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 § 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.
Claim(s) 12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang CN 111240082 in view of e-learning, “Internal structure of a liquid crystal or LCD TV screen” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gx-JVoOFYhs, Jan 23, 2022 hereafter e-learning.
With respect to claim 12, Wang teaches a device, comprising:
a substrate (fig 1, 3) “the liquid crystal pixel layer” (pg. 2, ¶ 9);
a pixel “liquid crystal pixel” in the substrate (pg. 2, ¶ 9);
a diffraction structure (fig 1, 63) “first grating layer” (pg. 2, ¶ 9) on the pixel, the diffraction structure including a plurality of first patterns (fig 1, 61) “transparent region” (pg. 4, ¶ 1, lines 1-3) that correspond to the plurality of pixels, a first one of the plurality of first patterns being different from the other adjacent ones (fig 1, 62) “shielding region” (pg. 4, ¶ 1, lines 1-3) of the plurality of first patterns; and
a polarization structure (fig 1) “first polarizer” (pg. 2, ¶ 9) on the diffraction structure “laminated in this order” (pg. 2, ¶ 9).
Wang does not specifically teach a plurality of pixels.
e-learning, in the same field of endeavor as Wang of LCD displays, teaches a liquid crystal layer i.e. pixels comprise a plurality of liquid crystals (fig 1). At the time prior to the effective filing date of the invention it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine a plurality of liquid crystals with Wang’s liquid crystal layer to create various shades of color in order to generate an image.
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Pertinent Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. CN 110546763, CN 111240082, & Kiyotaka Sasagawa, “Polarization Image Sensor for Highly Sensitive Polarization Modulation Imaging Based on Stacked Polarizers” 6, JUNE 2022.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-11 & 20-25 are allowed. Claims 13 & 14 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims or to include the limitation(s) and any intervening claims into the base claim. The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
As to claim 1, the prior art of record, taken alone or in combination, fails to disclose or render obvious “a polarimetric image sensor in and on a semiconductor substrate, the sensor including a plurality of pixels, each pixel including:
a photosensitive region in the semiconductor substrate; a diffraction structure on an illumination surface of the photosensitive region, the diffraction structure including a first pattern; and a polarization structure the diffraction structure opposite to the photosensitive region, the polarization structure including a second pattern that is different than the first pattern”, in combination with the rest of the limitations of claim 1.
As to claim 13, the prior art of record, taken alone or in combination, fails to disclose or render obvious “wherein the polarization structure includes a plurality of second patterns, the plurality of first patterns being different from the plurality of second patterns”, in combination with the rest of the limitations of claim 13.
As to claim 20, the prior art of record, taken alone or in combination, fails to disclose or render obvious “a photosensitive region in the silicon substrate, comprising a photodetection element; a diffraction structure on an illumination surface of the photosensitive region, the diffraction structure including a first pattern; and
a polarization structure on the diffraction structure opposite to the photosensitive region, the polarization structure including a second pattern that is different than the first pattern, wherein the plurality of pixels comprises at least first and second pixels adapted to measuring radiations according respectively to first and second distinct polarizations
”, in combination with the rest of the limitations of claim 20.
Conclusion
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/MAURICE C SMITH/Examiner, Art Unit 2877