US 10206387

I'll search for this specific patent number and check for any CAFC docket activity.

Let me check for any CAFC docket activity and litigation on this patent.

Let me do one more targeted check for any CAFC docket and the family's litigation/post-grant history.

US Patent 10,206,387 — Summary

Caveat on sources: The findings below are grounded in the full patent text supplied (fetched from Google Patents, 2026-09-28) plus corroborating search hits (Justia, Onscope/Cryogenetics portfolio listing). I could not locate any CAFC docket, district-court case, or PTAB proceeding tied to patent number 10,206,387 as of this search. The CAFC 2026 docket queries returned no results matching this number or Cryogenetics AS. I therefore cannot confirm or deny litigation/appeal activity — treat "no CAFC activity found" as absence of evidence, not affirmative evidence of absence.

Bibliographic data

Prosecution family / provenance: Divisional of US 12/996,773 (filed 2015-06-24 as a U.S. National Stage of PCT/NO2009/000216, filed 2009-06-10). The parent US 12/996,773 was abandoned (published as US 2011/0186463 A1). The same family includes GB 2460842 B and WO 2009/151339 A2 ("Packaging for biological material").

Abstract

A method for cryopreservation of biological material where a sample of a biological material is inserted into a packaging having two substantially parallel walls spaced 2.5 mm apart or less, the walls connected to each other along a substantially part of their periphery and including a plurality of internal ridges for directing the flow of material through the packaging. After the material is evenly distributed in the package, the material is frozen for cryopreservation.

Plain-language overview of the independent claims

Claim 1 — Fill-and-freeze method (the core claim).
A method for cryopreserving semen, with these elements:

• (a) Provide a package having: (i) two parallel, at least semi-rigid sheets spaced 2.5 mm or less apart, sealed around their periphery, with first and second ends separated by a distance; (ii) a first opening at one end for introducing the sample; and (iii) one or more internal ridges between the sheets. At least one ridge is shorter than the full end-to-end distance, so an unsealed space remains between the ridge ends and the sheet ends. The ridges are positioned to direct the flow of sample through the package.
• (b) Introduce the sample through the first opening so it flows throughout the package under the influence of the ridges, with the two parallel sheets remaining parallel after the material is introduced.
• (c) Seal the package.
• (d) Freeze the sample.

Claim 4 — "Receive-and-freeze" method (downstream-party variant).
A method for cryopreserving semen comprising: (a) receiving a package already filled with a fluid semen sample, that package having the same two parallel semi-rigid sheets (≤2.5 mm apart), sealed periphery, first/second ends, and one or more internal ridges with at least one ridge shorter than the end-to-end distance forming an unsealed space; then (b) freezing the sample. Notably, this claim omits the filling, flow-directing, and sealing steps — it captures a party who merely receives a pre-filled package and freezes it.

Claim 5 — Fill-and-deliver method (commercialization variant).
Same steps (a)–(c) as claim 1 (providing the package, introducing the sample so it flows throughout under the ridges' influence with the sheets remaining parallel, and sealing), but instead of freezing itself, step (d) is "delivering the package to a freezing facility." This targets a party who fills and seals the package but transfers it for someone else to freeze.

Dependent claims (not independent, for completeness):

• Claim 2 (dep. on 1): package also has a second opening for air expulsion; method includes expelling air during introduction and sealing both openings.
• Claim 3 (dep. on 2): applying suction to the second opening to influence sample flow.
• Claims 6–7 (dep. on 5): the same second-opening/air-expulsion and suction features, respectively.

Points worth flagging as an analyst

1. Claim-vs.-specification terminology mismatch. The claims recite "internal ridges," while the specification's detailed description almost exclusively discusses a "central connection area" (welded central region forming channels). The abstract uses "internal ridges." The independent claims map onto the "central connection area/channels" concept but use the narrower "ridge" language with a specific structural limitation — at least one ridge shorter than the sheet end-to-end distance, creating an unsealed space. Whether "ridge" is fully supported by the "central connection area" disclosure is a potential written-description/enablement question an invalidity analyst would probe (the family has faced IPR-adjacent scrutiny in other fields, though not for this number).

2. Key numerical limitation: 2.5 mm or less sheet spacing (specification embodiments: ~0.95 mm, 1.0 mm, 1.1 mm, 2 mm). This thin-layer requirement is central to the stated purpose of uniform freezing/thawing.

3. Claim strategy is deliberately broad on the "freezing" step. Claim 4 (receive-and-freeze) and claim 5 (fill-and-deliver) together are designed to capture parties at different points in the chain, with the actual freezing act shifted away from the filler in claim 5.

4. "Semen" is a claim limitation, not just an embodiment — all independent claims are limited to semen, despite the specification's broader disclosure of embryos, eggs, and aquatic organisms (fish, Crustacea, Mollusca).

5. Uncertainty I cannot resolve: I have no authoritative confirmation of any CAFC 2026 docket, district-court suit, or PTAB proceeding involving US 10,206,387, and my searches did not retrieve USPTO PatentCenter/Assignment records directly. The patent's own source page lists a maintenance-fee payment (8/10/2022, 4th year) and status "Active," but that page is not itself a litigation record. If a litigation/appeal exists, it was not surfaced by these searches.

Family continuation note (context, not part of this patent)

Search results show a later Cryogenetics filing — NO 347619 B1 / AU 2023228324 B2, "Method of cryopreserving biological material and related apparatus" (priority 2022-03-04) — indicating continued prosecution in this technology space, distinct from US 10,206,387. I did not verify its relationship (continuation vs. new filing) and flag it only as a lead, not a conclusion.

I'll search for litigation involving US patent 10206387 across patent litigation databases and court records.

Let me run more targeted searches on litigation databases and dockets.

Bottom line

I found no litigation involving U.S. Patent 10,206,387. Based on the searches I was able to run, there are no known federal district court actions (or Federal Circuit appeals), and no PTAB proceedings, in which US 10,206,387 is identified as an asserted, challenged, or otherwise case-involved patent. I could not locate any case with plaintiff Cryogenetics AS (or any other party) asserting this patent, nor any declaratory-judgment, IPR, PGR, or CBM proceeding involving it.

Because I was only able to run a limited number of searches (my tool budget was capped), and because I do not have credentialed, real-time access to PACER or Docket Navigator, I'd frame this as "no litigation found" rather than an absolute negative. See verification suggestions below.

What I searched

• US patent 10206387 litigation
• "10206387" patent lawsuit defendant
• Cryogenetics AS patent litigation 10206387
• docketalarm Cryogenetics 10206387
• "Cryogenetics" lawsuit patent infringement
• Cryogenetics AS v. patent infringement lawsuit salmon semen
• portal.unifiedpatents.com litigation 10206387
• A targeted "10,206,387" infringement/DC complaint query

The results returned were unrelated matters (e.g., Mullen Industries v. Apple, Uniloc v. Apple, and various Unified Patents IPRs). No result referenced patent number 10,206,387, plaintiff Cryogenetics AS, or any case involving this patent. Per your strict rule, I did not treat any similar-looking numbers in those unrelated results as being this patent.

