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 .
DETAILED ACTION
The following FINAL Office Action is in response to Applicant’s reply dated 10/06/2025.
Status of Claims
Applicant amended claims 1, 14, 27, and 37. Claims 1-49 are currently pending and have been rejected as follows.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to 35 U.S.C 101 are fully considered but unpersuasive. A revised rejection is set forth below addressing the amendments to the claims.
The claimed processes/computer instructions operate on signals representing specific limited, tangible physical phenomena.
Applicant argues that the amended claims recite a specific type of data obtained by specific apparatus deployed in a specific locations and therefore the claims are tied to a specific machine or apparatus such that they are more than mere extra solution activity (Remarks P. 15). This argument is unpersuasive. What the data represents, e.g. “seismic signals”, is merely descriptive of the field of use and does not make the calculations claimed any less abstract. Furthermore, the gathering of this data/signals is necessary in order to perform the abstract calculations, e.g. MPEP 2106.05(g): “(3) Whether the limitation amounts to necessary data gathering and outputting, (i.e., all uses of the recited judicial exception require such data gathering or data output). See Mayo, 566 U.S. at 79, 101 USPQ2d at 1968; OIP Techs., Inc. v. Amazon.com, Inc., 788 F.3d 1359, 1363, 115 USPQ2d 1090, 1092-93 (Fed. Cir. 2015) (presenting offers and gathering statistics amounted to mere data gathering).”
Examiner respectfully disagrees with Applicant’s assertion that the claims recite “a specific apparatus or machine”. It is unclear from Applicant’s argument which element in the claims they consider a “specific apparatus or machine”. However, it is found that the claims merely recite a generic “computer” and “seismic sensors”, neither of which rise to the level of a particular machine (see considerations in MPEP 2106.05(b)). For example, a “seismic sensor” could be any device capable of sensing a seismic related parameter and is not described in any detail as to the particular type of sensor or its structure or configuration such that it could be particularly identified. Instead, the claims recite this element generally as is well known in the art, e.g. Specification: [0005]. Furthermore, the location of the sensors in “a body of water” does nothing more than describe the environment in which the data is gathered and the field of use. Applicant’s specification makes clear that deploying sensors, receivers, or detectors in a body of water for seismic exploration is conventional in the field [0005]. Therefore, these elements are found to be insignificant extra-solution activity and insufficient to integrate into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea.
The output of the process is a representation of a specific tangible physical phenomenon.
Applicant argues that the “output” represents a tangible physical phenomenon and thus “the estimated noise may be of practical value in and of itself, such as determining the presence of turbulence and/or vibrations proximate the seismic sensors” (Remarks P. 16). This argument is unpersuasive. What the intangible data values represent does not make the claimed analysis and calculations any less abstract, at most it attempts to limit the abstract idea to a particular field of use. Furthermore, the “tangible physical phenomenon” to which Applicant refers is not tangible at all but instead is merely signals which are a result of natural phenomenon associated with the water (turbulence, vibrations). Such transitory signals and natural phenomenon do not render a claim any less abstract or amount to a practical application. For example, a formula describing certain electromagnetic standing wave phenomena was still found to recite an abstract idea, Mackay Radio & Tel. Co. v. Radio Corp. of America, 306 U.S. 86, 91, 40 USPQ 199, 201 (1939).
The estimation of noise is part of the abstract idea and the “practical value” of a judicial exception does not render the claim eligible under the two-part framework. See MPEP 2106: “Likewise, eligibility should not be evaluated based on whether the claim recites a "useful, concrete, and tangible result," State Street Bank, 149 F.3d 1368, 1374, 47 USPQ2d 1596, 1602 (Fed. Cir. 1998) (quoting In re Alappat, 33 F.3d 1526, 1544, 31 USPQ2d 1545, 1557 (Fed. Cir. 1994)), as this test has been superseded.” See also MPEP 2106.04(b): “Nor can one patent "a novel and useful mathematical formula," Parker v. Flook, 437 U.S. 584, 585, 198 USPQ 193, 195 (1978)”.
