CTNF 18/456,112 CTNF 102081 Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status 07-03-aia AIA 15-10-aia The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA. Priority The present application has a provisional application No. 63/419,272 filed on October 25, 2022. 07-30-03-h AIA Claim Interpretation 07-30-03 AIA The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(f): (f) Element in Claim for a Combination. – An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof. The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph: An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof. 07-30-05 The claims in this application are given their broadest reasonable interpretation using the plain meaning of the claim language in light of the specification as it would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art. The broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim element (also commonly referred to as a claim limitation) is limited by the description in the specification when 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is invoked. As explained in MPEP § 2181, subsection I, claim limitations that meet the following three-prong test will be interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph: (A) the claim limitation uses the term “means” or “step” or a term used as a substitute for “means” that is a generic placeholder (also called a nonce term or a non-structural term having no specific structural meaning) for performing the claimed function; (B) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is modified by functional language, typically, but not always linked by the transition word “for” (e.g., “means for”) or another linking word or phrase, such as “configured to” or “so that”; and (C) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is not modified by sufficient structure, material, or acts for performing the claimed function. Use of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim with functional language creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites sufficient structure, material, or acts to entirely perform the recited function. Absence of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is not to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is not interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites function without reciting sufficient structure, material or acts to entirely perform the recited function. Claim limitations in this application that use the word “means” (or “step”) are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action. Conversely, claim limitations in this application that do not use the word “means” (or “step”) are not being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action. This application includes one or more claim limitations that do not use the word “means,” but are nonetheless being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, because the claim limitations use a generic placeholder that is coupled with functional language without reciting sufficient structure to perform the recited function and the generic placeholder is not preceded by a structural modifier. Such claim limitations are: As to Claim 22 (23-28 in virtue of inheritance of the parent claim’s limitations) “means for generating, for each input of a plurality of inputs, a clean sample and an augmented sample Regarding claim 22 and the above-noted three-prong test, the recited “means” is a generic placeholder, for generating, for each input of a plurality of inputs, a clean sample and an augmented sample is functional language, and there is no recitation of sufficient structure to perform the providing. “means for associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with the augmented sample to form a positive pair Regarding claim 22 and the above-noted three-prong test, the recited “means” is a generic placeholder for associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with the augmented sample to form a positive pair is functional language, and there is no recitation of sufficient structure to perform the providing. “means for associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with another clean sample associated with another input of the plurality of inputs to form a negative pair” Regarding claim 22 and the above-noted three-prong test, the recited “means” is a generic placeholder for associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with another clean sample associated with another input of the plurality of inputs to form a negative pair is functional language, and there is no recitation of sufficient structure to perform the providing. “means for learning one or more representations of the plurality of inputs based on the positive pair and the negative pair of each input of the plurality of inputs” Regarding claim 22 and the above-noted three-prong test, the recited “means” is a generic placeholder for learning one or more representations of the plurality of inputs based on the positive pair and the negative pair of each input of the plurality of inputs is functional language, and there is no recitation of sufficient structure to perform the providing. As to Claim 23, “means for minimizing a loss for each input of the plurality of inputs” Regarding claim 23 and the above-noted three-prong test, the recited “means” is a generic placeholder for minimizing a loss for each input of the plurality of inputs is functional language, and there is no recitation of sufficient structure to perform the providing. As to Claim 26 (27-28 in virtue of inheritance of the parent claim’s limitations), “means for receiving each input at a contrastive learning model Regarding claim 23 and the above-noted three-prong test, the recited “means” is a generic placeholder for receiving each input at a contrastive learning model is functional language, and there is no recitation of sufficient structure to perform the providing. Because these claim limitations are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, they are being interpreted to cover the corresponding structure described in the specification as performing the claimed function, and equivalents thereof. If applicant does not intend to have these limitation(s) interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, applicant may: (1) amend the claim limitation(s) to avoid them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph (e.g., by reciting sufficient structure to perform the claimed function); or (2) present a sufficient showing that the claim limitations recite sufficient structure to perform the claimed function so as to avoid