DETAILED ACTION
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 1 and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Yao (CN 109588779; see attached translation for citation).
Yao teaches an atomizing (aerosol generation) device [0002], comprising: a heater comprising at least one heating element configured to heat an aerosol-forming substrate; a power supply; and a circuit, connected to the heater and the power supply [0015-0019], the circuit being configured to: obtain a sampling value of a resistance (thermal property) of the at least one heating element in real time and when the sampling value exceeds a preset determining threshold, control power supplied by the power supply to the at least one heating element to stabilize the sampling value of the thermal property of the at least one heating element to a target value [0020]; obtain an output power of the at least one heating element; and issue a prompt when the output power is less than a preset power threshold to prompt a user that dry burning occurs in the at least one heating element [0054, 0062, 0063]. The method of operating the device thereby reads on the claimed method.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim 9 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yao as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Yan (US 2022/0192273).
Yao teaches the circuit is configured to: obtain an initial sampling value of the at least one heating element [0046]. Yao does not teach determining a thermal property maximum value according to the initial sampling value and a preset maximum safety temperature. However, this configuration is known in the art of electronic smoking devices as taught by Yan [0016, 0078], and would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to apply to the circuit of Yan for the purpose of determining a resistance maximum value.
Claim 16 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yao in view of Thorsen (US 2019/0166918).
Yao as applied to above with respect to claims 1 and 10 teaches the claimed method. Yao does not teach or more non-transitory computer-readable mediums having processor-executable instructions stored thereon, wherein the processor-executable instructions, when executed, facilitate the method. However, it is known in the art of aerosol-generating devices to provide a non-transitory computer-readable medium having processor-executable instructions stored thereon, wherein the processor-executable instructions, when executed, facilitate a method, as taught by Thorsen [0006]. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to apply this to the method of Yao to achieve the predictable result of providing a means for storing instructions on how to operate the device.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-8, 11-15, and 17-20 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: There is no teaching or reasonable suggestion in the prior art to modify the device or method of Yao as applied above such that the circuit is further configured after obtaining the sampling value of the thermal property of the at least one heating element in real time, to: determine, according to the sampling value obtained at a current moment, whether the at least one heating element reaches a thermal balance state; and set the determining threshold as a first threshold if the at least one heating element reaches the thermal balance state, the first threshold being greater than a thermal balance stabilization value, and the thermal balance stabilization value being a thermal property value of the at least one heating element in the thermal balance state; or set the determining threshold as a second threshold if the at least one heating element does not reach the thermal balance state, the second threshold being a thermal property maximum value of the at least one heating element, and the thermal property maximum value being a thermal property value of the at least one heating element at a preset maximum safety temperature.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ERIC YAARY whose telephone number is (571)272-3273. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9-5.
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, Philip Louie can be reached at (571)270-1241. 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.
/ERIC YAARY/Examiner, Art Unit 1755
Prosecution Insights