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 .
Response to Arguments
This office action is in response to amendments filed 08/19/2026. Claims 1-20 are pending.
Applicant’s arguments and amendments to the claims with respect to prior art rejections of Claims 1-20 under 35 USC 102/103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. The rejections of Claims 1-20 under 35 USC 102/103 have been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new rejection is made in view of Rosenberg.
With respect to applicant’s arguments that the teachings of Rosenberg are not combinable with the teachings of Coste-Maniere, examiner respectfully disagrees.
Coste-Maniere teaches developing the internal and external models preoperatively and using the models to determine optimal port locations. Coste-Maniere goes as far as disclosing that the collision detection algorithms are run in real-time during the surgical procedure based on live sensor data (see par. 0112-0113) but appears silent towards updating the internal and external models to update port placement in real-time during the procedure.
Rosenberg also discloses a system for automatically determining optimal port placement for a robotic surgical procedure. Rosenberg fills in the gaps by disclosing a system that the system determines preoperative models like Coste-Maniere, but also updates the internal and external patient models for determining port placement in real-time during the procedure. Rosenberg also discloses that the motivation for updating the models in real-time is to account for the actual current pose of the patient on the operating table and organ shifting due to surgical steps during the procedure like insufflation (see par. 0075-0076, 0080-0081). Clearly Coste-Maniere and Rosenberg solve the same problem which is automatically determining optimal port placement for robotic surgery. One of ordinary skill in the art would be able to see the benefits of real-time model updates as taught by Rosenberg to arrive at updating the models taught by Coste-Maniere in real-time.
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) 1-3, 6-8, 10-17, 19-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Coste-Maniere et al (US 20070293734, hereinafter Coste-Maniere) in view of Rosenberg et al (US 20250380995, hereinafter Rosenberg).
Regarding Claim 1, Coste-Maniere teaches:
a computer-assisted system (see at least " Referring now to FIG. 1, one example of a robotic surgical system 10, with which the methods and apparatus of the present invention may be used " in par. 0038) , comprising:
an instrument configured to be at least partially inserted through a body wall from an external workspace to an internal workspace within a body (see at least “More specifically, various embodiments provide methods and apparatus for planning advantageous locations for placement of two or more entry ports for accessing a defined volume, such as a patient, with surgical tools to perform a minimally invasive operation” in par. 0036 and " Cart 300 here includes three robotic manipulator arm assemblies 302, each manipulator supporting an instrument 100. More specifically, one of the robotic arm assemblies supports an image capture device, such as an endoscope 306 (which is coupled to display 102 of the workstation). Each of the other two manipulator arms supports a tissue manipulation tool 308 having a surgical end effector for treating tissue. " in par. 0045 and “maximum acceptable entry angle, the angle between port-to-target path and the port direction--may depend on body wall properties,” in par. 0076) ; and
a controller (see at least " Finally, FIG. 2 shows a processor 400 coupled with master control station 200 and cart 300 and a tangible medium 410 embodying machine readable code, or software. The software typically includes instructions which enable various embodiments of the methods of the present invention. " in par. 0046) configured to:
generate a first three-dimensional model of the internal workspace in which a first portion of the instrument is inserted (see at least " . Modeling a patient may involve several sub-steps, such as: [0082] 1. acquiring patient-specific data for at least a portion of patent's body via such modalities as CT, MRI, and or arterial angiograms; [0083] 2. segmenting acquired data to distinguish organ, bone, vessel and other tissue structures (may be automated, manual or a combination of these); [0084] 3. reconstructing segmented, acquired data to construct a 3D model for at least a portion of patent's body. Optionally, such a model may include additional overlaid patient data, a body cavity insufflation space model, and/or the like. " in par. 0081-0084) ,
generate a second three-dimensional model of an external workspace in which a second portion of the instrument is located, (see at least "Step 1: Robotic system modeling. Step 1 typically includes defining a model of the insertable surgical tool portion, including structure, range of motion (ROM) limits, and optionally tool-type specific properties. Step 1 also includes defining a model of the external portion or robotic tool and manipulator arm structure and ROM limits. Finally, step 1 includes defining a multiple-arm robotic system model. Optionally, the model may include adjacent OR equipment such as operating table and accessories. " in par. 0075)
based on the first three-dimensional model and the second three-dimensional model, determine an internal geometry within the internal workspace defining a reachable volume within the internal workspace within which the instrument may be positioned (see at least "The criteria translate features such as collision avoidance between the manipulator arms and reachability of targeted organs. Validation 130 refers to a process of testing the feasibility of the operation by reproducing the expected movements of the surgeon and looking for collisions or other problems, such as an out of reach condition. " in par. 0050 and “Other criteria which may be used in identifying advantageous locations for entry ports include both qualitative and quantitative criteria. Referring now to FIG. 5, qualitative criteria, for example, may relate to the reachability from an admissible point 210 to a target point 212, with the admissible point being eliminated from consideration if a tool to be used in the operation is not long enough to reach across distance 214 to reach target point 212.” In par. 0059 and “The possibility of collisions between discrete time steps is handled by an interference detection algorithm that tests sweeps the volume covered by the manipulator arms. In addition to interference detection, out of reach conditions and possible singularities are monitored and signaled. Finally, the endoscope is positioned relative to the tips of the tool arms at a predefined distance, in a way to guarantee a good visibility at all times.” In par. 0066) , and
