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 .
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d). The certified copy has been filed in parent Application No. PCT/JP2021/042898 and JP2021-027147, filed on November 24, 2021, and February 24, 2021, respectively.
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
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 1-3, 6, and 9-10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Teshigahara et al (US PGPub 20160064645).
Regarding claim 1, Teshigahara teaches a nitride material represented by the formula ScxAl1-xN whereby x is preferably between 0.05 and 0.5 (or 0.15 and 0.45, see paragraph [0027]). Through an additional sputtering step, Teshigahara is able to add carbon atoms into the alloy nitride material target (paragraphs [0032-34]) at an atomic% of 10 or less. In paragraphs [0013-14], Teshigahara explains that the amount of carbon in the alloy can result in excellent piezoelectric properties, but that the amount should be maintained to a degree such that deterioration of piezoelectric properties is minimized. In example 1 (see also Table 1), Teshigahara prepares nitride materials with a fixed Sc at% of 43% (Sc0.43Al1-0.43N, paragraph [0048]) and sputters with carbon at at% of 0.2 to 14.29 (this % is relative to the Sc and Al atoms, thus the corresponding formula: Sc0.43CyAl1-0.43-yN). In samples 8-9, the ratio between Sc/C is < 5. Overlapping ranges have been held to present a prima facie case of obviousness over the prior art. It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to select from the overlapping portion of the range to arrive at the invention as claimed. Furthermore, as outlined in paragraphs [0059-60], Teshigahara teaches modification 1 involving target compositions as it relates between modulating amounts of Sc and C relative to one another. Based on the corresponding relationship, whereby the Sc target material has a C at% of 5/x at% or less, the arrival to the invention as claimed within the overlapping ranges would satisfy a relationship whereby Sc/C is always less than or equal to 5. Thus, Teshigahara satisfies the claimed “A nitride material represented by the chemical formula ScxMyAl1-x-yN, wherein: M is at least one or more elements among C, Si, Ge, and Sn; X is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.4; Y is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.2; and X/Y is less than or equal to 5.”.
Regarding claim 2, Teshigahara teaches the nitride material of claim 1. Furthermore, Teshigahara teaches the addition of only one element which is C for the ScAlN nitride material. Thus, Teshigahara teaches the claimed “The nitride material according to claim 1, wherein M is any one element among C, Si, Ge, and Sn”.
Regarding claim 3, Teshigahara teaches the nitride material of claim 2. Further, as described in the rejection of claim 1, Teshigahara discloses that Sc content is preferably between 0.05 and 0.5 (or 0.15 and 0.45, see paragraph [0027]). Overlapping ranges have been held to present a prima facie case of obviousness over the prior art. It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to select from the overlapping portion of the range to arrive at the invention as claimed. Thus, Teshigahara teaches the claimed “The nitride material according to claim 2, wherein: X is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.35; Y is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.2; and X/Y is less than or equal to 5”.
Regarding claim 6, Teshigahara teaches the nitride material of claim 1. Teshigahara teaches that this nitride material is for use in a piezoelectric thin film (paragraph [0013]) which is a piezoelectric body. Thus, Teshigahara teaches the claimed “A piezoelectric body formed of the nitride material according to claim 1”.
Regarding claim 9, Teshigahara teaches the piezoelectric body of claim 6. In paragraph [0003], Teshigahara discloses that piezoelectric thin films (or bodies) including scandium aluminum nitride can be applied to a microelectromechanical system (MEMS) and the like. Thus, Teshigahara teaches the claimed “A MEMS device using the piezoelectric body according to claim 6”.
Regarding claim 10, Teshigahara teaches the nitride material of claim 1. In paragraph [0003], Teshigahara discloses that piezoelectric thin films including scandium aluminum nitride can be applied to a surface acoustic wave (SAW) element. Thus, Teshigahara teaches the claimed “A transistor, an inverter, a transducer, a SAW device, or a ferroelectric memory using the nitride material according to claim 1”.
Claims 7 and 8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Teshigahara et al as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Soric et al (US PGPub 20220085795).
