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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement filed 2/24/2026 fails to comply with 37 CFR 1.98(a)(3)(i) because it does not include a concise explanation of the relevance, as it is presently understood by the individual designated in 37 CFR 1.56(c) most knowledgeable about the content of the information, of each reference listed that is not in the English language (the Korean Office Action mailed Nov 28, 2025). It has been placed in the application file, but the information referred to therein has not been considered.
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.
Claim(s) 1-6 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee (US PGPub No. 2006/0124280) in view of Martin (US Patent No. 11,542,605, effectively filed on 4/8/2020 before the instant case).
Regarding claim 1, Lee discloses a vapor chamber (Fig. 2) comprising:
a chamber body plate (lower plate 12 and sides 10) having one surface placed in direct contact with a heating surface of a heating element (bottom surface of the lower plate 12 contacts a top surface of a heat source) and another surface that is open (top surface of the lower plate 12 that is open to an enclosed space of the vapor chamber), the chamber body plate having a refrigerant filling space (the enclosed space closed by the lower plate 12 and the sides 10 and an upper plate 11) filled with a refrigerant therein (a working fluid within the space, paragraph 0054) and defined to have a predetermined thickness (a thickness of the space defined by the sides 10);
a chamber cover plate (the upper plate 11) bonded to shield the other open surface of the chamber body plate (to close the top surface of the lower plate 12); and
a wick (wick structure 10a) formed in the refrigerant filling space (within the enclosed space), which is a space between the chamber body plate and the chamber cover plate (the enclosed space is between the lower plate 12 and upper plate 11), the wick having at least multiple pores through which the refrigerant filled in the refrigerant filling space flows (the wick 10a has a structure of sintered aluminum powder, paragraph 0065. Thus, the wick 10a inherently includes pores to wick liquid working fluid by capillary force).
Lee fails to disclose wherein the wick comprises a Ni plating layer formed on an outer surface of aluminum powder bonded in particle units, and
wherein at least some of the aluminum powder particles bonded in the particle units retain their discrete particle forms with the Ni plating layer formed on the outer surfaces thereof, and wherein the multiple pores are formed between the particle units by contact of the Ni plating layers on the outer surfaces of adjacent aluminum powder particles.
Martin directed to a treatment to aluminum powder for sintering, discloses (Fig. 1B) wherein a reactive metal particle 110 may be coated with layer 120 and outer layer 130. Martin further discloses that the reactive metal may be aluminum (col. 9, lines 22-30); a coating may include from 1 to 10 coating layers, and the coating may further include multiple coating layers containing progressively more noble metals (col. 7, lines 60-67; and col. 8, lines 1-4); and the noble metals include nickel and copper (col. 8, lines 58-67).
Based on the teaching of Martin, the particle 110 may be aluminum, the layer 120 may be nickel which is more noble than aluminum and the outer layer 130 may be copper which is more noble than both the nickel and aluminum.
Martin further teaches that the coating removes the oxide barrier, lowering sintering temperature and sintering time, and increase mechanical toughness of the final sintered product (col. 6, lines 24-45).
Therefore, the wick 10a in Lee that is made of sintered aluminum powder may be made of aluminum powder that is coated with a more noble metal or nickel on the aluminum surface; and the nickel surface may be further being coated a furthermore noble metal or copper. It is expected that the sintering temperature and sintering time may be lowered, and an increased mechanical toughness of the resultant sintered product.
