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 .
Notice to Applicant
Claims 1-21 have been examined in this application. This communication is the first action on the merits of these claims.
Claim Objections
Claim 2 is objected to because of the following informalities: “fixed to head” in line 2 should be amended to “fixed to the head”. Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claims 1-15 and 18-21 are rejected under 35 USC 103 as being obvious in view of “Cellular Resolution Functional Imaging in Behaving Rats Using Voluntary Head Restraint by Scott in view of “A miniature kinematic coupling device for mouse head fixation” by Kim.
Regarding claim 1, Scott discloses a coupling apparatus for passively positioning a portion of an animal relative to an experimental apparatus, the coupling apparatus comprising:
An animal plate fixed to the animal portion (see headplate in the Figures), the animal plate including a plurality of first elements (Primary and secondary constraints in Figure 1B); and
A mounting stage fixed relative to the experimental apparatus, the mounting stage comprising a wall structure (see headport in Figure 1C) defining an animal opening large enough to accommodate the animal portion (Figures 1C and 1D show a U-shaped opening between the pistons that define an animal opening, and Figures 2D-F show the opening being large enough to accommodate the head of the animal) and a plate opening sized to accommodate the animal plate (slot for headplate in Figure 1C and G), the wall structure including a plurality of second elements (bearing balls);
Wherein, when the animal portion travels through the animal opening, the animal plate is passively guided through the plate opening until each first element is coupled with a respective second element such that the animal plate and the mounting stage are mechanically coupled together to form a kinematic mount (the “Kinematic Clamp and Microscope Design” section discloses “When the headplate was in this location, actuation of the kinematic clamp would drive the piston-mounted ball bearings toward the conical depression and the V groove. Interaction between the piston-mounted ball bearings and the conical depression and the V groove constrained 5 of 6 of the degrees of freedom of the headplate. The sixth degree, pitch, was constrained by interaction between the top plane of the headplate and the flat surface of the ceiling of the headplate slot”).
Scott does not disclose the first and second elements being passively coupled. However, this limitation is taught by Kim. Kim discloses a head fixation apparatus for mice, and section 2.6 discloses “allowing the magnetic force and kinematic features to guide its placement”, which comprises a passive coupling between the head plate and the vee grooves, as shown in Figure 1B. It would be obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to modify Scott using the teachings from Kim in order to reduce the number of moving parts and the potential for damage or malfunction from the parts.
Regarding claim 2 (dependent on claim 1), Scott discloses the animal portion is the head of the animal and the animal plate is fixed to the head. The “Development of an Operant Conditioning Procedure for Voluntary Head Restraint” section discloses “Rats were surgically implanted with kinematic headplates”.
Regarding claim 3 (dependent on claim 1), Kim further teaches each first element of the animal plate is a portion of a sphere. Figures 1B, 2A, and 2D show the connection element being a half sphere.
Regarding claims 4 (dependent on claim 1), 6 (dependent on claim 4), 7 (dependent on claim 6), Scott discloses each first element is made of a metal or metal alloy, wherein each first element is made of a non-magnetic metal or metal alloy, wherein each first element is made of a stainless steel or titanium. The “Design of an Implantable, Miniature Kinematic Registration System” section discloses the headplate being made of titanium.
Regarding claim 5 (dependent on claim 4), Scott discloses each second element is made of a metal or metal alloy. The “Design of an Implantable, Miniature Kinematic Registration System” section discloses the ball bearings being stainless steel ball bearings.
Regarding claim 8 (dependent on claim 1), Kim further teaches the animal plate includes three first elements and the wall structure includes three second elements (see Figure 1B and 1D), the animal plate having a triangular shape and each of the first elements being fixed at a respective corner of the plate (see Figures 2A and 2D).
Regarding claim 9 (dependent on claim 1), Kim does not disclose each second element is a pair of parallel-aligned and spaced cylinders. However, it would have been an obvious matter of design choice to make the different portions of the vee grooves of whatever form or shape was desired or expedient such as with a pair of parallel-aligned and spaced cylinders that form a groove in between. A change in form or shape is generally recognized as being within the level of ordinary skill in the art, absent any showing of unexpected results. In re Dailey et al., 149 USPQ 47.
Regarding claim 10 (dependent on claim 9), Kim further teaches each first element is a portion of a sphere (Figures 1B, 2A, and 2D show the connection element being a half sphere).
Kim as modified above discloses there being one point of contact between the sphere portion and the first cylinder of the respective pair of cylinders and there is one point of contact between the sphere portion and a second cylinder of the respective pair of cylinders when the sphere portion is passively coupled with the respective pair of cylinders. Modifying the grooves of Kim to be made of a para of parallel-aligned and spaced cylinders as discussed above would provide a tangential point of contact between each cylinder and the sphere portions of Kim.
