DETAILED ACTION
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 24 September 2025 has been entered.
Status
This First Action Final Office Action is in response to the communication filed on 24 September 2025. Claims 2, 5-6, 8, 10, 13-14, 17, and 20 have been cancelled, claims 1, 9, and 16 have been amended, and no new claims have been added. Therefore, claims 1, 3-4, 7, 9, 11-12, 15-16, 18-19, and 21 are pending and presented for examination.
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 .
Response to Amendment
A summary of the Examiner’s Response to Applicant’s amendment:
Applicant’s amendment does not overcome the rejection(s) under 35 USC § 101; therefore, the Examiner maintains the rejection(s) while updating phrasing in keeping with current examination guidelines.
Applicant’s arguments are found to be not persuasive; please see the Response to Arguments below.
Claim Interpretation
The Examiner notes that claims 1, 9, and 16 each now recite “wherein the adjacent populations are within a design boundary of the landscape design maps and the non-communicable disease data comprise centroid coordinates, improving the efficiency of extracting the non-communicable disease data within the design boundary of each landscape design map”; however, this alleged efficiency appears to merely be indicating a desired or intended result – presumably since the data outside the boundary is ignored or otherwise not considered. There is no description indicating how anyone would or could measure the efficiency of extracting data (e.g., using a computer), the only support for improving efficiency being Applicant ¶ 0028 as indicating “the assessment system 100 may improve the efficiency and efficacy of the computer and/or server 105”. All other indications of efficiency are in relation to “designing a landscape design map” (at Applicant ¶ 0028), “the efficacy and/or efficiency of a landscape design process” (at Applicant ¶ 0034), “the efficiency and/or efficacy of calculating the non-communicable disease score” (at Applicant ¶ 0037), and “the efficiency and effectiveness of landscape design and implementation” (at Applicant ¶ 0068). None of these examples provides any indication of how to determine or measure efficiency of extraction or what would be required to improve efficiency. As such, if the indicated efficiency claim phrasing were to be granted patentable weight, it would require rejection under 35 USC § 112 for indefiniteness since it would appear to be a subjective term without any description or indication as to what is meant by, or how to determine whether there is, an improvement to the efficiency of a computer.
MPEP § 2103(I)(C) indicates, in part, that
Language that suggests or makes a feature or step optional but does not require that feature or step does not limit the scope of a claim under the broadest reasonable claim interpretation. The following types of claim language may raise a question as to its limiting effect:
(A) statements of intended use or field of use, including statements of purpose or intended use in the preamble,
(B) "adapted to" or "adapted for" clauses,
(C) "wherein" or "whereby" clauses,
(D) contingent limitations,
(E) printed matter, or
(F) terms with associated functional language.
The above language or phrasing regarding efficiency is, per the claim and description, an indication intended use, functional language, and/or an implied "adapted to", "adapted for", "wherein", or "whereby" clause. See also MPEP § 2111.04(I), indicating in part that
In Hoffer v. Microsoft Corp., 405 F.3d 1326, 1329, 74 USPQ2d 1481, 1483 (Fed. Cir. 2005), the court held that when a "‘whereby’ clause states a condition that is material to patentability, it cannot be ignored in order to change the substance of the invention." Id. However, the court noted that a "‘whereby clause in a method claim is not given weight when it simply expresses the intended result of a process step positively recited.’" Id. (quoting Minton v. Nat’l Ass’n of Securities Dealers, Inc., 336 F.3d 1373, 1381, 67 USPQ2d 1614, 1620 (Fed. Cir. 2003)).
Therefore, the phrase or limitation of “improving the efficiency of extracting the non-communicable disease data within the design boundary of each landscape design map” is considered per the claims and the light of the specification to be intended and not required. As such, this phrase is granted little if any patentable weight.
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, 3-4, 7, 9, 11-12, 15-16, 18-19, and 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more.
Please see the following Subject Matter Eligibility (“SME”) analysis:
For analysis under SME Step 1, the claims herein are directed to a method (claims 1, 3-4, and 7), apparatus (claims 9, 11-12, and 15), and a computer-readable storage medium storing non-transitory computer-readable code (which is interpreted in light of the specification to only encompass tangible and non-transitory mediums) (claims 16, 18-19, and 21), which would be classified under one of the listed statutory classifications (SME Step 1=Yes).
