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 § 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.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-3, 5, 7-11, 13, 16-19, and 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) and 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Nunoo (US 20210320314 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Nunoo teaches a membrane electrode assembly of a fuel cell (Nunoo, [0001]) comprising a fuel electrode, and the fuel electrode can be made of materials used for solid oxide fuel cells (Nunoo, [0208]), and because the electrode assembly includes materials that are used for solid oxide fuel cells, one of ordinary skill in the art would recognize the fuel cell of Nunoo necessarily follows the structure of the claimed solid oxide cell,
The membrane electrode assembly includes an air electrode, solid electrolyte membrane, and the fuel electrode laminated in this order (Nunoo, [0143]), which corresponds to the claimed fuel electrode, air electrode, and electrolyte disposed between the fuel electrode and the air electrode,
Figures 21 and 22 show an electrode that can be a fuel electrode 212 with pores 213 (Nunoo, [0196]), the annotated figures 21 and 22 below show the first direction as Z, and the second and third directions are shown as Y and X respectively, as they are perpendicular to each other and the first direction,
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Figure 21 shows a plurality of pores 213 having an arrangement in the second direction (which corresponds to the claimed pore array), and two pores having a width (shown as W in annotated figure above) greater than the gap between the two pores (shown as S in the annotated figure above), which corresponds to the claimed each of at least two adjacent pores, among the plurality of pores having a width that is greater than or equal to a gap between the at least two adjacent pores.
Regarding claims 2 and 3, Nunoo teaches figure 21, and the annotated figure 21 above shows the width of each of the at least two pores being a maximum length in the second direction, and the gap between the at least two pores is a minimum gap in the second direction.
Regarding claim 5, Nunoo teaches figure 22 which shows the pores 213 having a length in the first direction (shown as Z in the annotated figure above) being longer than the length of the pores in the third direction (shown as X in the annotated figure above), which corresponds to the claimed length of the at least some of the plurality of pores in the first direction being greater than a length of each of the at least some of the plurality of pores in the second or third direction.
Regarding claim 7, Nunoo teaches that the fuel electrode side pore 13 extends linearly from the first fuel electrode side boundary surface 17 to the solid electrolyte membrane 11 (Nunoo, [0196]), which corresponds to the claimed at least some of the plurality of pores extending in the first direction from a surface of the fuel electrode in the first direction, wherein the first direction corresponds to the direction in which the side pore extends towards the solid electrolyte membrane.
Regarding claim 8, Nunoo teaches figure 30, which shows the pores 213 separated from the electrolyte 11 by a functional layer 220 in the first direction, which corresponds to the claimed at least some of the plurality of pores being spaced apart from the electrolyte in the first direction.
Regarding claims 9-11, Nunoo teaches figure 21 which shows that the pore array is provided in plural and the plurality of pore arrays having an arrangement in the first and third directions (shown in the annotated figure above).
Regarding claim 13, Nunoo teaches figure 21 which shows a plurality of pores 213 in the downstream region having a width (shown as W2 in the annotated figure below) which is different than the width of a plurality of pores in the upstream region (shown as W1 in the annotated figure below), which corresponds to the claimed structure where the at least two of the plurality of pores have different lengths in the first direction, and the first direction is shown as X in the annotated figure below.
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Regarding claim 16, Nunoo teaches the solid oxide cell comprising a fuel electrode, an air electrode, and an electrolyte disposed between the fuel electrode and the air electrode as discussed above, and figure 1 shows that the fuel electrode 12 includes a first layer of pores 13 and a second layer of pores 13, wherein the second layer of pores is disposed on the first layer of pores in a thickness direction of the electrolyte,
Wherein the thickness direction of the electrolyte is shown as X in the annotated figure below.
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Regarding claim 17, Nunoo teaches figure 4, which shows side pores 13 connected to each other by a fuel electrode side communication path 19 (Nunoo, [0213]), which corresponds to the claimed pore of the second layer disposed on another pore of the first layer in the thickness direction of the electrolyte being connected together, wherein figure 4 shows a cross section of figure 1, and figure 1 shows the pore of the second layer disposed on a pore of the first layer as discussed above.