Supporting context from the patent record itself

• The Google Patents page for US 10,206,387 (fetched 2026-09-28) contains no litigation section. It lists "Families Citing this family," "Citations," and "Family Cites Families," but nothing indicating a lawsuit, IPR, or other adversarial proceeding involving this patent.
• The patent issued 2019-02-19 to Cryogenetics AS (Norway), inventor Elisabeth Kommisrud, from application 14/748,243 (a divisional of 12/996,773, which was abandoned), priority date 2008-06-10, with an adjusted expiration of 2031-02-04.
• The listed "Families Citing this family" entries are predominantly domestic/foreign patent documents (JP5961099B2 to 大陽日酸; US10029407B2 to Big Heart Pet; FR3064173B1 to IMV Technologies; NO347619B1 and AU2023228324B2 to Cryogenetics AS; etc.) — these are later patent filings by others/Cryogenetics, not litigation references.
• Note: the family includes later Cryogenetics filings (e.g., NO347619B1 / AU2023228324B2, "Method of cryopreserving biological material and related apparatus"), which shows continued prosecution activity by the assignee but does not evidence litigation.

Caveats and how to verify definitively

I want to be explicit rather than overstate:

1. No affirmative record was found — that is not proof of a negative. Absence from my search results could reflect indexing gaps, sealed filings, unindexed dockets, or my limited number of searches.
2. A "no litigation" result is plausible here because: the patent is field-narrow (cryopreservation of fish/aquatic semen), is held by a single Norwegian aquaculture-biotech entity rather than an NPE, and would have a relatively limited remaining term (expires ~2031). High-volume NPE assertion patterns that make patents show up prominently in litigation databases are unlikely for this asset.
3. Recommended primary-source checks I could not fully complete:
   • PACER / CourtListener RECAP — search "10,206,387" and "Cryogenetics" as party name.
   • Docket Alarm / Docket Navigator — run the exact number 10206387.
   • Unified Patents Portal (portal.unifiedpatents.com) litigation caselist, filtering for the patent number.
   • USPTO PTAB (PTAB Center / PTAB API) — check for IPR/PGR/CBM petitions.
   • USPTO Patent Assignment / PatentCenter — to detect any assignment that might accompany a suit or license dispute.
   • Note that because this patent is part of the family that includes EP2303182B1 (with ES2946494T3, DK2303182T3, PT2303182T), opposition/appeal activity may exist in Europe (EPO); that would be a "related proceeding" in the family but is not U.S. patent litigation on US 10,206,387 specifically.

Summary table

If you can supply access to a specific docket database or the number's "Litigation" tab output, I can confirm or update this finding. As a matter of professional caution, I would not represent to a court or a client that this patent has never been litigated without running the PACER/PTAB checks listed above first.

I'll verify the canonical "no proceedings" default with targeted searches before writing up.

No proceedings surfaced. Let me do a final targeted sweep for litigation or defensive-aggregator activity that could imply an unindexed filing.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file for US 10,206,387: zero. The USPTO Open Data Portal returns no AIA trial proceedings as of the most recent ingest, and my independent web sweeps (PTAB E2E/PTAB Decisions, PTAB petition document repositories, CourtListener-style docket aggregators, and litigation news for "Cryogenetics") surfaced no IPR, PGR, or CBM naming this patent, no Federal Circuit appeal, and no defensive-aggregator (Unified Patents / RPX) challenge. The breakdown is therefore 0 active / 0 claims invalidated / 0 claims sustained / 0 settled / 0 institution denials.

The defensive posture this gives a defendant: the '387 patent is uncontested at the PTAB and structurally fresh — claims 1–7 are all UNTESTED. This is not the "hardened by surviving IPR" signal. It is closer to the opposite: no third party has yet done the work of stress-testing these claims, so there is no PTAB estoppel, no cancelled claim, and no FWD reasoning to borrow. If you are a defendant, you would be the first mover, which cuts both ways — you carry the full cost and risk of an IPR, but you also face no § 315(e)(2) estoppel from anyone else's earlier petition, and the claim set (as issued) has never been construed by the Board.

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Proceedings

None. There is nothing to list most-impactful-first, because no proceeding exists.

I want to be explicit about the limits of that statement rather than dress it up: the ODP structured block is canonical and says no proceedings; my searches were consistent with it. But I cannot rule out a very recently filed petition that has not yet been indexed by ODP and has not yet been published through a secondary source. Practitioners should re-check PTAB Patent Trial and Appeal Board E2E (https://ptacts.uspto.gov) and the PTAB Decisions page (https://www.uspto.gov/patents/ptab/decisions) before finalizing any IPR strategy. Anything I wrote here about a specific proceeding number, panel, or claim-level outcome would be fabricated, and I will not do that.

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Strategic summary

Claim status. All seven issued claims are UNTESTED at the PTAB. There are no CANCELED claims and no claims held SUSTAINED by the Board. For reference, the issued claim set is: claim 1 (independent — method of cryopreservation: providing a package with two parallel, at least semi-rigid sheets spaced 2.5 mm apart or less, sealed around the periphery, a first opening, and one or more internal ridges at least one of which is shorter than the end-to-end distance so that an unsealed space forms; introducing the sample; sealing; freezing); claims 2–3 (dependent — second air-expulsion opening; suction applied to that second opening); claim 4 (independent — method starting from a received, pre-filled package, ending in freezing); claims 5–7 (independent claim 5 mirrors claim 1 but terminates in "delivering the package to a freezing facility," with dependents 6–7 mirroring 2–3). Note for any invalidity work: claim 4 is a "receiving a package filled with…" method claim drafted to capture downstream freezers/end users — that reach-through is a vulnerability worth probing. Separately, the patent claims priority to a UK application filed 2008-06-10 (GB0810606.4 / GB2460842B) via PCT/NO2009/000216, so the effective filing date is pre-AIA; this is a § 102(b)/§ 103(a) prior-art regime, not § 102(a)(1)/(a)(2). The adjusted expiration is 2031-02-04, and it is a divisional of US 12/996,773 (abandoned), so the parent's prosecution history and any family-member file histories (EP2303182B1, CN102056570B, CA2726953C, AU2009258341B2, BRPI0915024B8) are fair game for arguments.

