July 2024

The digital twin technology has significantly advanced in recent years, with one possible use being in general education. For learners, approaching sustainability through digital twins can significantly enhance understanding and retention, especially in STEM subjects, where visual representation aids comprehension. For educators, digital twins offer a dynamic platform for developing and delivering curriculum, making abstract concepts tangible and interactive to foster learner engagement. Moreover, using digital twin technology can be significantly important in VET education and its connection to Industry 4.0. It can enhance the knowledge, skills, and competences of VET learners. For teachers and trainers, it can improve the necessary knowledge and tools to implement digital twin-based practical and experiential learning, ensuring students achieve the competences needed. Lastly, for schools and training centers, it can facilitate the implementation of practical distance learning. In more detail, learning and using digital twin technology early on can help learners prepare for the future job market, as digital twins are increasingly used in various industries, including manufacturing, healthcare, smart cities, and logistics. Moreover, it involves understanding data analytics, IoT (Internet of Things), AI (Artificial Intelligence), and simulation, all of which are essential skills in the modern workforce. Another advantage of the digital twin technology is developing data literacy, offering insight on how to collect, analyze, and interpret data. Digital twin technology also involves discussions on data privacy, security, and ethical considerations, preparing students to navigate these issues in their future careers. Digital twin technology is also very closely linked to STEM education (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics). Learners can see real-time simulations and practical applications of theoretical concepts, which enhances their understanding and retention. A hands-on approach can increase engagement and motivation, particularly in challenging subjects like physics, biology, and engineering. Cross-sector and overall useful skills for everyday life, such as critical thinking and problem solving, can also be enhanced. Working with digital twins requires understanding and managing complex systems, as well as analyzing different scenarios and predicting outcomes. Those skills can also be transferred in academic environments. Another advantage of digital twins is the adaptability it can offer. By simulating different learning paths and outcomes, educators can tailor instruction to meet individual learners’ needs. By receiving immediate feedback on their actions and decisions within a digital twin environment, learners can move on to quicker adjustments and a deeper understanding of the material. Interdisciplinary learning is also supported, as it involves subjects like computer science, engineering, mathematics, and environmental science. Innovation and digital twins go, of course, hand-in-hand: learners engage in project-based learning, where they design, build, and analyze digital twins, fostering creativity. This transfers to real-world problem-solving, by simulating and solving real-world problems, such as climate change, urban planning, and healthcare management, providing learners with a sense of purpose and relevance. Academic or theoretical research can sometimes feel out of touch with reality, and being able to imagine precise applications and solutions offers motivation. Last but certainly not least, all skills developed can foster future global competitiveness, as an early understanding of cutting-edge technology can help schools and training centers can cultivate the next generation of innovators and leaders. The DiTwin project aspires to do exactly that: offer an integrated system (modules, DiTwin System, supporting materials and training paths) to support VET teachers in implementing Digital Twin-based activities at school. Bibliography: Ağca, Rıdvan. (2023). Using digital twins in education from an innovative perspective: Potential and application areas. Education Mind. 2. 10.58583/Pedapub.EM2306, retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/376983460_Using_digital_twins_in_education_from_an_innovative_perspective_Potential_and_application_areas/citation/download Jin, S. (2021). DIGITAL TWINS AND THE FUTURE OF PRACTICAL EDUCATION, Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, retrieved from https://digitalsocietyschool.org/project/digital-twins-in-practical-education/ Twinview (2024). Building Tomorrow’s Classrooms Today: How Digital Twins Are Reshaping Education, retrieved from https://www.twinview.com/insights/building-tomorrows-classrooms-today-how-digital-twins-are-reshaping-education

We’ve heard about digital twin technology in the media as a trendy technology. But what is it? A simulation of something real? a virtual world full of avatars? a digital copy of myself? or none of the above. In any case, what are they applications? This misinformation usually happens when a concept becomes fashionable and we are bombarded with different interpretations of its real meaning, giving us only a biased view. Therefore, this article is focused to provide us with a precise answer tothe above questions and presents the applications of digital twin technologies. Basic concepts: modelling and simulation Almost all of us have had the experience that, when buying a house or a car, the seller tells us: let’s simulate your loan, so that you can see the monthly instalments, the capital you amortize and the interest you pay. They use a set of financial equations that, when you enter the data on interest, APR (Annual Percentage Rate) and those other things we don’t understand, give you a list of how your payments will evolve in the future. The seller says that has simulated your mortgage or loan. That’s what simulation is: using a set of equations, called a model, to predict how something will behave in the future. Thus, through thesemagic equations, most of natural events can be modelled mathematically, as far as the knowledge of science allows. Models of the expansion of the universe, planetary motion, or the Earth’s climate can be simulated to know what will happen in nature in the future. But we can also make models of artificial systems, the devices created by mankind. We have played with flight simulators or car racing simulators that emulate on a computer the behaviour of a machine in interaction with the environment and the human who drives it. The digital twin: a step forward As we have seen, a model, through a process called simulation, can predict the behaviour of a machine in the form of output data, which can be presented in many forms such as graphs or three-dimensional animations. In this sense it is a closed process that anticipates the response of the simulated machine to given initial conditions. Thus, we can simulate the behaviour of a nuclear reactor in different scenarios to predict when it may become unstable, in order to develop safety protocols. But what happens if we connect the model to the real nuclear reactor? That is, we feed the same conditions from the existing reactor scenario into the reactor model and compare the output data from both. Then we have a digital twin of the reactor that is composed of the real system coupled to the mathematical model, so that by comparing the output data of them, I can diagnose or predict future situations or failures. This is the true utility of digital twins, the realisation of decision support systems that allow to act on the real system in the most efficient way possible to achieve certain objectives. Applications of digital twins: decision support Digital twins have an immediate application in all those processes, biological or productive, that require action on them to achieve certain objectives. Thus, in the medical field, there are digital twins of types of patients to achieveso-called personalised medicine, or the use of planners for neurological or orthopaedic surgery. In agriculture, they are used to decide on irrigation policy, fertiliser use and crop rotation. In the tourism sector, they are used to schedule tourist visits to monuments in order to predict the deterioration of the latter. In industry, of course, they are widely used in the Industry 4.0 concept to decide machine maintenance policies or to design more efficient production lines, among many other applications. It is common in this field to use models to test the operation of the production line before it is actually built. This is called “virtual commissioning”. Digital twins and education: remote laboratories They allow a democratisation of resources in education, in the sense that they can provide virtual laboratories for practice to schools that cannot afford to invest in a real laboratory. This is critical in technical degrees related to Industry 4.0, where there is a need for facilities that emulate the industrial reality of their production lines with specialised machinery, robots and other devices for automation. Therefore, the DiTwin KA220-VE project, funded by the Erasmus+ programme, will develop teaching tools based on digital twin technologies. This is intended to include practices based on remote laboratories, which will complement theoretical knowledge. The idea focuses on bridging the gap between theory and practical knowledge needed for Industry 4.0 enabling technologies. This project aims to improve the digital competences of VET teachers to support the implementation of digital twin-based activities and the achievement of the digital competences required by Industry 4.0. Contribution of the University of Malaga in the DiTwin project The University of Malaga, through the Department of Systems Engineering and Automation and the Imech.umaInstitute, is the partner within the DiTwin project responsible for the development of the digital twins relating to a remote laboratory of a robotic industrial cell. This educational tool will allow online practices of students of Higher Vocational Training on the programming of robotic arms, communications and the use of sensors, disciplines necessary in Industry 4.0. This remote laboratory will be integrated into the free educational platform DiTwin, which will also contain other educational tools and resources.