Patent ID: 7157197

Claim:
An electrophotographic photosensitive member comprising a substrate, and a photoconductive layer and a surface layer in this order provided on the substrate, wherein; said surface layer comprises an amorphous material composed chiefly of silicon atoms and nitrogen atoms and containing at least oxygen atoms and carbon atoms, and in said amorphous material, oxygen atoms, carbon atoms and nitrogen atoms are contained in average concentrations represented respectively by the following expressions (1) to (3): 0.0001≦O/(Si+N+O+C)≦0.2 (1) 0.0001≦C/(Si+N+O+C)≦0.1 (2) 0.3≦N/(Si+N+O+C)≦0.6 (3) (in the expressions (1) to (3), Si represents the number of silicon atoms, N represents the number of nitrogen atoms, O represents the number of oxygen atoms, and C represents the number of carbon atoms).