DETAILED ACTION
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 3/31/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Regarding Applicant’s argument that the amendments overcome the 35 U.S.C. 112(b) rejections (response pages 9-11), Examiner agrees and the rejections are withdrawn.
Regarding Applicant’s argument that the references Law and Faragher ‘347 cannot be properly combined because Examiner does not point to any motivation in either of the references why one skilled in the art would attempt to combine a system and method for locating signal jammers (as taught in Law) with a system for determining a physical metric of a receiver, such as position (as taught in Faragher ‘347), to attempt to teach the invention of the Applicant’s claims, that “hindsight” should be inferred as the reasoning for combining the references, and that Examiner appeared to pick random references that have no motivation or reason to combine, (response page 11 through first full paragraph of page 12), Examiner respectfully disagrees. Motivation to combine Law and Faragher was provided on page 11 of the non-final rejection:
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Regarding Applicant’s argument that Examiner’s explanation is inadequate and unsupported by evidence at least because Faragher ‘347 does not teach the determination of a direction of arrival, but instead teaches in para. [0077] that a determination can be made whether a reflected component is actually received in the candidate direction (paragraph bridging pages 12-13 of response), Examiner respectfully disagrees with Applicant’s interpretation. The relevant portion of the rejection is, from pages 10-11 of the rejection:
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Examiner maintains that Faragher ’347 para. [0017] “a brute force search can be performed in all possible directions in order to identify the direction from which a ... signal is received” meets the claimed “determining a direction of arrival”.
Regarding Applicant’s argument that Faragher ‘347 para. [0012] does not teach or suggest determining a direction of arrival (response page 13, first full paragraph), para. [0012] teaches that direct signals have higher processing gain, which is relevant to determining which directions of arrival correspond to a direct signal. One of ordinary skill would recognize that directions of arrival of direct signals would be preferred for locating Law’s emitter.
Regarding Applicant’s argument that Law does not teach determining a location of the at least one emitter using the direction of arrival, but instead determines angle of arrival, and that “the phrase “Direction of Arrival (DOA) is defined as a technical, computed angle of incident signal waves (radio, sound) on a sensor array, whereas “simple direction”, such as angle of arrival, is a general, scalar orientation (e.g., North, left). DOA requires processing phases or time delays to localize sources, while simple direction is just a pointing vector” (response page 14 through first 5 lines of page 16), Examiner respectfully disagrees that the terms “direction of arrival” and “angle of arrival” can be distinguished in this way. If Applicant wishes the claims to be limited to determining direction/angle using a sensor array and phases or time delays, Examiner recommends amending the claims to recite these elements.
Regarding Applicant’s argument that Faragher paras. [0077] and [0017] do not teach or suggest determining a direction of arrival for the at least one received signal using the at least one motion compensated correlation result, but instead teaches that using motion compensated correlation, it can be determined whether a reflected component is received (response page 16 first and second full paragraphs), Examiner respectfully disagrees. The relevant portion of the rejection is, from pages 10-11 of the rejection:
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Examiner maintains that Faragher ’347 para. [0017] “a brute force search can be performed in all possible directions in order to identify the direction from which a ... signal is received” meets the claimed “determining a direction of arrival”. Examiner agrees that paras. [0017] and [0077] also discuss identifying reception of reflected components, as does para. [0012] “the processing gain for direct signals can be higher than the gain provided for signals received in other directions”. However, Examiner notes that Faragher ‘347 has been relied upon as evidence that the claimed method of determining signal direction of arrival is known, regardless of whether the signals are direct or reflected.
Regarding Applicant’s argument that Law and Faragher ‘347 fail to teach or suggest “determining a direction of arrival...” and “determining a location of the at least one emitter...” as recited in claim 1 and likewise, in independent claims 8 and 15 (response pages 17-18), Examiner respectfully disagrees, for the reasons discussed above.
Regarding Applicant’s argument that Alexander, cited in the 103 rejections of claims 3, 4, 10, 11, 17, and 18, fails to cure the alleged deficiencies (response pages 18-19), Alexander has not been relied upon to teach the features in question.
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.
Claims 1, 2, 5-9, 12-16, 19, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Law (US 8446310 B2) in view of Faragher (US 20200319347 A1, cited on IDS).
