DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Drawings
The drawings were received on 30 December 2025. These drawings are acceptable.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s amendment/arguments, see page 5, filed 30 December 2025, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1 and 4 under 35 USC 102(a)(1) have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Masanobu in view of US 6,812,821 (Fujita et al.).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1 and 4-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over JP 2007-309908 (Masanobu) in view of US 6,812,821 (Fujita et al.).
With respect to the limitations of claim 1, Masanobu discloses a hydrogen detection system (10) comprising:
a thermal conductivity type hydrogen sensor configured to detect a hydrogen concentration (heat conduction type gas detection element (24) is provided for measuring hydrogen concentration in the detection element storage space (22) by detecting a difference in electrical resistance, by knowing the change in resistance proportional to the difference in thermal conductivity between the gas to be detected and the reference gas - Figures 1-4);
a humidity sensor configured to detect humidity (humidity detection element(not shown) is provided in the detection element storage space (22) - Figures 1-4), the humidity sensor configured to detect gas in a detection target gas, and detect humidity in the detected gas (humidity of the environment within the element storage space is measured); and
a controller (5), wherein the controller corrects a first detection value detected by the thermal conductivity type hydrogen sensor, on a basis of the humidity detected by the humidity sensor, and outputs the hydrogen concentration as a second detection value (a first hydrogen concentration is corrected through a humidity compensation to generate a second corrected hydrogen concentration). Masanobu fails to expressly disclose that the humidity sensor includes a porous layer which serves as a flow path for a detection target gas.
Fujita et al. disclose a humidity sensor (1) comprising a porous moisture sensitive layer (13) between porous lower and upper detection electrodes (12, 14) (Figure 1). Modifying Masanobu to provide a humidity sensor including a porous layer would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing the invention as a means of detecting humidity within the sensing environment. Enhancing the response of the humidity sensor can be achieved when the moisture sensitive layer and the detection electrodes are also porous (col. 4, lines 7-11).
With respect to the limitation of claim 4, the combination (Masanobu) would appear capable of detecting a plurality of hydrogen concentrations in a range of at least 0.1% to 4% given that the explosion limit of hydrogen is 4%, and an alarm (9) is disclosed and raised if a concentration of hydrogen is deemed to be abnormal (out of range) or leaking. A system using hydrogen and a hydrogen sensor would be motivated to detect the presence of hydrogen at a level less than 4% to prevent an explosion that would be harmful to occupants or to the fuel cell system.
With respect to the limitation of claim 5, the combination (Fujita et al). further discloses that the humidity sensor is an yttria-stabilized zirconia type humidity sensor. Fujita et al. disclose that the lower and upper electrodes (12,14) are formed of porous material and comprise yttria-stabilized zirconia in an amount of 12% by weight (col. 9, lines 62-66 and col. 10, lines 14-18). Modifying Masanobu to make the humidity sensor an yttria stabilized zirconia type sensor would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing the invention as a means of improving the moisture permeability of the electrodes (col. 4, lines 39-45).
With respect to the limitation of claim 6, the combination (Fujita et al.) further disclose that a surface of the humidity sensor (1) is covered by a porous protective layer (150) (Figure 9b shows a protective layer (150) made of spinnel formed on the upper and side surfaces of the upper electrode (14) and the moisture-sensitive layer (13) - col. 13, lines 29-35; and the porosity of the protective layer is 55% - col. 13, lines 36-37).
Claims 2-3 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over JP 2007-309908 (Masanobu) in view of US 6,812,821 (Fujita et al.) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of EP2887057 (Hornung).
With respect to the limitations of claim 2, the combination discloses all of the limitations of the base claim including a storage device configured to store information (memory (8) stores information – Figure 5), but fail to expressly disclose that the storage device includes a conversion table that converts the first detection value into the second detection value according to the humidity, and the controller converts the first detection value into the second detection value by using the conversion table and outputs the hydrogen concentration.
Hornung discloses a device and method of humidity compensated gas concentration monitoring by thermal conductivity measurements by utilizing at least one thermal conductivity detector (16,17) and a humidity sensor (22), which uses a humidity measurement as a correction parameter for a concentration measurement (abstract). A memory (EEPROM 203) can be used to store calibration and/or correction data (paragraph [0018]). Additionally, the memory (203) provides a correction map with humidity and temperature values (paragraph [0020]). Given temperature and relative humidity a table representing a function of thermal conductivity versus absolute humidity can be used to derive a correction value for a conductivity processor (202), which is enabled to provide a value for the concentration of a gas component corrected for the error caused by humidity in the gas flow (paragraph [0020], lines 8-14). Modifying the combination to provide a table for converting first detection values into second corrected values would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing the invention as a means of providing a reference for showing how the concentration value is corrected.
With respect to the limitations of claim 3, the combination (Masanobu/Hornung) discloses use of a temperature sensor and temperature compensation. The combination (Hornung) further discloses that the storage device stores a plurality of tables corresponding to a plurality of temperatures as the conversion tables (memory (203) provides a correction map with humidity and temperature values (paragraph [0020]). Additionally, temperature measurements from temperature detector (21) can be used to correct the concentration measurements for the effects of the temperature of a substrate (12) and/or the flow or convert relative temperature measurements into absolute temperature measurements (paragraph [0019]). Moreover, given temperature and relative humidity a table representing a function of thermal conductivity versus absolute humidity can be used to derive a correction value for a conductivity processor (202), which is enabled to provide a value for the concentration of a gas component corrected for the error caused by humidity in the gas flow (paragraph [0020], lines 8-14). Modifying the combination to provide a table for converting first detection values into second corrected values would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing the invention as a means of providing a reference for showing how the concentration value is corrected.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
The prior art disclose humidity sensors having a porous layer to sensing humidity of a sensing environment.
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DANIEL SEAN LARKIN whose telephone number is 571-272-2198. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:00 AM - 5:30 PM.
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, Laura Martin can be reached at 571-272-2160. 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.
/DANIEL S LARKIN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2855