Regarding claim 7, Teshigahara teaches the nitride material of claim 1. Furthermore, as described in the rejection of claim 6 above, Teshigahara teaches a piezoelectric thin film (or a body) which includes the scandium aluminum nitride material. However, Teshigahara does not disclose disposing this nitride material on the surface of a scandium-containing nitride material (SczAl1-zN where 0 < Z ≤ 0.4 or Sc included at 0-40 at%). Soric teaches a layering approach whereby each layer is a piezoelectric thin film containing ScAlN which can be utilized in acoustic based devices (paragraph [0023]). These ScAlN layers may comprise varied concentrations of Sc and may also alternate between higher and lower concentrations of Sc (i.e., one layer 0-25% Sc, the next 25-50% and so on, see paragraph [0020]). The higher concentration layers can be used as etch stops. Additionally, in paragraph [0021], Soric teaches that Sc concentrations >27% may provide ferro-electric properties and may be selected based on the desired frequency characteristics. Overlapping ranges have been held to present a prima facie case of obviousness over the prior art. It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to select from the overlapping portion of the range to arrive at the invention as claimed or utilize “high” concentrations of 27% such that the ScAlN layer serves as an etch stop and provides ferro-electric properties. Therefore, it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to dispose the nitride material of Teshigahara onto the nitride material as informed by Soric for use in acoustic based devices. Teshigahara and Soric teach the claimed “A piezoelectric body comprising the nitride material according to claim 1, wherein the nitride material is disposed on a surface of a scandium- containing nitride material represented by the chemical formula SczAl1-zN (0 < Z< 0.4)”.
Regarding claim 8, Teshigahara and Soric teach the piezoelectric body of claim 7. Soric teaches layering the ScAlN structure as part of a bulk-acoustic wave resonator or other acoustic devices (paragraph [0023]). It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to stack or layer the thin films for use in acoustic devices. Thus, Teshigahara and Soric teach the claimed “A piezoelectric body comprising a stack of at least two or more piezoelectric bodies according to claim 7”.
Claims 1, 4-5, and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Teshigahara et al as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Gibb et al (US PGPub 20190259934).
As described in the rejection of claim 1 above, Teshigahara discloses a nitride material ScAlN with additional C such that one of ordinary skill in the art can arrive to the invention as claimed. However, Teshigahara does not mention other element sources that can be included with ScAlN materials. Gibb also describes ScAlN nitride materials which can incorporate “impurity” elements to adjust piezoelectric properties (paragraph [0006]). Gibb teaches including Sc as an alloying element in a range of 0.01%-50% (paragraph [0088]), similar to Teshigahara. In paragraph [0087], Gibb discloses a list of impurity species which include Si and C among others. Gibb discloses that concentrations of these impurities can be varied for different piezoelectric properties but does not disclose amounts relevant to at%. Teshigahara does teach that including C, an impurity informed by Gibb, at % less than 10 is preferable (see rejection of claim 1 above) and could represent a starting point for testing inclusion of other impurities such as Si. It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to select from the list of impurity element(s) as informed by Gibb and add to the nitride material of Teshigahara in order to modulate piezoelectric properties. Furthermore, it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to modify the “impurity” content of Teshigahara, as informed by Gibb, to have desired piezoelectric properties, as such a value represents an optimization of a result-effective variable (i.e. strain, displacement) for use in thin films. Thus, Teshigahara and Gibb teach the claimed “A nitride material represented by the chemical formula ScxMyAl1-x-yN, wherein: M is at least one or more elements among C, Si, Ge, and Sn; X is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.4; Y is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.2; and X/Y is less than or equal to 5.”.
Regarding claim 4, Teshigahara and Gibb teach the nitride material according to claim 1. Both authors teach incorporating the nitride material into a broader nitride material, or piezoelectric body/film. Teshigahara teaches the nitride material of claim 1 being disposed on a substrate which can be formed of silicon, Inconel, polymer films, etc (paragraph [0028]) but does not mention an intermediate layer between the nitride material and the substrate. From paragraphs [0081-83], Gibb teaches growing the nitride material (single crystal material) on a nucleation layer which is disposed directly upon the substrate. In paragraph [0083], Gibb discloses that the nucleation layers can be any single or combination of “AlN, AlGaN, GaN, InN, InGaN, AlInN, AlInGaN, and BN”. As described in paragraph [0081], Gibb teaches that the nucleation layer can be used to engineer strain in the subsequently formed structure. From paragraph [0084], strain engineering via growth parameter modification enables changing the piezoelectric properties of the grown epitaxial films. It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to include an intermediate layer, such as a nucleation layer, between the nitride material and the substrate, for strain engineering and modifying piezoelectric properties of the growing nitride material. Thus, Teshigahara and Gibb teach the claimed “A nitride material comprising the nitride material according to claim 1, the nitride material being disposed on a substrate, wherein at least one intermediate layer is disposed between the nitride material and the substrate”.
