DETAILED ACTION
This office action is responsive to original claims filed on 05/14/2025. Presently, Claims 1 - 6 remain pending.
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 .
Claim Objections
Claim 6 is objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 6, Line 8, “angle of the grating beam” should be changed to “angle of the grating beam output”.
Claim 6, Line 9, “number of diameter vibration elements” should be changed to “number of the plurality of vibration elements”.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 1, Lines 5-6, recites “a straight line passing through a centroid of the vibration elements and extending in the array direction”. For an array with curved surface along the array direction, such as claimed in Claim 6, a straight line does not extend in the curved direction (as Fig. 42 demonstrated), so does not divide all the vibration elements. For present purposes of examination, the recited phrase is interpreted to refer to “a straight line passing through a centroid of the vibration elements and extending in the array direction, as seen from a depth direction”.
Claim 6, Lines 2-3, recites “arranged on a curved surface”. It is unclear which direction the claimed surface curvature is along. Specifically, the surface curvature can be along the array direction, or along the elevation direction, or along both the directions. For present purposes of examination, the recited “curved surface” is interpreted to refer to a surface with curvature along the array direction.
Claim 6, Lines 9-10, recites “between the vibration elements”. The number of vibration elements in an array can be more than 2, so it is unclear which 2 of the vibration elements are referred to by the recited phrase. For present purposes of examination, the recited phrase is interpreted as “between two adjacent vibration elements”.
Claims 2-5 are also rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) because they inherit the indefiniteness of the claim(s) they respectively depend upon.
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 –
(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.
Claims 1 and 4-5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Henneken et al (US 20170319180 A1; hereafter Henneken).
With regard to Claim 1, Henneken discloses an ultrasound probe (Henneken, Para 0051; “The CMUT array 100 may be located on, e.g. wrapped around, the tip (or in the vicinity thereof) of a catheter or ultrasound probe 100’ …”) comprising:
a vibration element array (CMUT array 100, or more specifically an operational row of transducer elements (high) in Para 0044; “… one operational row in FIG. 4 comprises cells 621, 622, 623, 624, … 62N of two adjacent staggered rows, i.e. the Mth operational row comprises the Mth CMUT cell 50 of each column 58 of CMUT cells 50, with M being a positive integer …”) including a plurality of vibration elements arranged in an array direction (Henneken, Fig. 4 (cited below) show an example of disclosed “operational row”, which is highlighted by a black contour. The operational row comprises 6 pairs of cells, which are arranged in the horizontal direction, and each of the pairs, e.g. cells 621 and 622 in Fig. 4, can be interpreted as the claimed “vibration element”),
wherein, in a case where the vibration elements are virtually divided into a first virtual portion and a second virtual portion (as an example, cells 621 and 622 in Fig. 4) by a straight line passing through a centroid of the vibration elements and extending in the array direction (a virtual straight horizontal line through the center of a stagger row), each of the vibration elements has a shape in which a first virtual centroid that is a centroid of the first virtual portion (a centroid of cell 621) and a second virtual centroid that is a centroid of the second virtual portion (a centroid of cell 622) are located at different positions in the array direction (Henneken, Para 0044; “this decreased spacing 57”. Two cells 621 and 622 or 62N-1 and 62N are located at different positions, with distance of “spacing 57”, in the horizontal direction), and
due to the shape, a grating beam output from the first virtual portion and a grating beam output from the second virtual portion are canceled out from each other due to a phase shift, so that an intensity of the grating beam output from each of the vibration elements is reduced (Henneken, Para 0008; “This therefore facilitates the generation of ultrasound images with improved image quality and reduced image artefacts such as grating lobes due to the reduced pitch between CMUT cells.” Para 0044; “the staggered configuration of the operational row still is capable of providing acoustic signals for highly resolved images with lower clutter due to the reduced grating lobes in the antenna pattern.”).
Fig. 4 of Henneken
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544
513
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Greyscale
With regard to Claim 4, Henneken discloses the ultrasound probe according to Claim 1, and further discloses wherein an intervirtual centroid distance, which is a distance between the first virtual centroid and the second virtual centroid in the array direction (Henneken, Para 0044; “this decreased spacing 57”), is less than a vibration element pitch in the vibration element array (According to Fig. 5 of Application, the claimed “pitch” is the distance of two adjacent elements along the array direction. For Henneken, such “pitch” equals the distance of the center of cell 62N and of cell 62N-2, or 2 times of the spacing 57 (see Fig. 4 of Henneken cited above). Therefore, the disclosed “decreased spacing 57” is less than the pitch for Henneken).
