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 .
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.
Specification
Applicant is reminded of the proper language and format for an abstract of the disclosure.
The language should be clear and concise and should not repeat information given in the title. It should avoid using phrases which can be implied, such as, “The disclosure concerns,” “The disclosure defined by this invention,” “The disclosure describes,” etc. In addition, the form and legal phraseology often used in patent claims, such as “means” and “said,” should be avoided.
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(s) 1-2 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over
Wong et al. (WO2022/251945) in view of Alexander et al. (10,375,898).
Regarding claim 1, Wong et al. discloses a plant growing system comprising:
A grow room comprising a plurality of vertical shelves, the plurality of vertical shelves (23,27) holding trays (19) filled with growing plants
A processing room (18) comprising at least one robotic arm and at least two conveyor belts (page 6, paragraph 1)
Growing plants are allowed to grow in a controlled environment while being positioned on the plurality of vertical shelves (23,27)
The at least one robotic arm is adapted to perform transplantation of the growing plants in the processing room (page 4 paragraph 5)
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[AltContent: arrow][AltContent: textbox (arm)][AltContent: arrow][AltContent: textbox (conveyor)]
While Wong discloses the invention as described above, it fails to specifically discloses that the transplantation is carried out at pre determined stages of the plant life cycle. Wong discloses monitoring for density for transplantation purposes, but fails to specifically disclose plant life cycle considerations. Like Wong, Alexander also discloses a grow room with a robot transplanting device. Unlike Wong, Alexander discloses transplanting between different modules based on the plant life cycle (column 10 line 55 through column 11 line 10). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to transplant the plants in Wong based on where the plant is in its lifecycle as taught by Alexander as the use of a known technique to improve similar devices in the same way (KSR International Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 USPQ2d 1385 (2007)) to avoid overcrowding of plants.
Regarding claim 2, the combination discloses different predefined stages, but fails to disclose the exact number of days. It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to contrive any number of desirable ranges for the predefined stage limitation disclosed by Applicant, since it has been held that where the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, discovering the optimum or workable ranges involves only routine skill in the art. In re Aller, 105 USPQ 233. Further, it has been held that discovering an optimum value of a result effective variable involves only routine skill in the art.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 11-20 are allowed.
Claims 3-10 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.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Ruehr (2023/0150764) discloses vertical farming using a robot arm, but does not disclose conveyors or multiple robots for transplanting and tray movement. Joyner (2022/0039342) discloses utilizing a robot for transplanting, but the trays do not remain on vertical shelves during growing.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Jamie L McGowan whose telephone number is (571)272-5064. The examiner can normally be reached Monday through Friday 9:00-5:00 CST.
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/JAMIE L MCGOWAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3671
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