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 .
Status of Claims
This is in response to applicant’s filing date of August 8, 2024. Claims 1-5 are currently pending.
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority to Application CN2023109786911, filed on August 04, 2023. The certified copy of the application as required by 37 CFR 1.55 has been received.
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.
Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to the abstract idea of a mathematical formula without significantly more.
The limitation of transforming captured data of an environment, is a process that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation as a manual modelling and writing the outputs of the industrial process but for the recitation of generic computer components. Similarly, the step of applying computational methods to the captured data from a radar mapping array, is a process that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the user manually determining the outputs of the model using the mathematical equations and writing the outputs down. If a claim limitation, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components, then it falls within the “Mental Processes” grouping of abstract ideas. Accordingly, the claim recites an abstract idea.
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. In particularly, the claim only recites two additional elements – using a processor and memory to perform the modelling, constructing and presenting steps. The processors and memories in these steps is recited at a high-level of generality (i.e., as a generic processors and memories performing a generic computer function of modelling an industrial process and constructing/presenting its outputs) such that it amounts no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component. Accordingly, this additional element does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. The claim is directed to an abstract idea.
The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. As discussed above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, the additional elements of information was obtained from a radar and eventually the transformed data is used by a robot , constructing and presenting to a robot amounts to no more than mere instruction to apply the exception using a generic component such as a robot. Mere instructions to apply an exception using a generic components cannot provide an inventive concept. The claim is not patent eligible.
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.
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 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liang et al (CN-109556598-A)(“Liang”), machine translation of CN-109556598-A is attached hereto, and Stokes et al (US-20230215164-A1)(“Stokes”).
As per claim 1, Liang discloses a miniature radar array mapping system in complex narrow space, comprising a miniature radar mapping array, a miniature radar data acquisition module, a host computer and a robot platform (Figures 1 & 2), wherein:
a software system of the host computer comprises navigation software and mapping software (Liang at Page 1, section technical background at Last Para., discloses the use of an aptly programmed microcomputer for performing mapping of an environment:” algorithms significantly reduce the error caused by the noise accumulation of the vSLAM algorithm, and put 3D-SLAM on the practical level. However, the above algorithms still need strong computing power support. Because the equipment of the drone is limited, it can only be equipped with a single-chip microcomputer with low configuration requirements. Therefore, it is difficult to apply real-time SLAM on the drone.”);
the robot platform is an air robot motion platform, a ground mobile robot motion platform, a land and air amphibious robot or underwater robot motion platform (Liang at Page 8, bottom of page, discloses that applying the mapping to an aerial platform:” As a further improvement of the present invention, the motion platform is a vertical take-off and landing drone.”);
miniature radars of the miniature radar mapping array are laser radars, ultrasonic radars, millimeter wave radars or a combination of laser radars, ultrasonic radars and millimeter wave radars; and for underwater environments, active sonar probes are selected to form the miniature radar mapping array (Liang at Page 9 discloses that the mapping sensors are arranged as an array of NxN dimensions:” an autonomous mapping and navigation positioning method based on an ultrasonic sensor array includes the following steps: S100, installing a matrix arrangement ultrasonic sensor array on the drone. The sensor mounting method of the present invention adopts a matrix arrangement. Specifically: install M-row sensors, N sensors per row. In the present invention, M = 2 is selected, and the number of N is determined according to the size of the vertical takeoff and landing drone. The two rows of sensors are divided into front and rear rows mounted on the body coordinate system of the vertical takeoff and landing drone, and the facing directions of the sensors are vertically directed downward toward the center of the earth, as shown in FIG. 2 . The ultrasonic distance sensors are installed side by side in a row of N numbers, and the spacing between each row is the same, and a row is installed at the front end and the rear end of the vertical takeoff and landing drone. All sensor facets (data acquisition ends) are placed face down to facilitate the acquisition of data (distance, etc.) of all sensor locations to their first obstacle below vertical.”);