It is also noted that a product of sintered powders has the atoms in the materials diffuse across the boundaries of the particles, fusing the particles together and creating one solid piece (col. 15, lines 56-64 of Martin). Therefore, when the aluminum particles of Lee coated with nickel and copper as taught by Martin are sintered to form the wick 10a, the resultant structure has “wherein at least some of the aluminum powder particles bonded in the particle units retain their discrete particle forms with the Ni plating layer formed on the outer surfaces thereof” (the coated particles have only the boundaries of the particles fused so that they retain a recognizable and distinct particle form with the Ni/Cu plating layer formed on outer surfaces of the particles that are not fused with adjacent particles), “and wherein the multiple pores are formed between the particle units by contact of the Ni plating layers on the outer surfaces of adjacent aluminum powder particles” (the fused portion of the adjacent coated particles have their Ni layers materially contact to each other, and that results multiple pores formed between the particle units).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have provided the wick comprises a Ni plating layer formed on an outer surface of aluminum powder bonded in particle units, and wherein at least some of the aluminum powder particles bonded in the particle units retain their discrete particle forms with the Ni plating layer formed on the outer surfaces thereof, and wherein the multiple pores are formed between the particle units by contact of the Ni plating layers on the outer surfaces of adjacent aluminum powder particles in Lee as taught by Martin in order to improve quality of the sintered wick 10a in Lee.
Regarding claim 2, Lee in claim 1 further discloses wherein the chamber body plate and the chamber cover plate are made of aluminum (the lower plate 12 and upper plate 11 are made of aluminum, paragraph 0073), which is the same material as the wick (the aluminum material of the plated 11 12 is the same as the aluminum powder of the wick 10a) before an electroless Ni plating process (noted that the “before an electroless Ni plating process” is a product-by-process limitation, and the patentability of a product does not depend on its method of production, see MPEP 2113. “before an electroless Ni plating process” does not imply a distinct structure to the “wick” itself, and the structure of the wick has the same material as the plates before or after the claimed process).
Regarding claim 3, Lee in claim 2 further discloses wherein the chamber body plate and the wick or the chamber cover plate and the wick are bonded with a predetermined bonding force (the bonding between the plate 12 and the sintered wick 10a; or the plate 11 and the sintered wick 10a inherently has a predetermined bonding force defined by the sintering) through the electroless Ni plating process (as noted above, the “electroless Ni plating process” is product-by-process limitation and the resultant structure bears the predetermined bonding force with or without going through the claimed process).
Regarding claim 4, Lee in claim 2 further discloses the wick further comprises a Cu plating layer formed on an outer surface of the Ni plating layer (the modified sintered wick 10a has the copper outer layer formed outside the intermediate nickel layer).
Regarding claim 5, Lee in claim 4 further discloses wherein a predetermined bonding force between an inner surface of the chamber body plate and the wick is further increased by addition of a wet Cu plating process to form the Cu plating layer (“by addition of a wet Cu plating process” is a product-by-process limitation, and the patentability of a product does not depend on its method of production, see MPEP 2113. “by addition of a wet Cu plating process” does not imply a distinct structure to the bonding force between the inner surface and the wick itself. The bonding strength between inner surface of the plate 12 and the removed oxide and copper coated aluminum particles is expected to be increased since the oxide layer of the aluminum particles has been removed, see the teaching of Martin above).
Regarding claim 6, Lee in claim 5 further discloses wherein the multiple pores formed in the wick are sized such that the refrigerant flows through capillarity by the Cu plating layer (the sintered wick 10a made from modified aluminum particles has copper outer layer. The wick 10a itself inherently has sized pores so that the working fluid flows fluid through the pores by the copper outer layer of the sintered particles) formed through the wet Cu plating process (as noted above, “the wet Cu plating process” is product-by-process limitation and lacks a distinct structure to the modified copper layer on the aluminum particles).
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 5/19/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
In response to sintered structure in Lee and Martin do not retain their discrete particle forms at the bonding zones in amended claim 1 (pages 9-12 of remarks), “retain discrete particle forms” may refer to the particles in the particle units that are still recognizable or the particles in the particle units may be distinctly identified before and after the bonding. The limitation does not require that the particles retain strictly the same particle shape before and after the bonding. Based on the teaching in col. 15, lines 56-64 of Martin, sintering particles have “the atoms in the materials diffuse across the boundaries of the particles, fusing the particles together and creating one solid piece”. The particles, after bonding or sintering in Lee in view of Martin, may be distinctly identified and only results a minor change in shape at boundaries of the particles, so the particles “retain discrete particle forms” currently understood in claim 1.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
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/JIANYING C ATKISSON/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3763
/F.K.L/Examiner, Art Unit 3763
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