provide output related to performance of the procedure based on the determined internal geometry (see at least "Finally, a triplet combination of three entry ports (or however many entry ports are to by used) may be chosen to optimize the criteria discussed above while also maximizing the distances between the ports. This distance maximization criteria will prevent collision between robot arms and allow the surgeon to operate the robotic arms with a relatively wide range of movement. " in par. 0063).
Coste-Maniere does not appear to explicitly teach all of the following, but Rosenberg does teach:
Performing the modeling steps repeatedly during performance of a procedure performed using the instrument (see at least “With reference to FIG. 14, after the patient is brought into operating room and transferred and positioned onto the table 90 at step 502 patient's anatomy is marked by placing fiducial markers on the patient at desired locations. The fiducial markers are used by the external vision system 70 to detect the patient and determine the pose. In lieu of fiducial markers, the external vision system 70 may identify specific features (e.g., joints) of the patient.” In par. 0076 and "At step 518, patient's organs and surgical site are registered and/or scanned using the camera 51. The controller 21a may initialize the registration of the pre-operative internal 3D model of the patient with the depth map either via point-to-point semi-automatic registration or via fully automatic registration. For semi-automatic registration the user may mark a plurality of points on the pre-operative 3D model and the corresponding points on the 3D surface generated from the camera 51. The controller 21a may use a machine learning model in the form of a neural network to register the pre-operative 3D model and the 3D surface generated from the depth map of stereo images from the camera 51. Such a neural network may be trained to account for the movement of organs resulting from the insufflation of the abdomen. The controller 21a may additionally update the registration between the pre-operative internal 3D model of the patient with the intra-operative 3D depth map via fully automatic registration using real-time robotic arm kinematics data and Visual-SLAM. " in par. 0080)
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the system taught by Coste-Maniere to incorporate the teachings of Rosenberg wherein external and internal 3D models are updated in real-time during the surgical procedure to determine optimal port locations that account for the current pose of the patient and shifting of organs during the procedure. The motivation to incorporate the teachings of Rosenberg would be to help surgeons avoid unintended damage caused to the internal anatomy by accurately accounting for intraoperative patient pose and organ position changes (see par. 0075, 0080-0081)
Regarding Claim 2, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg (references to Coste-Maniere) teaches:
The system of claim 1, further comprising
a manipulator arm operatively coupled to the instrument and located in the external workspace (see at least "Cart 300 here includes three robotic manipulator arm assemblies 302, each manipulator supporting an instrument 100." in par. 0045) ,
wherein the controller is further configured to control drive force transmission from the manipulator arm to the instrument. (see at least " The control system typically includes at least one processor which relays input commands from the master control devices to the associated robotic arm and instrument assemblies and from the arm and instrument assemblies to the associated master control devices in the case of, e.g., force feedback, or the like." in par. 0010 and “In such embodiments, selecting the advantageous locations may be based at least in part on a set of criteria, the criteria including at least one of robot kinematics, robot kinetics, robot work range, deviation of tool entry angle from normal, organ geometry, surgeon defined constraints, robot force limitations, and patient force limitations” in par. 0016)
Regarding Claim 3, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg (references to Coste-Maniere) teaches:
The system of claim 2,
wherein the internal geometry includes an internal reach boundary, the internal reach boundary being a boundary defining a location of the first portion of the instrument within the internal workspace at which one or both of the instrument or manipulator arm contacts another object within the external workspace. (see at least “The criteria translate features such as collision avoidance between the manipulator arms and reachability of targeted organs. Validation 130 refers to a process of testing the feasibility of the operation by reproducing the expected movements of the surgeon and looking for collisions or other problems, such as an out of reach condition.” In par. 0050 and "Collisions are typically stratified as internal (between the manipulators) and external (with the anatomical entities), Internal collisions may be further divided into static and dynamic (continuous movement) collisions. In most embodiments, an algorithm is used to detect possible internal collisions, the algorithm detecting interferences between rectangular parallelepipeds and cylinders. FIG. 6, for example, shows a diagram of an internal collision detection logic which may be used. In that logic, testing for an intersection between two boxes is accomplished by looking for an overlap between one of the boxes and the sides of the other." in par. 0068).
