Foundational Research Gaps and Future Directions for Digital Twins

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Across multiple domains of science, engineering, and medicine, excitement is growing about the potential of digital twins to transform scientific research, industrial practices, and many aspects of daily life. A digital twin couples computational models with a physical counterpart to create a system that is dynamically updated through bidirectional data flows as conditions change. Going beyond traditional simulation and modeling, digital twins could enable improved medical decision-making at the individual patient level, predictions of future weather and climate conditions over longer timescales, and safer, more efficient engineering processes. However, many challenges remain before these applications can be realized.

This report identifies the foundational research and resources needed to support the development of digital twin technologies. The report presents critical future research priorities and an interdisciplinary research agenda for the field, including how federal agencies and researchers across domains can best collaborate.

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202 pages · 6 x 9 · paperback
ISBN Paperback: 0-309-70042-6
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-70043-4
DOI: https://doi.org/10.17226/26894

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National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2024. Foundational Research Gaps and Future Directions for Digital Twins. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

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The digital twin is an emerging technology that builds on the convergence of computer science, mathematics, engineering, and the life sciences. Digital twins have the potential to revolutionize atmospheric and climate sciences in particular, as they could be used, for example, to create global-scale interactive models of Earth to predict future weather and climate conditions over longer timescales.

On February 1-2, 2023, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine hosted a public, virtual workshop to discuss characterizations of digital twins within the context of atmospheric, climate, and sustainability sciences and to identify methods for their development and use. Workshop panelists presented varied definitions and taxonomies of digital twins and highlighted key challenges as well as opportunities to translate promising practices to other fields. The second in a three-part series, this evidence-gathering workshop will inform a National Academies consensus study on research gaps and future directions to advance the mathematical, statistical, and computational foundations of digital twins in applications across science, medicine, engineering, and society.

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13 pages · 8.5 x 11 ·
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-70128-7
DOI: https://doi.org/10.17226/26921

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National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Opportunities and Challenges for Digital Twins in Atmospheric and Climate Sciences: Proceedings of a Workshop—in Brief. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

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The digital twin is an emerging technology that builds on the convergence of computer science, mathematics, engineering, and the life sciences. Digital twins have potential across engineering domains, from aeronautics to renewable energy. On February 7 and 9, 2023, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine hosted a public, virtual workshop to discuss characterizations of digital twins within the context of engineering and to identify methods for their development and use. Panelists highlighted key technical challenges and opportunities across use cases, as well as areas ripe for research and development and investment. The third in a three-part series, this evidence-gathering workshop will inform a National Academies consensus study on research gaps and future directions to advance the mathematical, statistical, and computational foundations of digital twins in applications across science, medicine, engineering, and society.

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13 pages · 8.5 x 11 ·
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-70143-0
DOI: https://doi.org/10.17226/26927

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National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Opportunities and Challenges for Digital Twins in Engineering: Proceedings of a Workshop—in Brief. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

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The digital twin (DT) is an emerging technology that builds on the convergence of computer science, mathematics, engineering, and the life sciences. Given the multiscale nature of biological structures and their environment, biomedical DTs can represent molecules, cells, tissues, organs, systems, patients, and populations and can include aspects from across the modeling and simulation ecosystem. DTs have the potential advance biomedical research with applications for personalized medicine, pharmaceutical development, and clinical trials.

On January 30, 2023, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine hosted a workshop to discuss the definitions and taxonomy of DTs within the biomedical field, current methods and promising practices for DT development and use as various levels of complexity, key technical challenges and opportunities in the near and long term for DT development and use, and opportunities for translation of promising practices from other field and domains. Workshop panelists highlighted key challenges and opportunities for medical DTs at varying scales, including the varied visions and challenges for DTs, the trade-offs between embracing or simplifying complexity in DTs, the unique spatial and temporal considerations that arise, the diversity of models and data being used in DTs, the challenges with connecting data and models across scales, and implementation issues surrounding data privacy in DTs. This publication summarizes the presentation and discussion of the workshop.

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13 pages · 8.5 x 11 ·
ISBN Ebook: 0-309-70129-5
DOI: https://doi.org/10.17226/26922

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National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2023. Opportunities and Challenges for Digital Twins in Biomedical Research: Proceedings of a Workshop—in Brief. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

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