When we design machines, the traditional engineer’s toolbox can look rather empty. We need a new set of manufacturing and construction tools to meet the new realities of software-driven products fueled by digital disruption. A digital twin is a breakthrough technology proposed by Professor Michael Grieves in 2003 at the University of Michigan. We’ve seen glimpses of this technology being used in movies like the Avengers and I Robot. Recently, we’ve seen scientists claim that digital twins can help prevent a pandemic break-out like the Corona crisis, so let us see how true this statement is…
What is a digital twin?
In simple words, a digital twin is a digital representation of a physical object or system. It uses real-time data and other sources to enable learning, reasoning, and dynamically re-calibrating for improved decision making. The technology behind digital twins has expanded to include large items such as buildings, factories, and even cities, and some have said people and processes can have digital twins, expanding the concept even further.
How does it work?
Data
A digital twin requires data about an object or process for a virtual model to be created that can represent the behaviours or states of the real-world item or procedure. This data may relate to the lifecycle of a product and include design specifications, production processes, or engineering information. It can also include production information including equipment, materials, parts, methods, and quality control. Data can also be related to the operation, such as real-time feedback, historical analysis, and maintenance records. Other data used in a digital twin design can include business data or end-of-life procedures.
Modeling
Once the data has been gathered it can be used to create computational analytical models to show operating effects, predict states such as fatigue, and determine behaviours. These models can prescribe actions based on engineering simulations, physics, chemistry, statistics, machine learning, artificial intelligence, business logic, or objectives. These models can be displayed via 3D representations and augmented reality modelling in order to aid human understanding of the findings.
Linking
The findings from digital twins can be linked to create an overview, such as by taking the findings of equipment twins and putting them into a production line twin, which can then inform a factory-scale digital twin. By using linked digital twins in this way it is possible to enable smart industrial applications for real-world operational developments and improvements.
Augmented Reality and Digital Twins
AR and digital twin may be emerging technologies with novel challenges but combining them can ease the pain points associated with each and accelerate digital transformation With agility, flexibility, and scale as some of the main drivers of digital transformation, having interoperable information systems that communicate in real-time is paramount. Building digital twins provide the necessary architecture to deploy multiple augmented reality use cases with minimal effort, and help organizations maximize the value of all of their technology deployments across the value chain.
Industry 4.0
The fourth industrial revolution or Industry 4.0 which embraces automation, data exchange, and manufacturing technologies is at the talking point of the business world. Digital Twins is at the core of this new industrial revolution bringing in unlimited possibilities. It changes the traditional approach of ‘the first build and then tweak’ in the industrial world and brings in a more virtual system based design process that brings in the much more efficient role out of any equipment or system by understanding its unique features, performance, and potential issues if any.
How can Digital Twins Stop a Pandemic?
The application of digital twin technology in the healthcare industry to create personal digital twins for every person can help mitigate the spread of a pandemic. Let’s suppose every person will be flanked by a digital twin, that can raise a red flag in case of need. This red flag can be customised by the person, or more likely by that person’s physician, to generate information when a certain situation emerges, or when there is a risk for the emergence of a certain situation.
We can have, as an example, that all personal digital twins can be designed to accept instructions to raise a red flag when a mix of data creates a specific pattern, like the temperature at rest rising over 37.5 C and occurrence of rapid breathing, This, as we know, is a sign of a possible Covid-19 infection.
Healthcare institutions at the government level can receive these red flags and in turn can analyse a variety of connected data like the occurrence of these red flags in a specific area, analyse the movement of people in the previous months to correlate this with the emergence of other red flags. Notice that in this scenario government and healthcare institutions may impose some kind of data analytics and red flag generation on all personal digital twins to harvest data. With such technology at hand, a pandemic can be stopped before it spreads.
-Article by Abhinav Aithal, 2nd year Electrical and Electronics Engineering