From simple digital twin to complex digital twin part II: Multi-scenario applications of digital twin shop floor

The shop floor has always been an important application object for the digital twin. It is well known that production, process, and product are the core business of the shop floor. Therefore, the digital twin shop floor covers multi-dimensional information and multi-scale application scenarios. In this paper, the digital twin shop floor is constructed according to the modeling method of the complex digital twin proposed in Part I. The digital twin shop floor is firstly divided into several simple digital twins that focus on scenarios of different scales. Two simple application scenarios are constructed, including tool wear prediction and spindle temperature prediction. Main functions in different application scenarios, such as data acquisition, data processing, and data visualization, are implemented and encapsulated as components to construct simple digital twins. Secondly, ontology models, knowledge graphs, and message queues are used to assemble these simple digital twins into the complex digital twin shop floor. And two complex application scenarios are constructed, including machining geometry simulation considering spindle temperature and production scheduling considering tool wear. The implementation of the complex digital twin shop floor demonstrates the feasibility of the proposed modeling method.     

面向智能矿山与新工科的数字孪生技术研究

将数字孪生与人工智能(AI)技术相结合,提出了基于数字孪生+AI的智能矿山建设新思路。探索了智能矿山技术发展路径,研究了数字孪生技术的特征、应用领域及发展趋势,指出数字孪生是数字化矿山发展的必然趋势。提出了基于数字孪生+AI的智能矿山理论架构,构建了矿山数字孪生模型,模型自下而上分别为矿山全要素物理实体、矿山信息物理融合层、矿山数字孪生模型、矿山孪生数据交互层、矿山应用智能服务层,据此实现智能矿山的泛在感知、协同控制和智能决策与优化。从应用实际需求出发,探讨了智能矿山模型构建技术、智能开采数字孪生体技术、矿山智能控制技术、矿山设备故障预测、基于数字孪生的人机交互等关键技术。通过研究数字孪生在智能矿山中的应用,为AI技术在智能矿山应用落地提供思路,为未来智能矿山新工科建设提供理论借鉴。     

An effective MBSE approach for constructing industrial robot digital twin system

Recently, the rapid development of digital twin (DT) technology has been regarded significant in Cyber-physical systems (CPS) promotion. Scholars are focusing on the theoretical architecture and implementing applications, in order to establish a high-fidelity, dynamic, and full-lifecycle DT model and achieve a deep fusion of real and virtual. As a typical complex system with multi-disciplines, multi-physics, and multi-domain characteristics, industrial robot (IR) involves various processes and elements from the two other levels of the system: components and production lines. Their complex relationships lead to a huge challenge to build a comprehensive DT model. Current researchers usually concentrates on single-layer services because of limited construction methodology, which results in enormous isolated models, and leads to low reusable system blocks, finite scalability, and high costs of design, adjustment, upgrade, and maintenance. To address these issues, a standardized methodology and a hierarchical, modular, and generic architecture are proposed to depict comprehensive and variable industrial robot digital twin (IRDT). Firstly, the ontology information model is presented by analyzing variable factors systematically. Then, model-based system engineering (MBSE) based methodology is introduced, including construction process and variants management. After modeling process of three levels (problem domain, solution main, and implementation domain) and four viewpoints (requirement, structure, behavior, and parameter), a generic architecture of IRDT is constructed and a feature-based variants management method is described. Besides, a six-axis IRDTS is implemented to illustrate the mapping of logical architecture and physical system as a multi-level elements and processes representation example. And the steps of numerical evaluations consist of system delay and derivation. Finally, results show the effectiveness and the potential of the proposed theoretical methodology for constructing IRDTS and other industrial applications.     

Enabling technologies and tools for digital twin

Digital twin is revolutionizing industry. Fired by sensor updates and history data, the sophisticated models can mirror almost every facet of a product, process or service. In the future, everything in the physical world would be replicated in the digital space through digital twin technology. As a cutting-edge technology, digital twin has received a lot of attention. However, digital twin is far from realizing their potential, which is a complex system and long-drawn process. Researchers must model all the different parts of the objects or systems. Varied types of data needed to be collected and merged. Many researchers and participators in engineering are not clear which technologies and tools should be used. 5-dimension digital twin model provides reference guidance for understanding and implementing digital twin. From the perspective of 5-dimension digital twin model, this paper tries to investigate and summarize the frequently-used enabling technologies and tools for digital twin to provide technologies and tools references for the applications of digital twin in the future.     