Regarding claim 1, Law teaches [NOTE: limitations not taught by Law are lined through; language added by amendment is underlined] a method for determining a legitimacy of at least one emitter (104b, Fig. 1), comprising:
receiving at least one signal (103b, Fig. 1) from the at least one emitter (104b, Fig. 1) at a respective antenna of at least one receiver (monitor system 102, Fig. 1; 3:30-31 “each monitor system 102 may include one or more directional antennas”);
determining a motion of the respective antenna of the at least one receiver that received the at least one signal from the at least one emitter (3:42 “Each monitor system 102 may be mobile” and 10:23-24 “%Location information for mobile monitor systems 102” indicate that motion of mobile receivers, including their respective antennas, is determined);
determining a direction of arrival for the at least one received signal (“ANGLE OF ARRIVAL DATA” 300, Fig. 2B)
determining a location of the at least one emitter using the direction of arrival of the at least one received signal and a known location of the at least one receiver (“ESTIMATE SOURCE LOCATION” 212, Fig. 2B uses “ANGLE OF ARRIVAL DATA” 300, Fig. 2B and known locations as per 9:60-61 “information related to the location of each monitor system 102” and 10:23-24 “%Location information for mobile monitor systems 102”);
and determining the legitimacy for the at least one emitter based on the determined location of the at least one emitter and received information regarding locations of legitimate emitters (8:20-28 “Act 214 includes calculating a probability for each located source 104 that the source 104 is a jammer. According to one embodiment, the probability may be calculated at least in part by comparing the estimated location of each source 104 to the locations of sources 104 that may be transmitting expected signals 103. The probability that a particular source 104 is a jammer may be greater, for example, if the source 104 is estimated located at a position removed from locations where service-enabling signals 103 are typically transmitted”).
Law further broadly teaches determining signal characteristics, including direction of arrival data, using “one or more directional antennas, transmitters, receivers, power detectors, frequency detectors, processors, memory, interfaces, inputs, outputs, data storage devices, any combination of the preceding, and/or any other machines or apparatus capable of detecting electromagnetic signals 103 and determining one or more characteristics of each signal 103” (3:30-37). Law does not provide any further details.
Law does not teach:
using the determined antenna motion, performing motion compensated correlation on the at least one received signal to generate at least one motion compensated correlation result; and
determining a direction of arrival for the at least one received signal using the at least one motion compensated correlation result.
Faragher, in analogous art (para. [0007] “identify counterfeit signals when a signal is received in a direction that would not be possible from a trusted source”) teaches:
receiving at least one signal from the at least one emitter at a respective antenna of at least one receiver (S100, Fig. 21);
determining a motion of the respective antenna of the at least one receiver that received the at least one signal from the at least one emitter (S104, Fig. 21);
using the determined antenna motion, performing motion compensated correlation on the at least one received signal (S110, S112 Fig. 21) to generate at least one motion compensated correlation result (the output of step S112 is the result); and
determining a direction of arrival for the at least one received signal using the at least one motion compensated correlation result (S114-S117, Fig. 21; para. [0077] “the determination of a motion compensated correlation signal with a high signal-to-noise ratio strongly supports the presence of a received signal in the candidate direction”; para. [0017] “the plurality of directions may be distributed across all possible directions in which signals can be received at the receiver. In this way, a brute force search can be performed in all possible directions in order to identify the direction from which a ... signal is received. A correlation signal with a large signal strength will be determined when motion compensation is applied in the direction of a ... signal”; para. [0012] “the processing gain for direct signals can be higher than the gain provided for signals received in other directions”).
It would have been obvious to modify Law by implementing the determination of direction of arrival according to Faragher because the methods broadly taught by Law at 3:30-37 must be implemented somehow, and Faragher’s method could be used with predictable results and the advantage of providing further information regarding signal legitimacy as per Faragher para. [0007] “identify counterfeit signals when a signal is received in a direction that would not be possible from a trusted source”. This is a matter of applying a known technique to a known device ready for improvement to yield predictable results, an exemplary rationale that supports a conclusion of obviousness, see KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc.
Regarding claim 8, in addition to what has already been discussed with respect to claim 1, Law teaches at least one processor and at least one memory (3:30-37 “processors, memory”), and “at least one receiver comprising a respective antenna” (monitor system 102, Fig. 1 in view of 3:30-32 “each monitor system 102 may include one or more directional antennas... receivers”).
Regarding claim 15, in addition to what has already been discussed with respect to claim 1, Law teaches a system comprising at least one receiver comprising a respective antenna (3:30-31); a motion module (3:66-67 “each monitor system 102 may include a GPS receiver”); at least one emitter (104b, Fig. 1); and an apparatus comprising at least one memory and at least one processor (3:30-37 “processors, memory”).