Regarding claims 18 and 19, Nunoo teaches figure 21 which shows a plurality of adjacent pores with a width (W) greater than or equal to a gap (S) between the two adjacent pores as discussed above, the adjacent pores can be of the first layer or the second layer, and the first direction is shown as Y in the annotated figure below.
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Regarding claim 22, Nunoo teaches figure 1 which shows the claimed structure where in a plane perpendicular to the thickness direction of the electrolyte, the pores of the first layer are in a form of an array and the pores of the second layer are in the form of an array, wherein the thickness direction is shown as Z in the annotated figure 1 above, and the plane perpendicular to the thickness direction is shown as the plane formed by X and Y in the annotated figure 1 below.
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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.
Claims 4, 6, and 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nunoo (US 20210320314 A1) and Nitta (JP 2015064948 A1).
Regarding claim 4, Nunoo teaches the solid oxide cell of claim 1 as discussed above as well as the width of the at least two pores being larger than the gap between the at least two pores but does not explicitly teach the width of the at least two pores being two or more times and ten or less times the gap between the at least two pores.
However, Nitta teaches a fuel electrode with first pores 31 formed inside partition walls 32 (Nitta, [0006]), and the diameter of the first pore d1 is 1 µm or more and 10 µm or less, and the average thickness of the partition wall t1 is 1 µm or more and 10 µm or less (Nitta, [0018]), and values within these ranges suggest the claimed structure of each of the at least two pores being two times or more and ten or less times the gap between the at least two pores.
Thus, it would be prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to substitute the parameters for the diameter of the pores and the thickness of the partition walls for the parameters of the fuel electrode of Nunoo to allow for fuel gas to diffuse inside the fuel electrode as taught by Nitta (Nitta, [0019]).
Overlapping ranges are prima facie obvious (see MPEP § 2144.05).
Regarding claim 6, Nunoo teaches the solid oxide cell of claim 1 as discussed above as well as the length of the at least some of the plurality of pores in the first direction being larger than the length of the at least some of the plurality of pores in the second or third direction as discussed above but does not explicitly teach the length of each of at least some of the plurality of pores being two or more times and twenty or less times a length of each of the at least some of the plurality of pores in the second or third direction.
However, Nitta teaches that the first pores 31 that are formed can be ellipsoidal in shape (Nitta, [0028]), and because the first direction is any direction where the electrolyte has a thickness, values of diameters of the pores in the first and second directions, for the two diameters of the ellipsoidal shape, chosen from the range of average diameter for the first pore suggest a relationship that overlaps with the claimed relationship between the length of the pores in the first direction and the length of the pore in a second or third direction.
Overlapping ranges are prima facie obvious (see MPEP § 2144.05).
Thus, it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to add the structure of the pores from Nitta to the fuel electrode of Nunoo to allow for fuel gas to diffuse inside the fuel electrode as taught by Nitta (Nitta, [0019]).
Regarding claim 12, Nunoo teaches the solid oxide cell of claim 11 as discussed above, but is silent as to the length of two adjacent pores being larger than the gap between the two adjacent pores.
However, Nitta teaches a fuel electrode with first pores 31 formed inside partition walls 32 (Nitta, [0006]), and the diameter of the first pore d1 is 1 µm or more and 10 µm or less, and the average thickness of the partition wall t1 is 1 µm or more and 10 µm or less (Nitta, [0018]), and values within these ranges suggest the claimed structure of the length of two adjacent pores being larger than the gap between the two adjacent pores. Thus, it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to substitute the parameters for the diameter of the pores and the thickness of the partition walls for the parameters of the fuel electrode of Nunoo to allow for fuel gas to diffuse inside the fuel electrode as taught by Nitta (Nitta, [0019]).
