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 under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d).
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 10/30/2024 was filed in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
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, 9 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Lee et al. (US 20210036753).
Lee et al. disclose;
Regarding claim 1:
(in Figs. 3-7) a metasurface flat lens-type beamforming antenna (e.g., Fig. 7) for radars and communication (See Abstract; Para. 0004, Lines 1-3), capable of adjusting an electromagnetic wave beam pointing angle by selecting an electromagnetic wave source, and requiring no chipset active phase shifters (See Figs. 3b, 4b and 5-7), the antenna (e.g., Fig. 6) comprising: a radiation part (defined as RADIATION PATTERN; 610) comprising multiple radiating patches (612-616) arranged in one dimension and spaced a predetermined distance apart (640) from each other (See Fig. 6); and a metamaterial flat lens (defined as METASURFACE) which is disposed spaced a predetermined distance apart (642) from the radiation part (defined as RADIATION PATTERN; 610) and on which single-layer or multi-layer unit cell structures configured to compensate for phases are arranged to match a phase compensation distribution for a high gain and steering of an incident wave having been radiated from one of the multiple radiating patches (Para. 0067, Lines 1-6 – [a] discrete phase discontinuity metasurface composed of single- or multilayer planar metamaterials may be implemented by periodically printing sub-wavelength metal unit cells on a substrate. Each of the unit cells of the metasurface may receive incident EM waves from a feed antenna element, and subsequently radiate phase-delayed EM waves).
Regarding claim 9:
(in Fig. 7) a metamaterial flat lens (770) comprising single-layer or multi-layer unit cell structures configured to compensate for a phase for a high gain and steering of an incident wave, wherein the single-layer or multi-layer unit cell structures are arranged to match a phase compensation distribution (Para. 0067, Lines 1-6).
Regarding claim 15:
(in Fig. 7) a metamaterial flat lens (770) comprising single-layer or multi-layer unit cell structures configured to compensate for a phase for a high gain and steering of an incident wave, wherein the single-layer or multi-layer unit cell structures are arranged to match a phase compensation distribution (Para. 0067, Lines 1-6).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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 text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
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.
Claims 2, 4-5, 8, 10, 12-14, 16 and 18-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee et al. (US 20210036753) in view BT PLC (EP3300172A1).
Regarding claims 2, 4-5, 10, 12-13, 16 and 18-19:
Lee et al. are silent on that the unit cell structures comprise: a metal ring; and a modified circular patch disposed inside the metal ring and spaced a predetermined distance apart from the metal ring as required by claims 2, 10 and 16; the phase of the incident electromagnetic wave is compensated for by a combination of an inductance of the metal ring and a capacitance of the circular patch, and when the incident electromagnetic wave passes through each layer of a multi-layer unit cell structure, the phase required for an individual cell is obtained as required by claims 4, 12 and 18; and the phase to be compensated for is determined according to at least one of a diameter of the circular patch and a gap corresponding to a separation distance between the metal ring and the circular patch as required by claims 5, 13 and 19.
Lee et al. disclose the system structure can be simulated and these various simulations may be performed to estimate geometric parameters such as the number of antennas and unit cells, a distance between an antenna and the metasurface, antenna intervals and unit cell intervals (Para. 0159, Lines 3-6; Para. 0200, Lines 1-4).
Accordingly, it would have been an obvious matter of design consideration to implement metasurface flat lens-type beamforming antenna having unit cells having geometric parameters similar to circle patches especially since such design consideration would have been knowledge within the purview of one of ordinary skill in the art to achieve a metasurface RF front-end design that may have better characteristics (Para. 0159, Lines 9-12).
BT PLC discloses (in Figs. 7a -7c) the unit cell structures (700) comprise: a metal ring (defined by the outer square ring); and a modified patch (defined by inner square patch) disposed inside the metal ring (defined by the outer square ring) and spaced a predetermined distance apart (g) from the metal ring (defined by the outer square ring); the phase of the incident electromagnetic wave is compensated for by a combination of an inductance of the metal ring and a capacitance of the patch, and when the incident electromagnetic wave passes through each layer of a multi-layer unit cell structure (700a-700e), the phase required for an individual cell is obtained (Para. 0032, Lines 1-10; Para. 0034, Lines 1-5); the phase to be compensated for is determined according to at least one of a diameter of the circular patch and a gap corresponding to a separation distance between the metal ring and the patch (Para. 0019, Lines 1-6; Para. 0022, Lines 4-7; Para. 0032, Lines 1-10).