Regarding claims 2, 9, and 16, Law teaches performing an action to affect a reception of signals from the at least one emitter at the at least one receiver based on the determined legitimacy of the at least one emitter (20:23-39, esp “As the RQ-4 Global Hawk navigates toward a source 104 transmitting jamming or interfering signals 103, one or more internal processors may continually determine whether the current trajectory of the RQ-4 Global Hawk results in the greatest Doppler-shift increase in frequency of signal 103. An output may be generated that corrects the navigation path accordingly. In this manner, the RQ-4 Global Hawk and/or any munitions that it may deploy may be continually directed toward the source 104 transmitting jamming or interfering signals even if the source 104 is itself mobile”).
Regarding claims 5 and 12, as best understood, Law teaches wherein the determination of the legitimacy for the at least one emitter is further based on at least one characteristic of (1) at least one of the at least one signal from the at least one emitter received at the respective antenna of the at least one receiver or (2) the at least one emitter (300, 400, 500, 600, Fig. 2B).
Regarding claims 6, 13, and 19, Law teaches wherein the at least one characteristic comprises at least one of a signal type of the at least one signal (600, Fig. 2B), an angle of arrival of the at least one signal (300, Fig. 2B), or positional information of the at least one emitter (212, Fig. 2B).
Regarding claims 7, 14, and 20, as best understood, Faragher teaches wherein performing motion compensated correlation comprises:
correlating at least one local signal with the at least one signal from the at least one emitter to generate at least one respective correlation result (para. [0006] “provide a correlation signal by correlating the local signal with the received signal”);
generating a plurality of phasor sequences, where each phasor sequence represents a hypothesis comprising a sequence of signal phases related to a relative direction of motion of the relative antenna of the at least one receiver (para. [0033] “the plurality of vectors may be a sequence of phase vectors, or phasors which are 2D phase vectors indicative of amplitude and phase changes introduced into the received signal by the measured or assumed movement of the receiver”; paras. [0097]-[0101] ”phasor sequence”);
compensating at least one phase of at least one of the local signal, the at least one signal of the at least one emitter or the at least one correlation result, based on the generated plurality of phasor sequences, to determine at least one phase-compensated correlation result (para. [0033] “The plurality of vectors may be combined with the at least one of the local signal, the received signal and the correlation signal in the motion compensation device to provide relative motion compensation between the local and received signals”;
applying the determined at least one phased compensated correlation result to adjust a component of antenna motion to perform the at least one motion compensated correlation (para. [0235] “The correlator 310 performs motion-compensated correlation of the digital signal 222 using the transferred motion-compensated correlation sequence 322 to produce correlation result 312”); and
identifying a phasor sequence in the plurality of phasor sequences that optimizes the at least one motion compensated correlation result (para. [0017] “identify the direction from which a reflected signal is received”; para. [0073] “A higher signal-to-noise ratio is achieved for the line-of-sight signal 21 when motion compensation is performed in the direction in which the signal is received”).
It would have been obvious to further modify Law according to Faragher as claimed for the same reasons discussed above with respect to claims 1, 8, and 15.
Claims 3, 4, 10, 11, 17, and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Law (US 8446310 B2) in view of Faragher (US 20200319347 A1, cited on IDS) as applied to claims 1, 8, and 15, and further in view of Alexander (US 10024973 B1).
Further regarding claims 3, 4, 10, 11, 17, and 18, Law does not teach the claimed performed actions when the at least one emitter is determined to be legitimate or illegitimate.
However at least the actions “adjusting an antenna pattern of the respective antenna of the at least one receiver to increase a reception quality of the signals from the at least one emitter at the least one receiver” when the at least one emitter is determined to be legitimate and “adjusting an antenna pattern of the respective antenna of the at least one receiver to decrease a reception quality of the signals from the at least one emitter at the least one receiver” when the at least one emitter is determined to be illegitimate are well-known in the art.
For example, Alexander teaches adjusting an antenna pattern to null out signals from directions corresponding to illegitimate emitters (abstract “A direction from which a spoofing attack occurs is identified. A beamformer can control an antenna pattern of a CRPA to null out signals from that direction”), where nulling corresponds to decreased signal reception quality. Alexander further teaches adjusting an antenna pattern to increase a reception quality when spoofers disappear by removing a null (10:17-21 “The antenna pattern can by dynamically changed over time to account for ... disappearance of previously-observed spoofers”), where disappearance of a spoofer corresponds to increased signal reception quality.
It would have been obvious to further modify Law according to Alexander in order to maintain signal quality at the GPS receiver of Law’s monitor system 102 (Law 3:66-67; 9:7-11).
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to CASSI J GALT whose telephone number is (571)270-1469. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday, 9AM - 5PM EST.
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/CASSI J GALT/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3648
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