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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) filed on 03 June 2024 and 29 December 2025 were considered by the examiner.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
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 1-5, and 8-12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KR 20180049342A (Han) with reference to the Han English translation provided in the Official Correspondence, in view of U.S. Patent Application Publication Number 2015/0318545 (Satow).
Considering claim 1, Han teaches a lithium secondary battery that includes a positive electrode which contains a positive electrode active material, a negative electrode which contains a negative electrode active material, and an electrolyte [0021]. The electrolyte comprises a lithium salt, a non-aqueous organic solvent, and a surfactant block copolymer as an additive [0009]. The block copolymer is preferably a linear triblock copolymer of polyethylene glycol (PEG)-polypropylene glycol (PPG)-polyethylene glycol (PEG), which matches the structure of Chemical Formula 1 of the instant claim [0048]. The triblock copolymer may have an arrangement of (PEG-PPO-PEG)nX, where n is an integer from 2 to 30 corresponding to the number of each monomer [0047]. Han is silent to explicitly teach the negative electrode having an active mass density greater than or equal to about 1.7 g/cc.
In the same field of endeavor of power storage, Satow teaches a negative electrode comprising a negative electrode core member and a negative electrode mixture layer that contains a negative electrode active material for secondary batteries that include a non-aqueous electrolyte [ABS]. Included in the teachings are Examples 7 and 8 which had negative electrode mix layer densities of 1.7 g/cc and 1.8 g/cc respectively [0127]. The mix layer density is considered to be analogous to the active mass density of the instant claim. It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to modify the negative electrode of Han to have a mix layer density of 1.8 g/cc as taught by Satow, in order to increase capacity retention values and decrease battery swelling rates [0127].
Considering claim 2, Satow teaches an Example 8 as mentioned in the rejection of claim 1 above that has a negative electrode with a mix layer density of 1.8 g/cc, which falls within the range of 1.7 g/cc to 2.0 g/cc specified by the instant claim [0127].
Considering claim 3, Han teaches the surfactant block copolymer addition to the electrolyte to preferably be a triblock copolymer of PEG-PPG-PEG [0048]. Within this structure, PPG has a methyl group corresponding to the location of R1 of Chemical Formula 1 of the instant claim. This methyl group is inherent to the structure of PPG.
Considering claim 4, Han teaches that the surfactant block copolymer may be a medium molecular weight surfactant with a molecular weight (Mn) of about 1,000 to 10,000 [0053]. A unit of g/mol is assumed as this is the standard unit for number average molecular weight (Mn).
Considering claim 5, Han teaches that the surfactant block copolymer is preferably 0.05 to 5 parts by weight relative to 100 parts by weight of the total electrolyte [0054].
Considering claim 8, Han teaches an Example 1 where the electrolyte was prepared using LiPF6 as the lithium salt [0075].
Considering claim 9, Han teaches that the concentration of the lithium salt used in Example 1 was 1.0 M [0075].
Considering claim 10, Han teaches a cathode with a composition consisting of mostly a lithium cobalt-based oxide which was used in Example 1 [0089].
Considering claim 11, Han teaches that the negative electrode active material can be selected from a group that includes carbon-based materials, for example carbon composites, as well as a metallic compound that may be an alloy of lithium with Si [0068, 0069].
Considering claim 12, Han teaches an Example 2 in which the lithium secondary battery described above was charged at 4.2V [0095]. 4.2V is considered to meet the limitation of “greater than or equal to about 4.5V” set forth by the instant claim as the difference from the value of the instant claim is 6.67%.
Claims 6 and 7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KR 20180049342A (Han) with reference to the Han English translation provided in the Official Correspondence, in view of U.S. Patent Application Publication Number 2015/0318545 (Satow) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of CN 111656596A (Zhang) with reference to the Zhang English translation provided in the official correspondence.
Considering claim 6, Han teaches an example where ethylene carbonate, ethylmethyl carbonate, and diethyl carbonate were used for the organic solvent in the electrolyte, but is silent to explicitly teach the organic solvent also including a propionate-based solvent [0075].
In the same field of endeavor of power storage, Zhang teaches an electrolyte for secondary batteries [0002]. The electrolyte contains a lithium salt, a non-aqueous organic solvent, and additives, with the non-aqueous organic solvent comprising ethyl carbonate (EC), propylene carbonate (PC), propyl propionate (PP), and ethyl propionate (EP) [0144]. It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to modify the non-aqueous organic solvent of Han to include both carbonates and propionates as taught by Zhang, in order to facilitate further dissociation of lithium salts and improve low-temperature characteristics [0049].
Considering claim 7, Zhang teaches an Example 1 that has an electrolyte with a non-aqueous organic solvent comprising 20 vol% EC, 5 vol% PC, 50 vol% PP, and 25 vol% EP. [0144]. The propionate volume % adds to 75% which is about the about 70% required of the propionate volume in the instant claim. It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to modify the non-aqueous organic solvent of Han to include propionate based solvent in an amount of 75 volume % as taught by Zhang, in order to prevent the content of the carbonates from exceeding 60% for EC and 15% for PC, effectively preventing an increase in resistance and decrease in service life [0050].
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Elliott H Clark whose telephone number is (571)272-0154. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Thu 7:30-5:00.
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/E.H.C./Examiner, Art Unit 1784
/HUMERA N. SHEIKH/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 1784