Regarding Claim 6, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg (references to Coste-Maniere) teaches:
6. The system of claim 1, wherein the internal geometry is further determined based on one or both of a type of the procedure using the instrument or the stage of the procedure. (see at least " preparing a model of the defined volume from a set of acquired data; defining at least one target area within the defined volume" in par. 0016 and “The criteria translate features such as collision avoidance between the manipulator arms and reachability of targeted organs.” In par. 0050 )
Regarding Claim 7, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg (references to Coste-Maniere) teaches:
7. The system of claim 1, wherein the controller is further configured to cause the system to:
determine a location of the instrument within the internal workspace, and provide a feedback to an operator of the instrument based on the location of the instrument. (see at least " The control system typically includes at least one processor which relays input commands from the master control devices to the associated robotic arm and instrument assemblies and from the arm and instrument assemblies to the associated master control devices in the case of, e.g., force feedback, or the like." in par. 0010)
Regarding Claim 8, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg (references to Coste-Maniere) teaches:
8. The system of claim 7, wherein the feedback includes a haptic feedback, a visual feedback, an audio feedback, or a combination thereof. (see at least " The control system typically includes at least one processor which relays input commands from the master control devices to the associated robotic arm and instrument assemblies and from the arm and instrument assemblies to the associated master control devices in the case of, e.g., force feedback, or the like." in par. 0010).
Regarding Claim 10, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg (references to Coste-Maniere) teaches:
10. The system of claim 1, wherein the controller is further configured to cause the system to:
based on the first three-dimensional model and the second three-dimensional model, identify one or more locations on an external surface of the body for insertion of the instrument to access the internal workspace during the procedure. (see at least "(see at least "Finally, a triplet combination of three entry ports (or however many entry ports are to by used) may be chosen to optimize the criteria discussed above while also maximizing the distances between the ports. This distance maximization criteria will prevent collision between robot arms and allow the surgeon to operate the robotic arms with a relatively wide range of movement. " in par. 0063).
Regarding Claim 11, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg teaches:
11. The system of claim 1, wherein the controller is further configured to:
Coste-Maniere does not appear to explicitly teach all of the following, but Rosenberg does teach:
receive internal three-dimensional image data of the internal workspace (see at least " The laparoscopic camera may be configured to capture internal images of a surgical site. The controller may be further configured to generate a depth map of the surgical site from the internal images of the surgical site. The controller may be further configured to generate a registration of preoperative imaging data of the patient with the depth map. The controller may be additionally configured to track location of the laparoscopic camera via kinematics of the robotic arm and visual-simultaneous localization and mapping (visual-SLAM). The controller may be further configured to update the registration between the preoperative imaging data with the depth map via fully automatic registration using real-time robotic arm kinematics data and the visual-SLAM.” In par. 0004) ,
receive external three-dimensional image data of the external workspace (see at least "At step 102, an external image 202 is obtained of the patient's body and a depth map 204 is generated from the image 202 as shown in FIG. 8. The image 202 may be obtained using an external vision system 70 (FIG. 5), which may be a passive stereoscopic camera to provide for depth imaging as well to generate the depth map 204. In embodiments, the external vision system 70 may be an active stereoscopic infrared (IR) camera having an IR module configured to project an array of invisible IR dots onto the patient. The external vision system 70 is configured to detect the dots and analyze the pattern to create the depth map 204, which may then be used to create an external 3D model 208 of the patient." in par. 0054)
wherein a boundary is defined between the internal workspace and the external workspace and comprises an external surface portion of the body, identify an external boundary locus based on the external three-dimensional image data, (see at least "The GUI 300 allows for movement of the port locations 302 along the outside surface of the external 3D model 208. " in par. 0060 and “At step 524, the final port locations 552 are confirmed and the remaining one or more access ports 55b-d may be inserted through the marked port locations 552 under direct vision via the camera 51 to avoid the trocars piercing through any of the internal anatomical organs. The process of generating real-time sequentially registered intra-operative textured 3D model of surgical site during initial look phase creates a non-occupancy volume showing the distance between the abdominal cavity wall and internal organs.” In par. 0081)
