Northeast Manufacturing News • Manufacturing News Northeast Nov 2024 • Digital Twin Capabilities Periodic Table V1.1

Digital Twin Consortium (DTC) has announced Version 1.1 of the Digital Twin Capabilities Periodic Table (CPT), an architecture and technology agnostic requirements definition framework for organizations that want to design, develop, deploy and operate digital twins based on use case capability requirements versus the features of technology solutions.

The CPT follows a periodic table approach with capabilities grouped around common characteristics. It provides visual guidance for collaboration, brainstorming and making capability requirements explicit. The latest iteration reflects DTC’s commitment to continuous improvement, driven by the community’s valuable insights and active participation.

“CPT Version 1.1 provides important additions that continue to emphasize capabilities over specific technologies and includes a revised machine-readable schema for greater ease of implementation,” said Pieter Van Schalkwyk, CEO of XMPro, co-chair of the AI Joint Working Group, part of OMG/Digital Twin Consortium. “Serving as the key part of the Composability Framework, the CPT facilitates greater flexibility and innovation, ensuring that digital twin system development focuses on interoperability, scalability, design reuse and aligned with the evolving needs of businesses.”

“We are laying a robust foundation for the evolution of the CPT with a structured approach and integration of new capabilities like responsibility and search,” said Dan Isaacs, GM & CTO, DTC. “We are already working on V2 of the CPT, with plans to increase interoperability with AI, better incorporate geospatial and related spatial computing topics and provide more guidance on aligning use cases.”

• Responsibility as a core capability— Responsibility is introduced as a trustworthiness capability in Version 1.1, emphasizing ethical considerations. This encapsulates ethics, ESG criteria, AI explainability and fairness, underscoring the need for responsible and trustworthy digital twin operations.

• Search capability—One of the new capabilities in Version 1.1 is “Search.” Far from being just a feature within the table, it is a fundamental capability for digital twins to navigate and manage complex datasets within their environments efficiently.

• Consolidated and refined capabilities— Extended Reality (XR): DTC has consolidated Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) into Extended Reality (XR), reflecting the convergence of these technologies and supporting an integrated approach to immersive experiences.

• Domain specific data management— DTC has reclassified temporal data stores under “Domain Specific Data Management,” acknowledging the variety of domain- specific data types, such as geospatial data, essential for digital twins.

• Structured abbreviations—Moving beyond sequential numbering, Version 1.1 adopts structured abbreviations for each capability. This change facilitates quicker reference and aligns with the goal of making the CPT more intuitive and accessible.

• Capability mapping—To ease the transition from the initial framework, DTC provides a detailed mapping from the 1.0 to 1.1 capabilities. This guide ensures that existing users can adapt to the updated version with minimal disruption.