Opinion ID: 781031
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: atcc-vr2332

Text: 28 The next claim term in dispute is swine infertility and respiratory syndrome virus, ATCC-VR2332, which describes the virus employed in the method of claim 2. The term ATCC-VR2332 derives simply from the deposit of the virus with the American Type Culture Collection (ATCC), which assigned the accession number 2332 to the virus upon receiving Boehringer's deposit. '778 patent, col. 2, ll. 37-40. The district court construed this term to mean the specific strain of PRRS deposited with the ATCC. Boehringer, 984 F.Supp. at 249. Schering argues that the term should be limited to disease-causing viruses only, which would exclude Schering's attenuated strain. Boehringer, in contrast, argues that the term should be expanded to cover any PRRS virus, disease-causing or not, although Boehringer does not explain exactly what any PRRS virus would mean. We conclude that the district court again correctly chose the middle ground between the parties' contentions. 29 Schering's argument simply seeks to add another limitation (disease-causing) to the claim, and such arguments rarely succeed. The district court's claim construction already specifies a disease-causing virus, since the viral strain deposited with the ATCC will indeed cause PRRS. Presumably, Schering seeks to add an explicit disease-causing limitation so that it may argue that a finding of equivalence would vitiate this limitation entirely. We are not persuaded. The specification, as Schering points out, does state that ATCC-VR2332 will cause disease when administered to pigs. See '778 patent, col. 4, ll. 19-21. However, the specification also refers to modified or attenuated live ATCC-VR2332, id. at col. 5, l. 25, indicating that the term ATCC-VR2332 does not by itself demand pathogenicity. At bottom, Schering's argument is based on a simple fallacy: given the premise that all PRRS is caused by ATCC-VR332, all ATCC-VR2332 must therefore cause PRRS. Because such an argument is logically unsound, the district court correctly rejected Schering's attempt to add an additional limitation to the claim. 30 Boehringer, on the other hand, urges that the district court erred by construing ATCC-VR2332 too narrowly. 1 The district court construed the term to mean the particular strain of PRRS virus that Boehringer deposited with the ATCC, Boehringer, 984 F.Supp. at 252, although the district court did not explain exactly what properties must be shown to establish that an accused virus meets this definition. Boehringer argues that this construction was erroneous, and that the term ATCC-VR2332 should be understood as a prototype or generic term for all PRRS viruses, rather than as a reference to the deposited strain. 31 We find Boehringer's arguments no more persuasive than Schering's on this point. Boehringer chose to claim its virus using the term ATCC-VR2332, a term on its face referring to a particular ATCC deposit. Boehringer did not use the broader term PRRS virus, nor did Boehringer attempt to claim the virus in terms of the more general functional and structural properties disclosed by the specification. Boehringer did not choose to define the term ATCC-VR2332 in the specification, nor did Boehringer state that ATCC-VR2332 was a generic or prototype virus, nor did Boehringer assert that viruses related to but not identical to the isolated strain were within the scope of the invention. These choices must be held against it. We therefore conclude that the district court properly construed ATCC-VR2332 to refer to the strain of virus deposited with the ATCC. 32