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 § 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.
Claims 1-9 and 11-15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. Patent Pub. No. 2015/0147549 to Yoo et al. in view of U.S. Patent Pub. No. 2013/0041130 to Xu et al.
As to claims 1, 4, and 7, Yoo discloses a polylactic acid resin comprising a hard segment of a polylactic acid repeating unit and a soft segment comprising a polyurethane polyol in which polyether polyol repeating units are linearly linked via a urethane bond and wherein the polylactic acid resin has an organic carbon content from a biomass source of 60 wt% or more (Abstract).
Yoo does not expressly disclose wherein the soft segment further comprises at least 0.5% by weight of a repeat unit derived from polyester-based polyol, polylactone-based polyol, or polycarbonate-based polyol.
However, within the same field of endeavor directed to polylactic acid resin films, Xu discloses a transparent copolyester comprising repeating units of lactide (same as Yoo) and urethane repeating units derived from the reaction of hydroxy-functional components including polyester polyols and ring-opening of the lactide monomers (0025). Xu discloses a preparation method wherein the lactide is subjected to reaction with the polyisocyanate to provide a copolyester with excellent biodegradability, toughness, and transparency.
At the time of filing it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to add the polyester polyol taught in Xu in the urethane polyol component of Yoo to provide to improve upon certain properties of the Yoo polylactic acid resin including improved biodegradability, toughness, and transparency (0025-0026). Further, including the polyester polyol in the backbone reduces the bleeding problems of blending typically associated with polylactic acid resins and still provides the resin with improved toughness and transparency (0006).
Yoo discloses lactide and polyether repeating units:
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170
200
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Wherein n is 700 to 5,000 and m is 10 to 100 (0010-0011).
Yoo in view of Xu disclose polyester repeating units represented by the following:
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188
458
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With molecular weights that range from 3,000-40,000 (0011).
As to claim 2, Yoo discloses a soft segment content of 5 to 20 wt% (0057).
As to claim 3, Yoo in view Xu teach a ratio of copolyester:lactide:polyisocyanate of 100:100-2000:0.1-10 (0016). At the time of filing it would have been obvious to include the copolyester of Xu including those within the claimed amounts to prepare the soft segment to improve the toughness of the film (0026).
As to claim 5, Yoo discloses a soft segment derived from 1,6-hexamethylene diisocyanate (See Examples).
As to claims 6-7, Yoo discloses a biomass content of 95-98.2% (See Table 1).
As to claim 8 regarding the melt flow index, the Office realizes that all of the claimed effects or physical properties are not positively stated by reference. However, the reference teaches all the claimed ingredients. Therefore, the claimed effects and physical properties, i.e. melt flow values would implicitly be achieved by a composite with all the claimed ingredients. If it is the applicants’ position that this would not be the case: (1) evidence would need to be provided to support the applicants’ position; and (2) it would the Office’s position that the application contains inadequate disclosure that there is no teaching as to how to obtain the claimed properties with only the claimed ingredients.
As to claim 9, Yoo discloses process comprising initially reacting diisocyanate with the polyol component to obtain a polyurethane polyol followed by reacting the polyol with the lactide.
As to claims 11-14, Yoo discloses molded articles and resin films derived from the polylactic acid resin wherein the packaging films exhibit haze of about 3% or less (0088) and a young’s modulus in both machine and transverse direction of 350 to 750 kgf/mm2 at a thickness of 7 to 30 microns (0083-0084).
As to claim 15 regarding the tear strength, the Office realizes that all of the claimed effects or physical properties are not positively stated by reference. However, the reference teaches all the claimed ingredients including the combination of polyester polyol and lactide to improve toughness and strength. Therefore, the claimed effects and physical properties, i.e. tear strength would implicitly be achieved by a composite with all the claimed ingredients. If it is the applicants’ position that this would not be the case: (1) evidence would need to be provided to support the applicants’ position; and (2) it would the Office’s position that the application contains inadequate disclosure that there is no teaching as to how to obtain the claimed properties with only the claimed ingredients.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 10 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.
The combination of references taken alone or in combination fail to teach the addition of 0.01 to 2% by weight of chain extender.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MICHAEL L LEONARD whose telephone number is (571)270-7450. The examiner can normally be reached M - F 7:00-4:00.
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/MICHAEL L LEONARD/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1763
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