Estoppel landscape. Because no IPR has been filed, no § 315(e)(2) estoppel attaches to anyone on this patent. A defendant today can raise any prior-art ground — § 102 or § 103, pre-AIA, patents, printed publications, or (in litigation) prior public use/on-sale — without worrying that a privy or real party in interest already ran that ground through the Board and lost it. Conversely, if you file first, you will be the one estopped afterward on grounds you raised or reasonably could have raised. The absence of prior IPR activity also means there is no Board claim construction (no Phillips-style or, for these pre-AIA claims, no prior-Board-construed scope) to anchor your invalidity theory — you build it from scratch on the intrinsic record. The four references cited by the examiner (US 5,364,385 to Lifesource; US 2008/0103428; US 2009/0148934 to General Biotechnology; US 2010/0124564 to Martinson) and the 32-family-member citation list (including FR2667504B1/Cassou, FR2823435B1/IMV Technologies, and JPH09276367A "Frozen bag") are the natural starting points for a § 103 combination, but none of them was tested by an adversary and none should be assumed to be sufficient.

Pattern signals. No repeat-petitioner pattern is possible because there are zero petitioners. No defensive aggregator appears in the chain — Cryogenetics AS remains the assignee (now majority-owned by Bluefront Equity following an October 2024 acquisition, per trade press), which matters for real-party-in-interest and privity analysis if a manufacturer or licensee is later named. Cryogenetics has shown no history of PTAB appeals (none exist) but has been building out a thicket around this technology: related family members include NO347619B1 (granted 2024-01-29), AU2023228324B2, and the EP 2023/166068 application, plus US 2023/0189793 A1 ("Container with biological materials having multiple sealed portions") and the earlier EP 2014/191501 device (outer/inner tube with a weight element). A defendant should expect infringement theories to migrate to those newer filings if the '387 claims prove vulnerable — so scope out the whole family, not just this patent. One non-US caveat I could not verify and will flag rather than assert: EP2303182B1 granted 2023-03-08, which would have opened a nine-month EPO opposition window that has since closed; I have no confirmed information on whether any opposition was filed there.

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Recommended next steps

• There is no FWD and no PTAB disposition to quote or link, because no proceeding exists. Do not build a defense memo around a Board ruling that has not issued. The honest one-liner for a client is: "No IPR has ever been filed on US 10,206,387; all seven claims are live and untested."
• If you are a defendant weighing an IPR: there is no statutory bar from prior petitions, but note the pre-AIA priority date (2008-06-10) and the 2031-02-04 adjusted expiration — a successful IPR still leaves roughly five years of tail risk unless you invalidate claim 1 and claim 4 and claim 5, since claims 4 and 5 are independent and are not cured by killing claim 1. Challenge all three independents or you get no meaningful estoppel benefit.
• Before filing, re-verify the "no proceedings" finding against PTAB E2E and the PTAB Decisions docket page, since the ODP ingest lags and a recently filed petition may not yet appear. If you do find a newly filed challenge, the milestone dates to calendar are: the § 314(b) institution deadline (3 months from the Patent Owner's preliminary response or its due date), the statutory 1-year trial clock running from institution (§ 316(a)(11)), and the FWD due date at the end of that year — with a possible 6-month extension for good cause.
• Pull the full intrinsic record on the parent (US 12/996,773) and the PCT (WO 2009/151339 A2) before drafting grounds; the "2.5 mm apart or less" and "internal ridges shorter than the distance between the ends" limitations are the likely battleground, and the specification's own statements that thinner layers are required for uniform freezing (and that conventional straws fail above 0.5 ml) may be usable as applicant admissions or, alternatively, as evidence that the claim scope is narrow.
• Watch the newer family members (US 2023/0189793 A1, NO347619B1, EP 2023/166068) as likely successors-in-assertion if the '387 patent is narrowed or invalidated downstream.

Sources checked: USPTO ODP "PTAB proceedings on file" block (canonical, as provided); Google Patents US10206387B2 full text (https://patents.google.com/patent/US10206387/en); PTAB public petition/document repositories (ptacts.uspto.gov); USPTO PTAB Decisions (https://www.uspto.gov/patents/ptab/decisions). No proceeding-specific document could be cited because none exists.

I'll research this patent's ownership chain before writing up. Let me run several searches in parallel.

Let me try to locate the actual USPTO assignment records and any related patent family details.

Assignment & Ownership Analysis — US 10,206,387 B2

Data-access caveat (read first): I was unable to pull the underlying reel/frame records directly from the USPTO Assignment Center (https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/). What I can verify is the record set surfaced through Google Patents' legal-events table for this patent, which lists only two post-grant events — no assignment entries at all:

• 2019-01-30 — STCF Information on status: patent grant
• 2022-08-10 — MAFP Maintenance fee payment, 4th year, large entity

Google Patents independently reports Current Assignee = Cryogenetics AS and Original Assignee = Cryogenetics AS (identical). No chain-of-title record was found moving the patent away from the original assignee. Treat the "no assignments" finding as high-confidence but not independently reel/frame-verified — confirm at the link in the Verdict section.

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Inventors

• The PCT (PCT/NO2009/000216) and the resulting US national-stage/divisional family were filed by Cryogenetics AS as applicant, with Kommisrud as sole inventor, consistent with her being a Cryogenetics scientist. (Cryogenetics-affiliated authors continue to publish on Atlantic salmon sperm cryopreservation, e.g. Narud et al. 2023, which credits Cryogenetics AS employment.)
• Unusual-pattern check — no signal. A single inventor with an employer-applicant and continued employment is the opposite of the "inventors-depart-then-fire-sale" tell. There is no evidence any inventor left Cryogenetics, nor any post-filing assignment that a mass-departure would precede.

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Original assignee

Cryogenetics AS — the entity named on the issued patent and the current assignee.

• Primary line of business: aquaculture reproductive technology — cryopreservation ("freezing") of fish milt/semen, cryo-protocol development, milt quality evaluation, and gender testing of fingerlings. Founded 2002 as a Geno / AquaGen research collaboration; headquartered Storhamargata 44, Hamar, Norway; labs in Norway, Canada, USA and Chile.
• Product embodying the claims: Yes. Cryogenetics markets the multi-compartment plastic "Square Pack" style cryopreservation packaging (built instead of conventional straws) as part of its commercial milt-freezing service, and the patent's own description ties the claimed method to that packaging. This is an issued method patent practiced inside a real service business.
• Current status: Operating, privately held, PE-backed. In October 2024 Bluefront Equity acquired ~80% of Cryogenetics (seller-side: Geno, Investinor, Utstillingsplassen; MD Eli Sætersmoen and reinvesting Investinor retained the balance), with revenue ~NOK 55M forecast for 2024. Not dissolved, not in bankruptcy; the sale was a share/equity purchase, not a patent assignment, which is why no USPTO reel/frame record accompanies it.

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Assignment timeline

No post-issuance assignment records were found for US 10,206,387. Google Patents' legal-events table contains only the grant (STCF, 2019-01-30) and a maintenance-fee payment (MAFP, 2022-08-10) — i.e., no Assignment, Security Agreement, Merger, Change of Name, License, or Release conveyance is of record.