For analysis under revised SME Step 2A, Prong 1, independent claim 1 recites a method comprising: extracting, by use of a computer, design characteristics and spatial reference data from at least one landscape design map, wherein the adjacent populations are within a design boundary of the landscape design maps and the non-communicable disease data comprise centroid coordinates, improving the efficiency of extracting the non-communicable disease data within the design boundary of each landscape design map; extracting non-communicable disease data for adjacent populations to the at least one landscape design map; training a random forest decision tree predictive model based on the design characteristics and the non-communicable disease data; training a spatial gaussian process model on the spatial reference data and the non-communicable disease data; generating at least two landscape design maps; predicting a first non-communicable disease score for each landscape design map from the random forest decision tree model; predicting a second non-communicable disease score for each landscape design map from the spatial gaussian process model; calculating an improved non-communicable disease score for each landscape design map as a weighted average of the first non-communicable disease score and the second non- communicable disease score; selecting a given landscape design map from the at least two landscape design maps based on the improved non-communicable disease scores, improving efficiency of the computer selecting the given landscape design map; and implementing the given landscape design map..
Independent claims 9 and 16 are analyzed in the same manner as claim 1 above since claim 9 is directed to an apparatus comprising: a processor executing code stored in a memory to perform the same or similar activities as at claim 1, and claim 16 is directed to a computer readable storage medium storing non-transitory computer readable code executable by a processor to perform the same or similar activities as at claim 1.
The dependent claims (claims 3-4, 7, 11-12, 15, 18-19. and 21) appear to be encompassed by the abstract idea of the independent claims since they merely indicate the data factored into the scoring (claims 3-4, 11-12, and 18-19), and/or the health conditions the score estimates prevalence of (claims 7, 15, and 21).
The underlined portions of the claims are an indication of elements additional to the abstract idea (to be considered below).
The claim elements may be summarized as the idea of scoring landscape map characteristics for health effects; however, the Examiner notes that although this summary of the claims is provided, the analysis regarding subject matter eligibility considers the entirety of the claim elements, both individually and as a whole (or ordered combination). This idea is within the following grouping(s) of subject matter:
Mathematical concepts (e.g., relationships, formulas, equations, and/or calculations) based at least on the specific mathematical models used, their training, and the calculating and weighted combining of a score for each map;
Certain methods of organizing human activity (e.g. … business relations; and/or managing personal behavior or relationships between people such as social activities, teaching, and following rules or instructions) based at least on the extracting characteristics and disease data from maps and populations; and
Mental processes (e.g., concepts performed in the human mind such as observation, evaluation, judgment, and/or opinion) based at least on the observations, evaluations, and/or judgements involved in arriving at the characteristics and disease data – since this can be performed in the mind or by merely also using pen/pencil and paper.
Therefore, the claims are found to be directed to an abstract idea.
For analysis under revised SME Step 2A, Prong 2, the above judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because the additional elements do not impose a meaningful limit on the judicial exception when evaluated individually and as a combination. The additional elements are the use of a computer and the intent of improving efficiency of the computer selecting the given landscape design map, also an apparatus comprising: a processor executing code stored in a memory (at claim 9) and a computer readable storage medium storing non-transitory computer readable code executable by a processor (at claim 16) to perform the activities. These additional elements do not reflect an improvement in the functioning of a computer or an improvement to other technology or technical field, effect a particular treatment or prophylaxis for a disease or medical condition (there is no medical disease or condition, much less a treatment or prophylaxis for one), implement the judicial exception with, or by using in conjunction with, a particular machine or manufacture that is integral to the claim, effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing (there is no transformation/reduction of a physical article), and/or apply or use the judicial exception in some other meaningful way beyond generically linking use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment.
The claims appear to merely apply the judicial exception, include instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer, or merely use a computer as a tool to perform the abstract idea. The additional elements appear to merely add insignificant extra-solution activity to the judicial exception and/or generally link the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use.
The recitation of “improving efficiency of the computer selecting the given landscape design map” is interpreted, per the light of the specification as indicated above at the Claim Interpretation section, as merely being an intended use or result, and as such is granted little if any patentable weight. With specific regard to eligibility analysis, if there is/were an improved efficiency (as described and claimed), that efficiency is inherent to the performing of the steps of the abstract idea; therefore, this portion of the claim need not, apparently, actually be considered as additional to the abstract idea, but is considered in the analysis of eligibility.