With regard to Claim 5, Henneken discloses the ultrasound probe according to Claim 4, and further discloses wherein, in a case where the plurality of vibration elements are arranged on a plane, the intervirtual centroid distance is half of the vibration element pitch (Henneken, Fig. 4 (cited above) shows that the spacing 57 is half of the pitch, which equals distance of the center of cell 62N and of cell 62N-2).
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 2-3 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Henneken, in view of Zhao et al (US 20170136495 A1; hereafter Zhao).
With regard to Claim 2, Henneken discloses the ultrasound probe according to Claim 1, and further discloses wherein, in a plan view as seen from a depth direction, at least one side of the vibration element is curved (Henneken, Fig. 4 shows that each element comprises 2 cells with round shape, so at least one side of the element is curved). Henneken does not clearly and explicitly disclose wherein, in a plan view as seen from a depth direction, the shape of the vibration element is a polygon with 5 or more sides.
Zhao in the same field of endeavor discloses wherein, in a plan view as seen from a depth direction, the shape of the vibration element is a polygon with 5 or more sides (Zhao, Para 0047, “rather than having square or otherwise rectangular shaped CMUT cells when viewed in plan, as shown in FIG. 6, the CMUT cells 602-614 may have membranes (cavities) of various other shapes or any combination of shapes such as hexagonal, circular, triangular, trapezoidal, and so forth …”). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Henneken, as suggested by Zhao, in order to use transducer element with shape of polygon. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make the modification for the benefit of simplifying manufacturing process and creating transducer with multiple desired shapes by combing multiple polygonal elements.
With regard to Claim 3, Henneken discloses the ultrasound probe according to Claim 1, but does not clearly and explicitly disclose wherein, in a plan view as seen from a depth direction, a shape of the first virtual portion and a shape of the second virtual portion are in a point-asymmetric relationship with the centroid of the vibration element as a center.
Zhao in the same field of endeavor discloses wherein, in a plan view as seen from a depth direction, a shape of the first virtual portion and a shape of the second virtual portion are in a point-asymmetric relationship with the centroid of the vibration element as a center (Zhao, Para 0047; “rather than having square or otherwise rectangular shaped CMUT cells when viewed in plan, as shown in FIG. 6, the CMUT cells 602-614 may have membranes (cavities) of various other shapes or any combination of shapes such as hexagonal, circular, triangular, trapezoidal, and so forth.” For the disclosed “triangular” or “trapezoidal” shapes, two portions are in a point-asymmetric relationship with the centroid of the element). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Henneken, as suggested by Zhao, in order to use cells with point-asymmetric shape. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make the modification for the benefit of improved image quality by creating desired ultrasound beam patterns (Zhao, Para 0069; “… the trapezoidal shape of the sub-elements 1306 and 1308 causes the active area of the sub-elements 1306 and 1308 to decrease towards the edges 228 and 230, and therefore creates a linear apodization profile. An apodization profile is a window function that weighs more in the center and less toward both edges. In ultrasound imaging, apodization may be utilized to shape ultrasound beam patterns and reduce side lobe levels for obtaining better image quality.”).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 6 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The prior art does not disclose nor reasonably suggest the limitations set forth in the claim. Specifically the prior art does not disclose an ultrasound probe comprising:
a vibration element array including a plurality of vibration elements arranged in an array direction,
wherein, in a case where the vibration elements are virtually divided into a first virtual portion and a second virtual portion by a straight line passing through a centroid of the vibration elements and extending in the array direction, each of the vibration elements has a shape in which a first virtual centroid that is a centroid of the first virtual portion and a second virtual centroid that is a centroid of the second virtual portion are located at different positions in the array direction,
wherein an intervirtual centroid distance, which is a distance between the first virtual centroid and the second virtual centroid in the array direction, is less than a vibration element pitch in the vibration element array, and
wherein, in a case where the plurality of vibration elements are arranged on a curved surface, the intervirtual centroid distance is half of a virtual pitch P’ between the vibration elements, and the virtual pitch P’ is represented by
P
'
=
P
s
i
n
θ
g
/
s
i
n
(
θ
g
-
β
)
β
=
(
N
/
4
)
*
α
here, P is the vibration element pitch, θg is a beam angle of the grating beam, N is the number of diameter vibration elements, and α is an angular pitch between the vibration elements.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure. Raju et al (US 20120184854 A1) discloses ultrasonic sensor with array of transducer elements of triangular and trapezoidal shapes. Prins et al (US 20130245450 A1) discloses ultrasonic transducer arrays with elements arranged in skewed, hexagonal and annular grids.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to LEI ZHANG whose telephone number is (571)272-7172. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 8am-5pm E.T..
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Pascal Bui-Pho can be reached at (571) 272-2714. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/L.Z./Examiner, Art Unit 3798
/PASCAL M BUI PHO/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3798
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