Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of 35 U.S.C. 112(a):
(a) IN GENERAL.—The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor or joint inventor of carrying out the invention.
Claims 14-20 and 22-23 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) as failing to comply with the written description requirement. The claims contain subject matter which was not described in the specification in such a way as to reasonably convey to one skilled in the relevant art that the inventor or a joint inventor, at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention.
Claim 14 was amended to recite discrete enclosed shapes comprising a plurality of conic sections. This is regarded as new matter because the original disclosure does not mention the term "conic section", and because that term covers shapes such as parabolas and hyperbolas which are not disclosed. Claims 15-20 and 22-23 are rejected by dependence from claim 14.
Replacing "comprising of a plurality of conic sections" with "comprising a plurality of circles or ellipses" would suffice to overcome this rejection, since circles and ellipses are shown in the original disclosure.
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 21 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Claim 21 is indefinite because there is insufficient antecedent basis for "the core" or "the cladding". Claim 21 depends from claim 9 but those elements are not introduced until claim 12.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 9 and 12-13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by US 2012/0099813 A1 (previously made of record via information disclosure statement).
Claim 9: '813 discloses a modulator, comprising (see mainly figs. 2D, 3A, and 5):
a first waveguide 751 (fig. 5; 751 can be a waveguide per the last sentence of [0096]); and
a second waveguide (contained within phase shifter 10), comprising:
a light input end (left end of 300 as oriented in figs. 2D and 5),
a light output end (right end of 300 as oriented in figs. 2D and 5),
a first semiconductor material (undoped silicon of region 300, [0058]),
a second semiconductor material (impurity region 104) different from the first semiconductor material, the second semiconductor material contacting the first semiconductor material along a triangular boundary area CP14 (fig. 2D) wherein the triangular boundary area extends from one end of a core width of the second waveguide to a second end of the core width of the second waveguide (the core width being taken along the Y direction in fig. 3A, similar to the width direction of the instant application at fig. 3C; note corresponding boundary CP10a; fig. 3A can be based on earlier embodiments as stated in [0067]), and
wherein a first light output of the first waveguide is combined with a second light output from the light output end (via coupler 601), wherein the first waveguide and the second waveguide are part of a processor (either fig. 5 can be taken as a processor itself in the sense of processing optical signals, or can be part of one of the processors mentioned in [0116]), and
wherein the boundary area is greater than a length from the light input end to the light output end multiplied by a core width of the second waveguide.
Claim 12: The modulator further comprises a core (layer above 160a in fig. 3A, [0069]) and a cladding 160a, wherein the core is part of a folded waveguide phase shifter in which light may propagate through from the light input end to the light output end, and wherein the modulator comprises a Mach-Zehnder modulator that utilizes the folded waveguide phase shifter (fig. 5).
Claim 13: The modulator comprises at least one of two arms optically coupled between cascaded Y-branch couplers 401 / 601 disposed in a semiconductor material (fig. 5).
Response to Arguments
All rejections of the 12/3/2025 action were overcome by the 2/26/2026 response. Claims 9 and 12-13 have been rejected in the present action using a different reference to account for the amendments to claim 9. Independent claim 14 and its dependent claims have been rejected in the present action for insufficient disclosure.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1 and 3-8 are allowed. Claims 14-20 and 22-23 would be allowable if claim 14 is amended to excise the new matter identified above, for example by adopting the language suggested earlier at Page 2.
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.
Contact Information
Examiner: 571-272-2360
Examiner's direct supervisor: 571-272-2397
Official correspondence by fax: 571-273-8300
Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from Patent Center. Should you have questions about Patent Center, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free).
/Michael Stahl/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2874
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