them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101 07-04-01 AIA 07-04 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 1-28 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. Regarding Claim 1 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 1 is a method claim thus it falls into one of the four categories of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding independent claim 1, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “generating, for each input of a plurality of inputs, a clean sample and an augmented sample” [Mental Process] – generating samples or data using some kind of inputs through modifications such as removing or adding involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with the augmented sample to form a positive pair” [Mental process] – associating or paring samples according to some kind of indicators or features is just an act of comparing and grouping involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with another clean sample associated with another input of the plurality of inputs to form a negative pair” [Mental process] – associating or paring samples according to some kind of indicators or features is just an act of comparing and grouping involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “learning one or more representations of the plurality of inputs based on the positive pair and the negative pair of each input of the plurality of inputs” [Mental process] – learning some kind characteristics of inputs or data based on other data or pairs is just an act of distinguishing features which involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 1 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 2 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 2 is a dependent claim of 1, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 2, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “learning the one or more representations comprises minimizing a loss for each input of plurality of inputs” [Mathematical Calculations] – minimizing a loss of each input is using some kind of mathematical loss functions for optimization thus it recites to an abstract idea. “a stop-gradient is a function of an embedding of the clean sample” [Mathematical Calculations] – using a function for embedding an input or a sample is simply using the function or going through mathematical calculations to convert inputs into vectors thus it recites to an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 2 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 3 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 3 is a dependent claim of 1, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 3, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “learning the one or more representations via contrastive learning in a self-supervised manner” [Mathematical Calculations] – contrastive learning is simply learning by comparing two inputs or data using both embedding calculations to get vectors and loss functions to minimize a loss for optimization thus it recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 3 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 4 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 4 is a dependent claim of 1, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 4, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “ each input of the plurality of inputs is an audio input” [Mental process] – receiving audio inputs without reciting any structural means is a mere data gathering recited at a high level of generality such that humans are capable of simply listen to the audio inputs which involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 4 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 5 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 5 is a dependent claim of 1, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 5, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “receiving each input at a contrastive learning model” [Mental Process] – receiving input or data which can be considered as an action of looking/listening/recording involving observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen. [Mathematical Calculations] – the contrastive learning model is a step of mathematical calculations thus it recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 5 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 6 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 6 is a dependent claim of 5, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. As Claim 6 does not have any abstract idea by itself, thus uses all the limitations of Claims 1 and 5. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 6, the claim recites additional elements of “the contrastive learning model includes an augmentation module, an encoder, and a projection head” “augmentation module”, “encoder”, and “projection head” are recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)) [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or machine-learning components that simply runs mathematical calculations (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 7 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 7 is a dependent claim of 6, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 7, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “the augmented sample is generated, via the augmentation module , in accordance with augmenting the clean sample with noise” [Mathematical Calculations] – the augmented sample generated is simply applying mathematical operation to the data or sample thus recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 7, the claim recites additional elements of “ via the augmentation module ” “augmentation module” is recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)) [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or machine-learning components that simply runs mathematical calculations (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 8 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 8 is an apparatus claim thus it falls into one of the four categories of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding independent claim 8, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “generate, for each input of a plurality of inputs, a clean sample and an augmented sample” [Mental Process] – generating samples or data using some kind of inputs through modifications such as removing or adding involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “associate, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with the augmented sample to form a positive pair” [Mental process] – associating or paring samples according