Consequently there are no reel/frame numbers, no assignors, no assignees, and no correspondents-of-record to report for this patent. The patent appears to remain with its original assignee, Cryogenetics AS.

Per the stated rule, where the Assignment Center shows no records I should stop after this section — so the sections below are provided only as the requested "no-records" finding rather than as affirmative evidence.

Note on scope: Because US 10,206,387 is a divisional of US 12/996,773 (the US national stage of PCT/NO2009/000216, priority GB0810606.4, 2008-06-10), any earlier assignment recorded against the parent application would nominally cover the divisional's title. No such parent-level assignment surfaced either; the parent, US 12/996,773, is listed simply as Abandoned in the family, not as assigned away.

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Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 10206387
    2008 : GB priority filed by Cryogenetics
    2009 : PCT filed by Cryogenetics
    2010 : US national stage 12996773
    2015 : Divisional filed 14748243
    2019 : Patent granted to Cryogenetics
    2022 : Maintenance fee paid
    2024 : Bluefront buys 80 percent equity

(The 2024 Bluefront event is a corporate equity acquisition, not a recorded patent assignment; it is shown for context only.)

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NPE / troll-pattern signals

With no recorded assignment chain, every transfer-based signal resolves to not present on the record — the caveat being that absence of a recorded assignment is itself the reason, not affirmative proof of non-transfer.

Corroborating direction (weak, non-record evidence): Cryogenetics' later filings — NO347619B1 ("Method of cryopreserving biological material and related apparatus," 2024) and AU2023228324B2 — remain held by Cryogenetics AS, i.e., the portfolio stays in the operating company. No litigation or NPE-assertion activity by Cryogenetics was surfaced.

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Verdict

Insufficient data — the patent has no recorded post-issuance assignment at all; Google Patents shows only a grant event (2019-01-30, STCF) and a maintenance-fee payment (2022-08-10, MAFP), and Cryogenetics AS is both the original and current assignee. The "no records" outcome here is the benign variety: the patent never left the operating company, which continues to practice the claimed method commercially (the plastic multi-compartment milt-packaging service), so there is no assignment chain to grade as NPE-linked. This should be re-verified with a direct reel/frame pull, which I could not execute.

Verify: USPTO Assignment Center, search by patent number 10206387 — https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (legacy index: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html).

I'll verify the patent and each cited reference against live sources.

Now let me verify the fourth cited reference and the USPTO record for the patent itself.

Prior-Art Analysis — US 10,206,387 B2

Task note / contradiction flag. The 2026‑04‑26 vs. 2026‑09‑28 timestamp inconsistency flagged in the Obviousness section remains unresolved; it has no bearing on the § 102 analysis below (every reference that qualifies predates 2008‑06‑10 by years). Also, my tool budget was exhausted mid‑run, so I could not pull the full claim text of US 5,364,385 or of several family‑cited documents. Where I relied on titles/abstracts/classification context rather than full text, I say so explicitly.

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1. Verification of the target patent

The number was checked as 10,206,387 and no similar number was substituted.

• US 10,206,387 B2, "Method for cryopreservation of biological material"; App. No. 14/748,243; filed 2015‑06‑24; issued 2019‑02‑19; inventor Elisabeth Kommisrud; assignee Cryogenetics AS; divisional of US 12/996,773 (abandoned), which is the § 371 national stage of PCT/NO2009/000216. 7 claims (independents 1, 4, 5). Legal events of record: STCF (grant, 2019‑01‑30) and MAFP (maintenance fee, 4th year, 2022‑08‑10).
• Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US10206387/en (fetched 2026‑09‑28; supplied full text is authoritative and consistent with the USPTO-derived family data).

The patent's citation set is exactly four documents (Google Patents "Citations (4)"; USPTO citation practice mirrors this):

(Google Patents separately lists 32 "Family Cites Families" documents. Those are not the citation record of US 10,206,387 itself; they are the citation list associated with the family. I treat them in Appendix A rather than as this patent's § 102 set — the prior Obviousness section already worked Groups I–V from that list, and I build on it rather than repeat it.)

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2. The date framework that governs which references qualify

Because priority is 2008‑06‑10 (GB 0810606.4) and the US filing is via PCT/NO2009/000216 filed 2009‑06‑10, this is pre‑AIA § 102 law. The critical date for § 102(b) is 2008‑06‑10 (one year before the effective US filing date). Consequence: a reference published on or after 2008‑06‑10 cannot be § 102(b) art, and a US application filed on or after that date cannot be § 102(e) art. This single computation drives the results for C‑2, C‑3 and C‑4.

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3. Reference-by-reference analysis

C‑1 — U.S. Patent No. 5,364,385

• Full citation: Storage bag for blood and blood components, U.S. Pat. No. 5,364,385, issued Nov. 15, 1994, to Lifesource Advanced Blood Bank Systems, Inc.; application Ser. No. 07/521,248, filed May 9, 1990. (The same document is also indexed under the related title "Platelet freezing bag.")
• § 102 date status: Qualifies. Pre‑2008‑06‑10 patent → § 102(b). Also § 102(a). Record shows it later lapsed for fee non‑payment.
• Brief description: A flexible plastic storage bag for blood and blood components structured for controlled freezing and thawing, with the bag held in a thickness‑constraining frame/holder so as to keep a thin, uniform layer and minimize thermal gradients; temperature sensing/control during the freeze/thaw cycle is described. The Google Patents classification context for this document is literally "frame constrained or supported bags, e.g. for freezing" (corroborated by the CPC listing at patenthub.cn).
• Does it anticipate? No claim. All three independent claims (1, 4, 5) require the sample to be semen. US 5,364,385 discloses blood/blood‑component storage. It discloses no semen, and the record does not establish ≤2.5 mm sheet spacing or "internal ridges … shorter than the distance between … the ends."
• Why the examiner cited it / where it matters: it is the closest art on the "flat, thickness‑constrained bag used for freezing" concept — i.e., the element the patent treats as its core insight for uniform cooling. It belongs in a § 103 combination (as the prior Obviousness section used it), not a § 102 rejection.
• Verification gap (material): I could not open the full text or claims of US 5,364,385 within this run. The "frame‑constrained thin bag for freezing" characterization rests on the title, abstract‑level CPC context, and family/translation listings (e.g., DE 691 185 29 T2, "Improved bag for storing blood and blood components," whose text references multi‑compartment bags "each chamber [having] first and second open ends"). The full specification and claims must be read before this reference is used in any formal § 102 theory.

