DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted were filed in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Objections
Claim 9 is objected to because of the following informalities:
Line 6 teaches “the vaporization means”. This term lacks antecedent basis and should be “a vaporization means”.
Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claim(s) 9 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Patrick FR 3066596 (as seen in the IDS).
As to claim 9, Patrick teaches “An apparatus configured to determine a content of at least one impurity dissolved in a cryogenic liquid (page 1 teaches “The present invention relates to a method for analysing trace contaminants in a cryogenic liquid, i.e. a liquid which is liquefied at a cryogenic temperature.”), the at least one impurity being less volatile than the cryogenic liquid, the apparatus comprising: a vessel configured to receive an initial volume of the cryogenic liquid (Figure 1, E); means for isolating the vessel against any exit of material once all of the cryogenic liquid has been vaporized by the vaporization means (Figure 1 possesses valves V1-V7 that can isolate the vessel; Figure 1, H is a heating element; Page 3 teaches “The liquid L is heated by a heat source H and is partially vaporized, leaving a quantity of residual liquid R. A heat exchanger supplied by an external heat source 15 (heat exchange with a heat-generating fluid, electricity, waves, etc.) partially vaporizes the liquid.”); means for sending, into the vessel isolated by the isolation means, a determinable volume of gas, and means for vaporization or sublimation of the solid or liquid phase of the at least one impurity in such a way as to load the gas present in the vessel with the impurity, by heating the gas present in the vessel (Figure 1, pipes 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 aid in sending a gas/liquid to the vessel and out of the vessel); and a gas analyser in fluid communication with the vessel, wherein the gas analyser is configured to receive the gas loaded with the at least one impurity from the vessel, wherein the gas analyser is further configured to determine the content of the at least one impurity in the cryogenic liquid from a content of the at least one impurity measured in the gas loaded with the impurity (Page 2 teaches “The contaminant content of the residual liquid is measured by completely vaporizing 15 the residual liquid with at least one contaminant that it contains, the vaporization enclosure then being isolated from any material inlet or outlet and then the contaminant content in the vaporized residual liquid is analyzed and 20 d) The contaminant content in the initial liquid is deduced from the measurement of contaminant in the residual liquid. According to other optional aspects: during step ii), the liquid is completely vaporized, thus creating an increase in pressure in the isolated and closed chamber and 25 the vapor generated is then sent to an analyzer, the vapor generated is heated to a temperature higher than the vaporization temperature of the contaminant at the pressure of the chamber before sending it to the analyzer, the analyzer is capable of measuring a concentration of a 30 contaminant of less than 10 ppm, or even 1 ppm, or even 0.1 ppm.”).”
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-8 are allowed. The prior arts do not teach “vaporizing, within the vessel, all the cryogenic liquid present in the vessel, the pressure in the vessel during vaporization being lower than or equal to the pressure in the vessel during the filling step” and “and determining the content of the impurity in the cryogenic liquid from a content of the impurity measured, by the gas analyser, in the gas loaded with the impurity.”
Claims 10 and 11 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. These depend from claim 9, and the prior arts do not teach the particulars of claim 10 and do not teach “a thermosiphon effect” as seen in claim 11.
Conclusion
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/TARUN SINHA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2855
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