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 .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 9/10/2026 has been entered.
Status of Claims
Amendment to claims 1 – 2 have been entered.
Claims 1 – 7 are currently pending.
Response to Remarks.
RCE filed without remarks regarding Advisory dated 8/25/2026. A better primary and secondary reference have been found.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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 1 – 2 and 4 – 5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being obvious over Kronfield (US 20220416444 A1) in view of Boyer (US 20160072196 A1).
All citations are that of primary reference unless otherwise specified.
As to claim 1, Kronfield discloses an antenna assembly comprising:
a first RF element, a second RF element, a third RF element, and a fourth RF element (Fig. 2);
wherein each RF element further comprises a first port and a second port (Fig. 2 shows each antenna having V & H polarizations.);
wherein the first port of each RF element is configured for a first polarization, and the second port of each RF element is configured for a second polarization (Id.); and
an RF network connected to the eight RF element ports with four output ports providing two sets of orthogonal polarizations (Fig. 2 item 248);
by combining signals received from the eight RF elements ports corresponding to the first pair of orthogonal polarizaitons (Para. 254 “by combining vertical-polarization signals 351 from one or more dual-polarization antenna elements 327 of the dual-polarization RH 332, and horizontal-polarization signals 352 from the one or more dual-polarization antenna elements 337 of the dual-polarization RH 332.”).
Kronfield does not teach the features of the four ports having at least two pairs of orthogonal polarizations wherein at least said two pairs are different.
In the same field of endeavor, Boyer teaches “One way of providing this is to use four separate antennas; horizontally polarised, vertically polarised, left hand circularly polarised and right hand circularly polarised antennas and there are a number of well-known options for each of these antennas (Para. 19).”
In view of the teachings of Boyer, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before filing to apply the different pairs of orthogonality to further mitigate the presence of any interreference thereby improving accuracy.
As to claim 2, Kronfield in view of Boyer the antenna assembly of claim 1, wherein the first polarization is least one of a 45+ slanted polarization, 45- slanted polarization, an elliptical polarization, and an orthogonal polarization (Para. 19).
As to claim 4, Kronfield in view of Boyer the antenna assembly of claim 1, wherein the first polarization is configured to be orthogonal to the second polarization (Para. 19).
As to claim 5, Kronfield in view of Boyer the antenna assembly of claim 1, wherein the first polarization is different from the second polarization (Para. 19).
Claim 6 – 7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being obvious over Kronfield in view of Boyer and in further view of Bales (US 9391375 B1).
As to claim 6, Kronfield in view of Boyer does not disclose the antenna assembly of claim 1, further comprising a lens; wherein the lens is coupled to at least the first RF element, the second RF element, the third RF element, and the fourth RF element; wherein the power divider is coupled to at least the third RF element and the fourth RF element, and configured for a second polarization set; and wherein the third RF element and the fourth RF element are configured to produce a second beam pattern as a function of the second polarization set.
One of ordinary skill would expect item 323 of Kronfield to include a power divider to reduce the number of power sources required thus reducing cost – but Kronfield doesn’t recite the word power divider verbatim.
In same field of endeavor, Bales teaches “FIG. 7 shows a diagram 600 illustrating an embodiment of a 2×4 array 610 of sub-arrays each having four single-fed, single-slot coupled microstrip patch antenna elements with the two feed lines of each sub-array connected to a Rotman lens beamforming system. Array 610 may be the same as array 500 shown in FIG. 6 (col. 5 ll. 27 – 35).” Bales further teaches “The use of T-junction and Wilkinson power combiners/dividers in the vertical direction creates a “corporate” feed network for the elements arrayed vertically. However, the different amounts of additional phase that feed each element would make such a vertical linear array not work on its own. Rather, two vertical linear sub-arrays should be used in conjunction to produce a composite circularly polarized phased array (e.g. a column in array 500) that has greater gain, can beam steer in the horizontal (azimuth) direction, and has a narrower, fixed beam in the vertical (elevation) direction (col. 8 ll. 4 – 25).” Also, Bales’ Fig. 10 shows a graph of co-polarization and cross polarization beam patterns for the array shown in Fig. 6 without any beam steering. Bales’ further teaches witching/phasing blocks 1420, 1430, 1440 and 1450 connected to associated feed ports shown in Fig. 14.
In view of the teachings of Bales, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before filing to apply the lens and dividers in order to focus energy in particular directions and to prevent interference from other directions thereby improving signal-to-noise.
Both Boyer and Bales teaches different pairs of polarizations as cited and discussed supra. As such, it would also be obvious to use different polarized antenna patterns in order to reduce the effects from any one interfering source thereby improving accuracy.
As to claim 7, Kronfield in view of Boyer and Bales teaches the communication system of claim 6, wherein the second beam pattern differs from the second beam pattern in at least one of a vertical and a horizontal beamwidth.
Bales further teaches “A need exists for an antenna that provides wideband transmission and reception at radio frequencies that can be electronically reconfigured among four different polarizations: vertical linear polarization (VLP), horizontal linear polarization (HLP), right hand circular polarization (RHCP), and left hand circular polarization (LHCP), in a compact, planar form factor (col. 1 ll. 19 – 26).”
In view of the teachings of Bales, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before filing to apply various antennae patterns such as vertical and horizontal in order to reduce the effects from any one interfering source thereby improving accuracy.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MICHAEL W JUSTICE whose telephone number is (571)270-7029. The examiner can normally be reached 7:30 - 5:30 M-F.
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/MICHAEL W JUSTICE/Examiner, Art Unit 3648
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