Fracture toughness in Mg–Al–Zn alloy processed by equal-channel-angular extrusion

The fracture toughness in Mg–Al–Zn alloy was improved by the equal-channel-angular extrusion process. The improvement was the result of a large plastic zone size, which was sensitive to elongation-to-failure and a high strain hardening exponent, created ahead of the fracture pre-crack, because of the modified distribution of the basal texture.