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 .
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(s) 1, 2, 5, 6 and 9-16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yamauchi (JP 2003-177097).
Regarding claim 1, Yamauchi discloses a photoacoustic system comprising: a semiconductor substrate 10, the semiconductor substrate including a face forming an upper face (shown as the lower surface in Fig. 1b), and an inner wall delimiting a hollow volume 12, the hollow volume extending into the semiconductor substrate at a distance from the upper face of said semiconductor substrate (see Figs. 1a-b), the semiconductor substrate comprising at least one portion forming a window, transparent to an electromagnetic field, extending in vertical alignment with at least one part of the hollow volume and from the upper face of the semiconductor substrate up to the hollow volume (see Id. and par. 0024, portion of substrate 10 between area 12 and element 11 is transparent), and at least one surface emitting device 11 comprising an emitting face, said emitting face extending over said window (see Id.), said at least one surface emitting device 11 comprising: a waveguide 13 comprising a first face and a second face, opposite to the first face, the waveguide comprising an active region 131 configured to emit the electromagnetic field (see Fig. 5 and par. 0053), and a diffraction grating 111 having, along a first direction parallel to the emitting face of said device, a diffraction order, said diffraction grating extending over the first face of the waveguide (lower face in Fig. 5), the emitting face being coincident with the second face of the waveguide (upper face in Fig. 5).
Yamauchi is silent as to the diffraction order of the diffraction grating. However, one of ordinary skill in the art would have known that a diffraction order of a grating could be adjusted and tailored for particular function in a known and predictable way, i.e. the design of diffraction order and its effect on how light is diffracted has been well-established in the art. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have made the diffraction order of the grating in Yamauchi greater than or equal to two because it would have allowed the light to have spread out more and be more dispersed into the measurement volume.
Regarding claim 2, Yamauchi discloses that the diffraction grating of said at least one surface emitting device 11 extends over the first face of the waveguide of said at least one surface emitting device and said diffraction grating is reflective (see par. 0069, invention uses surface-emitting laser; see pars. 0072-0075, describing how distributed Bragg reflector type diffraction grating is used which is reflective; see also Fig. 4, light source comes from source 2 and is reflected through waveguide 11 and its grating 111 up to volume 12’).
Regarding claim 5, Yamauchi discloses the diffraction grating (e.g. grating layer 111 in Fig. 5, or grating 102 in Fig. 8) of said at least one surface emitting device extends in vertical alignment with the active region 103 of the waveguide of said at least one surface emitting device, the active region having a length, measured along the first direction, and the diffraction grating of said at least one surface emitting device having a length, also measured along the first direction, the length of said diffraction grating being substantially equal to the length of said active region, said grating having, along the first direction, a single diffraction order (see e.g. Fig. 8; and see pars. 0088-0093 describing diffraction order by pitch spacing and showing grating layer and active layer over each other aligned vertically and having the same length/width).
Regarding claim 6, Yamauchi does not explicitly disclose the diffraction grating having a diffraction order greater than or equal to three. Yamauchi does teach that the diffraction order may be adjusted based on the pitch spacing and other design features of the grating in order to produce specific emission wavelengths (par. 0093). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have used any of various diffraction orders, including one of greater than or equal to three, in order to produce different emission wavelengths.
Regarding claims 9 and 10, Yamauchi discloses that the surface emitting device 11 is arranged in some way against the window (see Fig. 1b). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have bonded the surface emitting device 11 to the window of the substrate in Yamauchi in order to ensure that the surface emitting device remains securely attached and aligned with the window. It would have been further been obvious to having bonded using a polymerisable adhesive because they are known to have versatile substrate compatibility and high adhesion strength.
Regarding claim 11, Yamauchi does explicitly disclose that the surface emitting device may be configured to emit infrared electromagnetic radiation (par. 0078). Yamauchi does not state that it is emitted from its face at an angle with respect to the normal of the emitting face of between 0º and 60º. However, one of ordinary skill in the art would have understood that the angle of the emitted light could be adjusted and controlled based on the excitation source used, the particular dye and the grating spacing. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have configured radiation to have emitted at 0º to the normal from the emitting surface, as well as other angles near the normal, because this would have directed radiation generally out from the surface an into the measurement volume area.
Regarding claim 12, Yamauchi discloses that the semiconductor substrate comprises a plurality of windows and the photoacoustic system comprises a plurality of surface emitting devices, each surface emitting device of the plurality of surface emitting devices being disposed on one window of the plurality of windows (see par. 0031, multiple measurement volumes 12 with multiple laser sources 11).
