Digital Twins
We cannot properly leverage digital tools and smart materials to service our infrastructure needs without a resilient data backbone. At a fundamental level, we need to derive
- a proof-of-concept DT data structure and cloud architecture able to support expressways product data built with smart materials, and to enable data science, robotic monitoring and federation across multiple cloud tenants, along with a strategy for static and dynamic data curation (TRL2) to enable productisation and facilitate data security and future-proofing by exploiting distributed ledger concepts such as blockchain;
- methods to generate and update the DT from pre-existing, WP4 field-captured and WP2 smart materials-provided data;
- how to approach machine-data and human-data interfaces to support WP3 and WP4 processes. The outcomes include an Information DeliveryManual (IDM) and prototypes of the data structure, cloud architecture, and methods validated to address the above. This work will act as the main reference point for all other WPs and the foundation for integration work in WP3 and the benefits realisation plan. It is a core business advantage for COS, as it will be extensible to other asset types. It will also help develop an understanding in NH and COS on the purpose and scope of future uses of a digital twin.