Claims 14 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nitta (JP 2015064948 A1), wherein an English machine translation is used and cited herein.
Regarding claim 15, Nitta teaches a fuel cell 1 comprising a solid oxide type electrolyte 2, a fuel electrode 3, and an air electrode 5 [0011], and figure 1 shows the electrolyte 2 disposed between the air electrode 5 and the fuel electrode 3,
Figures 1 and 2 show that the fuel electrode 3 includes a plurality of first pores 31 having an arrangement in the second direction which corresponds to the claimed pore array, and the pores 31 can be spaced apart from the pore array, and the first pores 31 that are formed can be ellipsoidal in shape (Nitta, [0028]) and can have an average diameter of 1 µm or more and 10 µm or less (Nitta, [0018]), and because the first direction is any direction where the electrolyte has a thickness, values of diameters of the pores in the second and third directions, for the two diameters of the ellipsoidal shape, chosen from the range of average diameter for the first pore suggest a relationship that overlaps with the claimed relationship between the maximum length of the line pore in the second direction and the maximum length of the line pore in a third direction. Wherein the first direction is shown as Z, the second direction is shown as Y, and the third direction is shown as X in the annotated figure below.
Overlapping ranges are prima facie obvious (see MPEP § 2144.05).
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Regarding claim 15, Nitta teaches figure 1, which shows the claimed structure of the pore array and the line pore being provided in plural, and the plurality of pore arrays and the plurality of line pores are alternately arranged in the third direction as shown in the annotated figure above, wherein the pore arrays have an arrangement in the second direction, and the line pores have an arrangement in the third direction.
Claim 20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nunoo (US 20210320314 A1) and Hashimoto (JP 2012252963 A), wherein an English machine translation is used and cited herein.
Nunoo teaches the solid oxide cell of claim 16 as discussed above, and that the fuel electrode side pores 13 can be randomly arranged, and that the fuel electrode side pores 13 can have any shape or arrangement patter (Nunoo, [0205]), but is silent as to the first and second layer of pores being disposed on the randomly arranged porous body.
However, Hashimoto teaches figure 1 which shows a plurality of porous fuel electrodes 7 stacked on one another in a stack structure 20. Thus, it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the present invention to add the stacking structure to the fuel cell of Nunoo, suggesting the structure of the layer of a fuel electrode made with randomly arranged pores stacked on a fuel electrode with the structure as illustrated in figure 1, as the stacking structure allows for thinning of the solid electrolyte layer, fuel electrode layer, and air electrode layer, while simultaneously enabling god mechanical strength and power generation characteristics as taught by Hashimoto (Hashimoto, [0018]).
Claim 21 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nunoo (US 20210320314 A1), Hashimoto (JP 2012252963 A), and Nitta (JP 2015064948 A1).
Nunoo modified by Hashimoto suggests the solid oxide cell of claim 20 as discussed above but is silent as to the widths of the pores, specifically the relationship of the width of one pore of the second layer being greater than a width of one of the randomly distributed pores.
However, Nitta teaches that the first pores have average diameters of 1 µm or more and 10 µm or less (Nitta, [0018]), thus it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to add the range of diameters for the pores to the suggested structure of Nunoo modified by Hashimoto to improve the strength of the fuel electrode while ensuring the permeability of the fuel gas as taught by Nitta [0006].
The addition of the range of diameters to the structure of Nunoo modified by Hashimoto suggests the randomly arranged pores having an average diameter in the range of 1 µm or more and 10 µm or less (Nitta, [0018]) and the linearly arranged pores having an average diameter in the range of 1 µm or more and 10 µm or less (Nitta, [0018]), which allows for the claimed relationship between the randomly distributed pores and the pores of the second layer.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JAMES M CLEVER whose telephone number is (571)270-3156. The examiner can normally be reached Tues-Thurs | 9:00am-4:00pm.
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/J.M.C./Examiner, Art Unit 1734
/JONATHAN JOHNSON/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 1734
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