Digital twins can be referred to as the ability to create the virtual representation of the elements and the dynamics of how the Internet of Things(IoT) operates and functions.The distinguished history of digital twin technology can be traced back to the 1990s when the core idea came out as a tale in a book called “Mirror Worlds”.
Later, Its concept was used in small-scale manufacturing during the 2000s, and then the fascination with this technology grew among the people and the technology was gradually innovated and developed.
How does digital twin work?
In a simpler manner, we can say that digital twins are a virtual model that is developed to replicate a physical object in the real world. By this principle, there can be a digital twin of anything and everything. We can develop a digital twin of a building, engine, factory, or maybe even a whole city. Although it may seem like a fictional thing to many of us, this technology solves a very major problem in engineering and other domains.
A digital twin of any object helps us to study its main features and critical functionality and after its analytical study, we can make significant improvements in the physical/real object. For instance, let us consider a car engine, to create its digital copy, we position various kinds of sensors around it. The sensors capture and process vital functionality like cylinder performance, RPM, fuel system, ignition, etc. This collected data is then fetched to some processing systems and after all the program development, a digital twin is created.
What is the use of digital twin?
This process is actually two-way i.e. not only data about physical objects are collected and processed to create a digital twin but even after the development of the digital twin, it is studied and various kinds of stimulation may occur to test the performance and related functions to solve the existing issue and to innovate and improve. In most application using the right database and tools is as imprtant as the valuable improvements made after all the studies and simulations can be back implemented in the physical object in the real world.
The digital twin can be used as a prototype for any physical object and we can perform all kinds of experiments and trials to improve its features and functionality, which otherwise would be very difficult and risky to perform with the real objects.
So, a digital twin can be used across any industry. It depends upon the mode of utilization but it has uses in healthcare, electricity generation, automobile, manufacturing, and many more sectors.
Already, this technology has solved a wide variety of engineering problems like testing of wind turbines, its features like corrosion resistance, motor RPM, etc, and had played a significant role in its improvement.
So all in all, this technology is very useful in pre-product development stages as well as post-product development stages to find the loopholes in the system and then eliminate loopholes and improve the efficiency of the system.
Designing of digital twin?
A digital twin is designed and developed by first collecting the real-time data of the physical object. Data about its features, body, working mode, working condition, etc.
Then we need modeling or virtual representation of the object using the collected data and also the computational models to examine and test the twin of the physical object.
Data collection of the object is the initial and most important stage in designing the digital twin. The more accurate and clean the data is, the more accurate and efficient the twin design will become.
The modeling stage begins after the data is collected and sorted. The data from the previous stage is used to create computational models for determining the behavior and operating conditions of the object. Then the 3D representation of the object is modeled via augmented reality modeling or related technology for human understanding.
So, the digital twin has a huge level of application in today’s world and there is still a lot of scope for its further development for taking it to more advanced stages which will make it a revolutionary technology in the coming future.