to some kind of indicators or features is just an act of comparing and grouping involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “associate, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with another clean sample associated with another input of the plurality of inputs to form a negative pair” [Mental process] – associating or paring samples according to some kind of indicators or features is just an act of comparing and grouping involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “learn one or more representations of the plurality of inputs based on the positive pair and the negative pair of each input of the plurality of inputs” [Mental process] – learning some kind characteristics of inputs or data based on other data or pairs is just an act of distinguishing features which involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 8, the claim recites additional elements of “one or more processors; and one or more memories coupled with the one or more processors and storing instructions operable, when executed by the one or more processors, to cause the apparatus to” “processors” to execute and “memories” to store the instructions recite at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered merely computer components that are just to store and execute code-based instructions which are considered a mere instruction to apply an exception and amount to storing and receiving information in memory, which is well-understood, routine, conventional activity (See MPEP 2106.05(d), subsection II). This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception. This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 9 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 9 is a dependent claim of 8, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 9, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “execution of the instructions further cause the apparatus to minimize a loss for each input of the plurality of inputs in accordance with learning the one or more representations” [Mathematical Calculations] – minimizing a loss of each input is using some kind of mathematical loss functions for optimization thus it recites to an abstract idea. “a stop-gradient is a function of an embedding of the clean sample” [Mathematical Calculations] – using a function for embedding an input or a sample is simply using the function or going through mathematical calculations to convert inputs into vectors thus it recites to an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 9 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 10 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 10 is a dependent claim of 8, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 10, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “learn the one or more representations via contrastive learning in a self-supervised manner” [Mathematical Calculations] – contrastive learning is simply learning by comparing two inputs or data using both embedding calculations to get vectors and loss functions to minimize a loss for optimization thus it recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 10 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 11 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 11 is a dependent claim of 8, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 11, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “ each input of the plurality of inputs is an audio input” [Mental process] – receiving audio inputs without reciting any structural means is a mere data gathering recited at a high level of generality such that humans are capable of simply listen to the audio inputs which involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 11 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 12 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 12 is a dependent claim of 8, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 12, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “receive each input at a contrastive learning model” [Mental Process] – receiving input or data which can be considered as an action of looking/listening/recording involving observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen. [Mathematical Calculations] – the contrastive learning model is a step of mathematical calculations thus it recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 12 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 13 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 13 is a dependent claim of 12, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. As Claim 13 does not have any abstract idea by itself, thus uses all the limitations of Claims 8 and 12. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 13, the claim recites additional elements of “the contrastive learning model includes an augmentation module, an encoder, and a projection head” “augmentation module”, “encoder”, and “projection head” are recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)) [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or machine-learning components that simply runs mathematical calculations (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 14 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 14 is a dependent claim of 13, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 14, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “the augmented sample is generated, via the augmentation module , in accordance with augmenting the clean sample with noise” [Mathematical Calculations] – the augmented sample generated is simply applying mathematical operation to the data or sample thus recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 14, the claim recites additional elements of “ via the augmentation module ” “augmentation module” is recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)) [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or machine-learning components that simply runs mathematical calculations (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 15 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 15 is a non-transitory computer-readable medium claim thus it falls into one of the four categories of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding independent claim 15, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “generate, for each input of a plurality of inputs, a clean sample and an augmented sample” [Mental Process] – generating samples or data using some kind of inputs through modifications such as removing or adding involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “associate, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with