Ex Parte Andersson et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Mar 9, 2015

11944773 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 9, 2015)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www.uspto.gov
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
11/944,773 11/26/2007 Lennart Andersson 4015-5923 / P24073-US2 6118
24112 7590 03/09/2015
COATS & BENNETT, PLLC
1400 Crescent Green, Suite 300
Cary, NC 27518
EXAMINER
WONG, XAVIER S
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2413
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
03/09/2015 PAPER
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte LENNART ANDERSSON and ANDRES REIAL
____________

Appeal 2012-012537
Application 11/944,773
1

Technology Center 2100
____________

Before STEPHEN C. SIU, DENISE M. POTHIER, and
IRVIN E. BRANCH, Administrative Patent Judges.

SIU, Administrative Patent Judge

DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
This is an appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s Final
Rejection of claims 1, 3–8, 11–13, 15–17, 19–22, and 25. Claims 2, 9, 14,
18, and 23 have been cancelled. See Response to Office Action, dated June
30, 2010. The Examiner objects to claims 10 and 24, which are not subject
to appeal. Final Rej. 17. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
The disclosed invention relates generally to message detection.
Spec. ¶ 2.

1
According to Appellants, the real party in interest is Telefonaktiebolaget
LM Ericsson (App. Br. 2).
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Independent claim 1 reads as follows:

1. A method for detecting a control channel message
in a communication receiver, the method comprising:
decoding messages transmitted over a plurality of shared
control channels;
determining at least one likelihood metric for each of the
decoded messages;
selecting a best candidate from the decoded messages,
based on the likelihood metrics;
generating one or more additional candidate messages in
addition to the decoded messages;
calculating additional likelihood metrics corresponding to
the additional candidate messages; and
comparing the at least one likelihood metric for the best
candidate to the corresponding likelihood metrics for the
decoded messages other than the best candidate and to the
additional likelihood metrics to determine whether the best
candidate is a valid message.

The Examiner relies on the following references:
Loeliger US 2003/0026359 A1 Feb. 6, 2003
Hutchins US 6,526,104 B1 Feb. 25, 2003
Hegde US 2004/0264555 A1 Dec. 30, 2004
Magee US 2005/0169399 A1 Aug. 4, 2005
Tanrikulu US 2005/0286654 A1 Dec. 29, 2005
Kim US 2006/0205357 A1 Sept. 14, 2006
Bernadac US 7,392,459 B2 June 24, 2008
Gutcher US 2008/0247493 A1 Oct. 9, 2008
Garrett US 7,609,777 B2 Oct. 27, 2009
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Appellants appeal the Examiner’s rejections as follows:
1) Claims 1, 4, 5, 15–17, 20, and 25 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Tanrikulu and Garrett. App. Br. 6.
2

2) Claims 3 and 19 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over
Tanrikulu, Garrett, and Bernadac. App. Br. 6.
3) Claim 6 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Tanrikulu,
Garrett, and Gutcher. App. Br. 6.
4) Claim 7 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Tanrikulu,
Garrett, Gutcher, and Loeliger. App. Br. 6.
5) Claims 8 and 22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over
Tanrikulu, Garrett, and Hegde. App. Br. 6.
6) Claims 11 and 13 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over
Tanrikulu, Garrett, and Kim. App. Br. 7.
3

7) Claim 12 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Tanrikulu,
Garrett, Kim, and Magee. App. Br. 7.
8) Claim 21 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Tanrikulu,
Garrett, and Loeliger. App. Br. 7.