Under Step 2A Prong 2 of the eligibility framework, the question is whether the additional elements (those elements beyond the abstract idea) in the claim provide a practical application. The considerations for whether a claim integrates the abstract idea into a practical application include: improvements to technology, particular machine, particular transformation, and other meaningful limits on the abstract idea beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment. In the instant case, the additional elements do not integrate into a practical application, e.g. the “outputting” of the estimated noise by a computer is simply the use of a general purpose computer as a tool to apply the abstract idea. See rejection for further detail.
3. The methods recited cannot be practically performed in the human mind.
The Applicant respectfully submits that “under their broadest reasonable interpretation, the instructions operable to cause a processor to determine landmarks and/or the various methods recited in claims 1, 14, 27 and 37 require a degree of complexity and specificity that significantly exceeds what can practically be performed in the human mind” specifically “Thus, for each signal recording, the seismic signals are represented by several thousand number pairs; to perform the matrix calculations recited in each of the foregoing claims may therefore require millions of calculations; the foregoing would necessarily apply to each and every seismic sensor.” (Remarks P. 16-17). This argument is unpersuasive.
First, the claims clearly recite mathematical concepts and therefore recite an abstract idea falling within at least one of the categories of abstract ideas. Furthermore, the recited mathematical concepts include calculations capable of being performed mentally with the aid of pen and paper. For example, the claims recite a sparsity promoting transformation such as a Fourier transform, matrix transformations/calculations, and solving a constrained optimization problem. Although such calculations may be complex1 and time consuming this does not preclude the mental nature of the calculations themselves and “The courts do not distinguish between mental processes that are performed entirely in the human mind and mental processes that require a human to use a physical aid (e.g., pen and paper or a slide rule) to perform the claim limitation. See, e.g., Benson, 409 U.S. at 67, 65, 175 USPQ at 674-75, 674 (noting that the claimed "conversion of [binary-coded decimal] numerals to pure binary numerals can be done mentally," i.e., "as a person would do it by head and hand.")” MPEP 2106.04(a)(2)(III).
4. The claimed process/computer instructions are drawn to a limited, practical application
Applicant asserts that “Claims 1, 14, 27 and 37 recites instructions for or processes for providing an output, based on measured seismic data input, an output that represents noise that can corrput the particle motion signal data. Even assuming that all other limitations of the claims recite an unpatentable abstract idea, the Applicant respectfully submits that this output integrates that idea into a limited, practical application amounting to significantly more than an abstract idea.” (Remarks P. 17). This argument is unpersuasive.
Merely outputting the results of a calculation that is otherwise abstract does not integrate the claims into a practical application. In the instant case, the computer “outputting” an estimate of the noise, which is determined through mathematical calculations (e.g. see the equations described in the specification, also [0050]: “N, which represents the noise component”, [0064]) and thus part of the abstract idea itself, is at most necessary data outputting, i.e. all uses of the recited mathematical calculations require the calculated result (estimated noise) to be “output”. The claims do not describe any means of “outputting” beyond the recited judicial exception and a general purpose “computer” used as a tool to perform the calculations that are otherwise abstract. Noting MPEP 2106.05(g): “When determining whether an additional element is insignificant extra-solution activity, examiners may consider the following: (3) Whether the limitation amounts to necessary data gathering and outputting, (i.e., all uses of the recited judicial exception require such data gathering or data output). See Mayo, 566 U.S. at 79, 101 USPQ2d at 1968; OIP Techs., Inc. v. Amazon.com, Inc., 788 F.3d 1359, 1363, 115 USPQ2d 1090, 1092-93 (Fed. Cir. 2015)”.
For at least these reasons, Applicant’s arguments are unpersuasive and the 35 U.S.C. 101 rejection is maintained.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-49 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception without significantly more. A subject matter eligibility analysis is set forth below. See MPEP 2106.
