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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the previous prior art rejection of claim 1 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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.
Claim 1 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Liang (US 2020/0408863).
Regarding claim 1, Liang teaches a method for magnetic resonance imaging, the method comprising:
(a) accessing magnetic resonance data acquired with a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) system, wherein the magnetic resonance data comprise spatiotemporally acquired data and navigator data [See kt space and see spatiotemperal mentioned throughout reference. See navigators mentioned throughout reference. See also rest of reference.];
(b) estimating motion data from the navigator data using a computer system, wherein the motion data comprise motion parameters associated with subject motion that occurred when the magnetic resonance data were acquired and Bo change data that indicate Bo inhomogeneity changes caused by the subject motion [See navigators mentioned throughout reference. ¶0066, wherein water navigators are used to determine B0 drift and head motion. See also rest of reference.];
(c) reconstructing an image from the spatiotemporally acquired data using a subspace reconstruction framework that models motion using the motion data, wherein the image has reduced motion artifacts [See subspace and navigators mentioned throughout reference. ¶0221-0222, wherein navigator information is used as a subspace in the subspace reconstruction. See also rest of reference.].
Claims 2-3 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over previously cited Liang, in view of Li (US 2018/0306882).
Regarding claim 2, Liang teaches the limitations of claim 1, which this claim depends from.
Liang further teaches wherein the motion data are estimated from navigator data [See navigators mentioned throughout reference. ¶0066, wherein water navigators are used to determine B0 drift and head motion. See also rest of reference.].
Liang are silent in teaching navigator images reconstructed from the navigator data using a second subspace reconstruction framework.
Li, which is also in the field of MRI, teaches navigator images reconstructed from the navigator data using a second subspace reconstruction framework [¶0122. See also rest of reference.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Liang with the teachings of Li because Liang teaches using navigators for motion estimation and Li teaches it is known in the art to reconstruct navigator images for motion estimation [Li - ¶0122. See also rest of reference.].
Regarding claim 3, Liang and Li teach the limitations of claim 2, which this claim depends from.
Liang teaches estimating the motion parameters from the navigator [See navigators mentioned throughout reference. ¶0066, wherein water navigators are used to determine B0 drift and head motion. See also rest of reference.]; and estimating the B0 change data by applying the motion parameters to a pre-estimated B0 map [See navigators mentioned throughout reference. ¶0066, wherein water navigators are used to determine B0 drift and head motion. See also rest of reference.].
However, Liang is silent in teaching reconstructing the navigator images from the navigator data using the second subspace reconstruction framework and navigator images.
Li teaches reconstructing the navigator images from the navigator data using the second subspace reconstruction framework and navigator images ¶0122. See also rest of reference.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Liang with the teachings of Li because Liang teaches using navigators for motion estimation and Li teaches it is known in the art to reconstruct navigator images for motion estimation [Li - ¶0122. See also rest of reference.].
Claim 4 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over previously cited Liang, in view of Li, and in further view of Wang (“3D-EPTI for Ultra-fast Multi-contrast and Quantitative Imaging”).
Regarding claim 4, Fair and Li teaches the limitations of claim 2, which this claim depends from.
Fair and Li are silent in teaching wherein the second subspace reconstruction framework models temporal subspace bases generated based on a signal model using an extended phase graph simulation.
Wang further teaches wherein the second subspace reconstruction framework models temporal subspace bases generated based on a signal model using an extended phase graph simulation [See Methods section. See also rest of reference.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Fair and Wang because both methods use echo planar and subspace reconstruction methods in MRI and because Wang teaches it is known in the art that EPTI is an efficient distortion/blurring-free multi-shot EPI technique for multi-contrast/quantitative imaging [Wang – introduction section. See also rest of reference.].
Claims 5-7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over previously cited Liang, in view of previously cited Li, and in further view of Dong (“Echo Planar Time-Resolved Imaging (EPTI) with subspace constraint and optimized k-t trajectory”.).
Regarding claim 5, Liang and Li teaches the limitations of claim 2, which this claim depends from.
Liang and Li are silent in teaching wherein the second subspace reconstruction framework models subspace bases based on a principal component analysis of simulated signals with different signal parameters.
Dong, which is also in the field of MRI, teaches wherein the second subspace reconstruction framework models subspace bases based on a principal component analysis of simulated signals with different signal parameters [Methods section. See also rest of reference.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Liang and Li with the teachings of Dong because Dong teaches it was known in the art to use PCA when performing subspace reconstruction [Dong - Methods section. See also rest of reference.].
Regarding claim 6, Liang, Li, and Dong teaches the limitations of claim 5, which this claim depends from.
Liang and Li are silent in teaching wherein the different signal parameters comprise at least one of different T2* decay values or different B0 change (ΔB0) values.
Dong further teaches wherein the different signal parameters comprise at least one of different T2* decay values or different Bo change (ΔBo ) values [Dong II – Methods section. See also rest of references.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Liang and Li with the teachings of Dong because Dong teaches it was known in the art to use PCA when performing subspace reconstruction [Dong - Methods section. See also rest of reference.].
Regarding claim 7, Liang, Li, and Dong teaches the limitations of claim 6, which this claim depends from.
Liang and Dong further teach w wherein the different T2* decay values are selected from a range of 5 ms to 400 ms [Liang - ¶0026. Dong – Fig. 4. See also rest of references.].
Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over previously cited Liang, in view of previously cited Li, and in further view of Dong, and in furthest view of Fair (“Propeller echo‐planar time‐resolved imaging with dynamic encoding (PEPTIDE)”).
