Liesl Ammerlaan started her career in the heat treat industry as a summer intern. She quickly distinguished herself by her enthusiasm for learning, eagerly jumping in to rebuild and qualify furnaces. Progressing from intern to metallurgy engineer, to senior metallurgy engineer, Liesl is now lead engineer of metallurgy. After working as a metallurgy engineer for a few years, Liesl's passion for metallurgy and heat treating drove her to pursue and receive her master’s degree in Materials Science while working full time.

Demonstrating her contributions to the industry, Liesl presented her original research, “Relationship Between Deep Case Carburizing and Residual Stress in Rolling Contact Service,” at the ASM Heat Treat 2023 conference. For this research, she was awarded ASM Heat Treating Society Prime Contributor. Additionally, Liesl has co-authored numerous research papers and continues to contribute to research as the primary contact with several universities on Amsted Rail Co., Inc.’s research into non-destructive testing and bearing life improvements.

Today, Liesl oversees one of the largest in-house heat treating operations in North America, supervising the metallurgy laboratory at Amsted Rail. One of Liesl's strengths is her natural ability to relate easily with everyone at the factory, from hourly employees to executives. She has implemented several large and successful projects, which have brought significant benefits to the organization.