Patent ID: 7175958

Claim:
An electrophotographic photoconductor, comprising: a conductive support; and a photoconductive layer disposed on the photoconductive support; wherein the photoconductive layer contains an azo compound expressed by a general formula <<101>> Ar N═N—Cp) n general formula <<101>> wherein in the general formula <<101>>, Ar is a substituted or non-substituted aromatic series hydrocarbon group or an aromatic series heterocyclic ring group which can be bonded by way of a bonding group; Cp is a coupler residual group, n represents an integer of 1, 2, 3, or 4; at least one of the Cp is a coupler residual group selected from the group consisting of general formulae <<102>>, <<103>>, and <<104>> wherein in the general formulae <<102>>, <<103>>, and <<104>>, each of R 1 , R 2 , R 3 and R 4 expresses a hydrogen atom, an alkyl group, an alkoxy group, a halogen atom, an amino group, a hydroxy group, a nitro group, or a cyano group; X represents a hydrogen atom, a substituted or non-substituted alkyl group, a substituted or non-substituted aromatic series hydrocarbon group, a substituted or non-substituted heterocyclic ring group, or a substituted or non-substituted amino group; Y represents a substituted or non-substituted alkylene group, a substituted or non-substituted aromatic series divalent organic residual group, a substituted or non-substituted heterocyclic ring aromatic series divalent organic residual group, or carbonyl group containing a divalent organic residual group expressed by —CO—Z—, wherein Z represents a substituted or non-substituted alkylene group, a substituted or non-substituted aromatic series divalent organic residual group, a substituted or non-substituted heterocyclic ring aromatic series divalent organic residual group, wherein each of the alkyl groups R 1 and R 2 may form a ring with each other.