Regarding claim 11 (dependent on claim 10), Kim further teaches the animal plate includes three first elements and the wall structure includes three second elements (see Figure 1B and 1D).
Regarding claim 12 (dependent on claim 10)¸ Kim does not disclose the cylinder of a first pair of cylinders have axes that are parallel with a mounting direction and the cylinders of second and third pairs of cylinders have axes that are perpendicular with the mounting direction and perpendicular with the axes of the first pair of cylinders. However, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made to position the grooves in different locations and orientations as desired, as long as they still provide a three groove connection as taught by Figure 1A, since it has been held that rearranging parts of an invention involves only routine skill in the art. In re Japikse, 86 USPQ 70.
Regarding claim 13 (dependent on claim 1), Kim further teaches the animal plate and the mounting stage are mechanically and passively coupled together to form the kinematic mount without the use of an external force to couple them together. Section 2.6 discloses “allowing the magnetic force and kinematic features to guide its placement”, the magnetic force and kinematic features form a mechanical and passive coupling without the use of any external force.
Regarding claim 14 (dependent on claim 1), Scott discloses the experimental apparatus is a microscope and the animal plate extends along a plate plane and the plate plane is parallel with an imaging plate of the microscope when the animal plate and the mounting stage are mechanically and passively coupled together to form the kinematic mount. The “Kinematic Clamp and Microscope Design” section discloses “The microscope was positioned so that the vertically oriented objective was centered over the headport clamp”.
Regarding claim 15 (dependent on claim 14), Scott and Kim do not explicitly disclose the position of the animal portion is fixed with a precision in a range of 1-40 micrometers in the imaging plane and with a precision in a range of 1-5 micrometers in a direction perpendicular to the imaging plane. However, the “Comparison with other systems” section of Kim suggest that “Other existing head-fixation systems made by laboratories or by other companies achieve micrometer-scale precision or large…Using a three-groove kinematic system with sufficiently smooth and hard contact surfaces, we observed an order of magnitude improvement in z-axis repeatability compared with previous studies”. It would therefore be obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to modify Scott and Kim to have micrometer-scale precision in order to provide reliable repeatability.
Regarding claims 18 (dependent on claim 1), 19 (dependent on claim 18), Scott discloses a guide system configured to passive constrain the animal plate as it is guided through the plate opening, wherein the guide system comprises a set of angled walls of the wall structure, the angled walls tapering along a mounting direction. Figure 1E shows two angled guide walls that guides the headplate into the opening and tapers in a mounting direction.
Regarding claim 20 (dependent on claim 1), Scott as modified by Kim teaches the animal is free to move along a path that is the opposite to a mounting direction but the animal is constrained to translate in the mounting direction or along the transverse directions to the mounting direction when the animal plate and the mounting stage are mechanically and passively coupled together to form a kinematic mount. Figure 2E of Scott shows that the guide wall would only allow movement along a path that is opposite to the mounting direction (downwards in Figure 1E) and is constrained in the mounting direction or in transverse directions (upwards or sideways in Figure 1E).
Regarding claim 21 (dependent on claim 20)¸ Scott as modified by Kim teaches
the experimental apparatus is a microscope (Scott discloses a two-photon microscope), and the animal plate extends along a plate plane and the plate plane aligns with an imaging plane of the microscope when the animal plate and the mounting stage are mechanically and passively coupled together to form the kinematic mount (The “Kinematic Clamp and Microscope Design” section discloses “The microscope was positioned so that the vertically oriented objective was centered over the headport clamp”); and
the animal is constrained from rotating about an axis that is perpendicular to the imaging plane and is constrained from rotating about an axis that is parallel with the mounting direction when the animal plate and the mounting stage are mechanically and passively coupled together to form the kinematic mount (the “Kinematic Clamp and Microscope Design” section discloses “When the headplate was in this location, actuation of the kinematic clamp would drive the piston-mounted ball bearings toward the conical depression and the V groove. Interaction between the piston-mounted ball bearings and the conical depression and the V groove constrained 5 of 6 of the degrees of freedom of the headplate. The sixth degree, pitch, was constrained by interaction between the top plane of the headplate and the flat surface of the ceiling of the headplate slot”).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 16-17 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.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MICHAEL H WANG whose telephone number is (571)272-6554. The examiner can normally be reached 10-6:30.
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MICHAEL H. WANG
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 3642
/MICHAEL H WANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3642
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