the augmented sample to form a positive pair” [Mental process] – associating or paring samples according to some kind of indicators or features is just an act of comparing and grouping involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “associate, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with another clean sample associated with another input of the plurality of inputs to form a negative pair” [Mental process] – associating or paring samples according to some kind of indicators or features is just an act of comparing and grouping involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “learn one or more representations of the plurality of inputs based on the positive pair and the negative pair of each input of the plurality of inputs” [Mental process] – learning some kind characteristics of inputs or data based on other data or pairs is just an act of distinguishing features which involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 15, the claim recites additional elements of “program code” Program code is just a set of instructions which is recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or the program code that simply executes instructions. (see MPEP 2106.05(f))} This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 16 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 16 is a dependent claim of 15, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 16, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “ the program code to learn the one or more representations comprises program code to minimize a loss for each input of the plurality of inputs” [Mathematical Calculations] – minimizing a loss of each input is using some kind of mathematical loss functions for optimization thus it recites to an abstract idea. “a stop-gradient is a function of an embedding of the clean sample” [Mathematical Calculations] – using a function for embedding an input or a sample is simply using the function or going through mathematical calculations to convert inputs into vectors thus it recites to an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 16, the claim recites additional elements of “program code” Program code is just a set of instructions which is recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or the program code that simply executes instructions. (see MPEP 2106.05(f))} This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 17 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 17 is a dependent claim of 15, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 17, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “learn the one or more representations via contrastive learning in a self-supervised manner” [Mathematical Calculations] – contrastive learning is simply learning by comparing two inputs or data using both embedding calculations to get vectors and loss functions to minimize a loss for optimization thus it recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 17, the claim recites additional elements of “program code” Program code is just a set of instructions which is recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or the program code that simply executes instructions. (see MPEP 2106.05(f))} This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 18 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 18 is a dependent claim of 15, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 18, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “ each input of the plurality of inputs is an audio input” [Mental process] – receiving audio inputs without reciting any structural means is a mere data gathering recited at a high level of generality such that humans are capable of simply listen to the audio inputs which involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 18 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 19 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 19 is a dependent claim of 15, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 19, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “receive each input at a contrastive learning model” [Mental Process] – receiving input or data which can be considered as an action of looking/listening/recording involving observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen. [Mathematical Calculations] – the contrastive learning model is a step of mathematical calculations thus it recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 19, the claim recites additional elements of “program code” Program code is just a set of instructions which is recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or the program code that simply executes instructions. (see MPEP 2106.05(f))} This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 20 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 20 is a dependent claim of 19, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. As Claim 20 does not have any abstract idea by itself, thus uses all the limitations of Claims 15 and 19. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 20, the claim recites additional elements of “the contrastive learning model includes an augmentation module, an encoder, and a projection head” “augmentation module”, “encoder”, and “projection head” are recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)) [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or machine-learning components that simply runs mathematical calculations (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 21 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 21 is a dependent claim of 20, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 21, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “the augmented sample is generated, via the augmentation module , in accordance with augmenting the clean sample with noise” [Mathematical Calculations] – the augmented sample generated is simply applying mathematical operation to the data or sample thus recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 21, the claim recites additional elements of “ via the augmentation module ” “augmentation module” is recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)) [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or machine-learning components that simply runs mathematical calculations (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 22 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 22 is an apparatus claim thus it falls into one of the four categories of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding independent claim 22, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “generating, for each input of a