combining prior art

Under Section 102 of the U.S. Patent Statute, a claim must be identically disclosed in a single prior-art reference in order to be rejected as being anticipated by prior art. Under Section 103 of the Patent Statute (which deals with the standard of obviousness) one is permitted to employ a single prior art reference or combine two or more references to render a claim obvious if such a combination would be apparent to one skilled in the art. Under either standard, a patent application claim may be rejected by a patent examiner, or a patent claim may be ruled invalid by a court.