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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) filed on 8/2/24 is considered by the examiner.
Response to Amendment
The preliminary amendment filed 8/2/24 is considered and is entered.
Claims 1-7 remain pending in the application.
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.
Claims 1 and 6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Yoshikawa et al. (WO 2020/090838 (A)(1), Machine translation provided by examiner).
Regarding claim 1, Yoshikawa et al. teaches (Figs. 6-7) an antenna element (130) comprising: a first conductor (131), a second conductor (132), a third conductor (133), and a fourth conductor (134) disposed on a first surface of a base (120); a first coupling conductor (135) located inside the base away from the first surface in a first direction and configured to capacitively coupe the first conductor, the second conductor, the third conductor, and the fourth conductor to each other (see translation ¶54 lines 1-2); a first power feeding conductor electromagnetically connected to any one of the first conductor, the second conductor, the third conductor, and the fourth conductor (151, for example, connected to 131); and a second power feeding conductor electromagnetically coupled to another conductor among the first conductor, the second conductor, the third conductor, and the fourth conductor, the other conductor being different from the one conductor to which the first power feeding conductor is electromagnetically connected (153, for example, connected to 133).
Regarding claim 6, Yoshikawa et al. teaches (Figs. 6-7) an antenna element (130) comprising: a first conductor (135) provided with a first resonator (131), a second resonator (132), a third resonator (133), and a fourth resonator (134) in a loop shape (see Fig. 7), wherein the first conductor capacitively couples the first resonator, the second resonator, the third resonator, and the fourth resonator in common (see translation ¶54 lines 1-2), resonators facing each other, among the first resonator, the second resonator, the third resonator, and the fourth resonator, are respectively provided with a first port (connection of 152, for example) and a second port (connection of 154, for example) inputting alternating currents of the same frequency (see ¶69), and the antenna element is configured to control a mode by a phase difference of the alternating currents of the same frequency from the first port and the second port (see ¶69).
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.
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yoshikawa et al. (WO 2020/090838 (A)(1) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Teshima et al. (US PG Pub. No. 2017/0062953).
Regarding claim 7, Yoshikawa teaches the antenna element according to claim 1.
Yoshikawa does not teach an array antenna comprising: a plurality of the antenna elements according to claim 1.
Teshima et al. teaches (Figs. 3, 5) an antenna array (6) comprising: a plurality of antenna elements (7), each antenna element comprising: a first conductor (7, see Fig. 5) disposed on a first surface of a base (2); a first coupling conductor located inside the base away from the first surface in a first direction (9); a first power feeding conductor electromagnetically connected to the first conductor (51).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the antenna element of Yoshikawa by forming a plurality of such elements as an antenna array, employing the teachings of Teshima.
Doing so would provide the predictable benefit of improving the range of the antenna at higher frequency bands (Teshima, ¶45).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-5 are 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.
Regarding claim 2, the prior art does not teach or reasonably suggest, in combination with other claimed limitations, the limitation of “the antenna element comprising a third coupling conductor located on the same plane as the second coupling conductor and configured to capacitively couple the first conductor and the second conductor to each other, a fourth coupling conductor located on the same plane as the second coupling conductor and configured to capacitively couple the second conductor and the third conductor to each other, a fifth coupling conductor located on the same plane as the second coupling conductor and configured to capacitively couple the third conductor and the fourth conductor to each other, and a sixth coupling conductor located on the same plane as the second coupling conductor and configured to capacitively couple the fourth conductor and the first conductor to each other”.
Claims 3-5 are included for their dependency upon claim 2.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure: Lee et al. (US Patent No. 7,952,526) teaches an antenna element comprising sub-surface coupling conductors and a set of four resonating surface elements.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Jordan E. DeWitt whose telephone number is (571)270-1235. The examiner can normally be reached Monday thru Thursday from 8:30 AM to 3:30 PM ET.
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/DAMEON E LEVI/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2845
/Jordan E. DeWitt/Examiner, Art Unit 2845
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