For more than 150 years silver halide photography has played a dominant role in image recording. Stability of silver halide photographic materials is regarded as one of the parameters governing the quality of this imaging medium.

Since Emil-Joachim Birr’s 1935 discovery of an effective, generally applicable stabilizer, the sphere of emulsion stabilization has markedly extended. These steady efforts are documented in more than 800 articles and 3, 260 patents published since 1969 alone.

"Gunther Fischer is extremely knowledgeable about these patents as well as the literature owing to his deep experience in this field [since 1964], and has managed to include all of them in this monograph in good arrangement. I am sure that this monograph will be very useful for photographic scientists and engineers, and will greatly contribute to progress in photographic science and technology."—Tadaaki Tani, The President of the Internationa Committee for Imaging Science and Technology (ICIS), Ashigara Research Laboratories, Fuji Photo Film Co., Ltd.

The book is unique in that it includes stabilizers, not only in the conventional sense, but also from the viewpoint of antioxidants, oxidized developer scavengers, compounds for modifications of grain habit and growth, inhibitions of chemical ripening and development, and development inhibitor releasing compounds.