2
The Examiner indicates that claims 2, 9, 18, and 23 are rejected. However,
these claims have been cancelled. See Response to Office Action, dated
June 30, 2010. Thus, claims 2, 9, 18, and 23 are not subject to appeal.
3
The Examiner indicates that claim 14 is rejected. However, claim 14 has
been cancelled. See Response to Office Action, dated June 30, 2010. Thus,
claim 14 is not subject to appeal.
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PRINCIPLES OF LAW
The question of obviousness is resolved on the basis of underlying
factual determinations, including (1) the scope and content of the prior art,
(2) any differences between the claimed subject matter and the prior art, and
(3) the level of skill in the art. Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 17–
18 (1966).
“The combination of familiar elements according to known methods
is likely to be obvious when it does no more than yield predictable results.”
KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 416 (2007).
ANALYSIS
Claims 1, 4, 5, 15–17, 20, and 25
Claim 1 recites decoding messages. Appellants argue that Garrett
discloses “symbols” but fails to disclose “messages,” as recited in claim 1.
See, e.g., App. Br. 10–11. Garrett discloses that “[i]t is well known in
communication theory that when a signal . . . is transmitted . . . the resulting
symbol” is received and that a symbol “represents . . . bits of information.”
Garrett 2:58–63. Hence, Garrett discloses that a “symbol” is a transmitted
signal of “bits of information.” Appellants do not explain sufficiently a
difference between the information (or symbol) of Garrett and a “message,”
which one of ordinary skill in the art would have understood to include
“information.” Therefore, we are not persuaded by Appellants’ argument.
In any event, as Appellants acknowledge, Tanrikulu discloses “messages.”
See, e.g., App. Br. 11. Thus, even if Appellants’ contention that Garrett fails
to disclose a “message” is correct, we are not persuaded by Appellants’
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argument that the combination of Tanrikulu and Garrett, as opposed to
Garrett alone, fails to disclose or suggest “messages.”
Appellants also argue that Garrett fails to disclose or suggest
“mak[ing] any decision, i.e., does not ‘detect’ or ‘decode’ the received
symbol, until after all of the candidate symbols have been generated” and
that “Garrett’s ‘additional candidate symbols’ are not ‘in addition to the
decoded messages’” because Garrett “does not disclose first producing
decoded messages at all” and “[w]hen Garett generates ‘additional candidate
symbols,’ there are no decoded messages and there are no decoded
symbols.” App. Br. 12 and 13. Hence, Appellants argue that Garrett fails to
disclose or suggest detecting or decoding received symbols prior to
generating all of the candidate symbols. Claim 1 recites generating one or
more additional candidate messages in addition to the decoded messages.
We are not persuaded by Appellants’ argument at least because Appellants
do not demonstrate sufficiently that claim 1 requires a specific temporal
relationship between decoding symbols and generating all of the candidate
symbols.
Even if claim 1 required decoding messages prior to generating all of
the candidate messages, we are not persuaded by Appellants’ arguments.
Garrett discloses, for example, “a receiver that receives symbols (i.e.,
information) and decodes the receive[d] symbols” in which an “Hx unit can
generate . . . a special portion of all the possible symbol candidates by
multiplying certain individual information patterns . . . to the channel
matrix.” Garrett 4:55–56 and 5:5–8. Subsequently, “at least one LLR unit is
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able to generate the remainder of the possible candidates by performing a
conversion operation on the currently generated symbol candidates.” Id. at
5:27–29. In other words, Garrett discloses generating “additional candidate
messages” (e.g., the remainder of the possible candidates) that are “in
addition to the decoded messages” because one of ordinary skill in the art
would have understood that generation of possible candidates that are “the
remainder” of possible candidates would be those possible candidates that
are not the possible candidates already in existence. Such possible
candidates (i.e., “the remainder”) that are distinct from the possible
candidates already in existence would be “in addition” to those possible
candidates already in existence.
In addition, we note that Tanrikulu confirms that one of ordinary skill
in the art would have understood the practice of generating one or more
additional candidate messages in addition to the decoded messages, as
recited in claim 1. For example, Tanrikulu discloses that, in addition to a
“detecting step” in which a “greatest global confidence information [and]
second greatest global confidence information” are obtained, a “validating
phase” is performed that “comprises re-encoding and re-masking the
decoded data of the . . . detected channel.” Tanrikulu ¶¶ 8 and 9. In other
words, Tanrikulu also discloses decoding messages and generating one or
more additional candidate messages (e.g., re-encoding and re-masking the
decoded data”) in addition to the decoded messages (i.e., the re-encoded and
re-masked data being distinct from – and “in addition to” – the previously
decoded data).
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Appellants argue that it would not have been obvious to one of
ordinary skill in the art to have combined the teachings of Tanrikulu and
Garrett because, according to Appellants, “Garrett and Tanrikulu are
fundamentally incompatible . . . because they address completely different
problems” and because there is no showing “that Garrett’s techniques for