define an internal boundary locus based on at least the identified external boundary locus and the internal three-dimensional image data, and output information relating to the defined internal boundary locus. (see at least " The process of generating real-time sequentially registered intra-operative textured 3D model of surgical site during initial look phase creates a non-occupancy volume showing the distance between the abdominal cavity wall and internal organs. The controller 21a may predict the trajectories of trocars inserted through the additional ports and the GUI may display an augmented reality overlay of trocars inserted through the port locations. The GUI may further display warnings and alarms if the projected trajectory or end points of any of the inserted trocars through any of the additional ports may collide with the internal organs as shown in the non-occupancy volume. The GUI may also let the clinical staff move the virtual viewpoint of the stereo endoscope camera using the 3D surgical site model to take a closer look at the projected trocar trajectories through any of the additional ports." in par. 0081)
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the system taught by Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg to incorporate the teachings of Rosenberg wherein external and internal 3D models are determined and their boundaries form a non-occupancy volume used to determine where trocars can be inserted in real-time during the surgical procedure. The motivation to incorporate the teachings of Rosenberg would be to help surgeons avoid unintended damage caused to the internal anatomy by accurately accounting for intraoperative patient pose changes in the models (see par. 0075, 0081)
Regarding Claim 12, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg teaches:
the system of claim 11,
Coste-Maniere does not appear to explicitly teach all of the following, but Rosenberg does teach:
wherein the controller is further configured to cause the system to display the information relating to the defined internal boundary locus, and the information includes a partially-transparent graphical element corresponding to the internal boundary locus that is overlayed with a real-time image. (see at least “The external 3D model 208 may be partially transparent to display the internal 3D model 200 including patient's organs, which may be color coded for easy identification. The GUI 300 is used to generate, view, and modify the port locations 302 based on the patient's internal 3D model 200 and external 3D model 208.” In par. 0059 and “The video stream from the external vision system 70 is displayed with the guidance overlays on the displays 23, 32, 34 of the system 10 and/or the head-mounted display 402. The combined video output (i.e., stream with the overlays) provides the surgeon with augmented guidance for port placement.” In par. 0073 and "At step 508, internal organs, such as liver, are visualized by projecting a 3D image of the liver 550 on the displays 23, 32, 34 of the system 10 and/or the head-mounted display 402 as shown in FIG. 16. At step 510, the abdomen and the pose of the patient are registered and/or scanned again. At step 512, the access port plan of the setup guide is also visualized by projecting locations 552 corresponding to the port locations 302 of FIGS. 11 and 12.” in par. 0078 and Figs. 11-13 and “The controller 21a may additionally update the registration between the pre-operative internal 3D model of the patient with the intra-operative 3D depth map via fully automatic registration using real-time robotic arm kinematics data and Visual-SLAM. At step 520, the patient's internal 3D model 200 is overlaid by the controller 21a over the registered patient's organs. At step 522, the internal organs are visualized by projecting a 3D image of the organs 554 on the displays 23, 32, 34 of the system 10 and/or the head-mounted display 402 as shown in FIG. 17.” In par. 0080 and Figs. 16-17 )
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the system taught by Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg to incorporate the teachings of Rosenberg wherein a real-time video feed of the patient anatomy is displayed to the surgeon with certain anatomical features provided with partial transparency to reveal deeper internal organ models overlaid on the video. The motivation to incorporate the teachings of Rosenberg would be to help surgeons visualize the internal anatomy and change the port plan if needed (see par. 0075)
Regarding Claim 13, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg (references to Coste-Maniere) teaches:
13. The system of claim 1, wherein the controller is further configured to:
based on the first three-dimensional model and the second three-dimensional model, provide information relating to planning a positioning of the instrument during the procedure (see at least "Generally, the trajectory between two target areas is a straight line, and this is the way a surgeon is expected to navigate. The possibility of collisions between discrete time steps is handled by an interference detection algorithm that tests sweeps the volume covered by the manipulator arms. In addition to interference detection, out of reach conditions and possible singularities are monitored and signaled. Finally, the endoscope is positioned relative to the tips of the tool arms at a predefined distance, in a way to guarantee a good visibility at all times. If no problem is detected during validation 130, then the triplet or other configuration is accepted and a surgeon may proceed with simulation 140. If there is a collision or other problem, the system may return to the planning stage 120 to select other entry port locations." in par. 0066) , and
