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 .
Rejections
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 5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Akashi et al., “Resistance to Active Oxidation of Sol-Gel HfO2 Coated SiC Polycrystal”, ECS Transactions, Vol. 44, No. 16, 2009, ISSN 1938-5862, pages 185-190.
Akashi discloses a hafnium compound containing sol-gel solution containing Hf(OEt)4, ethanol, which is a lower alcohol having 5 or less carbon atoms that serves as a solvent, and diethanol amine, which is a polyol of the instant claims, to stabilize the solution and increase the viscosity. The diethanol amine is a stabilizer of the instant claim 2 therefore. The instant claim 2 does not require the stabilizer to be different from the polyalcohol. See Akashi, page 186, the second paragraph of the section titled “Experimental Procedure”. The method described in “Experimental Procedure” falls within the scope of the instant claim 5. Note that the hafnium ethoxylate solution of Akashi is a sol-gel according to Akashi, the title, the abstract, and page 189, “Conclusion”.
3. Claims 1-5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Shimada et al., “Preparation and high temperature oxidation of SiC compositionally graded graphite coated with HfO2”, CARBON 40, April 27, 2002, pages 2469-2475.
Shimada discloses a hafnium compound containing sol-gel solution containing HfCl4 dissolved in ethanol and refluxed with diethanolamine and HNO3. See the abstract. This composition falls within the scope of the instant claims 1 and 2. The diethanolamine necessarily stabilizes the composition and the instant claims do not require the stabilizer to be different from the polyalcohol. See page 2470, the right column, first 4 lines of text.
The amount of HfCl4 of Shimada, page 2470, the right column, first 6 lines of text, is 9.5 wt% which falls within the scope of the instant claim 3. The amount of polyalcohol of Shimada falls within the scope of the instant claim 3.
The method of producing the hafnium compound-containing sol-gel solutions of Shimada falls within the scope of the instant claim 4. See Shimada, page 2470, the right column, first 6 lines of text.
The method of producing the hafnia-containing films of Shimada falls within the scope of the instant claim 5. See Shimada, page 2470, right column, Figure 1 and the paragraph bridging pages 2470-2471.
Conclusion
4. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PATRICK D NILAND whose telephone number is (571)272-1121. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday to Friday from 10 to 5.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Robert S Jones, can be reached at telephone number 571-270-7733. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/PATRICK D NILAND/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1762