Mutual information-enhanced digital twin promotes vision-guided robotic grasping

Vision-guided learning for autonomous robotic manipulations is a wide-ranging and high-impact topic in the context of smart manufacturing. Most learning strategies are object-centered or prior information-dependent, which likely lead to the problems of generalization across objects or scenes. To alleviate this, this work presented an embodiment decision-making method by the marriage between the digital twin epistemology and information-theoretic approach. The initial insight was that the mutual information generated in the interactions between the available vision models and real-world perceptions could decrease the uncertainty of sensing-action processes. Further, the real-time interactive information gains and visual templates constitute the digital twin through bidirectional data flowing and real-time optimization. As a demonstration of concept, on the conveyor-based and vision-guided robotic grasping platform, the robotic grasping experiments of freely placed and moving parts were performed. Experimental results indicated that the autonomous and real-time optimization of the conveyor-based and vision-guided robotic grasping system happens and the adaptability to the real-world changes had been clearly increased. This research suggested that the representation and dynamic capture of the complex interactions between both sides of cyber-physical system could generate new possibilities to the evolution of decision-making paradigm in more complex industrial processes.     

基于数字孪生的Buck电路故障诊断方法

针对Buck电路故障诊断方法存在计算量大和准确率低等问题,提出了一种基于数字孪生的Buck电路故障诊断方法。首先,通过Matlab/Simulink软件平台建立Buck电路的数字孪生模型,并根据Buck电路元器件标称值设置数字孪生模型初始参数;然后,将采集的Buck电路输出电压信号及运行状态映射到数字孪生模型中,根据数字孪生模型与Buck电路的输出电压建立目标函数,并利用Levenberg-Marquart算法迭代优化目标函数,实现数字孪生模型的更新,最终实现Buck电路元器件参数估计;最后,比较数字孪生模型得到的参数估计值与Buck电路元器件标称值,若二者之差超过标称值20%,表明元器件失效,从而实现Buck电路故障诊断。实验结果表明,该方法对Buck电路元器件参数具有较高的估计精度与诊断可靠性。     

数字孪生与生产线仿真技术研究

随着新一代信息技术与制造技术的深度融合,仿真技术正向着信息系统与物理系统深度融合和高效协同的方向发展,应运而生的数字孪生技术成为近年来的新兴研究热点.为探索采用新一代信息技术促进离散制造行业数字化转型升级,从仿真技术的发展脉络和应用场景入手,引入基于数字孪生技术开展生产线仿真分析的研究,介绍了数字孪生技术的概念和内涵,...     

Feature-based modeling for industrial processes in the context of digital twins: A case study of HVOF process

Industrial process modeling is currently undergoing a fundamental transformation, leading towards interconnected close-loop twins of models, i.e., the parametrically-controlled real-world physics model, and its corresponding digitalized virtual system model. Between these models, a highly time-sensitive mutual validation mechanism and a coherent and consistent control strategy are applied, which demand complex virtual-and-real world model-based information mapping and synchronization. Thus, this research proposes a semantic conceptual framework for industrial process modeling in the context of digital twins. Based on a hierarchical structure of digital twins, this framework modularizes the modeling process in terms of the semantic information modules of physics in the real-world phenomena, and clarifies inter-module associations and near-real-time data transmission coupled with virtual analysis in CAE environment so that the time-sensitive phenomenon information objects distributed on virtually-separated sub-level physics models can be supported for representing the real-world process comprehensively. Advanced feature concept is adopted to construct the digital models as the basic compositions of any virtual industrial process. The related feature definitions are extended in this work so that the common characteristics in the concept of digital twins could be generically and concisely represented. To validate the modeling method, the digital model of a prototyped High-velocity Oxygen-fuel (HVOF) coating process system was constructed as the case study. The data from the nozzle trajectory, the flame, and the in-flight particle behavior, and the transient thermal performance of the coating layer and substrate were synchronously incorporated for simulating the transient phenomena of the substrate component temperature and coating thickness distribution on the substrate surface. The final simulation result validates that the feature-based digital model is able to comprehensively reflect the real-world scenario on the virtual side. To illustrate how the developed model provides meaningful feedback to the real-world control, a general digital twin setup of the model is given at the end of the case study.     

