Magnesium-lithium matrix composites an overview

Ultralight magnesium-lithium alloys offer great weight-saving potential for various engineering applications but their intrinsic deficiencies such as low creep strength, low stiffness and poor corrosion resistance are serious setbacks as to the competition with other lightweight alloys. Refractory fibres and/or particles inserted into MgLi matrix considerably increase its strength level offering the possibility to fabricate metallic structural materials with very high strength-to-weight ratio. This group of metal matrix composites is still under development wherein the compatibility between reinforcement and matrix represents the crucial problem to be solved. In this paper, the state of art and recent developments in the area of MgLi matrix composites are briefly reviewed, focusing predominantly on the interfacial chemistry and mechanical behaviour of MgLi based composites that have been classified into three groups (continuously reinforced, short-fibre reinforced and particle reinforced ones).