Best Practices and Protocols in Mössbauer Spectroscopy

Over the past 50 years or so, the authors have written and reviewed many papers dealing with Mössbauer spectral research and have noticed many pitfalls, omissions, and marginal to poor practices in the literature. This paper first describes the best recommended practices and protocols for measuring, analyzing, and presenting Mössbauer spectra for publication. To illustrate these recommendations, the paper next presents a discussion of the techniques that ensure the best possible Mössbauer-effect spectrometer calibration, the best methods for minimizing the spectral line widths and thus obtaining the best possible spectral resolution, and the best spectral velocity ranges to use. A variety of iron containing compounds chosen from the fields of inorganic, organic, and material chemistry are used to illustrate the best practices and protocols that should be used. These materials include an organoiron carbonyl complex, iron phosphate compounds, two single molecule magnet compounds, and iron spin-state crossover complexes.