数字孪生潭江流域先行先试建设与实践

数字孪生流域与数字孪生水网、数字孪生水利工程互联互通、信息共享、各有侧重,共同构成数字孪生水利系统核心,是推动新时代水利高质量发展的重要实施路径之一_[^1]。水利部于2022年2月启动了数字孪生流域建设先行先试工作,为切实其提高潭江流域水利工程防洪调度能力,江门市水利局按照水利部及广东省数字孪生流域试点建设工作要求_[^2],开展数字孪生潭江流域建设。数字孪生潭江面向流域防洪调度需求,以精细化调度22宗大中型水库、7宗梯级闸陂为目标,围绕四预核心功能,建设数据底板、模型平台、业务应用等内容,构建了流域LI级数据底板,流域重点区域及重点工程L2级数据底板,开发了五大类水利专业模型,初步构建了流域联合调度平台,并在2022年“龙舟水”、西北江洪水、台风暴雨防御期间投入实战,助力潭江流域水库水闸的群联合调度,取得防洪不受淹水资源不浪费的最佳效益。     

Modeling and implementation of a digital twin of material flows based on physics simulation

Cyber-physical production systems enable adaptivity and flexibility when manufacturing customized products in small batches. Due to varying routes and a high variance of workpieces, material flows in cyber-physical production systems can get highly complex, which can lead to physically induced disturbances that can result in accidents or decreased throughput and high costs. This issue can be addressed by applying a physics engine to simulate the physical interaction between workpieces and the material handling systems during the operation. Connecting such a digital model to a real material handling system in order to derive simulation-based decision support leads to the concept of digital twins. To date, few practical implementations of digital twins in manufacturing outside the machine tool domain were reported. Therefore, this paper describes the modeling and the subsequent implementation of an integrated system that consists of a real material handling system and its digital twin, based on physics simulation. A practical use case demonstrates the versatile advantages of the implemented solution for a manufacturing system with respect to the three digital twin functions prediction, monitoring and diagnosis.     

Construction method of shop-floor digital twin based on MBSE

Digital twin (DT) technology is essential for achieving the fusion of virtual-real cyber-physical systems. Academics and companies have made great strides in the theoretical research and case studies of constructing the shop-floor digital twin (SDT), which is the premise of applying DT technology on the shop floor. A shop floor is a large complex system that involves many elements including people, machines, materials, methods, and the environment and processes, such as the technical flow, business process, logistics, and control flow. However, most of the developed cases lack a hierarchical, structured and modularized implementation framework for the development of an SDT system, which leads to problems such as a low reuse rate of the system blocks, lack of scalability, and high upgrade and maintenance costs. In response to these issues, we propose a construction method of the DT for the shop floor based on model-based systems engineering from the perspective of the system. In this method, a comprehensive DT model for the shop floor is gradually constructed by using system modeling language, the modeling method “MagicGrid,” and the “V model” of systems engineering. The model includes four dimensions of the shop-floor requirements, structure, behavior, and parameters, as well as three stages (the problem domain, solution domain, and implementation domain), and connects nine steps of the “V model,” including the system requirements, system architecture, subsystem implementation, subsystem integration, and system verification. Then, based on an example of a real NC machining shop floor, subsystems including a visualization system, synchronization system, and simulation system, are discussed. Finally, the functions of the integrated systems are verified based on the requirements, including the real-time synchronization of “man, machine, material, and method” and the transient simulation in real time. The numerical indicators of the integrated system are verified, including the model completeness and synchronization timeliness.     

