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 .
Status of the Claims
Amendment filed 27 May 2026 is acknowledged. Claims 1-5, 16, and 17 have been amended. Claims 1-20 are pending.
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election without traverse of group I, claims 1-15, in the reply filed on 27 May 2026 is acknowledged.
Claims 16-20 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected method, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 27 May 2026.
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
Information disclosure statement filed 9 February 2024 has been fully considered.
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, 2, and 6-15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Velea et al. (“Te-Based Chalcogenide Materials for Selector Applications,” hereinafter Velea) of record.
With respect to claim 1, Velea teaches (Table ST2) a device comprising a threshold switch formed of a mixture (P0.09Si0.51Te0.40) as claimed, the mixture comprising:
at least 0.90 parts by mole (1 part by mole) of a composition of three or four chemical elements (P, Si, and Te) comprising:
from 0.15 to 0.70 parts by mole of Si (0.51 parts by mole),
from 0.05 to 0.60 parts by mole of Te (0.40 parts by mole), and
from 0.05 to 0.60 parts by mole of one or both of S and P (0.09 parts by mole).
With respect to claim 2, Velea teaches wherein the mixture further comprises at most 0.10 parts by mole of other chemical elements different from Si, Te, S, and P, wherein a sum of all parts by mole of the mixture add up to 1.00 (Table ST2).
With respect to claim 6, Velea teaches wherein the mixture contains at most 0.07 parts by mole of other chemical elements different from the three or four chemical elements (Table ST2).
With respect to claim 7, Velea teaches wherein the mixture contains at most 0.05 parts by mole of the other chemical elements different from the three or four chemical elements (Table ST2).
With respect to claim 8, Velea teaches wherein the mixture is in a glass state at a temperature of 25° C. and a pressure of 1 atm (Table ST2).
With respect to claim 9, Velea teaches wherein the mixture contains an amount of Si in parts by mole, that is within 0.30 parts by mole of an amount of Te or, when S is among the three or four chemical elements, a combined amount of Te and S, in parts by mole (Table ST2).
With respect to claim 10, Velea teaches wherein the mixture contains an amount of Si in parts by mole, that is within 0.20 parts by mole of an amount of Te or, when S is among the three or four chemical elements, a combined amount of Te and S, in parts by mole (Table ST2).
With respect to claim 11, Velea teaches wherein the mixture is uniformly mixed (p. 9, “Experimental”).
With respect to claim 12, Velea teaches wherein the threshold switch is an Ovonic threshold switch, and the device is a memory device (abstract; “Introduction”).
With respect to claim 13, Velea teaches further comprising a memory element electrically coupled in series with the Ovonic threshold switch (abstract; “Introduction”).
With respect to claim 14, Velea teaches wherein the memory device comprises a memory element comprising the Ovonic threshold switch (abstract; “Introduction”).
With respect to claim 15, Velea teaches wherein the mixture contains at most 0.02 parts by mole of arsenic and selenium (Table ST2).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-5 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:
The prior art of record fails to teach the device comprising a threshold switch formed of a mixture of claims 3-5 in the combination of limitations as claimed, noting particularly the limitations, “from 0.10 to 0.50 parts by mole of S or P,” “from 0.15 to 0.50 parts by mole of S,” and, “from 0.15 to 0.45 parts by mole of P,” in combination with, “from 0.20 to 0.60 parts by mole of Si,” “from 0.30 to 0.60 parts by mole of Si,” and, “from 0.15 to 0.45 parts by mole of Si,” respectively.
Velea teaches (Table ST2) an ovonic threshold switching chalcogenide mixture comprising P0.09Si0.51Te0.40 as set forth in the 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) rejection of claim 1 above. However, Velea is silent to the aforementioned claimed relative molar concentrations.
Kostylev et al. (US Patent Application Publication 2005/0077515) teaches a chalcogenide alloy comprising Si14Te39As37Ge9X1, wherein where X may be element P ([0026]). However, this alloy fails to contain Si in the claimed relative molar concentrations.
Eun (US Patent Application Publication 2017/0243922) teaches ovonic threshold materials comprising Si, Te, and S ([0051-052, 0110-0111]). However, these materials also fail to contain Si in the claimed relative molar concentrations.
Conclusion
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/C.M.R./Examiner, Art Unit 2893
/SUE A PURVIS/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2893
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