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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 10/30/2024 was filed and considered by the examiner.
Specification
The lengthy specification has not been checked to the extent necessary to determine the presence of all possible minor errors. Applicant’s cooperation is requested in correcting any errors of which applicant may become aware in the specification.
Drawings
The drawings are objected to under 37 CFR 1.83(a). The drawings must show every feature of the invention specified in the claims. Therefore, the “anti-reflective coating”, “first medium”, “second medium”, “a substrate”, “a lens” must be shown or the feature(s) canceled from the claim(s). No new matter should be entered.
Corrected drawing sheets in compliance with 37 CFR 1.121(d) are required in reply to the Office action to avoid abandonment of the application. Any amended replacement drawing sheet should include all of the figures appearing on the immediate prior version of the sheet, even if only one figure is being amended. The figure or figure number of an amended drawing should not be labeled as “amended.” If a drawing figure is to be canceled, the appropriate figure must be removed from the replacement sheet, and where necessary, the remaining figures must be renumbered and appropriate changes made to the brief description of the several views of the drawings for consistency. Additional replacement sheets may be necessary to show the renumbering of the remaining figures. Each drawing sheet submitted after the filing date of an application must be labeled in the top margin as either “Replacement Sheet” or “New Sheet” pursuant to 37 CFR 1.121(d). If the changes are not accepted by the examiner, the applicant will be notified and informed of any required corrective action in the next Office action. The objection to the drawings will not be held in abeyance.
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.
Claims 1-10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Applicant’s submitted prior art, Liu et al., US 2012/0326800 A1.
Regarding claims 1 and 9, Liu et al. disclose a method for preparing an optical coating, wherein the tunable anti-reflective coating is disposed between a first medium and a second medium (e.g., impedance matching component, [0056]), and the method comprises steps of:
. measuring electromagnetic wave impedances values of the first medium and the second medium (the electromagnetic wave propagates through an interface between different media, partial reflection of the electromagnetic wave will occur, [0054])
. doping a substrate according to the such above values to obtain an optical coating (the electromagnetic parameter arrangement in these regions of the material can be adjusted by analyzing interactions between the electromagnetic parameters of the material and the electromagnetic parameters of the air and controlling the number and the size of the apertures, [0055])
. measuring an electromagnetic wave impedance values on a side of the optical coating in contact with the first, second mediums (an impedance of the first one of the functional sheet layers 4 is identical to that of the first medium and an impedance of the last one of the functional sheet layers 4 is identical to that of the second medium. Impedances of the intermediate functional sheet layers 4 vary continuously in a stacking direction of the substrates 1 to form an impedance gradient layer, [0056]).
Although Liu et al., do not explicitly disclose the step of comparison all values X1, X2 to X3, X4 (Applicant’s step S4), Liu et al. do disclose the step of an impedance thereof at a side being identical to that of a first medium and an impedance thereof at the other side being identical to that of a second medium, while impedances of the intermediate portions change continuously, which eliminate sudden transitions of the impedance between the first medium and the second medium ([0027]), the step of the impedance matching component comprising a plurality of functional sheet layers that each have a front surface and a back surface parallel to each other and that are stacked in a direction perpendicular to the surfaces of each of the functional sheet layers, wherein an impedance of the first one of the functional sheet layers is identical to that of the first medium and an impedance of the last one of the functional sheet layers is identical to that of the second medium, and impedances of the intermediate functional sheet layers vary continuously in a stacking direction of the substrates to form an impedance gradient layer ([0056]). It is implicit that impedance values of the substrate (Applicant’s X3, X4) will be adjusted to matching first/second medium impedance values (Applicant’s X1, X2), i.e., X1=X3 and X2=X4. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to employ the step of comparison over the Liu et al. method to complete a coating processing and to reduce the energy loss of an electromagnetic wave when propagating through an interface between different media ([0006]).
Re claim 2, wherein the substrate 1 is a first substrate for which wave impedance matching is performed by tuning a transverse electric wave, or a second substrate 1 (different substrate) for which wave impedance matching is performed by tuning a transverse magnetic wave ([0057]).
Re claims 3-4, wherein the first substrate is a double-zero material with both permittivity and permeability approximating to zero or a dielectric photonic crystal ([0065]).
Re claim 5, wherein the first medium and the second medium is independently selected from the group consisting of air, glass, silicon, silicon nitride, gallium arsenide, germanium, aluminum oxide, plastic, organic glass, iron oxide, and ferroferric oxide ([0055]).
Re claims 6-7, wherein a doped substance in Step S2 comprises a dielectric material and a wave-absorbing material, such as ultrafine metal powder, silicon carbide powder, silicon carbide fiber, carbon fiber, metal fiber, or an organic polymer ([0083]).
Re claim 8, wherein in Step S2, a doping ratio matches a doped substance and a type of the substrate ([0057]).
Re claim 10, the modification to Liu et al. described the claimed invention as above, except for the application in lens processing to include an anti-reflective covering an outer side of the lens body. It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to employ an anti-reflective coating over a lens, since it was known in the optical art forming anti-reflective coating over a lens to reduce reflections, enhance light transmission, as so to improve visual clarity characteristics.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
. Peroz et al., US 12,298,473, disclose a method of forming anti-reflective coatings over an optical panel.
. Jang, US 2021/0202559 A1, disclose an anti-reflective coating layer 22 over an outer body of lens 2 (fig. 1).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DUNG T NGUYEN whose telephone number is (571)272-2297. The examiner can normally be reached 8:00 - 5:00.
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/DUNG T NGUYEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2871
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