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 .
Election/Restrictions
Claims 3-5 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected inventions, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on April 17, 2026.
Specification
The use of the terms "RAMANforce" and "Nanophoton," which are trade names used in commerce, has been noted in this application. The term should be accompanied by the generic terminology; furthermore the term should be capitalized wherever it appears or, where appropriate, include a proper symbol indicating use in commerce such as ™, SM , or ® following the term.
Although the use of trade names and marks used in commerce (i.e., trademarks, service marks, certification marks, and collective marks) are permissible in patent applications, the proprietary nature of the marks should be respected and every effort made to prevent their use in any manner which might adversely affect their validity as commercial marks.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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.
Claim(s) 1 and 2 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Guo et al (CN 206711622).
Claim 1 is directed to the structure of a wire rod. The only structural limitation is that the wire rod is mostly composed of copper. The remainder of the claim describes a measuring process, a measurement system, and desired measurement results. These recitations directed at the measuring process, the measuring system, and desired measurement results do not serve to distinguish.
With these considerations, Guo shows:
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1. A wire rod mainly composed of copper (1, See Fig. 1, and "Preferred embodiment": "conductor 1 is a tinning soft copper conductor"),
wherein oxidation degree measured on a surface of the wire rod using Raman spectral analysis is less than 25 (this limitation is directed at desired measurement results and does not limit the structure of the wire rod, nor serve to structurally distinguish from Guo),
wherein measurement of the oxidation degree is performed by mapping Raman spectra under conditions described below, a histogram is created from peak areas of Raman spectral peaks in respective pixels of an obtained mapping image, an average value of a plurality of the peak areas is determined from the histogram, and the average value is measured as the oxidation degree (this limitation is directed at a process of measuring and does not limit the structure of the wire rod, and thus, does not serve to structurally distinguish from Guo),
wherein a plurality of the Raman spectral peaks are peaks attributed to a lattice vibration of a vibrational mode 2Eu of Cu2O (this limitation is directed at a process of measuring and does not limit the structure of the wire rod, and thus, does not serve to structurally distinguish from Guo), and
wherein the histogram has a horizontal axis representing 256 levels into which a range from minimum to maximum of the plurality of the peak areas are divided, and a vertical axis representing a frequency, which is a number of pixels in each level (this limitation is directed at desired measurement results and does not limit the structure of the wire rod, nor serve to structurally distinguish from Guo),
wherein Raman measurement system is RAMANforce Standard VIS-NIR-HS by Nanophoton, a laser wavelength is 532.06 nm, a width of an incident slit of a spectrometer is 50 μm, a ratio of light intensity after attenuation to maximum laser light intensity of ND filter (attenuation ratio) is 215/255, a number of engraved lines in diffraction grating is 600 gr/mm, a magnification of objective lens is 100x, a numerical aperture (NA) is 0.9, a mapping range is 88 × 60 μm, and a pixel size is 2 × 2 μm (this limitation is directed at the measurement system and does not limit the structure of the wire rod, nor serve to structurally distinguish from Guo).
2. An enameled wire, comprising: a conductor formed by drawing (the manner of making the wire rod is not found to impart any structural difference to the wire rod) a wire rod according to claim 1, and an insulative coating (2) formed around the conductor.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Gimenez Lopez et al. (US 2023/0361330) and Jo et al. (US 2016/0365165) show a Raman spectra of a copper wire.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Hwa Andrew S Lee whose telephone number is (571)272-2419. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Fri 9am-5:30pm.
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/Hwa Andrew Lee/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2877
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