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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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) 1-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102a1 as being anticipated by St. Aubin et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication 20190213740).
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Claims 14 and 15 recite an apparatus and a non-transitory computer readable medium configured to perform the method of claim 1. Since the additional independent claims recite the same methodology through different statutory classes without introducing additional functional limitations, claims 1, 14 and 15 rise and fall together and are addressed simultaneously.
As per claims 1, 14 and 15, St. Aubin et al. disclose a method comprising the step(s) of:
obtaining image data, for at least two levels of radiation energy (Fig. 3, dual-material calibration data 302-304; ¶¶ [0038-0039]);
obtaining equivalence data associated with mass equivalence of at least one of the first material and the second material with respect to a reference material, for the at least two levels of radiation energy (Fig. 3, equivalent path length modeling 306, equivalent path length lookup tables 308-310, mass thickness lookup table generation 312, mass lookup table 314; Fig. 18, elements 1800-1812; ¶¶ [0031; 0039; 0140-0143; 0170-0173]),
wherein the mass equivalence of a given material with respect to the reference material corresponds to a thickness of an object made of the reference material, associated with a same radiation transmission, in the inspection image, as a radiation transmission associated with a thickness of an object made of the given material (Fig. 3, elements 306-314; Fig. 18, elements 1800-1812; ¶¶ [0170-0173]);
obtaining observation data based on the image data and the equivalence data (Fig. 3, mass thickness lookup table 314, effective atomic number lookup table generation 316, effective atomic lookup table 318; Fig. 16; ¶¶ [0158-0163]); and
determining at least one of the first material and the second material, based on the obtained observation data (Fig. 3, effective atomic number lookup table 318; ¶¶ [0158-0163]).
[Examiner note: St. Aubin’s reference-material equivalent path lengths correspond to the claimed mass equivalence by representing corresponding reference-material thicknesses for the measured radiation transmission].
As per claims 2-4 and 16-19, St. Aubin et al. further disclose a method wherein, for an object made of a material other than the reference material, the mass equivalence with respect to the reference material depends on radiation energy (Fig. 3, dual-material calibration data 302-304; equivalent path length modeling 306; Fig. 18; ¶¶ [0031; 0039; 0170-0173])
the mass equivalence is expressed in g.cm-2 (Fig. 3, mass thickness lookup table generation 312 and mass thickness lookup table 314; Fig. 12, steps 366-380; ¶ [0116]).
the reference material being metallic, the mass equivalence MEQ to the reference material is associated with metallic MEQ, and/or the reference material being organic, the mass equivalence MEQ to the reference material is associated with organic MEQ (Fig. 3; using aluminum and ABS reference materials (Fig. 7; ¶¶ [0110-111]).
As per claims 5-7, St. Aubin et al. further disclose a method wherein:
obtaining the equivalence data comprises at least one of: receiving the equivalence data from a calibration step; and/or determining the equivalence data during a calibration step (Fig. 3; calibration workflow 302-314; Fig. 18, elements 1800-1812; ¶¶ [0038-0039], [0170-0173]);
determining, in a reference calibration sub-step, radiation transmission through a plurality of thicknesses of a reference object made of the reference material, for the at least two levels of radiation energy, detector by detector of an array of detectors configured to generate, at least partly, the inspection image of the cargo; and determining, in at least one sample calibration sub-step, a radiation transmission through a plurality of thicknesses of at least one sample object made of a material other than the reference material, for the at least two levels of radiation energy, detector by detector of the array of detectors configured to generate, at least partly, the inspection image of the cargo; and determining, detector by detector based on the reference calibration sub-step and the at least one sample calibration sub-step, at least one of: a mass equivalence MEQHE of the at least one a material other than the reference material to the reference material, at a higher level of radiation energy HE of the at least two levels of radiation energy, and/or a mass equivalence MEQLE of the at least one a material other than the reference material to the reference material, at a lower level of radiation energy LE of the at least two levels of radiation energy (Fig. 3, elements 302-310; Fig. 18, elements 1800-1812; ¶¶ [0170-0173]).
As per claims 8-10, St. Aubin et al. further disclose a method wherein:
obtaining the observation data based on the image data and the equivalence data comprises: applying the obtained mass equivalence data to the reference material, to the image data (Fig. 3, mass thickness lookup table 314, effective atomic number processing 316-318; Fig. 12, steps 366-380; Fig. 16; ¶¶[0140-0141; 0158-0163]);
determining, pixel by pixel of the inspection image of the cargo, based on the obtained mass equivalence data and the image data, at least one of: a mass equivalence MEQHE of the inspection image of the cargo to the reference material, at a higher level of radiation energy HE of the at least two levels of radiation energy, and/or a mass equivalence MEQLE of the inspection image of the cargo to the reference material, at a lower level of radiation energy LE of the at least two levels of radiation energy (Fig. 3, elements 314-318; Fig. 16; ¶¶[0158-0163]).
As per claims 11-13, St. Aubin et al. further disclose a method wherein: identifying one or more zones of interest where the first object overlaps the second object in the inspection image, and wherein determining the at least one of the first material and the second material, based on the obtained observation data, comprises, for at least one of the identified one or more zones of interest (Fig. 23A-23B; ¶¶[0161-0163]);
subtracting mass equivalence data of at least one of the first material and the second material from the obtained observation data; and determining the other one of the at least one of the first material and the second material, based on the subtracting (Fig. 23A-23B; ¶¶[0161-0163]);
determining mass equivalence data to be subtracted, based on at least one of: prior knowledge; and/or knowledge extracted from a zone where the first object and/or the second object do not overlap (Fig. 23A-23B; ¶¶[0161-0163]).
Conclusion
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/COURTNEY D THOMAS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2884
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