To satisfy the property requirements for biodegradable medical implants, Zn alloyed with low levels of Mg (≤0.8 wt%) has attracted increased research interest. In the present study, deformation twinning was observed in tensile tests and twinning appears to have an adverse impact on ductility. The profuse twinning in the as-cast Zn-Mg alloys accelerated crack growth in tension due to twinning impingement which caused local stress concentrations and initiates cracking. As-rolled Zn-Mg alloys have better ductility than their as-cast counterparts due to the inhibition of twinning by the refined Mg2Zn11 intermetallic phase and the finer grain size.

The present study investigates the influence of ultrasonic treatment on the grain refinement of commercial purity aluminium with a range of Al3Ti1B master alloy additions. When the aluminium contains the smallest amount of added master alloy, ultrasonics caused significant additional grain refinement compared to that provided by the master alloy alone. However, the influence of ultrasonics on grain size reduces with increasing addition of the master alloy which adds additional TiB₂ particles and Ti solute with each incremental addition. Applying the Interdependence model to analyse the experimentally measured grain sizes revealed that the results of this study and those from similar experiments on an Al-2Cu alloy were consistent when the alloy compositions are converted to their growth restriction factors (Q) and that increasing Q had a major effect on reducing grain size and increasing grain number density. Compared with the application of ultrasonic treatment where an order of magnitude increase in the grain number density is achieved, an increase in the Ti content over the range of master alloy additions, causes the grain number density to increase by approximately three times.