Patent ID: 7897316

Claim:
A toner comprising at least: a binder resin; and a colorant, wherein: the binder resin contains at least a polyester unit and a vinyl copolymer unit; a main peak MpA is present in a molecular weight region of 2,000 to 7,000 in a molecular weight distribution measured by means of gel permeation chromatography (GPC) of a tetrahydrofuran (THF) soluble matter A when the toner is extracted through Soxhlet extraction with THF for 16 hours; a main peak MpB is present in a molecular weight region of 5,000 to 10,000 in a molecular weight distribution measured by means of GPC of a THF soluble matter B when the toner is left in a THF solvent at 25° C. for 24 hours, and the THF soluble matter B contains a component of a molecular weight region of 100,000 or less in range from 70 to 100 mass %; and a peak molecular weight MpA of the THF soluble matter A and a peak molecular weight MpB of the THF soluble matter B satisfy the following equation: 0.50<MpA/MpB<0.95, wherein the binder resin comprises a hybrid resin in which the polyester unit and the vinyl copolymer unit are chemically bound to each other, wherein the hybrid resin is obtained by polymerizing a vinyl monomer to produce the vinyl copolymer unit on a first stage and reacting the vinyl copolymer unit and an unsaturated polyester unit on a second stage using a bifunctional polymerization initiator having reactive groups different from each other in decomposition temperature and wherein the unsaturated polyester unit is produced employing a dicarboxylic acid of the formula HOOC—(CH 2 ) n —COOH, where n is 4-8.