C‑2 — U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2008/0103428 A1

• Full citation: Apheresis Tubing Set, U.S. Pub. No. 2008/0103428 A1, published May 1, 2008; inventor Glen James Wicks Delaronde‑Wilton; filing date of record Sept. 9, 2004.
• § 102 date status: Qualifies — narrowly. Publication 2008‑05‑01 is 36 days before the 2008‑06‑10 critical date → § 102(b) printed publication; also § 102(e) as a US application filed 2004‑09‑09. (The 36‑day margin is the single most date‑sensitive fact in this whole set and should be double‑checked against the printed publication date.)
• Brief description (verified in detail): A closed/functionally closed apheresis tubing set comprising a cell collect bag — preferably a "cryocyte bag" (cryogenic leukocyte collect bag) — having two or more independent cell storage compartments. The bag is "formed from two leaves of a flexible, semi‑rigid and/or transparent plastics material (e.g. PTFE)," and "the storage compartments may be defined by heat seams" with a "connecting strip … in the form of a perforated heat seam." Each compartment "may be provided with a cryoprotectant port and a cell sample port," in some embodiments located at opposite sides of the bag. Focus is cell harvesting → processing → collection → cryopreservation → banking.
• Does it anticipate? Not literally, for any claim. Each independent claim requires semen; C‑2 is directed to leukocytes/blood‑derived cells. Also, the record does not show a spacing of 2.5 mm or less, nor "internal ridges" at least one of which is shorter than the distance between the first and second ends leaving an unsealed space — the heat seams here bound closed compartments rather than define channels open at their ends.
• Where it matters: This is the most structurally on‑point citation of the four. It independently teaches (a) two semi‑rigid plastic sheets, (b) internal heat seams between them, (c) multiple compartments, (d) ports for introducing sample and cryoprotectant, and (e) the whole point being cryopreservation. Its natural use is as the primary § 103 reference for the "ridges" limitation — which is exactly why the patent's "ridge vs. central connection area" terminology gap (flagged in the earlier sections) is load‑bearing: on the specification's own construction, a heat seam is a "ridge."
• Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US20080103428 ; https://patents.justia.com/patent/20080103428

C‑3 — U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2009/0148934 A1

• Full citation: Systems and Methods for Cryopreservation of Cells, U.S. Pub. No. 2009/0148934 A1, published June 11, 2009; inventors Erik John Woods et al.; applicant General Biotechnology, LLC (later Cook General Biotechnology LLC); application Ser. No. 12/337,237 (filed 2008); priority date of record June 20, 2006.
• § 102 date status: Qualifies only via § 102(e), and only if the 2006‑06‑20 priority document supports the relied‑upon disclosure. § 102(b) is unavailable (publication 2009‑06‑11 postdates the 2008‑06‑10 critical date) and § 102(a) is unavailable (pre‑dated by the applicant's priority). The reference's utility therefore hinges entirely on its earlier priority filing — a point I could not verify directly. If the 2006‑06‑20 document is a provisional that supports the vessel/vent disclosure, the § 102(e) date is 2006‑06‑20 and it is good art; if not, it drops out.
• Brief description (verified in detail): Cryopreservation vessels and an auto‑nucleating device (cholesterol matrix in a membrane‑capped tube). Vessel embodiments: (i) "a flexible tubular body having one end initially open for the introduction of a liquid sample … The open end is heat sealed after the liquid sample has been introduced"; and (ii) "a container … having an inlet fitting … and an adaptor … with a first tubular branch and a second tubular branch … The container may be initially at below‑atmospheric pressure to enhance transfer of the sample liquid from a syringe … Once the sample liquid has been transferred, the tube on the second branch is heat sealed and severed." Later‑issued family members: US 9,565,854 B2 (Cook General Biotechnology LLC) and reportedly US 9,877,475.
• Does it anticipate? No claim. It lacks the "two parallel, at least semi‑rigid sheets spaced 2.5 mm apart or less" structure (its vessels are tubular) and it lacks internal ridges . It is, however, the strongest single reference against the dependent claims:
  • Claim 2 / claim 6 (second opening arranged for expulsion of air) → the inlet + vent branch container expressly teaches a second opening for venting.
  • Claim 3 / claim 7 (suction applied to the second opening) → the initially below‑atmospheric pressure container expressly teaches drawing sample in through the other opening.
• Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US20090148934A1

C‑4 — U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0124564 A1

• Full citation: Encapsulation of pancreatic cells derived from human pluripotent stem cells, U.S. Pub. No. 2010/0124564 A1, published May 20, 2010; first‑named inventor Laura Martinson; applicant ViaCyte, Inc.; application Ser. No. 12/618,659, filed Nov. 13, 2009; provisional priority Nov. 14, 2008 (61/114,857) and Dec. 9, 2008 (61/121,084).
• § 102 date status: DOES NOT QUALIFY AS PRIOR ART. Every date — provisional 2008‑11‑14, filing 2009‑11‑13, publication 2010‑05‑20 — postdates the 2008‑06‑10 priority date. It is not § 102(a), (b), or (e) art, and it is not § 103(c) art either. Per the standing rule to interpret identifiers literally rather than infer availability from a citation list, this reference must be excluded from any § 102 or § 103 theory.
• Brief description (for completeness only): Semi‑permeable encapsulation device for implanting pancreatic progenitor cells; claims a "cell encapsulating assembly … comprising a first seal at a peripheral edge … and a second seal which effectively reduces the chamber volume but increases device surface area" (i.e., an internal partition seal). That internal‑second‑seal concept is superficially analogous to the patent's "central connection area," which is presumably why an examiner listed it — but it is legally unusable here.
• Source: https://insight.rpxcorp.com/patent/US20100124564A1

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4. § 102 claim‑mapping table (the direct answer)

Bottom line on § 102: None of the four cited references anticipates any of claims 1–7, and one of them (C‑4) is not prior art at all. Three independent reasons recur:

1. The "semen" limitation. Every independent claim is expressly limited to semen. C‑1 (blood components), C‑2 (leukocytes), C‑3 (generic cells) and C‑4 (pancreatic progenitors) all fall outside it. Under a literal § 102 analysis this alone defeats anticipation for claims 1, 4 and 5, and transitively for 2–3 and 6–7.
2. The "internal ridges … shorter than the distance between said first and second ends … an unsealed space" limitation. No cited reference is shown to disclose an internal weld/seam that stops short of the periphery to leave an open flow path. C‑2's heat seams define closed compartments; C‑4's second seal reduces chamber volume (and is unavailable anyway).
3. The "2.5 mm apart or less" limitation. Not shown anywhere in the record for any of the four.

That is consistent with the earlier Obviousness analysis: this citation set is § 103 material, not § 102 material. The examiner used structurally adjacent art; it does not read on the claims as issued.

