DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
This Office action is based on the 18/535,607 application filed 11 December 2023, which is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claims 1-20 are pending and have been fully considered.
Claim Interpretation
Applicant is reminded that “[i]f the body of a claim fully and intrinsically sets forth all of the limitations of the claimed invention, and the preamble merely states, for example, the purpose or intended use of the invention, rather than any distinct definition of any of the claimed invention’s limitations, then the preamble is not considered a limitation and is of no significance to claim construction.” Shoes by Firebug LLC v. Stride Rite Children’s Grp., LLC, 962 F.3d 1362, 2020 USPQ2d 10701. In the instant case, a catalyst for ammonia production, an in-situ proton filter catalyst for ammonia production and a method of forming a catalyst for ammonia production merely states the purpose or intended use of the catalyst, and, therefore, is not considered a limitation and is of no significance to claim construction.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
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) 1-6 and 8-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Krishnaraj et al in ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces (2019, vol 11, pp 27343-27352) as evidenced by Berlanga et al in Chemical Communications (2012, vol 48, pp 7976-7978).
With respect to claims 1, 10-11, 16, and 18, Krishnaraj et al discloses “[h]erein, we report for the first time lanthanides (Eu3+, Tb3+) coordinated to a 2D imine COF (TTA-DFP COF)” [last paragraph on left hand side of page 27344] and “[i]n a flask, 4,4′4″-(1,3,5-triazine-2,4,6-triyl)trianiline (TTA) (177 mg, 0.5 mmol) was dissolved in a mixture of mesitylene (2 mL) and 1,4-dioxane (3 mL). 2,6-Diformylpyridine (DFP) (101 mg, 0.75 mmol) was weighed separately and dissolved in a mixture of mesitylene (2 mL) and 1,4-dioxane (3 mL). The DFP mixture was then added slowly to the TTA mixture and precipitation was observed. Then, 0.5 mL of 6 M acetic acid was added dropwise and the flask was then kept still for 2 days under ambient conditions. Finally, the precipitate was filtered and washed with distilled water, diethyl ether, tetrahydrofuran, and acetone. After drying the materials at 90 °C for 24 h under vacuum, TTA-DFP COF (230 mg) was obtained as a yellow solid…an excess molar amount of the Ln(hfac)3(H2O)2 complex…was weighed and dissolved in 5 mL of methanol. In a Pyrex tube, the TTA-DFP COF was weighed, to which the methanol solution of the lanthanide complex was added. The tube was closed with a cap and the suspension was treated with ultrasound for 20 min. Then, it was left for 24 h at room temperature to soak in the lanthanide solution without stirring or heating. Applying this step significantly increased the amount of grafted lanthanide complexes onto the COF support. Afterward, it was placed on a heating block set to 85 °C and heated for 24 h. After cooling down to room temperature, the powder was filtered and washed a few times with methanol to remove any lanthanide ion absorbed on the surface. The powder was dried in an oven at 60 °C (Scheme S3)” [see paragraphs following the headings “Synthesis of TTA-DFP-COF” and “Synthesis of Ln@COFs” on page 27344].
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The Ln@TTA-DFP COF corresponds to the metal embedded Tta-Dfp COF catalyst of the instant application. Note that the instant application discloses “[t]he method further includes partially delaminating the plurality of layers by combining the COF moiety with a metal in a solution…” [paragraph 0007 of the published application]. It is well known in the art that exposing a COF to ultrasound may cause the same delaminating as evidenced by Berlanga et al [see 2nd paragraph on page 7977: “…[l]ooking for a first proof for the applicability of the methodology that we recently developed for delamination of COF-8 we used the mechanical forces induced by sonication to disrupt the noncovalent interactions between layers of the CMP0 bulk sample…”].
With respect to claims 2-6, 13-15, and 20, since the method of preparation of the Ln@TTA-DFP COF is similar to preparation method of the instant catalyst including delamination of the same TTA-DFP COF [see discussion above concerning delamination and compare the preparation method taught by the reference discussed above to paragraphs 0071-0073 of the published application], it is expected that the Ln@TTA-DFP COF meets the recited limitations of the aforesaid claims, absent evidence to the contrary.
With respect to claim 8, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to include copper.
With respect to claims 9 and 12, the excess molar amount of Ln(hfac)3(H2O)2 complex renders the recited range obvious.
With respect to claim 17, while Krishnaraj et al teaches a different order of performing the process steps recited in the instant claim, namely, exposing a suspension comprising methanol, metal, and TTA-DFP COF to ultrasound [see discussion above concerning such] instead of sonicating a metal/methanol solution (prior to mixing with TTA-DFP COF), applicant is reminded that the “selection of any order of performing process steps is prima facie obvious in the absence of new or unexpected results.” In re Burhans, 154 F.2d 690, 69 USPQ 330. Also, note the discussion of powder in Krishnaraj et al, some occurrences of which are italicized in the discussion above. A TTA-DFP COF powder would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art.
With respect to claim 19, it is well known in the art the COFs with C=N linkages may be prepared via a Schiff base condensation reaction [see Scheme S3 above, which illustrates C=N linkages].
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 7 is 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 does not appear to anticipate or render obvious ruthenium.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Guan et al in Nanoscale Advances (2020, vol 2, pp 3656-3733], which discloses “[m]ost COFs based on the Schiff-base reaction that form the C=N bond usually react at 120 C…” [1st paragraph on left hand side of page 3662] and Kaczmarek et al in Angewandte Chemie International Edition (2021, vol 60, pp 3727-3736], which discloses “TTA-DFP COF (Scheme 1) was synthesized following our earlier work by utilizing the dynamic imine condensation reaction[30]” [see 1st paragraph under the heading “Results and Discussion” on page 3728, wherein reference 30 is Krishnaraj et al cited above as prior art] and the following figure (note the Cu atoms disclosed therein):
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Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BRIAN A MCCAIG whose telephone number is (571)270-5548. The examiner can normally be reached Monday to Friday 8 to 4:30 Mountain Time.
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/BRIAN A MCCAIG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1772
17 June 2026
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