Regarding claim 13, Yamauchi discloses that the electromagnetic radiation comprises a wavelength in the range from 0.8 um to 20 um (par. 0075, wavelengths around 850 nm).
Regarding claim 14, Yamauchi discloses that the photoacoustic system comprises a heat regulator (lower substrate potion 10 in Figs. 4 and 5) configured to regulate temperature of said at least one surface emitting device 11 (see par. 0053, substrate portion 10 below element 11 is glass which has some heat regulating properties).
Regarding claim 15, Yamauchi discloses a method for manufacturing a photoacoustic system comprising, from a semiconductor substrate 10 comprising a face forming an upper face: forming an inner wall delimiting a hollow volume 12 (or 12’’), the hollow volume extending into the semiconductor substrate at a distance from the upper face of said semiconductor substrate (par. 0023) so that the semiconductor substrate comprises at least one portion forming a window (par. 0024, portion between light-emitting surface of element 11 and volume 12), transparent to an electromagnetic field, extending in vertical alignment with at least one part of the hollow volume and from the upper face of the semiconductor substrate to the hollow volume (see par. 0024 and Figs. 1a-b; note that “upper surface” is surface with element 11 on it and is facing down in Fig. 1b but would face up depending how structure is oriented in space); manufacturing at least one surface emitting device 11 extending over the window (Id.), said at least one device comprising: a waveguide 13 comprising a first face and a second face, opposite to the first face, the second face resting on said at least one window, the waveguide comprising an active region 131 parallel to the second face configured to emit the electromagnetic field (see Fig. 5 and par. 0053), and a diffraction grating 111 having a diffraction order and extending over the first face of the waveguide or over the second face of the waveguide (see Fig. 5).
Yamauchi is silent as to the diffraction order of the diffraction grating. However, one of ordinary skill in the art would have known that a diffraction order of a grating could be adjusted and tailored for particular function in a known and predictable way, i.e. the design of diffraction order and its effect on how light is diffracted has been well-established in the art. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have made the diffraction order of the grating in Yamauchi greater than or equal to two because it would have allowed the light to have spread out more and be more dispersed into the measurement volume.
Regarding claim 16, Yamauchi discloses forming the waveguide 13 of said at least one device on said at least one window of the semiconductor substrate 10 (see Fig. 1 and Fig. 4), and forming the diffraction grating 111 of said at least one device on the first face of said waveguide (see Fig. 5 and par. 0053).
Claim(s) 3 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yamauchi (JP 2003-177097) in view of Lee et al. (US 2022/0224081).
Regarding claim 3, Yamauchi does disclose that the diffraction grating of the at least one surface emitting device 11 comprises a periodic structure extending over the first face of the waveguide (see Fig. 5 showing grating 111; see Fig. 8 showing grating periodic lattice structure; see par. 0083, and pars. 0086-088, describing periodic structures formed on surface of waveguide element for surface emitting laser). Yamauchi does not explicitly disclose that the grating comprises a metal layer extending over the periodic structure but does state that electric current may be used as the excitation source (par. 0105). Lee et al. disclose a surface emitting laser that uses electric current as an excitation source, wherein in the surface emitting laser element has a grating periodic structures 200,300 and metal layer 140 extending over the periodic structures (Fig. 1B, par. 0025). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to have used a metal layer with the grating structure, as taught by Lee et al., in the invention of Yamauchi because it would have allowed for an integrated electrode to easily use the layer with electrical current as the excitation source.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4, 7, 8 and 17 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:
With regard to claim 4, Yamauchi fails to disclose or suggest the diffraction grating of said at least one surface emitting device extending over the second face of the waveguide of said at least one surface emitting device and said diffraction grating being non-reflective.
With regard to claim 7, Yamauchi fails to disclose or suggest that the active region of said at least one surface emitting device has a width, measured along a second direction, parallel to the emitting face of said at least one surface emitting device and perpendicular to the first direction, and the diffraction grating of said at least one surface emitting device has a width, measured along the second direction, the width of said diffraction grating being substantially equal to the width of said active region, where said diffraction grating has, along the second direction, another diffraction order, unique and greater than or equal to two.
With regard to claim 8, Yamauchi fails to disclose or suggest that the first and second opposing flanks of the waveguide have conductive layers extending over them.
With regard to claim 17, Yamauchi fails to disclose or suggest that manufacturing the surface emitting device comprises forming the diffraction grating of said at least one device on said at least one window of the semiconductor substrate, and forming the waveguide of said at least one device on said diffraction grating.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PAUL M WEST whose telephone number is (571)272-2139. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9 am - 5:30 pm (CT).
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/PAUL M. WEST/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2855
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