Specifically, representative Claim 1 recites:
A method for estimating noise in particle motion seismic sensor recordings resulting from at least one of unwanted vibrations, turbulence in a water column and/or interface waves back-scattered from shallow heterogeneities, the method comprising:
sending as input to a computer seismic signals comprising pressure related signals and particle motion related signals detected by seismic sensors at spaced apart locations with reference to position of a seismic energy source deployed in a body of water partly in response to actuation of the seismic energy source and partly in response to noise comprising vibrations and turbulence in the body of water;
in the computer, applying a sparsity promoting transformation to the input seismic signals;
in the computer, constructing a matrix A and column vector 6 according to the expression:
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in the computer, solving a constrained minimization according to the expression
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275
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for x; wherein µ represents a user-chosen scalar to adjust relative importance of minimization norms;
in the computer, inverse transforming and reordering the solved constrained minimization back into a domain of the input seismic signals; and
in the computer, generating an output comprising an estimate of the noise induced by at least one of backscattered seismic energy, turbulence or vibrations in the particle motion related signals.
The claim limitations in the abstract idea have been highlighted in bold above; the remaining limitations are “additional elements.”
Similar limitations comprise the abstract idea of Method Claim 14, Method Claim 27, and the Computer Program Claim 37 which performs a similar method.
Under Step 1 of the analysis, claims 1-36 belongs to a statutory category, namely they are method claims. Likewise, claims 37-49 are “A computer program stored in a non-transitory computer-readable medium”.
Under Step 2A, prong 1: This part of the eligibility analysis evaluates whether the claim recites a judicial exception. As explained in MPEP 2106.04, subsection II, a claim “recites” a judicial exception when the judicial exception is “set forth” or “described” in the claim.
In the instant case, claim 1 is found to recite at least one judicial exception (i.e. abstract idea), that being a Mental Process and/or a Mathematical Concept. This can be seen in the claim limitations of “applying” a sparsity promoting transformation, “constructing” a matrix and column vector, “solving” a constrained minimization, “inverse transforming and reordering” the solved minimization back into an input domain, and “generating” an output/result which is the judicial exception of a mental process because these limitations are merely data observations, evaluations, and/or judgements utilizing mathematical calculations and manipulations in order to estimate noise in the signals and is capable of being performed mentally and/or with the aid of pen and paper. Additionally, the aforementioned limitations explicitly recite the mathematical calculations, formulas, and relationships, etc. and thus clearly fall within the Mathematical Concepts category of abstract idea.
Similar limitations comprise the abstract ideas of independent claims 14, 27, and 37.
Step 2A, prong 2 of the eligibility analysis evaluates whether the claim as a whole integrates the recited judicial exception(s) into a practical application of the exception. This evaluation is performed by (a) identifying whether there are any additional elements recited in the claim beyond the judicial exception, and (b) evaluating those additional elements individually and in combination to determine whether the claim as a whole integrates the exception into a practical application.
In addition to the abstract ideas recited in claims 1, 14, 27, and 37, the claims recite additional elements including “sending as input to a computer seismic signals comprising pressure related signals and particle motion related signals detected by seismic sensors at spaced apart locations with reference to position of a seismic energy source deployed in a body of water partly in response to actuation of the seismic energy source and partly in response to noise comprising vibrations and turbulence in the body of water;” (claim 1, 37), “at selected times, actuating a seismic energy source in a body of water; detecting seismic signals using seismic sensors deployed at a plurality of spaced apart locations in the body of water, the signals comprising pressure related signals and particle motion related signals partly in response to actuation of the seismic energy source and partly in response to noise comprising at least one of interface waves back-scattered from shallow heterogeneities, vibrations and/or turbulence; conducting the detected signals to a computer;” (claim 14), and “sending as input to a computer seismic signals comprising pressure related signals and particle motion related signals detected by seismic sensors disposed on a bottom of a body of water in response to actuation of a seismic energy source deployed in the body of water;” (claim 27) however these elements are found to be data gathering steps recited at a high level of generality and thus merely amount to “insignificant extra-solution” activity(ies). See MPEP 2106.05(g) “Insignificant Extra-Solution Activity,”. Furthermore, the “actuating” and “detecting” are not performed in any particular manner or performed using any particular device, instead the claims merely characterize the type of data to be gathered which is found to be a general link to a field of use, as well as necessary data gathering, and does not amount to a meaningful limit on the abstract idea.