Regarding claim 8, Liang, Li, and Dong teaches the limitations of claim 6, which this claim depends from.
Liang, Li, and Dong are silent in teaching wherein the different Bo change values are selected from a range of -50 Hz to +50 Hz.
Fair further teaches wherein the different Bo change values are selected from a range of -50 Hz to +50 Hz [Section 3.1].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Liang, Li, and Dong with the teachings of Fair because at least Liang teaches measuring B0 and Fair teaches it is known in the art to measure a B0 map with signals from -50 Hz to +50 Hz [Fair - Section 3.1].
Claims 9-12 and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over previously cited Liang, in view of Wang (“3D-EPTI for Ultra-fast Multi-contrast and Quantitative Imaging”).
Regarding claim 9, Liang teaches the limitations of claim 1, which this claim depends from.
Liang is silent in teaching wherein the subspace reconstruction framework models subspace bases generated based on a signal model using an extended phase graph simulation with different signal parameters.
Wang further teaches wherein the subspace reconstruction framework models subspace bases generated based on a signal model using an extended phase graph simulation with different signal parameters [Methods section. See also rest of reference.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Fair and Wang because both methods use subspace reconstruction methods in MRI and because Wang teaches it is known in the art to use EPG for simulation in MRI [Fair – Page 2136. See also rest of reference.].
Regarding claim 10, Liang and Wang teaches the limitations of claim 9, which this claim depends from.
Liang is silent in teaching wherein the subspace reconstruction framework models subspace bases generated based on a signal model using an extended phase graph simulation with different signal parameters
Wang further teaches wherein the subspace reconstruction framework models subspace bases generated based on a signal model using an extended phase graph simulation with different signal parameters [Introduction and Methods sections. See also rest of references.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Fair and Wang because both methods use subspace reconstruction methods in MRI and because Wang teaches it is known in the art to use EPG for simulation in MRI [Fair – Page 2136. See also rest of reference.].
Regarding claim 11, Liang and Wang teaches the limitations of claim 10, which this claim depends from.
Liang is silent in teaching wherein the different T1 values are selected from a range of 400 ms to 5000 ms.
Wang further teaches wherein the different T1 values are selected from a range of 400 ms to 5000 ms [See Fig. 2, wherein T1 maps are shown with a range of within 400 ms to 5000 ms. See also rest of references.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Fair and Wang because both methods use subspace reconstruction methods in MRI and because Wang teaches it is known in the art to use EPG for simulation in MRI [Fair – Page 2136. See also rest of reference.].
Regarding claim 12, Liang and Wang teaches the limitations of claim 10, which this claim depends from.
Liang and Wang further teach wherein the different T2* values are selected from a range of 5 ms to 500 ms [Liang - ¶0026. Wang – See Fig. 2. See also rest of references.].
Regarding claim 14, Liang teaches the limitations of claim 1, which this claim depends from.
Liang is silent in teaching wherein the magnetic resonance data are acquired using an echo planar time-resolved imaging (EPTI) based pulse sequence.
Wang, which is in the field of MRI, teaches wherein the magnetic resonance data are acquired using an echo planar time-resolved imaging (EPTI) based pulse sequence [3D EPTI. See also rest of references.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Fair and Wang because both methods use echo planar and subspace reconstruction methods in MRI and because Wang teaches it is known in the art that EPTI is an efficient distortion/blurring-free multi-shot EPI technique for multi-contrast/quantitative imaging [Wang – introduction section. See also rest of reference.].
Claim 13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over previously cited Liang, in view of Wang, and in further view of Chen (“Magnetic resonance fingerprinting (MRF) for rapid quantitative abdominal imaging”).
Regarding claim 13, Liang and Wang teaches the limitations of claim 10, which this claim depends from.
Liang and Wang are silent in teaching wherein the different B1+ factors are selected from a range of 0.75 to 1.25.
Chen, which is also in the field of MRI, teaches wherein the different B1+ factors are selected from a range of 0.75 to 1.25 [See Fig. 1-2, the values of B1+ are shown and fall into the claimed range. See also rest of reference.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Liang and Wang with the teachings of Chen because Chen shows it is typical to have B1+ similar to 0.75 to 1.2 [Chen - See Fig. 1-2, the values of B1+ are shown and fall into the claimed range. See also rest of reference.].
Claim 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over previously cited Liang, in view of previously cited Wang, and in further view of Li (US 2020/0364908, herein referred to as Li II.).
Regarding claim 15, Liang and Wang teaches the limitations of claim 14, which this claim depends from.
Wang further teaches wherein the EPTI-based pulse sequence is an inversion recovery pulse sequence having a data acquisition period and a magnetization recovery period, wherein the spatiotemporally acquired data are acquired during the data acquisition period [See Fig. 1. See also rest of reference.].
However, Liang and Wang the navigator data are acquired during the magnetization recovery period.
Li II, which is also in the field of MRI, teaches a magnetization recovery period, and the navigator data are acquired during the magnetization recovery period [¶0003, ¶0090. See also rest of reference.].
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Liang and Wang with the teachings of Li II because Liang teaches acquiring navigator data and Li II teaches it is known in the art to acquire navigator data during a waiting period [Li - ¶0003, ¶0090. See also rest of reference.].
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RISHI R PATEL whose telephone number is (571)272-4385. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Thurs 7 a.m. - 5 p.m..
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, Jessica Han can be reached at 571-272-2078. 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.
/RISHI R PATEL/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2896