Electrophotographic sensitive member

Abstract

The present invention relates to an electrophotographic sensitive member, in particular to a divided function type electrophotographic sensitive member formed of amorphous silicon and amorphous silicon carbide capable of particularly widening an optical band gap range to heighten an optical sensitivity. Stabilized operation characteristics and durability are required for an electrophotographic sensitive member drum carried on instruments such as a high-speed copying machine and a laser beam printer. As for these requirements, hydrogenized amorphous silicon is being watched with interest from the viewpoints of superior abrasion resistance, heat resistance, anti-pollution property, optical sensitive characteristic and the like. However, even multi-layer type sensitive member and a divided function type sensitive member, which have been known as an electrophotographic sensitive member formed of hydrogenized amorphous silicon, have shown problems in that in the case where they are used in the high-speed copying, a residual image, in which the preceding image remains without being completely removed by an optical memory effect and appears again with the formation of the subsequent image, occurs, and an image exposure per one time of copying is reduced by the high-speediness, whereby the sufficient optical attenuation can not be obtained and the potentiality of the sensitive member corresponding to a shading contrast of a manuscript can not be sufficiently increased, so that a background smearing is produced. The present invention aims at the obtainment of an electrophotographic sensitive member capable of solving such problems and provides an electrophotographic sensitive member capable of heightening an optical sensitivity over a wide wavelength range to obtain sufficient optical attenuation characteristics, whereby being suitable for the high-speed copying.