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 .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC §§ 102 & 103
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.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1-7, 9-17, & 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as anticipated or, in the alternative, under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over Clark (US PG Pub 2008/0233288; hereafter ‘288).
Claim 1: ‘288 is directed towards a method comprising:
forming, by a cyclic process, a dopant concentration gradient in a doped hafnium zirconium oxide (HZO) layer on a substrate (abstract and ¶s 32, 87-90, 100, 101, 105, & 114), the cyclic process comprising:
providing a substrate in a reaction chamber (abstract);
pulsing one or more hafnium precursors into the reaction chamber, wherein at least a part of the substrate is contacted with the one or more hafnium precursors (abstract);
pulsing one or more zirconium precursors into the reaction chamber, wherein at least a part of the substrate is contacted with the one or more zirconium precursors (abstract);
pulsing one or more oxygen reactants into the reaction chamber, wherein at least a part of the substrate is contacted with the one or more oxygen reactants (abstract);
pulsing one or more dopant precursors into the reaction chamber, wherein at least a part of the substrate is contacted with the one or more dopant precursors (abstract); and
purging the reaction chamber (¶ 8).
As noted, ‘288 implicitly teaches forming a dopant concentration gradient.
However, if ‘288 does not necessarily anticipate forming a dopant concentration gradient, it does teach that concentrations can be controlled based on desired results.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to form a gradient concentration of the dopant because differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
Claim 2: ‘288 teaches repeating one or more of operations a), b), c), d), or e), in any order, until the doped HZO layer having a first predetermined thickness is deposited on the substrate (abstract and ¶s 32, 87-90, 100, 101, 105, & 114).
Claim 3: Pulsing the one or more dopant precursors into the reaction chamber further comprises depositing a first concentration of dopant elements proximate to to a surface or interface of the doped HZO layer exposing the substrate to an annealing process forming the dopant concentration gradient (‘288 further teaches annealing the doped HZO layers, ¶s 20 & 23).
Claim 4: The process of ‘288 further discloses forming a first HZO sub-layer having a first concentration of dopant elements and a second HZO sub-layer having a second concentration of dopant elements, wherein the first concentration of dopant elements is different from the second concentration of dopant elements (¶ 114).
Claim 5: ‘288 teaches controlling constituent concentrations by tuning the pulse ratios of the different constituents (see ¶ 114).
Claim 6: It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to form a gradient concentration of the dopant because differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
Claim 7: The one or more dopant precursors comprise an element selected from Si, Al, and Ga (abstract & ¶ 65).
Claim 9: ‘288 is directed towards a method (abstract) comprising:
providing a substrate in a reaction chamber (abstract);
forming a nanolaminate structure on the substrate comprising a first HZO sub-layer and a second HZO sub-layer, by a cyclic process (abstract), the cyclic process comprising:
pulsing one or more hafnium precursors into the reaction chamber, wherein at least a part of the substrate is contacted with the one or more hafnium precursors (abstract);
pulsing one or more zirconium precursors into the reaction chamber, wherein at least a part of the substrate is contacted with the one or more zirconium precursors (abstract);
pulsing one or more oxygen reactants into the reaction chamber, wherein at least a part of the substrate is contacted with the one or more oxygen reactants (abstract);
purging the reaction chamber (¶ 8).
wherein the first HZO sub-layer and the second HZO sub-layer comprise different concentrations of Hf and wherein the first HZO sub-layer and the second HZO sub-layer comprise different concentrations of Zr (abstract and ¶s 32, 87-90, 100, 101, 105, & 114).
However, if ‘288 does not necessarily anticipate forming first and second HZO layer with different concentrations of Hf & Zr it does teach that concentrations can be controlled based on desired results.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to form a first and second HZO layer with different concentrations of Hf & Zr because differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
Claim 10: ‘288 teaches repeating one or more of operations a), b), c), or d), in any order, until each of the first and second HZO sub-layers having a first predetermined thickness are deposited on the substrate (abstract and ¶s 32, 87-90, 100, 101, 105, & 114).
Claim 11: Differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
Claim 12: ‘288 further teaches pulsing one or more dopant precursors into the reaction chamber, wherein at least a part of the substrate is contacted with the one or more dopant precursors (abstract).
Claim 13: ‘288 further teaches forming, by a cyclic process, a dopant concentration gradient in a doped hafnium zirconium oxide (HZO) layer on a substrate (abstract and ¶s 32, 87-90, 100, 101, 105, & 114).
‘288 teaches controlling constituent concentrations by tuning the pulse ratios of the different constituents (see ¶ 114).
However, if ‘288 does not necessarily anticipate forming a dopant concentration gradient, it does teach that concentrations can be controlled based on desired results.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to form a gradient concentration of the dopant because differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
Claim 14: The one or more dopant precursors comprise an element selected from Si, Al, and Ga (abstract & ¶ 65).
Claims 15-17: Differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
Claim 20: ‘288 further teaches forming one or more additional HZO sub-layers each having a different concentration of dopant elements from at least one other HZO sub-layers (see ¶s 127-128).
Claims 8, 18, & 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over ‘288 as applied above, and further in view of Chen et al. (US PG Pub 2020/0035807; hereafter ‘807).
Claims 8, 18, & 19: ‘288 does not teach forming the HZO layers between ZrO2 and a TiO2 layers as claimed.
However, ‘288 teaches that the HZO layers are suitable as high-dielectric constant materials for semiconductor devices (¶ 2).
