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 .
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant's claim for foreign priority based on an application filed in Japan on 2/22/22. It is noted, however, that applicant has not filed a certified copy of the JP2022-025817 application as required by 37 CFR 1.55. An attempt by the USPTO to electronically retrieve the priority document was made but failed.
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election without traverse of Species I (Figs. 1A and 3A) in the reply filed on 1/12/26 is acknowledged.
Applicant indicated that claims 1-2 and 14 read on the elected species. Accordingly, claims 3-13 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected species, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 1/12/26.
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 1-2 and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102a1 as being clearly anticipated by Kuroda et al. (US 5,233,360).
Kuroda (e.g. Fig. 8) teaches a distributed constant circuit (e.g. 43-47 is a microstrip transmission line and a microstrip is fundamentally a distributed constant structure) including:
Regarding Claim 1, a dielectric (e.g. 42) including a first main surface (e.g. the top surface having the line 43-47) and a second main surface (e.g. the bottom surface of the dielectric 42) opposed to the first main surface; a transmission line (e.g. 43-47) arranged on the first main surface; and a ground electrode arranged on the second main surface (e.g. see Col. 5, lines 18-28, a ground is on the dielectric and which is on a layer opposite the transmission line conductor by the definition of a microstrip), wherein the transmission line includes a first line (e.g. 43, 47), a second line (e.g. 44, 46), and a third line (e.g. 45) that are formed to have different widths, and the transmission line includes a periodic structure in which the first line, the second line, the third line, the second line, and the first line are arranged in series in this order (e.g. see Fig. 8 and Col. 5, lines 18-28, line portions 43 thru 47 are in series order and have the width relationships in the same orientations as Fig. 1A of the present invention).
Regarding Claim 2, wherein the periodic structure is a periodic structure or a plurality of periodic structures that are electrically connected (e.g. the transmission line circuit is a one period periodic structure identical to the Applicant’s elected species Fig. 1A and [0012] of Applicant’s specification).
Regarding Claim 14, wherein the transmission line includes a microstrip line (e.g. see Col. 5, lines 23-25, the line 43-47 is microstrip).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Carlson et al. (US 4,233,579) teaches a periodic transmission line structure (e.g. see Fig. 1).
Mochizuki (e.g. US 2008/0117004) teaches a transmission line filter (e.g. see Fig. 10).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to STEPHEN E JONES whose telephone number is (571)272-1762. The examiner can normally be reached 9AM to 5PM.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Andrea Lindgren Baltzell can be reached at 571-272-5918. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Stephen E. Jones/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2843