plurality of inputs, a clean sample and an augmented sample” [Mental Process] – generating samples or data using some kind of inputs through modifications such as removing or adding involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with the augmented sample to form a positive pair” [Mental process] – associating or paring samples according to some kind of indicators or features is just an act of comparing and grouping involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with another clean sample associated with another input of the plurality of inputs to form a negative pair” [Mental process] – associating or paring samples according to some kind of indicators or features is just an act of comparing and grouping involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen “learning one or more representations of the plurality of inputs based on the positive pair and the negative pair of each input of the plurality of inputs” [Mental process] – learning some kind characteristics of inputs or data based on other data or pairs is just an act of distinguishing features which involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 22, the claim recites additional elements of “means for” The word “means” are recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or some kind of tools. (see MPEP 2106.05(f))} This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 23 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 23 is a dependent claim of 22, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 23, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “ the means for learning the one or more representations comprises program code to minimize a loss for each input of the plurality of inputs” [Mathematical Calculations] – minimizing a loss of each input is using some kind of mathematical loss functions for optimization thus it recites to an abstract idea. “a stop-gradient is a function of an embedding of the clean sample” [Mathematical Calculations] – using a function for embedding an input or a sample is simply using the function or going through mathematical calculations to convert inputs into vectors thus it recites to an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 23, the claim recites additional elements of “means for” The word “means” are recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or some kind of tools. (see MPEP 2106.05(f))} This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 24 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 24 is a dependent claim of 22, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 24, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “learn the one or more representations via contrastive learning in a self-supervised manner” [Mathematical Calculations] – contrastive learning is simply learning by comparing two inputs or data using both embedding calculations to get vectors and loss functions to minimize a loss for optimization thus it recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 24 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 25 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 25 is a dependent claim of 22, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 25, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “ each input of the plurality of inputs is an audio input” [Mental process] – receiving audio inputs without reciting any structural means is a mere data gathering recited at a high level of generality such that humans are capable of simply listen to the audio inputs which involves observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? The claim 25 does not recite any additional elements other than abstract ideas, so it does not integrate into a practical application. Thus, this claim is directed to the abstract idea. Regarding Claim 26 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 26 is a dependent claim of 22, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 26, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “receiving each input at a contrastive learning model” [Mental Process] – receiving input or data which can be considered as an action of looking/listening/recording involving observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions that is capable of being performed in the human mind with the assistance of paper and pen. [Mathematical Calculations] – the contrastive learning model is a step of mathematical calculations thus it recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 26, the claim recites additional elements of “means for” The word “means” are recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or some kind of tools. (see MPEP 2106.05(f))} This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 27 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 27 is a dependent claim of 27, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. As Claim 27 does not have any abstract idea by itself, thus uses all the limitations of Claims 22 and 26. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 27, the claim recites additional elements of “the contrastive learning model includes an augmentation module, an encoder, and a projection head” “augmentation module”, “encoder”, and “projection head” are recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)) [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or machine-learning components that simply runs mathematical calculations (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Regarding Claim 28 Step 1 – whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2016.03 Claim 28 is a dependent claim of 27, thus it falls within the same category of statutory subject matter. Step 2A Prong 1 – whether the claim recites a judicial exception. See MPEP 2106.04, subsection II. Regarding dependent claim 28, following limitations recite a judicial exception: “the augmented sample is generated, via the augmentation module , in accordance with augmenting the clean sample with noise” [Mathematical Calculations] – the augmented sample generated is simply applying mathematical operation to the data or sample thus recites an abstract idea. Step 2A Prong 2 – whether the claim recites additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application of the exception? Regarding Claim 28, the claim recites additional elements of “ via the augmentation module ” “augmentation module” is recited at a high level of generality and is merely adding words “apply it” to the judicial exception. (see MPEP 2106.05(f)) [Even when viewed in combination, the additional elements do no more than automate the mental processes that a person could perform, using computer components as a tool, thus the claim as a whole does not integrate into a practical application.] Step 2B – whether the claim as a whole amount to significantly more than the judicial exception? I.e. Are there any additional elements (features/limitations/step) recited in the claim beyond the abstract idea? The claim does not provide an inventive concept (significantly more than the abstract idea). The claim is ineligible. As explained above, the additional element [1] is considered a mere instruction to apply an exception to the generic computer components or machine-learning components that simply runs mathematical calculations (see MPEP 2106.05(f)). This limitation remains a mere instruction to apply an exception even upon reconsideration. Even when considered in combination, the additional element represents a mere instruction to apply an exception, which cannot provide an inventive concept. Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 07-06 AIA 15-10-15 In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status. 07-20-aia AIA 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. 07-23-aia AIA The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows: 1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art. 2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue. 3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art. 4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness. 07-21-aia AIA Claim s 1, 3-8, 10-15, 17-22, 24-28 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zheng et al. ( Zheng ), Non-Patent Literature listed in the IDS filed on Feb 20, 2024, “Contrastive Attraction and Contrastive Repulsion for Representation Learning”, published on July 25, 2022, pages34 in view of Baevski et al. ( Baevski ), Non-Patent Literature listed in the IDS filed on Nov 27, 2023, “wav2vec 2.0: A framework for Self-Supervised Learning of Speech Representations”, published on 2020, pages 12 . As to independent Claim 1, Zheng teaches a processor-implemented method comprising: generating, for each input of a plurality of inputs, a clean sample and an augmented sample ( Zheng, Pg3, Section3 The proposed approach, "we denote T(xi,ei) as a random transformation of xi, where ei ~ p(e) represents the randomness injected into the transformation” and Pg24, Section C Experimental details, Data Augmentation, Lines1-5, “We strictly follow the standard data augmentations to construct positive and negative samples introduced in prior works in contrastive learning. The augmentations include image resizing, random cropping, flipping, color jittering, and gray-scale conversion” , wherein T(xi,ei) is equivalent to the augmented sample of a clean sample xi through the augmentations such as image resizing, random cropping, flipping, color jittering, and gray-scale conversion, thus there are both the clean sample and the augmented sample which is equivalent to the claimed invention); learning one or more representations of the plurality of inputs based on the positive pair and the negative pair of each input of the plurality of inputs ( Zheng, Pg1, Abstract, Lines1-2, "Contrastive Learning (CL) methods effectively learn data representations in a self-supervision manner", Pg2, Figure1, Lines4-6, “For CACR, using multiple positive and negative pairs, the weight of a sample (indicated by point scale) is contrastively computed to allow the query to not only more strongly pull more distant positive samples, but also more strongly push away closer negative samples” and Pg4, Section 3.1 Contrastive attraction and contrastive repulsion, "In the same spirit of letting the query attract positive samples and repel negative samples, Contrastive Attraction and Contrastive Repulsion (CACR) directly models the cost of moving from the query to positive/negative samples..." , wherein contrastive learning uses both the positive and negative pairs to model or train, thus it is equivalent to the claimed invention). Zheng teaches about training the contrastive learning model using a positive pair and a negative pair ( Zheng, Pg3, Section 3 The proposed approach, "for each x0, with query x = T(x0, e0), we sample a positive pair (x, x+), where x+ = T(x0, e+), and M negative pairs ..." ). However, Zheng does not teach associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the clean sample with the augmented sample to form a positive. In the same field of endeavor of the contrastive learning, Baevski teaches this limitation ( Baevski, Pg3, Section 3.2, Contrastive Loss, "given context network output c_t centered over masked time step t, the model needs to identify the true quantized latent speech representation q_t in a set of K+1 quantized candidate representations q~ in Q_t which includes q_t and K distractors", wherein c_t is masked sample of q_t, which is equivalent of q_t being a clean sample and c_t being the augmented sample. Thus pairing these two samples as a positive pair is inherently equivalent to the claimed invention.) Baevski also teaches associating, for each input of the plurality of inputs, the cleans sample with another clean sample associated with another input of the plurality of inputs to form a negative pair ( Baevski, Pg3, Section 3.2, Contrastive Loss, "Distractors are uniformly sampled from other masked time steps of the same utterance ", wherein the distractors are basically q_1, q_2, and more where q_t is a clean sample of time step t. Thus, distractors are clean samples and pairing these as a negative pair is inherently equivalent to the claimed invention.) Zheng and Baevski are analogous to the claimed invention as both are from the same field of endeavor of the contrastive learning. