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Digital Twin

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CIRP Encyclopedia of Production Engineering

Synonyms

Virtual twin

Definition

A digital twin is a digital representation of an active unique product (real device, object, machine, service, or intangible asset) or unique product-service system (a system consisting of a product and a related service) that comprises its selected characteristics, properties, conditions, and behaviors by means of models, information, and data within a single or even across multiple life cycle phases.

Theory and Application

The term digital twin (DT) was coined by Vickers and introduced as “Mirrored Spaces Model” concept by Grieves in the first executive Product Lifecycle Management courses at the University of Michigan in 2002 (Grieves 2005, 2014, 2016). The concept of the DT has historically evolved from the aerospace industry and has since then been translated into many areas. This may also be a cause for the fact that there is no uniform accepted scientific definition of the term, yet. Nevertheless, the subject was researched intensively during...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Mechanical Engineering and Transport Systems, Department of Machine Tools and Factory Management (IWF), Chair Industrial Information Technology, Technische Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany

    Rainer Stark

  2. Division Virtual Product Creation, Fraunhofer-Institute for Production Systems and Design Technology (IPK), Berlin, Germany

    Rainer Stark & Thomas Damerau

Authors
  1. Rainer Stark
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  2. Thomas Damerau
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rainer Stark .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. IUL-Inst, Tech Univ Dortmund IUL-Inst, Dortmund, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany

    Sami Chatti

  2. Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Istituto di Tecnologie Industriali Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Milan, Italy

    Tullio Tolio

Section Editor information

  1. Japan Educational Foundation, Tokyo, Japan

    Tetsuo Tomyama

  2. TU Berlin, Berlin, Germany

    Rainer Stark

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Stark, R., Damerau, T. (2019). Digital Twin. In: Chatti, S., Tolio, T. (eds) CIRP Encyclopedia of Production Engineering. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-35950-7_16870-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-35950-7_16870-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-35950-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-35950-7

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference EngineeringReference Module Computer Science and Engineering

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