For analysis under SME Step 2B, the claim(s) does/do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the additional elements, as indicated above, are merely “[a]dding the words ‘apply it’ (or an equivalent) with the judicial exception, or mere instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer, e.g., a limitation indicating that a particular function such as creating and maintaining electronic records is performed by a computer, as discussed in Alice Corp.” that MPEP § 2106.05(I)(A) indicates to be insignificant activity.
There is no indication the Examiner can find in the record regarding any specialized computer hardware or other “inventive” components, but rather, the claims merely indicate computer components which appear to be generic components and therefore do not satisfy an inventive concept that would constitute “significantly more” with respect to eligibility. The only indications describing the computer indicate known and available components (see, e.g., Applicant ¶ 0018-0021), and the description of functions performed by the computer are generic functions like communicating and executing software (see, e.g., Applicant ¶ 0024-0028, 0030). Applicant ¶ 0059 and Fig. 6 illustrates the computer envisioned for the invention, which is a generic representation and description of a general-purpose computer.
The individual elements therefore do not appear to offer any significance beyond the application of the abstract idea itself, and there does not appear to be any additional benefit or significance indicated by the ordered combination, i.e., there does not appear to be any synergy or special import to the claim as a whole other than the application of the idea itself.
The dependent claims, as indicated above, appear encompassed by the abstract idea since they merely limit the idea itself; therefore the dependent claims do not add significantly more than the idea.
Therefore, SME Step 2B=No, any additional elements, whether taken individually or as an ordered whole in combination, do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea, including analysis of the dependent claims.
Please see the Subject Matter Eligibility (SME) guidance and instruction materials at https://www.uspto.gov/patent/laws-and-regulations/examination-policy/subject-matter-eligibility, which includes the latest guidance, memoranda, and update(s) for further information.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1, 3-4, 7, 9, 11-12, 15-16, 18-19, and 21 are indicated as allowable over the prior art.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The closest prior art of record appears to be Shen, et al., Can green structure reduce the mortality of cardiovascular diseases?, Science of The Total Environment, Vol. 566–567, 2016, Pp. 1159-1167, ISSN 0048-9697, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2016.05.159. Downloaded from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969716310919 on 14 May 2025 (hereinafter Shen), as disclosing the extracting steps, training a model, and predicting a disease score.
Hughes et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2007/0250378, hereinafter Hughes) further indicates generating at least two landscape design maps; predicting non-communicable disease scores for the at least two landscape design maps; selecting the given landscape design map from the at least two landscape design maps based on the non-communicable disease scores; and implementing the given landscape design map by comparing scores of at least two landscape designs for implementation.
Perry et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2019/0050948, hereinafter Perry) also further indicates wherein the predictive models comprise a random forest decision tree model and a spatial Gaussian process model.
Araya et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2018/0365372, hereinafter Araya) also further indicates “embodiments applying model combination techniques, a combined model can be generated by applying ensemble methods, by taking an equally or unequally weighted average of the outputs from individual models (Ripley 2008; Hastie et al. 2001)” (Araya at 0096), where the contemplated models may include Gaussian Mixture and Random Forest Models (Araya at 0085).
Therefore, although all the claim elements appear taught by the prior art, it does not appear reasonable to combine the various references to arrive at the instant claimed invention.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 24 September 2025 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Applicant first indicates “Applicants have amended claim 1 with the limitations that are well supported by the specification in [0032, 0034, 0039]” (Response at 6, dated 24 September 2025). However, there does not appear to be any support for “improving the efficiency of extracting the non-communicable disease data within the design boundary of each landscape design map” – as indicated at the Claim Interpretation above. As noted above, however, no 112 rejection for written support is being made since the indicated portion of the claims is interpreted as merely being an intended or desired effect from limiting the data.