environmental sample data are obtained by environmental information sampling of the miniature radar mapping array and then transmitted to the miniature radar data acquisition module(Liang at Page 11 discloses sampling data of the environment at the array of sensors:” Since the distance between the front and rear distance sensors is L, in the set flight mode, the sampling period T of each probe is fixed, L and T are both known, and because the vertical takeoff and landing drone is in When SLAM is performed, it is set to move at a uniform speed, so the travel distance d of each detection period T is obtained according to k …”.);
the environmental sample data sampled by the miniature radar data acquisition module are transmitted to the navigation software of the host computer (Liang at Page 13 discloses producing a map of the environment using navigation software (SLAM):” a map representation that occupies a raster map for 3D, the third dimensional coordinate representing the height of the obstacle. When the motion platform SLAM is constructed, the motion platform is considered to be moving in a uniform linear mode. The sensors in the front row detect the data with a certain sampling period T. Since the sensors in the array detect the sampling period T every time, as long as the moving distance of the front row sensor array of the moving platform in the current sampling period is known, according to each row of the row The distance measured by the sensor constructs a 3D map of the terrain. In the uniform linear mode, the distance information of the front and rear sensor arrays of the motion platform is the same as the motion of the centroid of the motion platform, and the motion information of the centroid (speed v, distance L) It is obtained by the navigation calculation in the present invention. The simulated map obtained by calculation is shown in Fig. 3.”);
position, velocity and attitude information of a robot at a current moment are obtained by the navigation software and are transmitted to the mapping software (Liang at Page 1 discloses that the slam navigation determines velocity and attitude information:” current 3D-SLAM algorithm is usually a vSLAM, which uses a visual depth sensor or a binocular camera instead of a laser distance sensor in 2D-SLAM to detect the target area, and obtains the relative position and maps by the attitude conversion algorithm. This algorithm determines the change in posture and position between the two shots by detecting similar points among successively taken images. In the accumulation process, the error may also accumulate, so this algorithm produces many variants to reduce the error. It is more famous to obtain its own attitude and position change by adding an odometer or inertial sensor, and reduce it by expanding Kalman filter.”);
Liang does not explicitly disclose a panoramic map of the environment as claimed.
Liang does not disclose, Stokes discloses a 360° 3D mapping model of environment is constructed by the mapping software based on a miniature radar detection model and a miniature radar array model, which is a component unit for generating panoramic 3D maps of the complex narrow space (Stokes at Para. [0122] discloses generating a panoramic map of the environment:” rotating line imaging module may be implemented as a digital camera that uses a linear CCD array to assemble a digital image as the camera rotates. In some embodiments, the CCD array may be implemented by three sensor lines, one for each RGB color channel. Advanced rotating line imaging modules may have multiple linear CCD arrays on the focal plane and may capture multiple panoramic images during their rotation. Line-scan technology is capable of capturing data extremely fast and at very high image resolutions. Usually under such conditions, resulting accumulated image data can exceed 100 MB in a fraction of a second. Line-scan-camera-based integrated systems are therefore usually designed to streamline the imaging module’s output in order to meet the system’s objective, using inexpensive computer technology.”).
Stokes is considered to be analogous to the claimed invention because it is in the same field of systems which uses imaging to navigate an environment. Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Liang further in view of Stokes to allow for generating a panoramic view of an environment to produce reliable remote sensing data and/or imagery important to general operation of a mobile structure such as a robot. Motivation to do so would allow for reducing negative effects of limitation from images that provide only a partial area of an environment that when enhanced with stokes arrangement of sensors and imaging techniques can produce more accurate, precise, and reliable situational awareness about a vessel, including imagery derived from such remote sensing data. (Stokes at Para. [0006]).
While Liang and Stokes are silent as to dimension of the elements forming the sensor array. It would have been an obvious matter of design choice to change the size of the components, since such a modification would have involved a mere change in the size of a component. A change in size is generally recognized as being within the level of ordinary skill in the art. In re Rose, 105 USPQ 237 (CCPA 1955).
