Development of High Performance Biodegradable Magnesium Alloy

Magnesium and its alloys have been long been used as biodegradable implants. However, tailoring the mechanical properties, degradation kinetics and as well cost effective processing/fabrication of this alloy system for short to medium range load bearing applications is still in developmental stage. Relation between chemical composition and microstructure plays major role in this regard. Magnesium alloy development process is mostly dominated by ingot metallurgy process with very few studies on mechanical alloying process. Powder metallurgy is an important processing route for development of materials with higher strength. Cost effective powder blending, without milling process to avoid contamination, is proven efficient to develop magnesium based materials. However, there is scarcity of efforts reported in the open literature to develop biodegradable magnesium-calcium-zinc alloy using blend-press-sinter powder metallurgy route. Accordingly, the aim of this project is to investigate the potential of development of magnesium-calcium-zinc alloy using simple blend-press-sinter powder metallurgy route followed by hot extrusion. Effect of composition of alloying elements and processing parameters on the microstructure and mechanical properties of the developed alloys will be studied. Parameters will be optimized to identify the suitable alloy composition and process parameters leading to improved properties of the magnesium-calcium-zinc ternary alloy. The proposed project duration is 28 working months and the total budget is 299,400.00 Saudi Riyal.