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 § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
The USPTO “Interim Guidelines for Examination of Patent Applications for Patent Subject Matter Eligibility” (Official Gazette notice of 23 February 2010), reads as follows (see also MPEP 2111.01):
CLAIMS MUST BE GIVEN THEIR BROADEST REASONABLE INTERPRETATION
During patent examination, the pending claims must be “given their broadest reasonable interpretation consistent with the specification.” >The Federal Circuit’s en banc decision in Phillips v. AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303, 75 USPQ2d 1321 (Fed. Cir. 2005) expressly recognized that the USPTO employs the “broadest reasonable interpretation” standard: The Patent and Trademark Office (“PTO”) determines the scope of claims in patent applications not solely on the basis of the claim language, but upon giving claims their broadest reasonable construction “in light of the specification as it would be interpreted by one of ordinary skill in the art.” In re Am. Acad. of Sci. Tech. Ctr., 367 F.3d 1359, 1364[, 70 USPQ2d 1827] (Fed. Cir. 2004). Indeed, the rules of the PTO require that application claims must “conform to the invention as set forth in the remainder of the specification and the terms and phrases used in the claims must find clear support or antecedent basis in the description so that the meaning of the terms in the claims may be ascertainable by reference to the description.” 37 CFR 1.75(d)(1). 415 F.3d at 1316, 75 USPQ2d at 1329. See also< In re Hyatt, 211 F.3d 1367, 1372, 54 USPQ2d 1664, 1667 (Fed. Cir. 2000). Applicant always has the opportunity to amend the claims during prosecution, and broad interpretation by the examiner reduces the possibility that the claim, once issued, will be interpreted more broadly than is justified. In re Prater, 415 F.2d 1393, 1404-05, 162 USPQ 541, 550-51 (CCPA 1969) (Claim 9 was directed to a process of analyzing data generated by mass spectrographic analysis of a gas. The process comprised selecting the data to be analyzed by subjecting the data to a mathematical manipulation.
The examiner made rejections under 35 U.S.C. 101 and 102. In the 35 U.S.C. 102 rejection, the examiner explained that the claim was anticipated by a mental process augmented by pencil and paper markings. The court agreed that the claim was not limited to using a machine to carry out the process since the claim did not explicitly set forth the machine. The court explained that “reading a claim in light of the specification, to thereby interpret limitations explicitly recited in the claim, is a quite different thing from reading limitations of the specification into a claim,’ to thereby narrow the scope of the claim by implicitly adding disclosed limitations which have no express basis in the claim.” The court found that applicant was advocating the latter, i.e., the impermissible importation of subject matter from the specification into the claim.). See also In re Morris, 127 F.3d 1048, 1054-55, 44 USPQ2d 1023, 1027-28 (Fed. Cir. 1997) (The court held that the PTO is not required, in the course of prosecution, to interpret claims in applications in the same manner as a court would interpret claims in an infringement suit. Rather, the “PTO applies to verbiage of the proposed claims the broadest reasonable meaning of the words in their ordinary usage as they would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art, taking into account whatever enlightenment by way of definitions or otherwise that may be afforded
by the written description contained in applicant’s specification.”).
The broadest reasonable interpretation of the claims must also be consistent with the interpretation that those skilled in the art would reach. In re Cortright, 165 F.3d 1353, 1359, 49 USPQ2d 1464, 1468 (Fed. Cir. 1999) (The Board’s construction of the claim limitation “restore hair growth” as requiring the hair to be returned to its original state was held to be an incorrect interpretation of the limitation. The court held that, consistent with applicant’s disclosure and the disclosure of three patents from analogous arts using the same phrase to require only some increase in hair growth, one of ordinary skill would construe “restore hair growth” to mean that the claimed method increases the amount of hair grown on the scalp, but does not necessarily produce a full head of hair.).
The broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim drawn to a computer readable medium typically covers both forms of non-transitory tangible media and transitory propagating signals per se in view of the ordinary and customary meaning of computer readable media. See the OG Notice of 23 February 2010 entitled "Subject Matter Eligibility of Computer Readable Media", 1351 OG 212.
When the broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim covers a signal per se, the claim must be rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as covering non-statutory subject matter. See In re Nuijten, 500 F.3d 1346, 1356-57 (Fed. Cir. 2007). Since none of the clearly and unambiguously exclude propagating signals from the full scope of the claimed invention. Furthermore, because signals can be considered to "store" the values of the information being transmitted, at least during the transient period of the transmission, the term "storage" also fails to clearly and unambiguously exclude such signals from the claimed invention.
Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter as follows.
Claim 8 defines a computer readable recording medium embodying functional descriptive material (i.e., a computer program or computer executable code). However, the claim does not define a “non-transitory computer-readable recording medium or non-transitory computer-readable memory” and is thus non-statutory for that reason (i.e., “When functional descriptive material is recorded on some non-transitory computer-readable medium it becomes structurally and functionally interrelated to the medium and will be statutory in most cases since use of technology permits the function of the descriptive material to be realized” – Guidelines Annex IV). The scope of the presently claimed invention encompasses products that are not necessarily non-transitory computer readable, and thus NOT able to impart any functionality of the recited medium.