As per claim 2, Liang and Stokes disclose a miniature radar array mapping system according to claim 1, wherein the miniature radar mapping array is installed on the robot platform (Liang at Page 9, discloses that the sensors are installed on the robot platform:” ultrasonic distance sensors are installed side by side in a row of N numbers, and the spacing between each row is the same, and a row is installed at the front end and the rear end of the vertical takeoff and landing drone.”), the miniature radars detect the environmental sample information in a direction away from the robot (Liang at Page 9, discloses sampling sensor data in the forward and other directions of the environment:” the number of N is determined according to the size of the vertical takeoff and landing drone. The two rows of sensors are divided into front and rear rows mounted on the body coordinate system of the vertical takeoff and landing drone, and the facing directions of the sensors are vertically directed downward toward the center of the earth, as shown in FIG. 2 .”); there are multiple rows of miniature radars in each direction (Liang at Page 9 discloses multiple column and rows of sensors:” sensor mounting method of the present invention adopts a matrix arrangement. Specifically: install M-row sensors, N sensors per row. In the present invention, M = 2 is selected, and the number of N is determined according to the size of the vertical takeoff and landing drone. The two rows of sensors are divided into front and rear rows mounted on the body coordinate system of the vertical takeoff and landing drone”); the miniature radar mapping array is rectangular, H-shaped, polygonal, or circular; or equivalent deformations of these forms, the forward, backward, upward and downward parallel movement of the miniature radars in these arrays; or a combination of these arrays, elliptic, a combination of a portion of rectangle and a portion of circle or arch, a circular or arc-shaped array formed by a portion of a circle or arch; the miniature radar mapping array comprises n miniature radars which are positioned to a body frame OXYZ of the robot, an installation angle of the miniature radars of the miniature radar mapping array comprises an elevation angle β and an azimuthal angle γ in the body frame OXYZ, wherein the elevation angle β is an angle between an orientation of the miniature radars and an XOY plane in the body frame, the azimuthal angle γ is an angle between an orientation of the miniature radars and a YOZ plane in the body frame (Stokes at Para. [0079] discloses the use angular sensors to measure the angle/elevation direction of the sensors:” modules 180 may include a sensing element angle sensor, for example, which may be physically coupled to a radar assembly housing of radar system 160 and be configured to measure an angle between an orientation of an antenna/sensing element and a longitudinal axis of the housing and/or mobile structure 101. Other modules 180 may also include a rotating antenna platform and/or corresponding platform actuator for radar system 160.”).
Stokes is considered to be analogous to the claimed invention because it is in the same field of systems which uses imaging to navigate an environment. Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Liang further in view of Stokes to allow for generating a panoramic view of an environment to produce reliable remote sensing data and/or imagery important to general operation of a mobile structure such as a robot. Motivation to do so would allow for reducing negative effects of limitation from images that provide only a partial area of an environment that when enhanced with stokes arrangement of sensors and imaging techniques can produce more accurate, precise, and reliable situational awareness about a vessel, including imagery derived from such remote sensing data. (Stokes at Para. [0006]).
As per claim 3, Liang and Stokes disclose a he miniature radar array mapping system according to claim 1, wherein miniature radars of the miniature radar mapping array are configured to measure surrounding environmental information, and to synchronously or sequentially sample relative distance information between the robot and buildings, walls and objects in surrounding environment according to a preset frequency; the host computer is configured to obtain the environmental sample data of the miniature radars (Stokes at Para. [00126] discloses using the distance to objects and the like to generate a panoramic view of the environment:” imaging module that is mounted off center, as the imaging module rotates it is effectively translated around the circumference of a circle, that is defined by the distance of the objective lens from the center of rotation. Multiple images from the imaging module will overlap by an amount defined by the rotation speed, the frame rate, and the horizontal field of view, and the overlapping images will be taken from slightly different positions on the circumference of the circle. This technique, referred to herein as pseudo-stereo imaging, provides a mechanism for generating a 3D representation of the surrounding environment with a single camera because the overlapping images are taken from slightly different perspectives. Such data can be further enhanced by using the information from the radar, which provides range and bearing to targets.”).
As per claim 4, Liang and Stokes disclose a miniature radar array mapping system according to claim 1, wherein the miniature radar detection model is based on two parameters of the miniature radars, a field angle α and a measuring distance d; beam of the miniature radars form a projection surface on a measured object, a shape of the projection surface is affected by a shape of the object, a coverage area of the beam is a circle with a radius of dtan(α/2), here, the measuring distance d is a distance from the object to a miniature radar antenna in the coverage area (Stokes at Para. [0126] discloses the use of field angle and distance to define the view of the environment from the body of the robot:” Multiple images from the imaging module will overlap by an amount defined by the rotation speed, the frame rate, and the horizontal field of view, and the overlapping images will be taken from slightly different positions on the circumference of the circle. This technique, referred to herein as pseudo-stereo imaging, provides a mechanism for generating a 3D representation of the surrounding environment with a single camera because the overlapping images are taken from slightly different perspectives. Such data can be further enhanced by using the information from the radar, which provides range and bearing to targets.”);
in the miniature radar array model, coordinates of the ith miniature radar in the body frame are
PNG
media_image1.png
169
91
media_image1.png
Greyscale
, setting angles are
PNG
media_image2.png
49
120
media_image2.png
Greyscale
,
PNG
media_image3.png
49
226
media_image3.png
Greyscale
, here, the subscript b indicates that in the body frame, the superscript γ indicates that the coordinate value is the coordinate of the ith miniature radar, di is the distance, coordinates of a center point of a area measured by the ith miniature radar indicate measured environmental information and are expressed as
PNG
media_image4.png
169
574
media_image4.png
Greyscale
;
coordinates
PNG
media_image5.png
160
78
media_image5.png
Greyscale
of all miniature radars in the body frame are
PNG
media_image6.png
185
523
media_image6.png
Greyscale
;
under a same sampling period, the environmental sample information obtained by environmental information sampling of the miniature radar mapping array is expressed as
PNG
media_image7.png
191
421
media_image7.png
Greyscale
;
a measured value Zb of environmental information sampling of the miniature radar mapping array in the body frame is expressed as
PNG
media_image8.png
160
322
media_image8.png
Greyscale
, here, A is a transformational matrix for transforming the environmental sample information in the body frame, and is expressed as
PNG
media_image9.png
147
880
media_image9.png
Greyscale
.
