Although a strong thermo-compression bond is formed between some metals and ceramics, the bonding mechanism is not clearly understood. In the present work⁵⁷Fe Mössbauer spectroscopic study of (Al₂O₃ + Fe) cermet is carried out to investigate the reason of adherence at the metal-ceramic interface. The isomer shift, quadrupole splitting and linewidths of Mössbauer spectra indicate that a compound of the spinel type FeO·Al₂O₃ is formed but the site symmetry around Fe may be locally distorted by a small amount as compared to that for stoichiometric FeAl₂O₄.

A simple computer program is described to evaluate magnetic field distributions from complex Mössbauer spectra of magnetic alloys. The use of this program for test cases of Vitrovac 4040 amorphous sample and a simulated spectrum of two gaussian peaks is discussed.

We report thermoelectric power measurements on BiSrCaCuO (2212) superconducting oxide and compare the observed behaviour with that of the YBaCuO (123) system. The relative importance of phonon drag and diffusion thermopower contributions is evaluated for the two systems by analysing the data using a generalized expression of the typeS=αT+β/T. The thermopower enhancement effect just aboveT_c gives parameter values comparable to those of YBa₂Cu₃O_7−x system.