Applicant then argues the 101 rejection (Remarks at 8), alleging “Applicants submit that claim 1 integrates the judicial exception with improving the functioning of a computer. By using adjacent populations that are within the design boundary of the landscape design maps and organizing the non-communicable disease data as centroid coordinates, the embodiments improve the efficiency and efficacy of a computer or processor in extracting non- communicable disease data and designing a landscape design map beyond the capabilities of a human designer as noted in [0034]” (Id. at 6-7). However, this is merely limiting the data to be extracted – using coordinate mathematics to define the boundary from which data would be extracted. Therefore, there does not appear to be any actual or real improvement to the extraction or the computer. There is no indication of what improvement (if any) may be had to any computer efficiency (how to measure it, or what this may mean), the claimed improvement is merely an intended result, the intended result is apparently merely the intended or desired result from the limiting the data to be extracted. AS indicated above, the efficiency of extraction (if there is any) may be granted little if any patentable weight.
Therefore, Applicant’s arguments are not persuasive.
Conclusion
All claims are identical to or patentably indistinct from, or have unity of invention with claims in the application prior to the entry of the submission under 37 CFR 1.114 (that is, restriction (including a lack of unity of invention) would not be proper) and all claims could have been finally rejected on the grounds and art of record in the next Office action if they had been entered in the application prior to entry under 37 CFR 1.114. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL even though it is a first action after the filing of a request for continued examination and the submission under 37 CFR 1.114. See MPEP § 706.07(b). 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.
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Transforming spaces: The impact of landscape architecture on mental health and well-being, McNeil Engineering, dated 14 August 2023, downloaded 13 May 2025 from https://www.mcneilengineering.com/transforming-spaces-the-impact-of-landscape-architecture-on-mental-health-and-well-being/#:~:text=The%20healing%20power%20of%20nature&text=Landscape%20architecture%20has%20the%20unique,sense%20of%20calm%20and%20relaxation., indicating various impacts that landscape architecture can have on various aspects of mental and physical health.
Kennedy, Alyson. "Health-Promoting Characteristics of Urban Green Spaces in Consideration of Non-Communicable Diseases." PhD diss., University of Guelph, 2022. Downloaded 4 September 2025 from https://atrium.lib.uoguelph.ca/items/a88605b3-9719-420d-9db9-e8637b6f645e, via Files: Kennedy_Alyson_202205_MLA.pdf (15.43 MB) link, indicating “There is an immediate need within the urban environment to address non-communicable diseases (NCD) and sedentary lifestyles. Evidence in the literature suggests that urban green spaces (UGS) can have a positive effect on people’s physical activity, social and mental well-being. The intent of this research is to explore two types of UGS, both located in Georgetown, Ontario: a multipurpose municipally operated community park and a naturalised public trail system. The methods include a review of literature, two walking methods, and a case study analysis. A set of design recommendations will be developed that identify characteristics in the landscapes that promote and encourage physical activity, social and mental well-being. By using the evidence-based design recommendations developed in this study, municipalities may increase their understanding of how to create and maintain reliable environments with stimulating health-promoting characteristics in consideration of NCDs and sedentary lifestyles.” (at Abstract).
Aronson et al., Neighborhood Mapping and Evaluation: A Methodology for Participatory Community Health Initiatives. Matern Child Health J 11, 373–383 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10995-007-0184-5, downloaded 6 December 2025 from https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10995-007-0184-5, indicating “This paper describes the use of neighborhood mapping as a key element in an ecological study of a community-based urban infant mortality prevention program. We propose the use of neighborhood mapping in evaluation research to more fully examine the local context of community health programs. Mapping can be used to study community change and to describe community assets and structural, epidemiological, and social features of neighborhoods that may influence program implementation and outcomes” (at Abstract, Objectives).
Marshall et al., Community design, street networks, and public health, Journal of Transport & Health, Vol. 1, Iss. 4, 2014, pp. 326-340, ISSN 2214-1405, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jth.2014.06.002. Downloaded 6 December 2025 from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214140514000486, indicating in part, that they “ask the following: what is the influence of the three fundamental measures of street networks on obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, and asthma? We answer this question by examining 24 California cities exhibiting a range a street network typologies using health data from the California Health Interview Survey. We control for the food environment, land uses, commuting time, socioeconomic status, and street design. The results suggest that more compact and connected street networks with fewer lanes on the major roads are correlated with reduced rates of obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease among residents. Given the cross-sectional nature of our study, proving causation is not feasible but should be examined in future research. Nevertheless, the outcome is a novel assessment of streets networks and public health that has not yet been seen but will be of benefit to planners and policy-makers.” (at Abstract).
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/SCOTT D GARTLAND/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3685