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
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.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the cavity” in lines 10 and 11. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claims 2-13 are rejected as being dependent from rejected claim.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-13 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) set forth in this Office action.
Claims 14-26 are allowed.
The following is an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance: claims in this application are allowable due to the amended limitations “said precompressed graft defining an exterior perimeter having a second cross-sectional area smaller than said first cross-sectional area” and “wherein said decompressed graft is configured to anchor the graft within the portion of bone without a foreign body” as set forth in claims 1 and 14.
The closest prior art of record of McDevitt et al. (2012/0215257) and Collette (2009/0292321) fail to disclose a precompressed tissue graft having a second cross-sectional area smaller than the nonuniform bone tunnel, where the precompressed graft is decompressed within the bone tunnel and is configured to anchor the graft within the bone tunnel without the use of foreign fixation body. Therefore, the claims have not been found anticipated by or obvious over any prior art.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to YASHITA SHARMA whose telephone number is (571)270-5417. The examiner can normally be reached on 8am-5pm M-Th; 8am-4pm Fri (MT).
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner' s supervisor, Jerrah Edwards, can be reached at 408-918-7557. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/YASHITA SHARMA/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3774