in Re Magnolia Medical Technologies, Inc v. Kurin, Inc., 169 F.4th 1094, 1098 Fed. Cir. 2026 citing ’483 patent col. 3 ll. 25-29…

N OTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.
United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit
______________________
IN RE MAGNOLIA MEDICAL TECHNOLOGIES,
INC.,
Appellant
______________________
2025-1961
______________________
Appeal from the United States Patent and Trademark
Office, Patent Trial and Appeal Board in No. 90/019,177.
______________________
Decided: July 9, 2026
______________________
F REDERIC MEEKER , Banner & Witcoff, Ltd., Washing-
ton, DC, for appellant. Also represented by SIMON C.
L ASKER , P AUL T. Q UALEY .
K AKOLI CAPRIHAN , Office of the Solicitor, United States
Patent and Trademark Office, Alexandria, VA, for appellee
John A. Squires. Also represented by J USTIN BOVA,
N ICHOLAS T HEODORE MATICH , IV, AUSTIN P HILIP MAYRON.
______________________
Case: 25-1961 Document: 40 Page: 1 Filed: 07/09/2026

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IN RE MAGNOLIA MEDICAL TECHNOLOGIES, INC. 2
Before L OURIE and P ROST , Circuit Judges, and
SUBRAMANIAN, District Judge.1
P ER CURIAM .
Magnolia Medical Technologies, Inc. (“Magnolia”) ap-
peals from a decision of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board
(“the Board”) in an ex parte reexamination affirming an ex-
aminer’s rejection of claim 1 of U.S. Patent 10,039,483 (“the
’483 patent”) as anticipated and therefore unpatentable.
Ex Parte Magnolia Med. Techs., Inc., No. 2025-001039,
2025 WL 1528341 (P.T.A.B. May 20, 2025) (“Decision”). We
affirm.
BACKGROUND
The ’483 patent is directed to a device for procuring
blood samples “with reduced contamination from microbes
exterior to the [blood] source, such as dermally-residing mi-
crobes.” ’483 patent col. 2. ll. 14–16. The device aims to
reduce such contamination “[b]y separating and excluding
the initial portion of blood collected” from the sample used
for testing. Magnolia Med. Techs., Inc. v. Kurin, Inc., 169
F.4th 1094, 1098 (Fed. Cir. 2026) (citing ’483 patent col. 3
ll. 25–29).
Independent claim 1 is the only claim on appeal, and
reads as follows:
1. A blood sequestration device, comprising:
a housing having an inlet port configured
to be fluidically coupled to a patient and an
outlet port configured to be fluidically cou-
pled to a sample reservoir;
1 Honorable Arun Subramanian, District Judge,
United States District Court for the Southern District of
New York, sitting by designation.
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IN RE MAGNOLIA MEDICAL TECHNOLOGIES, INC. 3
a fluid reservoir disposed in the housing
and at least partially defined by a seal
member, the fluid reservoir configured to
receive an initial volume of blood with-
drawn from the patient; and
a vent disposed in the housing and config-
ured to allow air to exit the housing as
blood enters the fluid reservoir,
the blood sequestration device configured
to allow the initial volume of blood to flow
from the inlet port to the fluid reservoir,
the blood sequestration device further con-
figured to allow a subsequent volume of
blood to flow from the inlet port toward the
outlet port via a sampling flow path,
thereby bypassing the fluid reservoir and
the initial volume of blood sequestered
therein.
’483 patent col. 20 ll. 48–65 (emphases added).
The two disputed limitations are: (1) “a . . . fluid reser-
voir configured to receive an initial volume of blood with-
drawn from the patient” (the “fluid reservoir limitation”),
id. col. 20 ll. 52–55, and (2) “a subsequent volume of
blood . . . bypass[es] the fluid reservoir and the initial vol-
ume of blood sequestered therein” (the “bypass limitation”).
Id. col. 20 ll. 62–65.
A third party requested ex parte reexamination based
on U.S. Patent 6,013,037 (“Brannon”), which discloses “a
syringe for collecting multiple samples of blood for labora-
tory testing that substantially minimizes contamination of
and/or hemolysis [(the destruction of red blood cells)] in the
samples.” Brannon col. 1 ll. 12–14.
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IN RE MAGNOLIA MEDICAL TECHNOLOGIES, INC. 4
Reexamination was granted and an Examiner rejected
claim 1 as anticipated by Brannon. J.A. 19654–55. Mag-
nolia appealed to the Board, which affirmed the Exam-
iner’s rejection. Decision at *3–8.
Magnolia timely appealed. We have jurisdiction under
28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(4)(A).
D ISCUSSION
“Under 35 U.S.C. § 102 a claim is anticipated if each
and every limitation is found either expressly or inherently
in a single prior art reference.” King Pharms., Inc. v. Eon
Labs, Inc., 616 F.3d 1267, 1274 (Fed. Cir. 2010) (citation
omitted). “Anticipation is a question of fact we review for
substantial evidence.” Nidec Motor Corp. v. Zhongshan
Broad Ocean Motor Co. Ltd, 851 F.3d 1270, 1273 (Fed. Cir.