Multi-scale evolution mechanism and knowledge construction of a digital twin mimic model

Metal products are susceptible to factors such as cutting force, clamping force and heat in the machining process, resulting in product quality problems, such as geometric deformation and surface defects. The real-time observation and control of product quality are integral to optimizing machining process. Digital twin technologies can be used to monitor and control the quality of products via multi-scale based quality analysis. However, previous research on digital twin lacks a fine-grained expression and generation method for product multi-scale quality, making it impossible to carry out an in-depth analysis of product quality. Aiming at addressing this challenge, we study the multi-scale evolution mechanism of the digital twin model and explore the knowledge generation method of the digital twin data. The proposed method constructed the digital twin quality knowledge model from the macro, meso, and micro levels by utilizing the data of the digital twin mimic model. These multi-scale quality knowledge models can express product quality in a fine-grained way and provide data support for digital twin-based decision-making. Finally, we tested the method in monitoring and controlling the machining quality of an air rudder to verify the feasibility of the proposed method.     

Conceptual digital twin modeling based on an integrated five-dimensional framework and TRIZ function model

Digital twin represents a fusion of the informational and physical domains, to bridge the material and virtual worlds. Existing methods of digital twin modeling are mainly based on modular representation, which limits guidance of the modeling process. Such methods do not consider the components or operational rules of the digital twin in detail, thereby preventing designers from applying these methods in their fields. With the increasing application of digital twin to various engineering fields, an effective method of modeling a multi-dimensional digital twin at the conceptual level is required. To such an end, this paper presents a method for the conceptual modeling of a digital twin based on a five-dimensional digital twin framework to represent the complex relationship between digital twin objects and their attributes. The proposed method was used to model the digital twin of an intelligent vehicle at the concept level.     

数字孪生小浪底知识库建设研究与实践

随着大数据、人工智能等新技术的飞速发展，信息技术在水利工程运行管理中正发挥越来越重要的支撑作用。数字孪生小浪底作为水利部数字孪生水利建设的首批试点工程，其知识库的建设是数字孪生小浪底的核心组成部分，技术难度大，业务场景应用面临着较大挑战。本文针对数字孪生小浪底知识库的建设进行了系统性的研究与实践，采用了知识引擎、知识库和知识应用三部分组成的知识库架构体系，实现了基于水利知识的检索、问答、推荐和推理决策等多样化服务，并在数字孪生“四预”业务应用中进行实践和验证，为小浪底枢纽的工程安全和防汛调度等核心业务提供了重要支撑。本文数字孪生小浪底知识库建设为类似水利工程具有参考价值和实践意义。     

Building a right digital twin with model engineering

In recent years, the concept of digital twin (DT) is attracting more and more attention from researchers and engineers. But there is still no consensus on what a right DT is. On one hand, some common models are renamed as DTs. On the other hand, some DTs extremely pursue ‘the same’ as physical objects, which bring unnecessary complexities to them. In this paper, we try to answer two questions from the point of view of model engineering: how to define a right digital twin, and how to build a right digital twin. The concept and related technologies of model engineering are introduced. Some basic principles and a set of metrics for a right DT are given. An evolutionary concurrent modeling method for DT (ECoM4DT) is proposed not only inheriting the theory from classic M&S methods but also highlighting the characteristics of DT compared with traditional models to systemically guide the DT modeling process.     

基于混合现实的数字孪生自动驾驶测试环境构建

随着现阶段数字孪生技术的不断发展,围绕着数字孪生的研究和应用逐渐成为了热点.由于传统的自动驾驶测试方法存在着不同程度的功能性、安全性以及测试成本方面的各种缺陷,本文针对数字孪生的基本特征以及自动驾驶的测试方法,提出了一种混合现实下数字孪生自动驾驶测试环境的构建方法,利用空间坐标映射、碰撞检测模型、虚拟场景注册,将实际环境下的自动驾驶信息映射到虚拟场景中,同时构建了对应的混合现实的自动驾驶测试模型,并通过实验展示了混合现实系统具有交互特征的碰撞测试,对比了50 ms、200 ms和1000 ms采样频率下系统的性能并进行了分析,实验表明,本文算法在采样频率200 ms或以上,有较好的运行帧率特征.     

