Qatar University’s Centre of Advanced Materials (CAM) has held a professional training course for engineers and technicians from Qatar Petroleum (QP) and Qatar Aluminium Limited (Qatalum). The two-day course on ‘Heat treatment of ferrous and non-ferrous metals,’ focused on the fundamentals of designing and optimising heat treatment processes as well as evolving solutions for process/product problems faced in the steel and aluminium manufacturing industries. Trainees learned how heat treatment processes greatly affect the mechanical properties of metals such as strength, hardness, ductility and toughness. CAM course instructors Dr Adel Mohamed and Moinuddin Mohamed Yusuf provided theoretical presentations supported by laboratory sessions illustrating the key role of heat treatment in improving product performance by increasing strength and other metallurgical properties. They explained that heat treatment plays a vital role in industries of today as science and technology are in pursuit of designing materials of improved properties.