  Magnesium and its alloys are ideal candidates for biodegradable implants.
However, they can dissolve too rapidly in the human body for most applications.
In this research, high purified magnesium (HP-Mg) was coated with stearic acid
in order to slow the corrosion rate of magnesium in simulated body fluid at
37{\deg}C. HP-Mg was anodized to form an oxide/hydroxide layer, then it was
immersed in a stearic acid solution. Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and
potentiodynamic polarization were used to estimate the corrosion rate of HP-Mg
specimens. The results confirm that the hydrophobic coating can temporarily
decrease the corrosion rate of HP-Mg by 1000x.