update the first three-dimensional model based on an updated output of an image sensor. (see at least " Recording and analyzing operational data. Recorded procedure history and computer data, including surgeon inputs, tool motions and robotic arm movements, may be used to refine models, optimization criteria, feasibility criteria and/or cost function terms. The robotic surgical system may be provided with an Application Program Interface (API), or the equivalent, in communication with the robotic control system and/or endoscope imaging system, to permit recordation during the course of a surgical procedure (and/or real-time analysis) of sensor signals, encoder signals, motions, torques, power levels, rates, input commands, endoscope display images, and the like." in par. 0113)
Regarding Claim 14, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg also teaches:
14. A computer-implemented method, comprising:
Implementing, step by step, each function of the system of Claim 1 (see Claim 1 analysis for rejection of the system)
Regarding Claim 15, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg also teaches:
A method for implementing, step by step, each function of the system of Claim 3 (see Claim 3 analysis for rejection of the system)
Regarding Claim 16, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg (references to Coste-Maniere) also teaches:
16. The method of claim 14, further comprising displaying the internal geometry, a representation of the first portion of the instrument within the internal workspace, or both to an operator of the instrument. (see at least “Also optionally, the computer may include a display device for displaying the simulation of the robotic operation.” In par. 0023 and "a processor of master controller 200 will preferably coordinate movement of the input devices with the movement of their associated instruments, so that the images of the surgical tools, as displayed to the operator O, appear substantially connected to the input devices in the hand of the operator." in par. 0039)
Regarding Claim 17, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg also teaches:
A method for implementing, step by step, each function of the system of Claim 7 (see Claim 7 analysis for rejection of the system)
Regarding Claim 19, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg also teaches:
A method for implementing, step by step, each function of the system of Claim 10 (see Claim 10 analysis for rejection of the system)
Regarding Claim 20, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg also teaches:
A method for implementing, step by step, each function of the system of Claim 11 (see Claim 11 analysis for rejection of the system)
Claim(s) 4-5, 9, 18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Coste-Maniere et al (US 20070293734, hereinafter Coste-Maniere) in view of Rosenberg et al (US 20250380995, hereinafter Rosenberg) and Gonenc et al (US 20210330405, hereinafter Gonenc).
Regarding Claim 4, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg teaches:
4. The system of claim 2,
Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg does not appear to explicitly teach all of the following, but Gonenc does teach:
wherein the controller is further configured to:
determine a location of an instrument within the internal workspace (see at least " After starting teleoperation, the same or different guides may be used to adjust the configuration and move the robotic manipulator 122 based on the repositioning of the RCM and/or workspace alignment." in par. 0070 and “After the teleoperation starts, the workspace requirements may still change, such as due to intraoperative complications, intra-operatively discovered anatomical variations, metastases, deformation or shifting of organs during the surgery, etc. . . . . As a result, the new target anatomy may fall out of or be less covered by the boundaries of the previously optimized workspace of the robotic manipulator 122. If such changes in the required anatomical workspace are sensible (e.g., endoscope images combined with joint angles can tell where the surgeon is trying to reach and instrument joints reach their limits but the surgeon is not being able to reach the anatomy to operate), the overall manipulator pose may be continually or periodically reoriented so that the target anatomy is maintained within the reachable workspace of the instrument 220.” In par. 0072) ; and
display a repositioning request, the repositioning request including a visual indication to reposition the manipulator arm. (see at least " In yet another guidance, visual feedback is used. The user is guided through virtual cues to adjust the position of each individual joint. For example, LED status lights on each joint are red if the joint needs to be adjusted. Once the joint reaches the computed position for the “optimal” overall pose, the LED turns green. As another example, an augmented reality display guides the user with arrows superimposed on a view of the actual robot or user input controls." in par. 0069)
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the system taught by Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg to incorporate the teachings of Gonenc wherein when the controller recognizes that the arm configuration needs to be reoriented during the procedure because target anatomy is out of reach of the instrument, the surgeon is prompted to reorient the arm to an optimal configuration. The motivation to incorporate the teachings of Gonenc would be to prevent loss of operative time (see par. 0072)