(Both Liang and Stokes disclose various equations that measure distance, angles and the like so these equations are taught therein. Additionally these equations are considered to be in nature and are considered to be part of the prior art.)
As per claim 5, Liang and Stokes disclose a miniature radar array mapping method in complex narrow space comprising:
transforming the environmental sample information obtained by the miniature radar mapping array into a ground coordinate system determined at an initial moment, wherein it is required to perform coordinate transformation according to the attitude of the robot (Stokes at Para. [0128] discloses applying a transformation to convert all measurements to a world coordinate:” helps ensure that image and radar data are angularly aligned but will not necessarily correct for the direction of the camera and radar in world coordinates because of the platform yaw, which means that not only may the panning speed change but the scene may be moving as well.”), a coordinate transformation matrix C is expressed as
PNG
media_image10.png
194
1396
media_image10.png
Greyscale
,
here, ψ is a yaw angle, θ is a pitch angle, ϕ is a roll angle; in order to rotate the coordinate matrix in the body frame to be parallel to the ground coordinate system, the measured value Zb needs to be multiplied by the coordinate transformation matrix C to the left;
coordinates S of a centroid of the robot in the ground coordinate system is obtained by the navigation software, and is expressed as
PNG
media_image11.png
133
286
media_image11.png
Greyscale
;
based on a superposition of the measured value Zb of the miniature radar mapping array in the body frame and the coordinates
PNG
media_image12.png
133
73
media_image12.png
Greyscale
of the centroid of the robot in the ground coordinate system in the same period, coordinates of the environmental sample information of the miniature radar mapping array in the ground coordinate system at this moment are obtained, which are expressed as
PNG
media_image13.png
133
361
media_image13.png
Greyscale
,
here,
PNG
media_image14.png
49
331
media_image14.png
Greyscale
;
the measured values of the environmental sampling are transformed to the ground coordinate system, and the grids occupied in the three-dimensional space are marked to form a three-dimensional topographic map (Both Liang and Stokes disclose various equations that measure distance, angles and the like so these equations are taught therein. Additionally these equations are considered to be in nature and are considered to be part of the prior art.).
CONCLUSION
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
CHAE; Hyukjin et al. (US-20210311181-A1) METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR VEHICULAR MICROWAVE IMAGING BY MIRROR REFLECTION IN WIRELESS COMMUNICATION SYSTEM;
YAN, Jing et al. (CN-112734921-A) An underwater three-dimensional map construction method based on sonar and visual image splicing;
FUCHS; Ronit Roxana et al. (US-20190384318-A1) RADAR-BASED SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR REAL-TIME SIMULTANEOUS LOCALIZATION AND MAPPING;
CHIZECK; Howard Jay et al. (US-20180232052-A1) Integration of Auxiliary Sensors with Point Cloud-Based Haptic Rendering and Virtual Fixtures;
BÖCKEM; Burkhard et al. (US-20180099744-A1) FLYING SENSOR;
Pavek; Richard E. et al. (US-20170315229-A1) Low Cost 3D Radar Imaging and 3D Association Method from Low Count Linear Arrays for All Weather Autonomous Vehicle Navigation;
Pratzovnick; Arie et al. (US-20120267472-A1) AIR VEHICLE;
Kavaler; Robert (US-8264401-B1) Micro-radar, micro-radar sensor nodes, networks and systems;
Dilz; Albert E. JR. et al. (US-20060287117-A1) Miniature radar for measuring club head speed and tempo.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ELLIS B. RAMIREZ whose telephone number is (571)272-8920. The examiner can normally be reached 7:30 am to 5:00pm.
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, Ramon Mercado can be reached at 571-270-5744. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/ELLIS B. RAMIREZ/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3658
Prosecution Insights