DETAILED ACTION
Priority
1. Receipt is acknowledged of papers submitted under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a) — (d), which papers have been placed of record in the file. Oath/Declaration
Oath/Declaration
2. Oath and declaration filed on 3/20/2024 is accepted.
Information Disclosure Statement
3. The prior art documents submitted by application in the Information Disclosure Statement filed on 12/11/2024 and 12/8/2024 and 2/4/2026 have all been considered and made of record (note the attached copy of form PTO – 1449).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
4. 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)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1-3,5-7,and 13-15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Mohanty (11,154,194 B2).
Regarding claim 1, Mohanty discloses ( refer to figures 1-14) a Fourier-domain optical coherence tomography, FD-OCT (column 5, lines 39-40), apparatus arranged to acquire optoretinography, ORG, data that is indicative of a physiological response of a retina (2000) of an eye (2080) of a subject to an optical stimulus, the FD-OCT apparatus comprising: an optical system operable to apply the optical stimulus to the retina (2000) ; an FD-OCT imaging system (column 6, lines 14-16) operable to acquire OCT data by imaging a portion of the retina; and a controller arranged to: control the FD-OCT imaging system to acquire OCT data of a plurality of portions of the retina (2000) such that, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina, at least some of the OCT data acquired from the portion is acquired after a respective optical stimulus has been applied to the portion by the optical system; generate, based on the acquired OCT data, respective ORG data (figure 6, ORG system detect retina column 10, lines 1-40) for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina which is indicative of the respective response of the portion of the retina to the optical stimulus applied to the portion of the retina; and store, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina (i.e., scan retinas layers) , the respective ORG data generated for the portion in association with a respective indication of a position in a visual field of the eye of a point that is optically conjugate with a corresponding position of the portion on the retina ( column 5, line 23—column 15, line 15).
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Regarding claim 2, Mohanty discloses wherein the controller (2110) (column 5, lines 40-45) is further arranged to determine a respective indication of a position on the retina of each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina at which OCT data is to be acquired by the FD-OCT imaging system by determining, for each point of a plurality of points in the visual field of the eye, a respective indication of a corresponding position on the retina that is optically conjugate with the point.
Regarding claim 3, Mohanty discloses wherein the controller (2110) (column 5, lines 40-45) is further arranged to: determine a respective indication of a position on the retina(2000) of each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina at which OCT data is to be acquired by the FD-OCT imaging system based on an image of the retina of the eye; and determine, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina, the respective indication of the position in the visual field of the eye of the point that is optically conjugate with the position of the portion on the retina.
Regarding claim 5, Mohanty discloses (refer to figures 1-14) the optical coherence tomography, FD-OCT, apparatus arranged to acquire optoretinography, ORG, data that is indicative of a physiological response of a retina of an eye of a subject to an optical stimulus, the FD-OCT apparatus(column 5, lines 39-40), comprising: an optical system operable to apply the optical stimulus to the retina (2008); an FD-OCT imaging system operable to acquire OCT data by imaging a portion of the retina; and a controller arranged to: control the FD-OCT imaging system (column 6, lines 14-16) to acquire OCT data of a plurality of portions of the retina such that, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina (2008), at least some of the OCT data acquired from the portion is acquired after a respective optical stimulus has been applied to the portion by the optical system; generate, based on the acquired OCT data, respective ORG data(figure 6, ORG system detect retina column 10, lines 1-40) for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina which is indicative of the respective response of the portion of the retina to the optical stimulus applied to the portion of the retina; store, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina, the respective ORG data generated from OCT data acquired from the portion in association with a respective indication of a location of the portion on the retina; and acquire data indicating how measurements of the subject's ability to see optical stimuli that are confined to respective different portions of the retina of the eye at different respective locations on the retina are distributed over the at least a part of the retina of the eye( column 5, line 23—column 15, line 15).
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Regarding claim 6, Mohanty discloses (refer to figures 1-14) wherein the controller (2120) is arranged to acquire the data which indicates how measurements of the subject's ability to see optical stimuli applied to respective different locations on the retina of the eye are distributed over at least a part of the retina of the eye by: receiving visual field test data acquired from the eye by a visual field-testing device, the visual field test data comprising measurements of the subject's ability to see optical stimuli applied from a plurality of points in the visual field of the eye of the subject; and determining, for each point of the plurality of points in the visual field of the eye, a respective indication of a corresponding position on the retina that is optically conjugate with the point ( column 5, line 23—column 15, line 15).
Regarding claim 7, Mohanty discloses ,wherein the controller (2120) (column 5, lines 45-50) is arranged to acquire the data which indicates how measurements of the subject's ability to see optical stimuli applied to respective different locations on the retina of the eye are distributed over at least a part of the retina of the eye by: receiving indications, provided by the subject, of whether the subject saw the respective optical stimulus applied to each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina (2000) by the optical system; and associating each of the received indications with a respective indication of a location of the respective portion on the retina.