Regarding Claim 5, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg teaches:
5. The system of claim 2,
Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg does not appear to explicitly teach all of the following, but Gonenc does teach:
wherein the controller is further configured to generate guidance for adjusting the manipulator arm to increase a size of the internal geometry. (see at least “Such selection is repeated during teleoperation. The same or different configuration is selected for each repetition. Due to positional shifts, more or less maximum overlap may be provided. Due to positional shifts, a different configuration may provide greater overlap than the previous configuration providing greatest overlap. A different one of the possible workspaces and corresponding configuration is selected.” In par. 0058 and " In yet another guidance, visual feedback is used. The user is guided through virtual cues to adjust the position of each individual joint. For example, LED status lights on each joint are red if the joint needs to be adjusted. Once the joint reaches the computed position for the “optimal” overall pose, the LED turns green. As another example, an augmented reality display guides the user with arrows superimposed on a view of the actual robot or user input controls." in par. 0069 and " After starting teleoperation, the same or different guides may be used to adjust the configuration and move the robotic manipulator 122 based on the repositioning of the RCM and/or workspace alignment." in par. 0070 and “After the teleoperation starts, the workspace requirements may still change, such as due to intraoperative complications, intra-operatively discovered anatomical variations, metastases, deformation or shifting of organs during the surgery, etc. . . . . As a result, the new target anatomy may fall out of or be less covered by the boundaries of the previously optimized workspace of the robotic manipulator 122. If such changes in the required anatomical workspace are sensible (e.g., endoscope images combined with joint angles can tell where the surgeon is trying to reach and instrument joints reach their limits but the surgeon is not being able to reach the anatomy to operate), the overall manipulator pose may be continually or periodically reoriented so that the target anatomy is maintained within the reachable workspace of the instrument 220.” In par. 0072)
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the system taught by Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg to incorporate the teachings of Gonenc wherein when the controller recognizes that the arm configuration needs to be reoriented during the procedure because target anatomy is out of reach of the instrument, the surgeon is prompted to reorient the arm to an optimal configuration to increase the overlap in instrument reach and target anatomy volume. The motivation to incorporate the teachings of Gonenc would be to prevent loss of operative time (see par. 0072)
Regarding Claim 9, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg teaches:
9. The system of claim 1, wherein the controller is further configured to cause the system to:
Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg does not appear to explicitly teach all of the following, but Gonenc does teach:
determine a location of the instrument within the internal workspace, and control actuation of the instrument based on the location of the instrument within the internal workspace. (see at least " After the teleoperation starts, the workspace requirements may still change, such as due to intraoperative complications, intra-operatively discovered anatomical variations, metastases, deformation or shifting of organs during the surgery, etc. . . . . As a result, the new target anatomy may fall out of or be less covered by the boundaries of the previously optimized workspace of the robotic manipulator 122. If such changes in the required anatomical workspace are sensible (e.g., endoscope images combined with joint angles can tell where the surgeon is trying to reach and instrument joints reach their limits but the surgeon is not being able to reach the anatomy to operate), the overall manipulator pose may be continually or periodically reoriented so that the target anatomy is maintained within the reachable workspace of the instrument 220." in par. 0072)
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the system taught by Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg to incorporate the teachings of Gonenc wherein when the controller recognizes that the arm configuration needs to be reoriented during the procedure because target anatomy is out of reach of the instrument, the surgeon is prompted to reorient the arm to an optimal configuration to increase the overlap in instrument reach and target anatomy volume. The motivation to incorporate the teachings of Gonenc would be to prevent loss of operative time (see par. 0072).
Regarding Claim 18, Coste-Maniere as modified by Rosenberg and Gonenc also teaches:
A method for implementing, step by step, each function of the system of Claim 9 (see Claim 9 analysis for rejection of the system)
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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DYLAN M KATZ whose telephone number is (571)272-2776. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Thurs. 8:00-6:00.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Abby Lin can be reached on (571) 270-3976. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/DYLAN M KATZ/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3657
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