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to combine the conventional contrastive learning model of Zheng and wav2vec 2.0 framework of Baevski . The motivation is as recited by Baevski ( Baevski, Pg1, Abstract, Lines1-3, “We show for the first time that learning powerful representations from speech audio alone followed by fine-tuning on transcribed speech can outperform the best semi- supervised methods while being conceptually simpler”) such that extracting core features directly from raw audio with structural simplicity, which achieves state-of-the-art accuracy and extreme data efficiency that outperforms complex supervised models. As to dependent Claim 3, Zheng teaches the processor-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising learning the one or more representations via contrastive learning in a self-supervised manner ( Zheng, Pg1, Abstract, Lines1-2, "Contrastive Learning (CL) methods effectively learn data representations in a self-supervision manner".) As to dependent Claim 4, The combination of Zheng and Baevski teaches, as discussed above, all the limitations of Claim 1. The combination teaches about the contrastive learning model uses the clean-augmented positive pair and the clean-clean negative pair. Baevski further teaches the processor-implemented method of claim 1, wherein each input of the plurality of inputs is an audio input ( Baevski, Pg1, Abstract, Lines1-3, “We show for the first time that learning powerful representations from speech audio alone followed by fine-tuning on transcribed speech can outperform the best semi-supervised methods while being conceptually simpler”, wherein it uses only audio samples as the primary inputs to train the contrastive learning model, which is equivalent to the claimed invention.) As to dependent Claim 5, The combination of Zheng and Baevski teaches, as discussed above, all the limitations of Claim 1. The combination teaches about the contrastive learning model uses the clean-augmented positive pair and the clean-clean negative pair. Zheng further teaches the processor-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising receiving each input at a contrastive learning model ( Zheng, Pg5, Figure2, wherein the sample construction, the left side, indicates the inputs that will be used for the contrastive learning model which is equivalent to the claimed invention of receiving inputs at a contrastive learning model.) As to dependent Claim 6, The combination of Zheng and Baevski teaches, as discussed above, all the limitations of Claims 1 and 5. The combination teaches about the contrastive learning model receive the inputs and uses the clean-augmented positive pair and the clean-clean negative pair. Zheng further teaches the processor-implemented method of claim 5, wherein the contrastive learning model includes an augmentation module, an encoder, and a projection head ( Zheng, Pg4, Section3 The proposed approach, "we denote T(xi,ei) as a random transformation of xi, where ei ~ p(e) represents the randomness injected into the transformation”, Pg5, Figure 2, "The encoder extracts features from samples..." and Zheng, Pg5, Figure 2, “embedding hypersphere”, wherein the function T(xi, ei) corresponds to the augmentation module such that with the input xi, it will output an augmented sample. Figure 2 mentions about the encoder that extracts the features from the samples that can be embedded in the hypersphere which is equivalent to the claimed invention’s encoder and the projection head.) As to dependent Claim 7, The combination of Zheng and Baevski teaches, as discussed above, all the limitations of Claims 1, 5 and 6. The combination teaches about the contrastive learning model receive the inputs and uses the clean-augmented positive pair and the clean-clean negative pair and these steps are done through using the augmentation module, the encoder, and the projection head. Zheng further teaches the processor-implement method of claim 6, wherein the augmented sample is generated, via the augmentation module, in accordance with augmenting the clean sample with noise ( Zheng, Pg4, Section3 The proposed approach, "we denote T(xi,ei) as a random transformation of xi, where ei ~ p(e) represents the randomness injected into the transformation”, wherein ei represents the random noise that will be injected into the transformation step to clean sample, xi, which is equivalent to the claimed invention. ) As to independent Claim 8, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 1 which contains similar limitations of Claim 1 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 10, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 3 which contains similar limitations of Claim 3 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 11, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 4 which contains similar limitations of Claim 4 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 12, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 5 which contains similar limitations of Claim 5 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 13, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 6 which contains similar limitations of Claim 6 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 14, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 7 which contains similar limitations of Claim 7 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to independent Claim 15, it is a non-transitory computer-readable medium claim of Claim 1 which contains similar limitations of Claim 1 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 17, it is a non-transitory computer-readable medium claim of Claim 3 which contains similar limitations of Claim 3 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 18, it is a non-transitory computer-readable medium claim of Claim 4 which contains similar limitations of Claim 4 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 19, it is a non-transitory computer-readable medium claim of Claim 5 which contains similar limitations of Claim 5 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 20, it is a non-transitory computer-readable medium claim of Claim 6 which contains similar limitations of Claim 6 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 21, it is a non-transitory computer-readable medium claim of Claim 7 which contains similar limitations of Claim 7 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to independent Claim 22, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 1 which contains similar limitations of Claim 1 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 24, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 3 which contains similar limitations of Claim 3 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 25, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 4 which contains similar limitations of Claim 4 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 26, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 5 which contains similar limitations of Claim 5 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 27, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 6 which contains similar limitations of Claim 6 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 28, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 7 which contains similar limitations of Claim 7 and thus rejected under the same rationale . 