generating an exhaustive set of symbols . . . can be applied to generating
additional candidate messages [of Tanrikulu].” App. Br. 13 and 15. In other
words, Appellants argue that there is no showing that the Garrett reference
may be incorporated into the Tanrikulu reference. We are not persuaded by
Appellants’ argument at least because “[t]he test for obviousness is not
whether the features of a secondary reference may be bodily incorporated
into the structure of the primary reference . . . . Rather, the test is what the
combined teachings of those references would have suggested to those of
ordinary skill in the art.” In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981).
In any event, as previously discussed, both Tanrikulu and Garrett
disclose similar systems of decoding data on multiple channels and
determining the “best candidate.” See, e.g., Tanrikulu ¶¶ 41, 43, and 45;
Garrett, 3:11–13, 4:55–56, 5:22–23, and 27–29. Appellants do not provide
a sufficient showing that the similar systems of Tanrikulu and Garrett
somehow would be incompatible. For example, based on the cited
references, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to
have combined the known function of receiving multiple channels of data,
determining a best candidate (e.g., by calculating global confidence
information) from candidate messages, and generating additional candidate
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messages, such as re-encoding and re-masking decoded data in a validating
phase (the system of Tanrikulu), with the known function of receiving
multiple channels of data (e.g., symbols or “information”), determining a
best candidate (e.g., based on a cost function analysis) and generating
additional candidates, such as the “remainder” of the possible candidates
(the system of Garrett) to achieve the predictable result of a system of
Tanrikulu and/or Garrett that receives information on multiple channels,
determines a best candidate, and generates additional messages or symbols
(e.g., “information”). “The combination of familiar elements according to
known methods is likely to be obvious when it does no more than yield
predictable results.” KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 416
(2007).
Claim 5 recites selecting one or more frequently used messages for
use as additional candidate messages. Appellants argue that Tanrikulu
discloses “four messages [that] are decoded . . . and the best one is chosen”
but fails to disclose or suggest that “the remaining ones of the four messages
are . . . the ‘additional candidate messages’ of the claims.” App. Br. 16–17.
We are not persuaded by Appellants’ arguments for at least the reasons set
forth by the Examiner. See, e.g., Ans. 7. For example, Tanrikulu discloses
“decod[ing] data received on . . . control channels” and, when “decoding is
done, . . . a global confidence information is calculated.” Tanrikulu ¶¶ 38
and 43. Subsequently, “additional candidate messages” are generated (e.g.,
the “two best channels detected” are selected and are “convolutionally re-
encoded . . . punctured and scrambled with the UE mask” – Tanrikulu ¶¶ 46
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and 54). Appellants do not explain persuasively a difference between the
additional candidate message of Tanrikulu and the additional candidate
messages as recited in claim 5, for example.
Appellants also argue that Tanrikulu fails to disclose that the “second
best channel” is “the other most frequently used channel.” App. Br. 16–17.
Claim 5 recites selecting one or more frequently used messages for use as
additional candidate messages. Appellants do not demonstrate sufficiently
that claim 5 also recites “the other most frequently used channel.” Rather,
claim 5 merely recites selecting a frequently used message. As the
Examiner explains Tanrikulu discloses selecting messages (e.g., “a selection
of the two calculated greatest sums of LLRs” – Tanrikulu ¶ 45). Appellants
do not demonstrate or assert that the use of the selected message in
Tanrikulu is not “frequent.” Indeed, the selected message of Tanrikulu is, in
fact, used thus demonstrating the frequency of use of the message.
Claim 15 recites selectively decoding a traffic channel using decoding
parameters determined from the best candidate or blind decoding one or
more traffic channels based on whether the best candidate is a valid
message. Claim 25 recites a similar feature. Appellants argue that
Tanrikulu fails to disclose or suggest “two different techniques that are
selectively applied, based on whether the best candidate is a valid message.”
App. Br. 17. Appellants provide the same arguments in support of claims 16
and 25.
The Examiner finds that Tanrikulu discloses this feature. Ans. 8
(citing Tanrikulu, ¶¶ 12 and 41). As the Examiner indicates, Tanrikulu
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discloses different decoding methods such as “searching the most likely
sequence of symbols . . . and look[ing] for [the] mostly likely sequence” or
an alternate “blind detection” in which “the maximum-cumulated state
metric . . . is used as reliability of the decoded result.” Tanrikulu ¶ 12; see
also Tanrikulu ¶ 41. Appellants do not explain sufficiently a difference
between Tanrikulu and decoding a traffic channel using decoding parameters
determined from the best candidate or blind decoding one or more traffic
channels based on whether the best candidate is a valid message. The
Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 15 and 25 and dependent claim 16
not separately argued from claim 15.
Claims 4, 17, and 20 were not separately argued. Claim 17 recites
similar subject to that disputed above in connection with claim 1. We are
not persuaded that the Examiner erred in rejecting these claims for the above
reasons.