Bi-level dynamic scheduling architecture based on service unit digital twin agents

Pure reactive scheduling is one of the core technologies to solve the complex dynamic disturbance factors in real-time. The emergence of CPS, digital twin, cloud computing, big data and other new technologies based on the industrial Internet enables information acquisition and pure reactive scheduling more practical to some extent. However, how to build a new architecture to solve the problems which traditional dynamic scheduling methods cannot solve becomes a new research challenge. Therefore, this paper designs a new bi-level distributed dynamic workshop scheduling architecture, which is based on the workshop digital twin scheduling agent and multiple service unit digital twin scheduling agents.Within this architecture, scheduling a physical workshop is decomposed to the whole workshop scheduling in the first level and its service unit scheduling in the second level. On the first level, the whole workshop scheduling is executed by its virtual workshop coordination (scheduling) agent embedded with the workshop digital twin consisting of multi-service unit digital twins. On the second level, each service unit scheduling coordinated by the first level scheduling is executed in a distributed way by the corresponding service unit scheduling agent associated with its service unit digital twin. The benefits of the new architecture include (1) if a dynamic scheduling only requires a single service unit scheduling, it will then be performed in the corresponding service unit scheduling without involving other service units, which will make the scheduling locally, simply and robustly. (2) when a dynamic scheduling requires changes in multiple service units in a coordinated way, the first level scheduling will be executed and then coordinate the second level service unit scheduling accordingly. This divide-and-then-conquer strategy will make the scheduling easier and practical.The proposed architecture has been tested to illustrate its feasibility and practicality.     

面向数字孪生流域的云网融合架构研究

数字孪生流域建设是智慧水利建设的重要标志,是推动流域水利高质量发展的必然要求。为了应对当前数字孪生流域建设过程中面临的流域物联感知能力、通信传输网络资源、模型算法仿真计算水平等方面的不足而产生的挑战,本文结合云网融合的云网协同、按需互联、敏捷智能的服务能力特性,基于云网融合层次化的设计思想,把流域云和网充分融合,有效调度并应用计算、通信、存储等基础设施资源,提出了面向数字孪生流域的云网融合逻辑架构,梳理并阐述了水利感知网云网融合服务实现、水利信息网云网融合服务实现、数字孪生平台算力服务实现等可应用于数字孪生流域建设的云网融合服务架构,总结分析了面向数字孪生流域的云网融合关键技术。研究对充分发挥新一代信息技术对数字孪生流域建设的支撑驱动作用具有重要参考意义。     

Hybrid learning-based digital twin for manufacturing process: Modeling framework and implementation

Digital twin (DT) and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies are powerful enablers for Industry 4.0 toward sustainable resilient manufacturing. Digital twins of machine tools and machining processes combine advanced digital techniques and production domain knowledge, facilitate the enhancement of agility, traceability, and resilience of production systems, and help machine tool builders achieve a paradigm shift from one-time products provision to on-going service delivery. However, the adaptability and accuracy of digital twins at the shopfloor level are restricted by heterogeneous data sources, modeling precision as well as uncertainties from dynamical industrial environments. This article proposes a novel modeling framework to address these inadequacies by in-depth integrating AI techniques and machine tool expertise using aggregated data along the product development process. A data processing procedure is constructed to contextualize metadata sources from the design, planning, manufacturing, and quality stages and link them into a digital thread. On this consistent data basis, a modeling pipeline is presented to incorporate production and machine tool prior knowledge into AI development pipeline, while considering the multi-fidelity nature of data sources in dynamic industrial circumstances. In terms of implementation, we first introduce our existing work for building digital twins of machine tool and manufacturing process. Within this infrastructure, we developed a hybrid learning-based digital twin for manufacturing process following proposed modeling framework and tested it in an external industrial project exemplarily for real-time workpiece quality monitoring. The result indicates that the proposed hybrid learning-based digital twin enables learning uncertainties of the interaction of machine tools and machining processes in real industrial environments, thus allows estimating and enhancing the modeling reliability, depending on the data quality and accessibility. Prospectively, it also contributes to the reparametrization of model parameters and to the adaptive process control.