Regarding claim 5, Teshigahara and Gibb teach the nitride material of claim 4. In paragraph [0083], Gibb discloses that the nucleation layers can be any single or combination of “AlN, AlGaN, GaN, InN, InGaN, AlInN, AlInGaN, and BN”. It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to select from the overlapping list of nucleation layers and arrive at the invention as claimed. Thus, Teshigahara and Gibb teach the claimed “The nitride material according to claim 4, wherein the intermediate layer contains at least one of aluminum nitride, gallium nitride, indium nitride, titanium nitride, scandium nitride, ytterbium nitride, molybdenum, tungsten, hafnium, titanium, ruthenium, ruthenium oxide, chromium, chromium nitride, platinum, gold, silver, copper, aluminum, tantalum, iridium, palladium, and nickel”.
Regarding claim 10, Teshigahara and Gibb teach the nitride material of claim 1. In paragraph [0003], Teshigahara discloses that piezoelectric thin films including scandium aluminum nitride can be applied to a surface acoustic wave (SAW) element. Gibb teaches that nitride materials can be applied to electronic devices such as high electron mobility transistors or heterojunction bi-polar transistors (paragraph [0005]). Thus, it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to implement the nitride material into either known electronic device for use as a SAW device or a transistor. Therefore, Teshigahara and Gibb teach the claimed “A transistor, an inverter, a transducer, a SAW device, or a ferroelectric memory using the nitride material according to claim 1”.
Claim 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Teshigahara as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Hiru “ヒル” et al (JP2020526471A).
As described in the rejection of claim 1 above, Teshigahara discloses a nitride material ScAlN with additional C such that one of ordinary skill in the art can arrive to the invention as claimed. However, Teshigahara does not mention other element sources that can be included with ScAlN materials. Hiru teaches generic doping of AlN materials for use in piezoelectric devices. Like Teshigahara, Hiru teaches that Sc can be included to AlN structures. Hiru discloses that including Sc can lower shared valence and increase piezoelectricity of the doped AlN (see Fig 8). Hiru also teaches that electron substitution via Al-replacement by Si or by C. Si can serve as a deep level donor that can reduce conductivity while C acts as a deep level acceptor. Additonally, Hiru discloses other compounds useful in mixing with AlN to form a doped AlN material includes Ge3N4 as Ge crystallizes into a defect-containing wurtzite structure in which cation vacancies are ordered. Hiru does not disclose specific amounts of Si, C, or Ge to include, but Teshigahara does teach that including C at % less than 10 is preferable (see rejection of claim 1 above) and could represent a starting point for testing inclusion of other dopants. Thus, it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to replace C with Si and/or Ge or further include Si and/or Ge for a deep level electron donor (Si) or to help order cation vacancies (Ge). Thus, Teshigahara and Hiru teach the claimed “A nitride material represented by the chemical formula ScxMyAl1-x-yN, wherein: M is at least one or more elements among C, Si, Ge, and Sn; X is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.4; Y is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.2; and X/Y is less than or equal to 5.”.
Claim 3 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Teshigahara as applied to claim 2 above, and further in view of Akiyama et al (US PGPub 20080296529).
Teshigahara teaches the nitride material of claim 2 and further establishes an overlapping range for Sc content such that one of ordinary skill in the art could arrive at the invention as claimed (see rejection of claim 3 above). Akiyama characterizes the effects of Sc content in AlN nitride materials, preferably providing a range of 15-45at% (0.15-0.45, paragraph [0046]) or a range of 10-35% (0.10-0.35, paragraph [0048]). Having Sc contents in the range of 10-35%, it is possible to realize size reduction and power consumption saving of a piezoelectric device containing the ScAlN nitride material and improve device performance (paragraph [0075]). Thus, it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, as of the effective filing date, to restrict the Sc content in a range below 35% to realize size reduction and power consumption while improving piezoelectric device performance. Teshigahara and Akiyama teach the claimed “The nitride material according to claim 2, wherein: X is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.35; Y is greater than 0 and not greater than 0.2; and X/Y is less than or equal to 5”.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Iwazaki et al detail benefits of codoping AlN materials. Boguslawski et al disclose doping GaN and AlN with C, Si, or Ge and subsequent properties. Logan et al disclose stacking of alternating compositions of ScAlN thin film layers for use in piezoelectric devices. Dittmar et al teach doping of AlN with Sc within amounts up to 43% and corresponding properties at different “high”, “medium”, or “low” Sc contents.
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/NWFG/Examiner, Art Unit 1759
/MELVIN C. MAYES/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 1759
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