Claims 3 and 19
Claim 3 recites randomly selecting the one or more additional
candidate messages from a set of possible messages. Appellants argue that
Bernadac discloses “a tie-breaking procedure for selecting a most likely
decoding result” but fails to disclose or suggest “randomly selecting one or
more additional messages.” App. Br. 18. Appellants provide the same
arguments in support of claim 19. The Examiner finds that Bernadac
discloses random selection of messages. Ans. 9 (citing Bernadac 6:46–49
and 53–54, abstract). We note that Bernadac discloses “randomly picking a
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sequence from among all the multiple sequences,” as the Examiner
indicates. Bernadac 6:46–47. Appellants do not explain sufficiently a
difference between Bernadac’s explicit disclosure of randomly selecting a
sequence and randomly selecting a message, as recited in claims 3 and 19.
The Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 3 and 19.

Claim 6
Claim 6 recites determining one or more next-most-likely decoding
results corresponding to one or more of the decoded messages. Appellants
argue that Gutcher discloses only “intermediate state transitions in a Viterbi
decoder” but fails to disclose or suggest decoding results. App. Br. 18–19.
The Examiner finds that Gutcher discloses this feature. Ans. 9 (citing
Gutcher ¶ 33). We agree with the Examiner. Gutcher discloses, for
example, a “decoder” that “finds the minimum value to compute the next
state metric of the most likely next state and of the next most likely next
state.” One of ordinary skill in the art would have understood that results
from a “decoder” (as taught by Gutcher by computation) would be a
“decoding result.” Appellants do not demonstrate persuasively that the
result from the “decoder” of Gutcher would somehow differ from a
“decoding” result. The Examiner did not err in rejecting claim 6.

Claims 7 and 21
Claim 7 recites perturbing an information bit sequence corresponding
to one of the decoded messages to recover potential lost paths in a reduced-
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trellis Viterbi decoder. Appellants argue that Loeliger fails to disclose or
suggest this feature because “it is far from common knowledge that
Loeliger’s specific techniques could be applied to a reduced-trellis
algorithm.” App. Br. 19–20. Appellants provide similar arguments in
support of claim 21. App. Br. 22. We disagree with Appellants for at least
the reasons set forth by the Examiner. Ans. 10. For example, the Examiner
finds that Loeliger discloses a “Viterbi-decodable, concatenated encoding
mechanism” with “functionality of trellis-coded encoding/decoding
mechanisms that have been and are currently employed . . . .” Ans. 10
(citing Loeliger ¶35). Hence, contrary to Appellants’ assertion, Loeliger
discloses techniques that are applied to “trellis-coded encoding/decoding
mechanisms.” Appellants do not point out sufficient differences between
Loeliger, for example, and the features recited in claim 7. The Examiner did
not err in rejecting claim 7 or claim 21.

Claims 8 and 22
Claim 8 recites eliminating decoded messages or additional candidate
messages having impossible information bit sequences. Appellants argue
that Hegde fails to disclose or suggest eliminating decoded messages or
additional candidate message having impossible information bit sequences
but instead discloses “possible paths.” App. Br. 20. Appellants provide the
same arguments in support of claim 22. We disagree with Appellants for at
least the reasons set forth by the Examiner. Ans. 11 and 19 (citing Hegde
¶ 72, Abstract). The Examiner did not err in rejecting claim 8 or 22.
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Claims 11 and 13
Claim 11 recites comparing the correlation value for the best
candidate to an average of the correlation values for the messages other than
the best candidate. Appellants argue that Kim fails to disclose or suggest
“the comparison of one value to an average of other comparable values.”
App. Br. 21. Appellants provide the same arguments in support of claims 12
and 13. App. Br. 21. We disagree with Appellants for at least the reasons
set forth by the Examiner. For example, the Examiner finds that Kim
discloses a “correlation value” and “average of the correlation values” while
Tanrikulu and Garrett disclose “comparison” with a “best candidate.” Ans.
19–20 (citing Kim ¶ 69 and 73). Also, although Appellants argue that Kim
fails to disclose the disputed claim limitation of claim 11, Appellants do not
explain persuasively how the combination of Tanrikulu, Garrett, and Kim,
for example, also fails to disclose or suggest claim 11. Appellants do not
provide additional arguments in support of claim 13, which depends from
claim 11. The Examiner did not err in rejecting claim 11 or claim 13.
The Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 1, 4, 5, 15–17, 20, and 25
as unpatentable over Tanrikulu and Garrett; claims 3 and 19 as unpatentable
over Tanrikulu, Garrett, and Bernadac; claim 6 as unpatentable over
Tanrikulu, Garrett, and Gutcher; claim 7 as unpatentable over Tanrikulu,
Garrett, Gutcher, and Loeliger; claims 8 and 22 as unpatentable over
Tanrikulu, Garrett, and Hegde; claims 11 and 13 as unpatentable over
Tanrikulu, Garrett, and Kim; claim 12 as unpatentable over Tanrikulu,
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Garrett, Kim, and Magee; and claim 21 as unpatentable over Tanrikulu,
Garrett, and Loeliger.

DECISION
We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1, 3–8, 11–13, 15–17,
19–22, and 25.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED
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