Magnetization, x-ray diffraction and specific-heat measurements reveal that SmCoAsO undergoes three magnetic phase transitions. A ferromagnetic transition attributed to the Co ions, emerges at TC=57 K with a small saturation moment of 0.15muB/Co. Reo
rientation of the Co moment to an antiferromagnetic state is obtained at TN2=45 K. The relative high paramagnetic effective moment Peff=1.57 MuB/Co indicates an itinerant ferromagnetic state of the Co sublattice. The third magnetic transition at TN1=5 K is observed clearly in the specific-heat study only. Both magnetic and 57Fe Mossbauer studies show that substitution of small quantities of Fe for Co was unsuccessful.
The recently discovered superconducting - spin density wave materials, containing Fe and As, have raised huge interest. However most materials prepared to date, suffer from a varying degree of content of foreign Fe-As phases, Fe2As, FeAs2 and FeAs, w
hich can lead to wrong conclusions concerning the properties of these materials. We show here that Mossbauer Spectroscopy is able to determine quite easily the relative content of the foreign phases. This procedure is demonstrated by a study of seven samples of superconducting or spin density wave materials, prepared in three different laboratories.
