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 .
Election/Restrictions
Applicant's election with traverse of the Restriction Requirement in the reply filed on 9 May 2026 is acknowledged. The traversal is on the ground(s) that the apparatus claims require the same process steps as the process claims. This is not found persuasive because examination of apparatus claims is based on the claimed structure of the apparatus, not the intended use of the apparatus, which is different than the stepwise consideration of the process features of a process claim.
The requirement is still deemed proper and is therefore made FINAL.
Claims 11-18 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b), as being drawn to a nonelected invention, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Applicant timely traversed the restriction (election) requirement in the reply filed on 8 May 2026.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
Claim(s) 1, and 3-10 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Krolikowski et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication 2019/0125503). Regarding Claim 1, Krolikowski et al., hereafter “Krolikowski,” shows that it is known to carry out a method of producing a dental restoration by jet-printing, comprising jet-printing a layer of the dental restoration using a plurality of opaque ceramic slurries having different colors from each other; and jet-printing another layer of the dental restoration using a translucent ceramic slurry (0014, 0016). Krolikowski does not specifically describe that the core is opaque and the enamel is translucent. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to choose appropriate materials for the core and enamel layers because Krolikowski discloses that the layers can be chosen as desired (0014, 0016) and changes in configuration are held to be a matter of choice which would have been found obvious (MPEP 2144.04 (IV)(B)).
Regarding Claim 3, Krolikowski shows the method of claim 1 above, including one wherein the dentin core of the dental restoration is additionally jet-printed using a colored translucent slurry (0014, 0016).
Regarding Claim 4, Krolikowski shows the method of claim 1 above, including one wherein the different colors of the slurries for the dentin core form a color scheme with a limited color space (0015-0016).
Regarding Claim 5, Krolikowski shows the method of claim 1 above, including one wherein an area of the dental restoration having an intermediate color value and/or intermediate translucency value is produced by mixing at least two slurries (0021).
Regarding Claims 6-7, Krolikowski shows the method of claim 5 above, including one wherein the mixing is implemented by generating different two-dimensional dithering pattern for successive layers of the dental restoration (0041).
Regarding Claim 8, Krolikowski shows the method of claim 1 above, including one wherein a print head is assigned to each receiving container for the slurries (0021).
Regarding Claims 9-10, Krolikowski shows the method of claim 1 above, including one wherein the produced dental restoration is subjected to a debinding step prior to a sinter process in a furnace (0014: heat/pressure chamber~furnace).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 2 is 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.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MONICA HUSON whose telephone number is (571)272-1198. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8a-4p.
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MONICA ANNE HUSON
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 1742
/MONICA A HUSON/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1742
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