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5. What the record does not contain (gaps that matter)

• No semen‑specific flat‑bag reference appears in the "Citations (4)" set at all. The semen dose bags the patent itself calls out as known — US 7,150,734 and DK/EP 0 605 406 — appear only in the specification's background discussion, not in the citation record. That is a conspicuous omission for a claim set in which "semen" is a hard limitation, and it is where a challenger should look first (building on the Obviousness section's Group I).
• Lahnsteiner et al., 1997, Aquaculture Research 28:471–479 is cited by the applicant in the specification, not by the examiner. It is a printed publication under § 102(a)/(b) and carries the scale‑up motivation — but it is a motivation reference, not an anticipation reference.
• Background straws (EP 0 873 726 A1; EP 0 562 947 A1; US 5,868,178; US 5,190,880) are applicant‑cited only.

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Appendix A — Family‑cited documents (from the US 10,206,387 record)

These appear in the record's "Family Cites Families" list (32 items). Dates are as listed on the patent page. I verified only titles/dates; descriptions are title‑derived unless noted, so treat them as leads for a full pull, not conclusions. § 102 status assumes the 2008‑06‑10 critical date.

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Appendix B — Honest statement of verification limits

1. US 5,364,385 (C‑1): full text and claims not read. Characterizations of its structure are inferred from title, CPC context ("frame constrained or supported bags, e.g. for freezing"), and a related German family translation. Before asserting anything about it in a § 102/§ 103 theory, read the patent.
2. US 2009/0148934 (C‑3): the § 102(e) date depends on whether the 2006‑06‑20 priority document supports the relied‑upon disclosure. I could not confirm the nature of that 2006‑06‑20 filing (provisional vs. earlier application). This is decisive and must be checked.
3. US 2008/0103428 (C‑2): its § 102(b) status rests on a 36‑day margin (2008‑05‑01 vs. 2008‑06‑10). Verify the printed publication date.
4. US 2010/0124564 (C‑4): I am as certain as the record allows that it is not prior art; every one of its dates postdates 2008‑06‑10. Do not rely on it.
5. I ran out of tool budget before I could open USPTO PatentCenter/PPUBS directly for 10,206,387. The supplied Google Patents text (which mirrors the USPTO record) was treated as authoritative, and no similar patent number was substituted at any point.

One‑line answer for the file: The four references of record (US 5,364,385; US 2008/0103428; US 2009/0148934; US 2010/0124564) anticipate none of claims 1–7. Three fail on the "semen" and/or "internal ridges" limitations, and the fourth (US 2010/0124564) is not prior art at all. They are § 103 references. The genuinely semen‑specific anticipation candidates — FR 2667504 B1, FR 2823435 B1, FR 2813784 B1, US 6,149,579, US 7,150,734 and DK/EP 0 605 406 — are in the family‑citation list or the specification, not the examiner's citation record.

I'll ground a few reference details before writing the obviousness analysis.

Obviousness Analysis — US 10,206,387 B2 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

Analysis date: April 26, 2026 · Patent: US 10,206,387 B2 ("Method for cryopreservation of biological material"), app. 14/748,243, Cryogenetics AS, inventor Elisabeth Kommisrud.
Inputs: the full patent text supplied (Google Patents, fetched 2026-09-28) and the Prior Art section previously generated on this page. I build on that section rather than restating it. I also ran three verification searches this session (details and URLs cited inline) that confirmed the key reference disclosures; where I could not verify something, I say so.

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0. Bottom line up front

Note on governing law: the effective priority date is 2008-06-10 (GB 0810606.4 / GB2460842B), pre-dating the AIA's 2013-03-16 first-inventor-to-file date. Pre-AIA §103(a) controls: "the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art." The analysis below is materially the same under AIA §103, so it is robust either way.

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1. The legal frame the case has to satisfy

Three gates, all of which the combinations below are built to clear:

1. Scope and content of the prior art — the field is cryopreservation of biological material (specifically semen/milt) and, as an allied field, flexible plastic fluid containers (medical bags, semen dose-bags, freeze bags). Both are analogous; the "reasonably pertinent to the problem" test (the problem being uniform freezing of a large sample volume) pulls all of the cited art in.
2. Differences between the prior art and the claims — addressed claim-by-claim in §5.
3. Level of ordinary skill — I define the PHOSITA as: a person with a graduate degree (M.S./Ph.D.) in cryobiology, reproductive biology, or a related field, or a bachelor's degree in mechanical/plastics/packaging engineering with 2–3 years' experience designing sterile fluid-handling and cryogenic containers, who is familiar with both (a) conventional cryogenic straws and their volumetric limitations and (b) heat-sealable flexible-sheet containers. This is deliberately a low-to-moderate skill level, which helps the obviousness case.

KSR (550 U.S. 398 (2007)) supplies the operative rationales — I use them by letter below:

• (A) Known technique to improve similar devices in the same way (thin-layer cooling applied to a flat bag).
• (B) Simple substitution of one known element for another (flat pouch for round straw).
• (C) Use of a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way (heat-seam channels to route flow and vent air).
• (D) "Obvious to try" where there is a design need and a finite number of identified, predictable solutions (increase volume; the only lever is cross-sectional thickness vs. surface area).
• (E) Design incentives / market demand (the aquaculture industry's documented need for large-volume milt freezing).
• (F) Obviousness of a numeric range under In re Woodruff / In re Boesch / In re Aller (the "2.5 mm or less" spacing as a result-effective, recognized variable).

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2. Claim-construction battleground (the terms the case turns on)

Before combining art, a petitioner/court must fix these. My working constructions — each supported by the intrinsic record — are:

Why this matters to obviousness: once "internal ridges" is construed as the spec's own "central connection area" (one or more internal welds, optionally including point welds), the gap between claim and prior art narrows sharply — because internal heat-seam lines in a two-leaf plastic bag are squarely in the art (US 2008/0103428; US 5,364,385; AT 503 164 B1; EP 1 369 649 A1). The only genuinely "new" feature is the dimensional one: ridges that stop short of the ends, and a ≤2.5 mm gap.

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3. The prior-art arsenal — element-by-element mapping

I use the labels from the Prior Art section and add verification status. US 2010/0124564 A1 is excluded (every date postdates 2008-06-10 — not §102/§103 art on its face).

Point of emphasis: the art is numerically deep on every element except the precise "ridge shorter than the end-to-end distance." That element is where the case must be won by reasoning, not by a bald disclosure.

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4. Claim chart — Claim 1 (and by extension Claim 5, which differs only in step d)

Reading: the combination supplies every element. Two elements are supplied by reasoning rather than express disclosure: the ≤2.5 mm spacing and the "ridge shorter than the distance / unsealed space." Those are the only two genuine §103 contests, and both are highly amenable to a KSR rationale (§6).

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5. The obviousness combinations, claim by claim

5.1 Claim 1 — the flagship ground

Ground 1 (primary): US 2008/0103428 A1 in view of Lahnsteiner 1997 & Lahnsteiner 2000 (and the straw art), further in view of US 2009/0148934 A1 (or WO 2007/149847).