Regarding claim 13, Mohany discloses a computer -implemented method of controlling a Fourier-domain optical coherence tomography, FD-OCT, (refer to figures 1-14) apparatus to acquire optoretinography, ORG, data that is indicative of a physiological response of a retina of an eye of a subject to an optical stimulus, the FD-OCT apparatus comprising an optical system operable to apply the optical stimulus to the retina and an FD-OCT imaging system operable to acquire OCT data by imaging a portion of the retina, the method comprising: controlling the FD-OCT imaging system to acquire OCT data of a plurality of portions of the retina such that, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina (2000) (column 5, lines 45-50), at least some of the OCT data acquired from the portion is acquired after a respective optical stimulus has been applied to the portion by the optical system; generating, based on the acquired OCT data, respective ORG data for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina which is indicative of the respective response of the portion of the retina to the optical stimulus applied to the portion of the retina; and storing, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina, the respective ORG data generated for the portion in association with a respective indication of a position in a visual field of the eye of a point that is optically conjugate with a corresponding position of the portion on the retina.
Regarding claim 14, Mohanty discloses ( refer to figures 1-14) a computer-implemented method of controlling a Fourier-domain optical coherence tomography, FD-OCT, apparatus to acquire optoretinography, ORG, data that is indicative of a physiological response of a retina of an eye of a subject to an optical stimulus, the FD-OCT apparatus (column 5, lines 39-40), comprising an optical system operable to apply the optical stimulus to the retina (2008) and an FD-OCT imaging system operable to acquire OCT data by imaging a portion of the retina, the method comprising: controlling the FD-OCT imaging system to acquire OCT data of a plurality of portions of the retina such that, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina, at least some of the OCT data acquired from the portion is acquired after a respective optical stimulus has been applied to the portion by the optical system; generating, based on the acquired OCT data, respective ORG data for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina which is indicative of the respective response of the portion of the retina to the optical stimulus applied to the portion of the retina; storing, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina, the respective ORG data generated from OCT data acquired from the portion in association with a respective indication of a location of the portion on the retina; and acquiring data indicating how measurements of the subject's ability to see optical stimuli that are confined to respective different portions of the retina of the eye at different respective locations on the retina are distributed over the at least a part of the retina of the eye( column 5, line 23—column 15, line 15). .
Regarding claim 15, Mohanty discloses ( refer to figures 1-14) a computer program comprising computer-readable instructions which, when executed by a computer (2010) , cause the computer to perform a method, comprising: controlling the FD-OCT imaging system to acquire OCT data of a plurality of portions of the retina such that, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina, at least some of the OCT data acquired from the portion is acquired after a respective optical stimulus has been applied to the portion by the optical system; generating, based on the acquired OCT data, respective ORG data for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina which is indicative of the respective response of the portion of the retina to the optical stimulus applied to the portion of the retina; and storing, for each portion of the plurality of portions of the retina, the respective ORG data generated for the portion in association with a respective indication of a position in a visual field of the eye of a point that is optically conjugate with a corresponding position of the portion on the retina.
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Allowable Subject Matter
5. Claims 4 and 8- 12 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.
6. The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: a display device, wherein the controller is further arranged to: acquire data indicating how measurements of the subject's ability to see optical stimuli applied confined to respective different portions of the retina of the eye at different respective locations on the retina are distributed over at least a part of a visual field of the eye; control the display device, based on at least some of the acquired data, to display a first map indicative of how the subject's ability to see the optical stimuli is distributed over the at least a part of the visual field of the eye; and control the display device, based on at least some of the stored ORG data and the associated stored indications, to display a second map for comparison with the first map, the second map indicating how the physiological response of the retina to the optical stimulus indicated by at least some of the stored ORG data is distributed over the at least a part of the visual field of the eye and a display device, wherein controller is further arranged to: control the display device, based on at least some of the acquired data, to display a first map indicative of how the subject's ability to see the optical stimuli is distributed over at least a part of the retina of the eye; and control the display device, based on at least some of the generated ORG data and positions of the portions of the retina from which the at least some of the ORG data was generated, to display a second map for comparison with the first map, the second map being indicative of how the response of the retina to optical stimulus, which is indicated by the at least some of the generated ORG data, is distributed over the at least a part of the retina of the eye. Regarding claim 10, wherein the FD-OCT apparatus further comprises a fixation target arranged to fix a gaze direction of the eye, the optical system is operable to apply the optical stimulus to the retina such that an illumination of the retina by the optical stimulus is confined to a portion of the retina, the optical system being controllable by the controller to vary a location on the retina at which the optical stimulus is to be applied while and comprising a light source arranged to generate light which provides the optical stimulus, and one or more scanning elements arranged to direct the light to the retina, the controller is further arranged to: acquire an indicator of a target location on the retina at which the optical stimulus is to be applied by the optical system; use the acquired indicator to control the one or more scanning elements of the optical system, while a position of the fixation target relative to the eye remains fixed, to direct the light to a first portion of the retina which is at the target location; control the FD-OCT imaging system to acquire OCT data of a second portion of the retina, wherein at least a part of the second portion of the retina is disposed in relation to the first portion so as to be stimulated by the applied optical stimulus during acquisition of at least some of the OCT data; and generate ORG data based on the acquired OCT data of the second portion of the retina.
Conclusion
7. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MOHAMMED A HASAN whose telephone number is (571)272-2331. The examiner can normally be reached M-TH 6 AM -4 PM.
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/MOHAMMED A HASAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2872 7/22/2026
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