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 statements (IDS) submitted on 04/25/2025, 08/06/2025, 08/29/2025, 10/17/2025, and 10/30/2025 are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner.
The information disclosure statement filed 09/20/2024 fails to comply with 37 CFR 1.98(a)(2), which requires a legible copy of each cited foreign patent document; each non-patent literature publication or that portion which caused it to be listed; and all other information or that portion which caused it to be listed. It has been placed in the application file, but the information referred to therein has not been considered.
Claim Objections
Claim 1 is objected to because of the following informalities: Line 8 recites “brightness of backscattered illumination” which Examiner suggests amending to “brightness of the backscattered illumination”. Lines 9-10 recite “the voxel and pixel sensors” which Examiner suggests amending to “the at least one voxel sensor and the pixel sensor”. Lines 12 and 14 recite “the target surface” which Examiner suggests amending to “the target surface of the object”. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 4 is objected to because of the following informalities: Line 2 recites “based on location of all sources of light” which Examiner suggests amending to “based on a location of all sources of light”. Line 3 recites “individual contribution of all sources of light” which Examiner suggests amending to “an individual contribution of all sources of light”. Line 4 recites “from all of the light sources” which Examiner suggests amending to “from all sources of light” Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 10 is objected to because of the following informalities: Line 1 recites “the voxel and pixel sensors” which Examiner suggests amending to “the at least one voxel sensor and the pixel sensor”. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 11 is objected to because of the following informalities: Line 1 recites “DOE” which Examiner suggests amending to “diffractive optics elements (DOE)”. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1-11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
The term “relatively narrow range of wavelengths” in claim 1 is a relative term which renders the claim indefinite. The term “relatively” is not defined by the claim, the specification does not provide a standard for ascertaining the requisite degree, and one of ordinary skill in the art would not be reasonably apprised of the scope of the invention. Applicant’s specification does not specify what is considered to be a relatively narrow range of wavelengths. For purposes of examination, Examiner has interpreted the limitation to be a narrow range of wavelengths.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the intensity of ambient light" in Line 5. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim as there is no earlier mention of an intensity of ambient light. Examiner suggests amending to “an intensity of ambient light” and has interpreted the limitation as such.
Claim 4 recites the limitation "the diffuse component of illumination from all of the light sources" in Lines 3-4. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim as claim 1 only recites obtaining a backscattered illumination having a diffuse component from illumination from a light source (singular). Examiner suggests amending to “a diffuse component of backscattered illumination from all sources of light” and has interpreted the limitation as such.
The terms “substantially all light outside of the narrow range of wavelengths” and “substantially all specular light” in claim 6 are relative terms which renders the claim indefinite. The term “substantially” is not defined by the claim, the specification does not provide a standard for ascertaining the requisite degree, and one of ordinary skill in the art would not be reasonably apprised of the scope of the invention. Applicant’s specification does not specify a range or define what is considered to be substantially all light outside of the narrow range of wavelengths or substantially all specular light. For purposes of examination, Examiner has interpreted the limitations to be all light outside of the narrow range of wavelengths and all specular light.
Claim 10 recites the limitation "the near infrared band of frequencies" in Line 2. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim as there is no earlier mention of a near infrared band of frequencies. Examiner suggests amending to “a near infrared band of frequencies” and has interpreted the limitation as such.
Claims 2, 3, 5, 7-9, and 11 depend on claim 1 and thus are also rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 1 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action.
With regards to claim 1, Hasegawa (JP 2015-59849) discloses uniformly illuminating a target surface of the object within the scene with light from a light source having an intensity within a narrow range of wavelengths such that the light overwhelms the intensity of ambient light within the narrow range to obtain reflected, backscattered illumination having a diffuse component, a volumetric sensor including at least one voxel sensor configured to sense brightness of backscattered illumination from the target surface of the object, and computing surface albedo of the target surface based on the voxel information, however, there is no mention of a pixel sensor positioned in a predetermined location relative to the at least one voxel sensor and computing the surface albedo of the target surface based on both the voxel and pixel information to remove correlation between rotation and pixel values for the target surface. Ahmed et al. (US 2014/0085625) discloses the concept of computing a surface albedo based on 3-D position and active brightness, however, there is no mention of the active brightness being pixel information from a pixel sensor positioned in a predetermined location relative to the at least one voxel sensor and computing the surface albedo of the target surface based on voxel information and pixel information to remove correlation between rotation and pixel values for the target surface. Wu et al. (Combining Gradient and Albedo Data for Rotation Invariant Classification of 3D Surface Texture) discloses computing a surface albedo using voxel information and generating a surface invariant texture classification scheme using the surface albedo. However, this is not the same as computing the surface albedo of the target surface based on both the voxel and pixel information to remove correlation between rotation and pixel values for the target surface. Thus, while different prior arts disclose parts of the claim, none of the prior arts disclose or have reasonable motivation to combine to disclose all of the limitations of the claim as a whole.
Claims 2-11 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
With regards to claims 2-11, they are dependent on claim 1.
Contact Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to CAROL W CHAN whose telephone number is (571)272-5766. The examiner can normally be reached 9:30-3:30 M-F.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Sumati Lefkowitz can be reached at (571) 272-3638. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/CAROL W CHAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2672
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