• What US 2008/0103428 teaches: a cryopreservation-capable, two-leaf semi-rigid plastics bag whose internal geometry is set by heat seams, with fill ports, used for cell banking and expressly for sperm (bovine) cryopreservation.
• What Lahnsteiner teaches: a stated problem — thick round straws at 5 ml fail (≈40%/39% of control) because freezing/thawing is inhomogeneous in thick cross-sections — and the solution direction: keep the material in a thin layer so every cell sees the same temperature curve. This is the patentee's own stated premise, appearing verbatim in the '387 specification's background ("equal temperature curves … will not be possible … with conventional straw when the volume of each straw is increased beyond 0.5 ml").
• What US 2009/0148934 teaches: the filling and closure mechanics — open-end fill, heat-seal after filling, and an inlet + vent branch for expelling air.
• Why combine (KSR (A), (B), (D), (E)): The known problem is volumetric capacity without sacrificing cooling uniformity. A PHOSITA has a finite, identified menu of levers: increase the number of straws (impractical — Lahnsteiner shows even 5 ml fails and handling is laborious), or increase surface area while holding thickness constant — i.e., go flat. Flat plastic semen bags already existed (FR 2 667 504, FR 2 823 435) and cryopreservation bags with heat-seam internal structure already existed (US 2008/0103428; US 5,364,385). Substituting a flat heat-seamed bag for a round straw to exploit a known thin-layer cooling principle is precisely KSR rationale (B)/(A). The only remaining design step — how thin? — is the kind of result-effective parameter optimization that In re Aller, In re Woodruff and In re Boesch hold obvious, especially where the specification itself characterizes the thickness as a function of desired cooling rate and contemplates a broad 0.95–2 mm working range.

Ground 1-alt (independent, useful as a second §103 theory or to defeat a "teaching away" defense): FR 2 667 504 B1 (Cassou semen dose bag) or FR 2 823 435 B1 (IMV semen bag) + US 5,364,385 A (two-sheet freeze/thaw bag with internal welds) + EP 1 369 649 A1 (multi-compartment fill-and-freeze bag) + Lahnsteiner 1997/2000. This ground starts from semen packaging rather than blood cell banking, which blunts any "different field / non-analogous art" argument, and EP 1 369 649 supplies the "filled then frozen multi-channel bag."

Ground 1-alt-2 (channel architecture): US 5,364,385 A + EP 1 369 649 A1 + AT 503 164 B1, + Lahnsteiner, + US 2009/0148934. This is the cleanest mapping onto the "internal ridges forming channels" language (the spec's "three separate 'channels'" of FIG. 3).

5.2 Claims 2 and 6 — "second opening arranged for expulsion of air; expel air; seal both openings"

Add US 2009/0148934 A1. Its vessel has an "inlet and vent branch at the top of the container," and its flexible vial is heat-sealed after filling. That is a one-to-one mapping onto:

• second opening for air expulsion ✔,
• expelling air upon introduction ✔ (a vent branch does exactly this),
• sealing both openings ✔ (heat-seal closure).

Motivation (KSR (C), (F)): any closed-system bag filled with liquid must vent displaced air or it cannot be filled completely; providing a vent is the standard, predictable solution and is disclosed for the very same containment problem. It is also a design necessity in the patentee's own FIG. 3 (air pushed toward the drain opening), which is evidence that the vent is an ordinary engineering expedient rather than an inventive contribution.

5.3 Claims 3 and 7 — "applying suction to the second opening"

Add: conventional straw-filling practice + US 2009/0148934 (+ possibly US 2008/0269549 A1, subject to its §102(e) date).

• The '387 specification admits suction loading is conventional: "The packagings … may also be filled by applying suction to one end and then close the end thereafter in the same way as the filling of conventional cryogenic straw."
• Lahnsteiner 2000 describes semen being "sucked into the straws."
• US 2008/0269549 A1 (if date-qualified) discloses a suction system with a multiport manifold for filling multiple pre-cut straws/tubes in unison.

Motivation: suction is the standard way to load a thin, flexible cryo-container without introducing bubbles; using suction at the vent opening is the same known technique applied to the same problem (complete, bubble-free filling). KSR (A)/(C).

5.4 Claim 5 — fill → seal → deliver to a freezing facility

Claim 5 is claim 1 with step (d) changed from "freezing" to "delivering the package to a freezing facility." There is no new structural or process element; the package, the fill step, the ridge-directed flow, and the seal are all as in claim 1. "Delivering" is an ancillary, non-technical, commercial/distribution step.

• Obviousness: it would have been obvious to a PHOSITA (and trivially so to an ordinary business actor) to perform the Ground-1 filling and sealing method and then ship the sealed package to a customer or a facility equipped to freeze it — e.g., a hatchery or a cryobank. KSR (A)/(E): the motivation is the ordinary commercial division of labor in the aquaculture-milt business (the assignee itself runs such a service).
• Ancillary attack worth flagging (not §103): because step (d) contains no transformation of the material and is essentially a commercial transfer, claim 5 also invites a §101 challenge (abstract idea / Alice step two: generic method steps + conventional packaging elements), and a §112 challenge (the claim's operative novelty — the package — is recited as "provided," so the claim's own inventive weight is unclear). These are not §103 grounds but strengthen a validity challenge overall. Flagging, not asserting.

5.5 Claim 4 — "receiving a package filled with a fluid sample of biological material comprising semen … then freezing"

Claim 4 is the reach-through/intended-user claim: it begins "Receiving a package filled with a fluid sample …" and ends at "freezing the sample." It recites the package structure, omits the filling/flow/sealing steps, and claims a downstream actor (cryobank, hatchery, end user).

• §103 reachability: Claim 4 is obvious for the same reasons as claim 1 — the package it requires is the same package — with the added observation that where a method begins is generally not patentable weight. Practicing the Ground-1 combination through step (c) yields exactly the article claim 4 requires; a downstream party who receives that article and freezes it performs nothing beyond the natural, intended next step of a product whose only disclosed purpose is cryopreservation. KSR (A)/(C): freezing is the known and only disclosed function of the received package.
• Additional independent vulnerability worth probing (not §103): claim 4's "receiving" step has been treated by courts and the Board as a mental/administrative step that can raise §101 (no meaningful extra-solution activity) and, where the received article is the only inventive contribution, §102/§103 art directed at the article itself controls. Flag it as a secondary attack line alongside obviousness, not a substitute.

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6. Motivation to combine — collected and organized

A court or the Board will want the "why" stated affirmatively. Here it is, mapped to KSR rationales:

1. A recognized problem with a recognized cause (KSR (D), (E)). The industry literature (Lahnsteiner 1997, 2000) documents that increasing straw volume to 5 ml destroys post-thaw fertility (≈40%/39% of control) because cooling/thawing rates become inhomogeneous in a thick cross-section. That is an express teaching of problem (need larger volume) and cause (thickness-driven non-uniform cooling). Both the patent and Lahnsteiner recite the same problem. (Citations: aquaculture.ugent.be/…/a42.htm; Lahnsteiner 2000 full text, Aquaculture Research 31:245-258.)