The claims also recite that the various steps, e.g. “applying”, “constructing”, “solving”, etc., are performed “in the computer” (claim 1, 14, 27) or are performed by “A computer program stored in a non-transitory computer readable medium, the program comprising logic operable to cause a programmable computer to perform actions comprising:” (claim 37) however this is found to be equivalent to adding the words “apply it” and mere instructions to apply a judicial exception on a general purpose computer does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. See MPEP 2106.05(f).
The generic data gathering, processing, and output steps, are recited at such a high level of generality (e.g. using “seismic sensors” and “a computer”) that it represents no more than mere instructions to apply the judicial exceptions on a computer. It can also be viewed as nothing more than an attempt to generally link the use of the judicial exceptions to the technological environment of a computer. Noting MPEP 2106.04(d)(I): “It is notable that mere physicality or tangibility of an additional element or elements is not a relevant consideration in Step 2A Prong Two. As the Supreme Court explained in Alice Corp., mere physical or tangible implementation of an exception does not guarantee eligibility. Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank Int’l, 573 U.S. 208, 224, 110 USPQ2d 1976, 1983-84 (2014) ("The fact that a computer ‘necessarily exist[s] in the physical, rather than purely conceptual, realm,’ is beside the point")”.
Thus, under Step 2A, prong 2 of the analysis, even when viewed in combination, these additional elements do not integrate the recited judicial exception into a practical application and the claim is directed to the judicial exception. No specific practical application is associated with the claimed methods. For instance, nothing is done with the result of generating an estimate of noise.
Under Step 2B, the claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the additional elements, as described above with respect to Step 2A Prong 2, merely amount to a general purpose computer system that attempts to apply the abstract idea in a technological environment, limiting the abstract idea to a particular field of use, and/or merely performs insignificant extra-solution activit(ies) (e.g. the “actuating” of an energy source, “detecting” of signals by “seismic sensors”, and “sending” signals to a computer; see claims 1, 14, 27, and 37). Such insignificant extra-solution activity, e.g. data gathering and output, when re-evaluated under Step 2B is further found to be well-understood, routine, and conventional as evidenced by MPEP 2106.05(d)(II) (describing conventional activities that include transmitting and receiving data over a network, electronic recordkeeping, storing and retrieving information from memory, and electronically scanning or extracting data from a physical document). Furthermore, the “actuating” and “detecting” are not performed in any particular manner or performed using any particular device. The claims recite that “seismic sensors” are used to gather the data however these are recited at a high-level of generality and merely serve as the source of the data necessary to perform the calculations that are abstract. The claims merely characterize the type of data to be gathered which is found to be a general link to a field of use, as well as necessary data gathering, and does not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea. Additionally, Applicant’s own specification makes clear that it is well known in the art to acquire seismic data in the manner claimed, e.g. [0005]: “It is known in the art to acquire seismic exploration data with a plurality of sensors, receivers or detectors (used interchangeably in this disclosure) placed in, or at the base of, the water column of a body of water.” Therefore, these additional elements do not provide an inventive concept.
Therefore, similarly the combination and arrangement of the above identified additional elements when analyzed under Step 2B also fails to necessitate a conclusion that claims 1, 14, 27, and 37 amount to significantly more than the abstract idea.
With regards to the dependent claims, claims 2-13, 15-26, 28-36, and 38-49, merely further expand upon the algorithm/abstract idea and do not set forth further additional elements that integrate the recited abstract idea into a practical application or amount to significantly more. Therefore, these claims are found ineligible for the reasons described for parent claims 1, 14, 27, and 37.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). 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 SHELBY A TURNER whose telephone number is (571)272-6334. (via email: Shelby.Turner1@uspto.gov “without a written authorization by applicant in place, the USPTO will not respond via internet e-mail to an Internet correspondence” MPEP 502.02 II). The examiner can normally be reached on M-F 10-6 ET.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Technology Center Director Allana Bidder can be reached at (571) 272-5560. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/SHELBY A TURNER/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2857
1 For example: https://www.byhand.ai/p/28-discrete-fourier-transform
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