And, ‘807, which is directed towards a semiconductor device (title) teaches forming a multilayer stack of high dielectric multilayer stack (118, Fig. 19 and ¶ 106) which can be any combination of ZrO2, HZO, and TiO2 in any order (¶ 108).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to form a multilayer stack comprising a first layer of ZrO2, followed by the HZO stack of ‘288, and capped with a layer of TiO2 because a prior art’s disclosure of possible combinations renders all combinations obvious (See Merck & Co. v. Biocraft Laboratories Inc., 874 F.2d 804, 807 (Fed. Cir. 1989) (holding that the prior art’s disclosure of over 1200 possible combinations rendered all possible formulations obvious)).
Double Patenting
The nonstatutory double patenting rejection is based on a judicially created doctrine grounded in public policy (a policy reflected in the statute) so as to prevent the unjustified or improper timewise extension of the “right to exclude” granted by a patent and to prevent possible harassment by multiple assignees. A nonstatutory double patenting rejection is appropriate where the conflicting claims are not identical, but at least one examined application claim is not patentably distinct from the reference claim(s) because the examined application claim is either anticipated by, or would have been obvious over, the reference claim(s). See, e.g., In re Berg, 140 F.3d 1428, 46 USPQ2d 1226 (Fed. Cir. 1998); In re Goodman, 11 F.3d 1046, 29 USPQ2d 2010 (Fed. Cir. 1993); In re Longi, 759 F.2d 887, 225 USPQ 645 (Fed. Cir. 1985); In re Van Ornum, 686 F.2d 937, 214 USPQ 761 (CCPA 1982); In re Vogel, 422 F.2d 438, 164 USPQ 619 (CCPA 1970); In re Thorington, 418 F.2d 528, 163 USPQ 644 (CCPA 1969).
A timely filed terminal disclaimer in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(c) or 1.321(d) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on nonstatutory double patenting provided the reference application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with the examined application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement. See MPEP § 717.02 for applications subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA as explained in MPEP § 2159. See MPEP § 2146 et seq. for applications not subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . A terminal disclaimer must be signed in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(b).
The filing of a terminal disclaimer by itself is not a complete reply to a nonstatutory double patenting (NSDP) rejection. A complete reply requires that the terminal disclaimer be accompanied by a reply requesting reconsideration of the prior Office action. Even where the NSDP rejection is provisional the reply must be complete. See MPEP § 804, subsection I.B.1. For a reply to a non-final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.111(a). For a reply to final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.113(c). A request for reconsideration while not provided for in 37 CFR 1.113(c) may be filed after final for consideration. See MPEP §§ 706.07(e) and 714.13.
The USPTO Internet website contains terminal disclaimer forms which may be used. Please visit www.uspto.gov/patent/patents-forms. The actual filing date of the application in which the form is filed determines what form (e.g., PTO/SB/25, PTO/SB/26, PTO/AIA /25, or PTO/AIA /26) should be used. A web-based eTerminal Disclaimer may be filled out completely online using web-screens. An eTerminal Disclaimer that meets all requirements is auto-processed and approved immediately upon submission. For more information about eTerminal Disclaimers, refer to www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/applying-online/eterminal-disclaimer.
Claims 1-7, 9-17, & 20 are provisionally rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1-3, 8-18, & 21 of copending Application No. 18/319,933 (reference application). Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because they are combinations and permutations of the copending claims.
Claims 1 & 9: See claim 1.
Though the copending does not explicitly teach forming a gradient it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to form a gradient because differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
Claims 2-7, 10-17, & 20: See claims 1-3, 8-18, & 21.
Additionally, differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
This is a provisional nonstatutory double patenting rejection because the patentably indistinct claims have not in fact been patented.
Claims 8, 18, & 19 are provisionally rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claim 1-3, 8-18, & 21 of copending Application No. 18/319,933 in view of ‘807.
Claims 8, 18, & 19: ‘807, which is directed towards a semiconductor device (title) teaches forming a multilayer stack of high dielectric multilayer stack (118, Fig. 19 and ¶ 106) which can be any combination of ZrO2, HZO, and TiO2 in any order (¶ 108).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to form a multilayer stack comprising a first layer of ZrO2, followed by the HZO stack of ‘288, and capped with a layer of TiO2 because a prior art’s disclosure of possible combinations renders all combinations obvious (See Merck & Co. v. Biocraft Laboratories Inc., 874 F.2d 804, 807 (Fed. Cir. 1989) (holding that the prior art’s disclosure of over 1200 possible combinations rendered all possible formulations obvious)).
This is a provisional nonstatutory double patenting rejection.
Claims 1-20 are provisionally rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1-29 of copending Application No. 18/898,409 (reference application). Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because they are combinations and permutations of the copending claims.
Claims 1 & 9: See claim 1.
Though the copending does not explicitly teach forming a gradient it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to form a gradient because differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
Claims 2-8 & 10-20: See claims 1-29.
Additionally, differences in concentration or temperature will not support the patentability of subject matter encompassed by the prior art unless there is evidence indicating such concentration or temperature is critical. "[W]here the general conditions of a claim are disclosed in the prior art, it is not inventive to discover the optimum or workable ranges by routine experimentation." In re Aller, 220 F.2d 454, 456, 105 USPQ 233, 235 (CCPA 1955). MPEP 2144.05(II)(A).
This is a provisional nonstatutory double patenting rejection because the patentably indistinct claims have not in fact been patented.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JAMES M MELLOTT whose telephone number is (571)270-3593. The examiner can normally be reached 8:30AM-4:30PM CST.
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/James M Mellott/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1759
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