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 .
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 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 factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied 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 1, 4-7 and 15-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ikeda et al. (CN 1628611 A, Brain Disease Auxiliary Diagnosis And Treatment Apparatus, X-ray Computed Tomography Apparatus), hereinafter, “Ikeda”, in view of Takada et al. (USPAP 2022/0313,220), hereinafter, “Takada”.
Regarding claim 1 Ikeda teaches, acquire a character string including a description regarding a first region of interest; specify a second region of interest that is not described in the character string and that is related to the first region of interest. (Please note, page 11, last paragraph. As indicated selectively displaying contrast enhanced images and the sulcus enhanced image on the display part 38. When the input device 39 by an operator, the contrast enhancement or the sulcus of the enhanced image is designated indicating a low CT value region (unrecoverable region) of profile (first ROI) frame scanning line (S4). In FIG. 16A shows an example of first ROI. designating method of the first ROI is not limited to manual input. Instead, the ROI can be specified by threshold value processing or packet processing based on CT image. specifying data of the first ROI and contrast enhancing, brain strengthening and the original CT image are stored in the data storage section 37.).
Ikeda does not expressly teach, notifying a user to check a necessity of displaying an image in which the second region of interest is likely to be included.
Takada teaches, notifying a user to check a necessity of displaying an image in which the second region of interest is likely to be included. (Please note, paragraph 0065. As indicated with the display control function 187, the processing circuitry 180 displays a ROI on the ultrasonic image data based on a ROI coordinate calculated by the calculation function 186. The processing circuitry 180 may display information related to the automatic setting of the ROI. Specifically, the processing circuitry 180 changes the display of a letter or a mark notifying a user of completion of automatic setting of an ROI after the transition of a display mode, or changes a display color of an ROI in the display mode post-transition.).
Ikeda & Takada are combinable because they are from the same field of endeavor.
At the time before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to utilize this notifying a user operation of Takada in Ikeda’s invention.
The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been as indicated paragraph 0064, “The processing circuitry 180 may also add supplementary information, such as textual information of various parameters, a scale, or a body mark, to the display image data. The processing circuitry 180 may also generate a user interface (graphical user interface (GUI)) to allow the operator to input various commands through the input device, and cause the display to display the GUI.”.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Takada with Ikeda to obtain the invention as specified in claim 1.
Regarding claim 4, Takada recites, wherein the processor is configured to display a character string indicating the second region of interest and at least one of a symbol or a figure on a display as the notification. (Please note, paragraph 0065. As indicated specifically, the processing circuitry 180 changes the display of a letter or a mark notifying a user of completion of automatic setting of an ROI after the transition of a display mode, or changes a display color of an ROI in the display mode post-transition. With regard to the change of a display color, for example, a display color of an automatically set ROI may be changed from a conventional display color; alternately, a default display color of a ROI displayed when no ROI has been automatically set may be changed from a conventional display color.).
Regarding claim 5, Takada recites, wherein the processor is configured to display the image in which the second region of interest is likely to be included on a display. (Please note, figure 7).
Regarding claim 6, Takada recites, wherein the processor is configured to, in a case in which the image includes the second region of interest, highlight the second region of interest. (Please note, paragraph 0121. As indicated after estimating the ROI coordinate, the processing circuitry 180 implements the display control function 187 to thereby display a ROI on second ultrasonic image data of the second display mode based on the ROI coordinate.).
Regarding claim 7, Takada recites, wherein the processor is configured to, in a case in which there is an instruction, display the image in which the second region of interest is likely to be included on the display. (Please note, paragraph 0147. As indicated a second specific example is a configuration of recalculating a ROI coordinate when satisfying the condition of resetting a region of interest and displaying a new region of interest based on the recalculated ROI coordinate.).
Regarding claim 15, Takada recites, wherein the image is a medical image (Please note, paragraph 0055. As indicated the processing circuitry 180 generates a plurality of ultrasonic images (medical images) respectively corresponding to a plurality of consecutive frames by transmission and reception of ultrasound waves.), and the first region of interest and the second region of interest are each at least one of a region of a structure that is likely to be included in the medical image or a region of an abnormal shadow that is likely to be included in the medical image. (Please note, figure 7).
Regarding claims 16-17, analysis similar to those presented for claim 1, are applicable.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-3 and 8-14 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: The closest applied Prior Art of record fails to disclose or reasonably suggest wherein the processor is configured to specify the second region of interest related to the first region of interest based on correlation data in which a degree of association with other regions of interest is predetermined for each type of region of interest.
Examiner’s Note
The examiner cites particular figures, paragraphs, columns and line numbers in the references as applied to the claims for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claims, other passages and figures may apply as well.
It is respectfully requested that, in preparing responses, the applicant fully consider the references in their entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the examiner.
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/AMIR ALAVI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2668 Monday, June 8, 2026
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