![\"Sierre](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/GroupHD.jpg\")
Supervisor Jan Pyschik (far left) set a \u2018wildcard\u2019 challenge for Ternoey (far right). Courtesy of Sierre Ternoey<\/p>\nWhen Northeastern University industrial engineering student Sierre Ternoey started her research position in Aachen, Germany, she was challenged to fix an issue that frustrates chemical engineers worldwide.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The industrial plants that make cleaning agents, clothing fabrics and countless other products are designed using sophisticated software that lays out a \u201cchemical flow sheet,\u201d Ternoey, explained, essentially a \u201cblueprint for how a chemical factory is going to work.\u201d<\/p>\n
This software simulates production processes to ensure chemical ingredients are mixed and recycled, while useful products are separated. But first drafts typically don\u2019t work perfectly.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat you get back is a long, dense report telling you something broke without telling you why,\u201d Ternoey told Northeastern Global News. \u201cSorting out the cause takes real experience, a lot of time\u201d and, in practice, she added, a ton of guesswork.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Using skills she acquired in a first-year course at Northeastern, she was able to produce an AI agent that could read the report and diagnose the problem \u2013 and then fix the flow sheet, to hand back a working simulation.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the best configuration, the agent passed 26 of 30 test cases,\u201d she said, meaning it found a solution without disturbing the engineer\u2019s original design choices.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For Ternoey, her experience was the fulfillment of a course that had taught both hands-on tools and problem-solving initiative \u2013 all skills she needed, she admitted, as she\u2019d \u201cnever taken a chemical engineering course.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Innovation learned at Northeastern<\/p>\n
Ternoey grew up in the German-speaking region of Switzerland and had all the language skills she needed for her semester at RWTH Aachen University, Germany\u2019s largest technical school. But the industrial engineering undergraduate arrived with some trepidation, she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was definitely excited and optimistic, but I got here when it was kind of very dark and gloomy weather. It had snowed, I didn\u2019t know a single person in this town, and I was definitely nervous that I wasn\u2019t going to be able to cut it at my co-op,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But these fears were quickly put to rest as she found a small community that welcomed her into salsa lessons and found her a place to continue training in Taekwondo, which she competed in while on Northeastern\u2019s Boston campus.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Supervisor Jan Pyschik (far left) set a \u2018wildcard\u2019 challenge for Ternoey (far right). Courtesy of Sierre Ternoey<\/p>\n
Her supervisor, research associate Jan Pyschik said the project he set was \u201ckind of a wildcard\u201d that didn\u2019t quite fit into his research agenda and was too uncertain to be assigned as a student\u2019s thesis.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHonestly, I was curious,\u201d to see what she could achieve, he said. When other students had considered it, they were advised to avoid it because \u201cit wasn\u2019t clear if it was going to work at all,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Thankfully, Ternoey brought with her a \u201crelentless can-do attitude,\u201d he said. \u201cShe was like: \u2018This will be a big daunting task,\u2019 but then she went to work.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although she had no chemical engineering experience, her studies at Northeastern gave her the tools to take on such a complex challenge. Northeastern\u2019s Cornerstone of Engineering course \u201cput me in front of problems before I had the tools to solve them and told me to start anyway,\u201d said Ternoey, who called it her hardest but best class.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Engineering professor Kathryn Schulte Grahame, known as KSG to students, teaches the essential components to being an engineer, including the engineering design process, engineering ethics, computer-aided design programs and programming. But the course, partnered with a local elementary school, specializes in teaching students to think like self-motivated engineers, and sets them an open challenge to create\u00a0 museum-style exhibits for a pop-up exhibition that will engage a class of budding scientists.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Students start with a big idea \u2013 like Ternoey\u2019s team\u2019s concept for a PacMan-style video game about bees \u2013 and then learn in a milestone system that breaks down big challenges into small, attainable goals, with weekly class check-ins, explained Schulte Grahame. \u201cThe project is fairly open-ended and the students can create whatever they feel is best for our partners. Whatever idea they choose, they must follow through on, creating their own goals and solving their own problems,\u201d she explained.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think that it taught me to approach something that I\u2019d never approached before and be comfortable with just starting,\u201d said Ternoey. When she began her project in Aachen, she was reminded of making her first electrical circuit in KSG\u2019s class, she said. \u201cI was thinking, \u2018Okay, this is the same. We\u2019re going to start by making one flow sheet. We\u2019re going to watch one tutorial,\u2019\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
In Aachen, the results have been so encouraging that Pyschik hopes that her successful agent could be the basis for a scientific paper and a working tool for anyone stumped by the software\u2019s error reports. \u201cSierre did quite a lot of fundamental work and we\u2019re now trying to narrow it down\u201d and shape it into an article for a journal, he added.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Schulte Grahame says Ternoey\u2019s drive was already clear during her first year in Boston, where, despite realizing that her PacMan game would require a crash course in advanced programming, Sierre and her team persisted for the elementary school community that was her clients.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cShe taught herself something new: learning for the sake of creating something great for another human, not just for a grade,\u201d said Schulte Grahame. \u201cWhen the pressure was on and there was no single solution, Sierre learned to trust her instincts and knowledge to truly become an engineer.\u201d<\/p>\n
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