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 .
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 3 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.
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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1, 4, and 5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Inoue et al (US Patent 6,400,919) in view of Takesawa et al (JP 2017-125946) (machine translation of which is referred to henceforth).
Inoue discloses an electrophotographic apparatus comprising a charging roller, which is also referred to generically as a conducting member (col. 5, line 10). The conducting member comprises a conductive support (analogous to a shaft), an elastic layer disposed on the support, and a surface layer formed in turn on the elastic layer (col. 6, lines 21 – 27). Inoue teaches several resins which may serve as the binder resin of the surface layer (col. 10, lines 15 – 22), pointing out acrylic resin as being preferable. Inoue also teaches that the surface layer may comprise one or more conducting agents, and gives an example metal oxides such as tin oxide (col. 10, lines 28 – 35). The conducting agent is preferably subjected to a surface treatment (col. 10, lines 53 – 61). Inoue does not appear to teach a fluorine-based anionic surface modifier for the conducting agent.
Takesawa teaches an electrophotographic photoreceptor having a protective layer as a surface layer ([0006]). Takesawa discloses a configuration wherein the protective layer comprises a binder resin and metal oxide particles ([0015], [0042]). Acrylic resin is given as an example of a preferable binder resin for use in the surface layer ([0044]). Takesawa gives tin oxide as an example of the metal oxide particles contained in the surface layer ([0046]). Takesawa teaches that the metal oxide fine particles have a first surface treatment agent A ([0045]), which contains a fluorine atom ([0050]). The fluoroalkyl group of surface treatment agent A preferably has 4 – 7 carbon atoms, which increases the degree of hydrophobicity of the metal oxide fine particles. This in turn enhances hydrophobicity of the protective (surface) layer, and reduces the amount of water in the layer ([0051]). Takesawa gives a phosphate ester-based agent having fluorine atoms as an example of a surface treatment agent A ([0053]).
In preparing the charging roller taught by Inoue, which comprises in a surface layer metal oxide particles which may be tin oxide, and a binder resin which may preferably be an acrylic resin, one of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to improve the hydrophobicity of the metal oxide particles, and thereby the hydrophobicity of the surface layer, by surface treating the metal oxide particles as taught by Takesawa. The phosphate ester having a fluoroalkyl group taught as a surface treatment agent by Takesawa would be anionic due to deprotonation of a hydroxyl function on the phosphate ester group, and therefore would read on the fluorine-based anionic surface modifier recited in Claim 1. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant application to prepare the charging roller taught by Inoue, wherein the metal oxide particles comprised in the surface layer are surface-treated as taught by Takesawa, resulting in a charging roller described by Claim 1.
As mentioned above, both Inoue and Takesawa teach tin oxide as an optional embodiment of the metal oxide particles, satisfying Claim 4.
Inoue describes examples of methods for surface-treating the metal oxide particles (col. 10, lines 62 – 64). A dry process and a wet process are described (col. 10, line 65 – col. 11, line 22), each of which would read on the step of mixing the metal oxide and the surface treatment agent recited in Claim 5. Inoue further describes the preparation of a coating fluid for forming the surface layer which entails mixing of surface-treated tin oxide particles with a binder resin (col. 12, lines 58 – 67), reading on the step of mixing the treated metal oxide with the binder resin recited in Claim 5.
Claim 2 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Inoue et al (US Patent 6,400,919) in view of Takesawa et al (JP 2017-125946), further in view of Nishioka et al (US PGP 2016/0154323).
The above discussions of Inoue and Takesawa are incorporated herein. Neither of Inoue or Takesawa appears to teach roughness-forming particles.
Nishioka teaches an electrophotographic electroconductive member comprising an electroconductive substrate, an electroconductive elastic layer, and a surface layer (Abstract), which may be a charging roller ([0005]). The surface layer may contain particles for roughness adjustment ([0118] – [0119]). The particles for roughness adjustment may be resin (organic) particles or inorganic particles. The particles may be surface-treated, but Nishioka does not offer further guidance surrounding the surface treatment agent used.
In preparing the charging roller taught by Inoue, wherein the metal oxide particles comprised in the surface layer are surface-treated as taught by Takesawa, one of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to control the surface roughness of the charging roller by incorporating the particles for roughness adjustment taught by Nishioka. Further, where Nishioka teaches surface treatment of the particles for roughness adjustment, but does not offer further guidance, one of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to improve the hydrophobicity of those particles by surface-treating them with the surface treatment agent taught by Takesawa. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant application to prepare the charging roller taught by Inoue, wherein the metal oxide particles comprised in the surface layer are surface-treated as taught by Takesawa, incorporating the particles for roughness adjustment taught by Nishioka, wherein the particles for roughness adjustment are surface-treated as taught by Takesawa, resulting in a charging roller described by Claim 2.
Conclusion
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/GRANT STEVEN SEILER/ Examiner, Art Unit 1734
/PETER L VAJDA/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1737 08/10/2026
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