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 .
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 7 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.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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 –
Claims 1-6, 8 and 9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Nakajima et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2021/0231703 A1).
With respect to claim 7, the prior art fails to teach in combination with the rest of the limitations in the claim: “an abnormality determination circuit configured to determine whether the reference voltage is abnormal and output an abnormality determination signal indicating a determination result; and
a failure diagnosis signal output circuit configured to diagnose whether the reference voltage generation circuit.
fails based on the abnormality determination signal, and output a failure diagnosis signal indicating a diagnosis result, wherein
the failure diagnosis signal output circuit diagnoses that the reference voltage generation circuit fails when the abnormality determination signal continues for a predetermined time and the reference voltage is abnormal.”
With respect to claim 1, Nakajima et al. discloses a failure diagnosis circuit that performs failure diagnosis on a reference voltage generation circuit (para 0029, lines 1-9), wherein
the failure diagnosis circuit monitors a reference voltage supplied from the reference voltage generation circuit to a first circuit (see reference voltage generation circuit 40 shown in Fig. 1), and diagnoses that the reference voltage generation circuit fails when a state in which the reference voltage is not within a predetermined range continues for a predetermined time (para 0029, lines 8-12).
With respect to claim 2, Nakajima et al. discloses the failure diagnosis circuit according to claim 1, wherein the first circuit is an analog-digital conversion circuit that converts an analog signal into a digital signal (para 0029, lines 1-5).
With respect to claim 3, Nakajima et al. discloses the failure diagnosis circuit according to claim 1, wherein
the first circuit is a physical quantity signal processing circuit that outputs a drive signal for driving a physical quantity detection element for detecting a physical quantity (see physical quantity detection circuit 2 includes and angular velocity signal processing circuit 10 shown in Fig. 1), and generates a detection signal corresponding to the physical quantity based on an output signal of the physical quantity detection element (para 0029, lines 1-8).
With respect to claim 4, Nakajima et al. discloses the failure diagnosis circuit according to claim 2, wherein the reference voltage temporarily fluctuates in at least one of a timing at which the analog-digital conversion circuit starts sampling of the analog signal and a timing at which the analog-digital conversion circuit ends the sampling (para 0089, lines 1-13).
With respect to claim 5, Nakajima et al. discloses the failure diagnosis circuit according to claim 3, wherein the reference voltage temporarily fluctuates in at least one timing of a rising edge and a falling edge of the drive signal (col. 0091, lines 13-19).
With respect to claim 6, Nakajima et al. discloses the failure diagnosis circuit according to claim 3, wherein the reference voltage temporarily fluctuates in at least one timing of a rising edge and a falling edge of a control signal for controlling the physical quantity signal processing circuit (para 0098, lines 1-10).
With respect to claim 8, Nakajima et al. discloses a vibrator device comprising: the failure diagnosis circuit according to claim 1 (para 0148, lines 1-8).
With respect to claim 9, Nakajima et al. discloses a physical quantity sensor comprising: the failure diagnosis circuit according to claim 1 (para 0148, lines 1-8).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to FARHANA AKHTER HOQUE whose telephone number is (571)270-7543. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday, 7:30am-4:00pm.
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/FARHANA A HOQUE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2858
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