2017). “Substantial evidence . . . means such relevant evi-
dence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to
support a conclusion.” Consol. Edison Co. of New York v.
NLRB, 305 U.S. 197, 229 (1938) (citation omitted).
The Board affirmed the Examiner’s findings that Bran-
non discloses both the fluid reservoir and bypass limita-
tions. Those findings are consistent with Brannon and are
therefore supported by substantial evidence. Brannon dis-
closes that “a . . . first [blood] sample is contained within
the fluid chamber 30,” Brannon col. 12 ll. 45–46, tracking
claim 1’s fluid reservoir limitation, which requires a part of
the device to be “configured to receive an initial volume of
blood withdrawn from the patient.” ’483 patent col. 20 ll.
52–55. Brannon also discloses that “fluid chamber 30 may
be substantially separated from the second and any subse-
quent samples drawn,” Brannon col. 12 ll. 55–57, tracking
the bypass limitation, which requires a later volume of
blood collected to “bypass[] the fluid reservoir and the ini-
tial volume of blood sequestered therein.” ’483 patent col.
20 ll. 64–65.
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IN RE MAGNOLIA MEDICAL TECHNOLOGIES, INC. 5
Magnolia’s arguments on appeal are unpersuasive.
Magnolia first argues that the Board’s finding that fluid
chamber 30 meets the fluid reservoir limitation is unsup-
ported by substantial evidence. Magnolia’s argument is
built upon multiple premises. Magnolia first asserts that
the phrase “initial volume of blood” as used in the fluid res-
ervoir limitation should be construed to mean “the first vol-
ume of blood after venipuncture,” i.e., the insertion of a
needle into the vein. See Open. Br. 15. Magnolia then con-
tends that Brannon’s fluid chamber 30 must be configured
to be devoid of any air at the time of venipuncture to avoid
the safety risk of introducing an air embolism into the pa-
tient. Open. Br. 16 (citing J.A. 37001–02, ¶¶ 31–32 (expert
declaration)). Accordingly, Magnolia asserts that the re-
quired configuration of fluid chamber 30 cannot meet the
“an initial volume of blood from the patient” requirement
of the reservoir limitation because it does not contain blood
at the time of venipuncture. See Open. Br. 14–21; ’483 pa-
tent col. 20 ll. 52–55.
That argument is unconvincing because nothing in the
text of claim 1 requires that the fluid reservoir limitation
must be met at the time of venipuncture. Whether or not
fluid chamber 30 meets the fluid reservoir limitation at the
time of venipuncture thus does not affect the anticipation
analysis. See Net MoneyIN, Inc. v. VeriSign, Inc., 545 F.3d
1359, 1370 (Fed. Cir. 2008) (anticipation requires the “ref-
erence to show all of the limitations of the claims arranged
or combined in the same way as recited in the claims”).
And the Board reasonably found Magnolia’s purported
safety concerns with the Brannon device to be unsup-
ported, because an embodiment of the ’483 patent itself op-
erates in a materially similar manner. Decision at *5
(“[T]he Examiner takes the position that [Brannon] is no
more dangerous than [Magnolia’s] device considering that
. . . the ’483 patent . . . is in a configuration having a fluid
reservoir [] which would have air therein.”) (citing J.A.
37059; ’483 patent Fig. 8). Multiple premises upon which
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IN RE MAGNOLIA MEDICAL TECHNOLOGIES, INC. 6
Magnolia’s argument are unsound, and thus the argument
fails.
Separately, Magnolia argues that Brannon does not
meet the bypass limitation because Brannon discloses “how
an initial flash” of blood from the first volume collected
flows into the sample collected for testing. Open. Br. 20
(citing Brannon col. 7 ll. 14–18). Magnolia therefore con-
tends that Brannon does not disclose “the initial volume of
blood sequestered” in the fluid reservoir. ’483 patent col.
20 ll. 64–65.
We are again unconvinced. The bypass limitation only
requires “the initial volume of blood [to be] sequestered,”
which refers back to the antecedent fluid reservoir limita-
tion, which states: “an initial volume of blood withdrawn
from the patient.” ’483 patent col.20 ll. 52–55, 62–65; see
ABS Glob., Inc. v. Cytonome/St, LLC, 84 F.4th 1034, 1040
(Fed. Cir. 2023) (explaining the antecedent rule of con-
struction). But the fluid reservoir limitation does not re-
quire that the full amount of initially collected blood must
be sequestered in the fluid reservoir, just that “an initial
volume of blood” must be sequestered. See ’483 patent col.
20 ll. 52–55 (emphasis added). It is therefore immaterial
that some of the initial portion of blood in Brannon ulti-
mately ends up in the sample collected and tested.
CONCLUSION
We have considered Magnolia’s other arguments but
find them unpersuasive. For the reasons provided, we af-
firm. Claim 1 is invalid.
AFFIRMED
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