07-21-aia AIA Claim 2, 9, 16 and 23 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zheng and Baevski as discussed in Claim 1 in view of Grill et al (Grill), Non-Patent Literature listed in the IDS filed on Nov 27, 2023, “Bootstrap Your Own Latent a New Approach to Self-Supervised Learning”, published on July 25, 2020, pages14 . As to dependent Claim 2, The combination of Zheng and Baevski teaches, as discussed above, all the limitations of Claim 1. The combination teaches about the contrastive learning model uses the clean-augmented positive pair and the clean-clean negative pair. However, the combination fails to teach the following limitations but Grill teaches the processor-implemented method of claim 1, wherein learning the one or more representations comprises minimizing a loss for each input of the plurality of inputs ( Grill, Pg4, Figure2, "BYOL minimizes a similarity loss between qθ(zθ) and sg(z'e), where θ are the trained weights, e are an exponential moving average of θ and sg means stop-gradient. At the end of training, everything but fθ is discarded, and yθ is used as the image representation", wherein qθ(zθ) and sg(z'e) are output samples created from the inputs and BYOL is trying to minimize the loss between these two samples, which is inherently equivalent to the claimed invention); the clean sample is a ground truth ( Grill, Pg4, Section 3.1 Description of BYOL, Lines5-6 "The target network has the same architecture as the online network, but uses a different set of weights e", wherein regression targets are considered as the answer key for the online network to be, thus it is equivalent to the clean sample as a ground truth of the claimed invention ); a stop-gradient is a function of an embedding of the clean sample ( Grill, Pg4, Figure2, "BYOL minimizes a similarity loss between qθ(zθ) and sg(z'e), where θ are the trained weights, e are an exponential moving average of θ and sg means stop-gradient. At the end of training, everything but fθ is discarded, and yθ is used as the image representation", wherein if the stop-gradient here is used on the clean samples of Baevski , it is equivalent to the claimed invention.) Zheng, Baevski, and Grill are analogous to the claimed invention as they are from the same field of endeavor of the contrastive learning. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date, to combine the conventional contrastive learning model of Zheng , wav2vec 2.0 framework of Baevski with stop-gradient and target network mechanism of Grill. The motivation is as recited by Grill (Grill, Pg7, Section 5 Building intuitions with ablations, Batch Size, Lines2-3, “BYOL does not use negative examples and we expect it to be more robust to smaller batch sizes” ) as due to the need to increase training stability and reduce the dependency on large batch sizes as some linguistic samples may be scarce. As to dependent Claim 9, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 2 which contains similar limitations of Claim 2 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 16, it is a non-transitory computer-readable medium claim of Claim 2 which contains similar limitations of Claim 2 and thus rejected under the same rationale. As to dependent Claim 23, it is an apparatus claim of Claim 2 which contains similar limitations of Claim 2 and thus rejected under the same rationale . Conclusion 07-96 AIA The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Wang et al. (US Patent, US-20210182686-A1), Bose et al (Canadian Patent, CA-3022998-A1), Sun et al (Chinese Patent, CN-113505601-A), Liu et al (Chinese Patent, CN-115035606-A) and Schroff et al (NPL, “FaceNet: A Unified Embedding for Face Recognition and Clustering”, 10page) Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DONG YOON JUNG whose telephone number is (571)270-0198. The examiner can normally be reached 8am-5pm. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Cesar Paula can be reached at (571) 272-4128. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. /DONG YOON JUNG/Examiner, Art Unit 2145 /CESAR B PAULA/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 2 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 3 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 4 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 5 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 6 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 7 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 8 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 9 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 10 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 11 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 12 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 13 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 14 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 15 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 16 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 17 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 18 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 19 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 20 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 21 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 22 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 23 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 24 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 25 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 26 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 27 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 28 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 29 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 30 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 31 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 32 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 33 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 34 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 35 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 36 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 37 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 38 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 39 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 40 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 41 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 42 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 43 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 44 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 45 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 46 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 47 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 48 Art Unit: 2145 Application/Control Number: 18/456,112 Page 49 Art Unit: 2145
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