The examiner suggests amending the claim to embody the medium on “non-transitory computer-readable recording medium” or equivalent; assuming the specification does NOT define the computer readable medium as a “signal”, “carrier wave”, or “transmission medium” which are deemed non-statutory (refer to “note” below).
Any amendment to the claim should be commensurate with its corresponding disclosure.
Note:
“A transitory, propagating signal … is not a “process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter” Those four categories define the explicit scope and reach of subject matter patentable under 35 U.S.C. § 101; thus, such a signal cannot be patentable subject matter.” (In re Nuijten, 84 USPQ2d 1495 (Fed. Cir. 2007). Should the full scope of the claim as properly read in light of the disclosure encompass non-statutory subject matter such as a “signal”, the claim as a whole would be non-statutory. Should the applicant’s specification define or exemplify the computer readable medium or memory (or whatever language applicant chooses to recite a computer readable medium equivalent) as statutory tangible products such as a hard drive, ROM, RAM, etc, as well as a non-statutory entity such as a “signal”, “carrier wave”, or “transmission medium”, the examiner suggests amending the claim to include the disclosed tangible non-transitory computer readable storage media, while at the same time excluding the intangible transitory media such as signals, carrier waves, etc.
Merely reciting functional descriptive material as residing on a “tangible” or other medium is not sufficient. If the scope of the claimed medium covers media other than “non-transitory computer readable” media, the claim remains non-statutory. The full scope of the claimed media (regardless of what words applicant chooses) should not fall outside that of a non-transitory computer readable medium.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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.
Claims 1 and 5-9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Zou (USPAP 2019/0180,115).
Regarding claim 1, Zou recites, obtaining a base image of a certain road from at least one sensor mounted on a vehicle; extracting a multi-scale image feature by using the base image (Please note, paragraph 0053. As indicated the sensor system 28 includes one or more sensing devices 40a-40n that sense observable conditions of the exterior environment and/or the interior environment of the autonomous vehicle 10. The sensing devices 40a-40n can include, but are not limited to, radars, lidars, global positioning systems, optical cameras 140a-140n, thermal cameras, ultrasonic sensors, and/or other sensors. The optical cameras 140a-140n are mounted on the vehicle 10 and are arranged for capturing images (e.g. a sequence of images in the form of a video) of an environment surrounding the vehicle 10.); generating a bird's-eye-view (BEV) feature by performing view transformation on the extracted multi-scale image feature (Please note, paragraph 0053. As indicated there are two front cameras 140a, 140b arranged for respectively imaging a wide angle, near field of view and a narrow angle, far field of view. Further illustrated are left-side and right-side cameras 140c, 140e and a rear camera 140d. The number and position of the various cameras 140a-140n is merely exemplary and other arrangements are contemplated. In various embodiments, one or more of the cameras 140a-140n have an overlapping field of view with the field of view of one or more other cameras 140a-140n.); and training a neural network model by using the BEV feature as input data for the neural network model and using a lane polyline for the certain road as output data. (Please note, paragraph 0018. As indicated a method is provided for training an artificial neural network. The method includes receiving, via the artificial neural network, image data and feature labels, each feature label including a feature classification and a localized line (straight, curved or both). The method includes defining a region of interest between two lines positioned outside of boundaries of a feature of interest. The method includes operating the artificial neural network using the image data as an input layer to produce output classified and localized data including output classification and localization parameters).
Regarding claim 5, Zou recites, generating a lane polyline for the certain road as output data of the neural network model. (Please note, paragraph 0024. As indicated each feature label includes first and second localized lines, wherein the method includes extending, via a processor, the region of interest (ROI) outwards from the margin, delineated by the first and second lines; evaluating, via the artificial neural network, the cost function, the cost function comparing the output classification and localization parameters and corresponding nominal parameters defined within the ROI, serving as the learning target.).
Regarding claim 6, Zou recites, generating a control signal for controlling the vehicle traveling on the certain road. (Please note, paragraph 0026. As indicated using the artificial neural network to determine lane features and controlling a vehicle based on the lane features.).
Regarding claim 8, Zou recites, computer-readable recording medium having recorded thereon a program for causing a computer to execute the method of claim 1. (Please note, paragraph 0055. As indicated the controller 34 includes at least one processor 44 and a computer readable storage device or media 46.).
Regarding claims 7 and 9, analysis similar to those presented for claim 1 are applicable.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-4 are 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: The closest applied Prior Art of record fails to disclose or reasonably suggest wherein the calculating of the probability comprises: setting a centroid for each of the plurality of clusters, and a fixed margin for generating a cluster; and calculating the probability that each of the foreground pixels corresponds to the certain cluster among the plurality of clusters by using the centroid and the fixed margin.
Examiner’s Note
The examiner cites particular figures, paragraphs, columns and line numbers in the references as applied to the claims for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claims, other passages and figures may apply as well.
It is respectfully requested that, in preparing responses, the applicant fully consider the references in their entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the examiner.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to AMIR ALAVI whose telephone number is (571)272-7386. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F from 8:00-4:30.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Vu Le can be reached at (571)272-7332. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/AMIR ALAVI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2668 Friday, August 28, 2026
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