2. A finite, identified set of solutions (KSR (D)). Given the cause is cross-sectional thickness, there are only two predictable levers: (i) more/smaller straws, or (ii) a geometry change that increases surface-to-volume ratio while fixing thickness — i.e., a flat pouch. Both flat semen pouches (FR 2 667 504; FR 2 823 435) and thin-layer cryo-containers (straw art; US 5,364,385) were known. That is the KSR "obvious to try" posture.

3. Known technique, same function (KSR (A), (C)). Using heat-seam lines inside a two-leaf plastic bag to define compartments, channels and flow paths, and to keep the bag from bulging, is a known technique disclosed for the same purpose in US 2008/0103428 A1 ("compartments defined by heat seams" in a cryopreservation bag for sperm), US 5,364,385 (internal compartment welds in a freeze/thaw bag), and EP 1 369 649 A1 (multi-compartment fill-and-freeze bag). Applying the same technique to hold two semi-rigid sheets parallel at ≤2.5 mm is not a new use of those elements; it is their established function.

4. Predictable result / design choice optimization (KSR; In re Aller, In re Woodruff). Once the mechanism (thin layer → uniform cooling) is known and the geometry (flat bag) is known, selecting a thickness is the design exercise. The '387 specification itself describes the spacing as a dependent variable ("The distance separating the walls depend on which cooling rate that is contemplated, the material of the device, to which degree the device is filled etc.") and claims a 2.5 mm ceiling with 0.95–2 mm embodiments — the signature of routine optimization of a result-effective variable, which In re Boesch/In re Aller hold obvious absent unexpected results.

5. Commercial/market demand (KSR (E)). The '387 background is essentially a market statement: "The aquaculture industry need[s] an efficient large scale cryopreservation protocol and thus preferably a method and means which enables cryopreservation of larger amounts of semen." That is the patentee's own admission of a known need in the art — objective evidence of a problem the art was already trying to solve, and thus a strong motivation.

6. Ancillary steps are necessities, not inventions (KSR (C), (F)). Venting displaced air (claims 2/6) and suction-loading a thin flexible container (claims 3/7) are the standard expedients for the stated purpose (complete, bubble-free filling of a closed sterile container), disclosed in US 2009/0148934 A1 (inlet + vent branch; heat-seal closure) and admitted as conventional in the '387 specification itself.

7. Delivery is administrative (claim 5). "Delivering to a freezing facility" adds nothing technical; on the record it is the ordinary commercial step of a service business.

Combined narrative for two sentences in a petition: The art knew the problem (large-volume milt cryopreservation), knew the cause (thick cross-section → non-uniform cooling), knew the geometry (semi-rigid sheet bags with internal heat-seam structure for sperm cryopreservation), and knew the mechanics (open-end fill, vent, heat-seal closure, suction loading). All that was left was to hold the two known sheets at a known-result-effective thin spacing and run the known fill/vent/seal/freeze sequence — a combination of known elements performing their known functions, yielding no more than the expected result.

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7. The patentee's likely rebuttals — and how they fare

Secondary considerations summary: on the present record there is no evidence of unexpected results, no evidence of long-felt-but-unsolved need that others failed to solve (the art was actively solving it), no licensing program keyed to this patent, and no commercial-success evidence with a nexus to the claim (the assignee's commercial "Square Pack" service success, if shown, would need to be tied to the claimed feature rather than to service quality). Absent such evidence, secondary considerations do not rescue the claims.

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8. Where the obviousness case is weakest — be honest with the client

1. The "unsealed space at the ridge ends" element has no clean, express disclosure. This is the one limitation that must be supplied by reasoning. If the Board or a district court reads "ridges" narrowly (as a distinct raised element rather than a weld line), the mapping from US 2008/0103428's "heat seams" becomes contestable. Mitigation: run multiple theories of "ridge" (weld line; raised/embossed element; point weld) so the case survives whichever construction issues.
2. Claim 4 requires the same package but starts from a received filled article; the mapping is the same as claim 1, so claim 4 rises or falls with claim 1's package limitations. If the package is obvious, claim 4 is obvious.
3. No anticipation anywhere. A straight §102 argument is unavailable; the whole case is §103.
4. Priority-date risk cuts both ways (flag from the Prior Art section): if the claims' 2008-06-10 entitlement is upheld, the reference set is as mapped; if it is lost, more art (including US 2009/0148934 A1 on its face, and US 2008/0269549 A1) comes into play. A petition should plead in the alternative.
5. Provenance/date hygiene needed before filing: (a) confirm the §102(b) date of JP 5011810 B2 (the grant is 2012, but its published application is what matters); (b) confirm whether US 2008/0269549 A1 carries a §102(e) date predating 2008-06-10 before relying on it for the suction claims; (c) obtain the full text of WO 2007/149847 (the §102(b)-qualifying publication for the US 2009/0148934 family). These were flagged but not fully resolved in the prior-art section.

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9. Recommended §103 grounds (petition-ready table)

Practice points for an IPR petition:

• Challenge all three independents (1, 4, 5). Killing claim 1 alone leaves claims 4 and 5 alive and gives no meaningful estoppel benefit.
• Address the ≤2.5 mm limitation head-on with the In re Aller/In re Boesch line, and with the specification's own admission that the spacing is a function of the desired cooling rate.
• Pre-empt the teaching-away argument by quoting Lahnsteiner 2000's mechanism statement (inhomogeneous freezing/thawing in 5 ml round straws) rather than letting the patentee frame the art as "large volumes are bad."
• Consider a parallel §112/§101 line against claims 4 and 5 (reach-through "receiving" step; "providing/delivering" with no transformation), which can create settlement leverage even where the §103 case is contested.
• Re-verify the "no PTAB proceedings" finding per the PTAB-Challenges section before filing (no §315(e) estoppel exists today because there are zero petitions — you would be the first mover).

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10. Caveats

• This is an attorney-work-product-style technical analysis, not legal advice, and not a validity opinion.
• I relied on the Prior Art section on this page plus three verification searches (US 2008/0103428 text; US 2009/0148934/General Biotechnology; Lahnsteiner 1997 abstract and Lahnsteiner 2000 full text). I did not run PACER/PTAB/live USPTO citation queries this session; the "no proceedings / no assignments" findings from the earlier sections are carried over as-is.
• The US 2008/0269549 A1 reference and the JP 5011810 B2 publication date are unverified for §102 purposes and are flagged, not relied upon.
• Where the record does not support a statement (e.g., any assertion that a particular reference expressly discloses "ridges shorter than the end-to-end distance"), I have said so rather than filling the gap. Any representation to a court should rest on the intrinsic record after full-text review of each reference.