Stability of Small Silver Particles in Redox Buffers

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Abstract
The change in size dist.ribution of small silver particles, caused by treatment in buffered ferrous-ferric physical developer has been followed. The particles were prepared by vacuum evaporation of silver on a carbon film and histograms of treated and untreated samples were determined by electron microscopy. It was found that for each specified redox potential there is a critical size ro, particles smaller than which dissolve in the developer, while larger ones grow at the expense of the silver ions in the solution. This, as shown, has as a result the temporary appearance of a clearly observable minimum in the size distribution curve at r = ro. The redox, potential of the developer and the critical size ro were found to be in very good agreement With Gibbs-Thomson equation, relating the free energy of a small particle with its dimensions. The significance of this result for the stability of latent image specks is indicated.

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