig. 15; Col. 9, Lines 51-54; Liquid storage chamber 120) and the vaporization core (Atomization assembly 200) of Claim 1 (see Claim 1 rejection; Fig. 15; Col. 10, Lines 1-8; discloses that the core/assembly uses the assembly previously disclosed in Fig. 2).
Regarding Claim 12, Wang further discloses wherein the plurality of first microgrooves (30) are parallel to each other and provided at intervals (see Fig. 5; grooves are shown to be parallel and at intervals relative to each other);
wherein the liquid storage cavity (120) comprises a first liquid storage chamber and a second liquid storage chamber provided at intervals on two ends of the plurality of first microgrooves (see annotated Fig. 15; Col. 9, Lines 40-54; liquid storage chamber is shown to be split into two parts/chambers provided on opposite sides with a partition/interval for the smoke passage 110);
and the aerosol-generation substrate in the first liquid storage chamber and the second liquid storage chamber is configured to diffuse from two ends to a middle part of the plurality of first microgrooves (see Fig. 15; Col. 10; Lines 21-39; Liquid flows in the direction shown by R1 which illustrates said liquid flowing from the two outer ends towards the center/middle part of the substrate and subsequently the middle of the microgrooves);
and wherein the first heating element (20) is arranged at a position on the second surface corresponding to the middle part of the plurality of first microgrooves (see Figs. 1-2; the heating element is shown to be centered on the second surface, which corresponds with the center of the first surface where the grooves are located).
Regarding Claim 13, Wang discloses the plurality of first microgrooves (30a) extend from a center of the plurality of first microgrooves to a periphery of the plurality of first microgrooves (see Fig. 4; the microgrooves are shown to be in an array where each groove radiates outwards from the center of the groove array, to a periphery of said array).
Wang does not disclose the following;
the liquid storage cavity is provided corresponding to the center;
and the aerosol-generation substrate in the liquid storage cavity is configured to diffuse from the center to the periphery along the plurality of first microgrooves;
and wherein the first heating element is arranged on the second surface around the liquid storage cavity.
Regarding (I-III), it should be noted rearrangement of parts without modifying the operation of the device is held to be an obvious matter of design choice that gives predictable results (see MPEP § 2144.04.VI.C). For example, Chen, directed to an electronic cigarette device (i.e., vaporization assembly) discloses a liquid reservoir (130) and heating tube (120) with grooves (129) on an inner surface (i.e., substrate), wherein said tube substrate wraps around the liquid reservoir such that the reservoir corresponds to the center of the tube substrate (see Figs. 8-9; [0058-0059]; embodiments are disclosed to be equivalent; grooves assist with liquid contact which is considered equivalent to guiding liquid).
Furthermore, Wang states that the liquid conduction hole and atomization assembly can be reshaped according to the needs of different atomizer products (Col. 10, Lines 40-48). As such, one ordinarily skilled in the art could reasonably reshape Wang’s porous member and liquid cavity in a similar manner as that disclosed by Chen so that the cavity would be centered in the porous member with the grooves facing towards the center extending outwards to the periphery and the heating element wraps around said liquid storage cavity (i.e., the structure disclosed by Wang in Figs. 11-12 is inverted; the grooves face the liquid cavity in the center which implies that the liquid will diffuse from the inner center outwards via the grooves).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinarily skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to rearrange the liquid cavity and cylindrical hollow substrate (i.e., porous body) disclosed by Wang such that the liquid cavity is centered and the substrate wraps as disclosed by Chen, as both are directed to an electronic vaporizing device, where one ordinarily skilled in the art could reasonable rearrange Wang’s substrate and liquid cavity to be centered in relation to each other as disclosed in Chen’s alternate embodiment, and predictably yield a substrate with a heating element wrapped around a liquid cavity, that is capable of diffusing liquid from the center to the periphery via grooves.
Regarding Claim 14, Wang further discloses an electronic cigarette atomizer (Fig. 15; Col. 9, Lines 40-42; the atomizer is considered equivalent to a vaporization assembly). The atomizer comprises a power supply (66) (Fig. 1; Col. 2, Lines 39-46) and the vaporization core (Atomization assembly 200) of Claim 1 (see Claim 1 rejection; Fig. 15; Col. 10, Lines 1-8; discloses that the core/assembly uses the assembly previously disclosed in Fig. 2).
Claim 2 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang et al (Publication No. US12213523B2) in view of Huang et al (Publication No. US20220132930A1) as applied to Claim 1 above, and further in view of Flickinger et al (Publication No. US20120152238A1).
Regarding Claim 2, Wang further discloses that the width of each first microgroove is between 50 to 500 um (Col. 2, Lines 25-26; 0.05 to 0.5 mm). The claimed range for groove width (i.e., less than 0.3 mm) overlap with the range disclosed by Wang and are therefore considered prima facie obvious (see MPEP § 2144.05.I).
Wang further discloses that the depth of each first microgroove is less than 0.8 times of a distance from the electronic cigarette liquid absorption surface to the atomization surface. Wang does not explicitly disclose that the width is less than 0.3 mm.
However, Flickinger, directed to a nebulizing device, discloses a base (i.e., substrate) with grooves (226) that help regulate the flow of fluid (i.e., guide flowing aerosol-generating substrate) (Fig. 9b; [0094]). The grooves have a depth ranging from 0.127 to about 3.81 mm ([0094]; disclosed depth overlaps with the claimed depth of the application).
The claimed range for groove depth overlap with the range disclosed by Flickinger, and are therefore considered prima facie obvious (see MPEP § 2144.05.I); this also involves applying a known teaching of a groove depth for a base/substrate for guiding fluid as disclosed by Flickinger, to a similar nebulizing/aerosol-generating device disclosed by Wang to yield predictable results.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Chen (Publication No. US20220287156A1) – Atomizing assembly comprising porous member and heating element. The heating element is disposed within the porous assembly which absorbs and conducts liquid to the heating element.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Vu P Pham whose telephone number is (703)756-4515. The examiner can normally be reached M-Th (7:30AM-4:00PM EST).
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/V.P./Examiner, Art Unit 1755 /PHILIP Y LOUIE/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 1755
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