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the unit cell structures comprise: a metal ring; and a modified circular patch disposed inside the metal ring and spaced a predetermined distance apart from the metal ring; the phase of the incident electromagnetic wave is compensated for by a combination of an inductance of the metal ring and a capacitance of the patch, and when the incident electromagnetic wave passes through each layer of a multi-layer unit cell structure, the phase required for an individual cell is obtained; the phase to be compensated for is determined according to at least one of a dimension of the square patch and a gap corresponding to a separation distance between the metal ring and the square patch as taught by BT PLC into the device of Lee et al. for the benefit of achieving metamaterial structure that is active and digitally controlled, positioned in front of the main antenna elements, and behaves like a phase shifter (See Abstract; Para. 0022, Lines 4-6) thereby eliminating the need for expensive phase shifters for each or group of antenna elements, which are very costly and present implementation challenges for economic mass productions (Para. 0019, Lines 2-6).
Regarding claims 8, 14 and 20:
Lee et al. are silent on that the unit cell structures configured to have multiple layers are configured by stacking multiple single-layer unit cells having an identical structure of multiple layers.
BT PLC disclose (in Figs. 7a-7c) the unit cell structures (700) configured to have multiple layers (700a-700e) are configured by stacking multiple single-layer unit cells having an identical structure of multiple layers (See Fig. 7c).
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the unit cell structures configured to have multiple layers are configured by stacking multiple single-layer unit cells having an identical structure of multiple layers as taught by BT PLC into the device of Lee et al. for the benefit of adjusting the phase delay at each unit cell, the electromagnetic wave can be steered in a desired direction (Para. 0035, Lines 7-9).
Claims 3 and 11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee et al. (US 20210036753) in view BT PLC (EP3300172A1) as applied to claims 1 and 2 above and further in view of Wu (US 20210075119).
Regarding claims 3 and 11:
Lee as modified are silent on that the modified circular patch comprises: a first capacitance adjustment part acquired by making a hole at the central part of the circular patch; and a second capacitance adjustment part acquired by making notches on the top, bottom, left, and right sides as the outer circumferential part of the circular patch, and the circular patch is configured to have a point symmetric shape.
Wu discloses (in Figs. 9 and 10) a metasurface flat lens, having a patch surrounded by a metal ring and comprising a first and a second capacitor and further that the ring shape are equivalent to inductors and gaps between metal parts separated from each other can be equivalent to capacitors (Para. 0055, Lines 4-6).
Accordingly, it would have been an obvious matter of design consideration to implement capacitance adjustments as taught by Wu (Para. 0055, Lines 6-8 - accordingly, by designing the metal frame MF and the metal square MS, inductance and capacitance can be adjusted) into the modified unit cells of Lee especially since such design consideration would have been knowledge within the purview of one of ordinary skill in the art for the benefit of adjusting equivalent permittivity and equivalent permeability of the three-dimensional unit (Para. 0080, Lines 3-5).
Claims 6-7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee et al. (US 20210036753) in view Ebling et al. (US 20070001918).
Regarding claims 6-7:
Lee et al. are silent on that a switch configured to provide an incident electromagnetic wave to one of the multiple radiating patches as required by claim 6; and a switch controller configured to control operation of the switch as required by claim 7.
Ebling et al. disclose (in Fig. 12) a switch (66) configured to provide an incident electromagnetic wave to one of the multiple radiating patches (18); and a switch controller (92) configured to control operation of the switch (66).
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement a switch configured to provide an incident electromagnetic wave to one of the multiple radiating patches and a switch controller configured to control operation of the switch as taught by Ebling et al. into the device of Lee et al. so that the beams of electromagnetic energy may be generated individually at different times so as to provide for a scanned beam of electromagnetic energy (Para. 0042, Lines 16-19) for the benefit of providing reliability and reducing system manufacturing cost (Para. 0040, Lines 10-12).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BAMIDELE A. IMMANUEL whose telephone number is (571)272-9988. The examiner can normally be reached General IFP Schedule: Mon.-Fri. 8AM - 7PM (Hoteling).
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/BAMIDELE A IMMANUEL/Examiner, Art Unit 2845
/ALEXANDER H TANINGCO/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2845
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