Digital Twin Aging for Infrastructure Degradation Prediction
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Solution Overview
Problem
It is challenging to accurately manage and predict the behavior of infrastructure in customer environments due to the inability of vendors to replicate these environments and limited access, leading to issues like costly degradation and downtime.
Innovation Solution
The use of digital twins to virtually represent infrastructure, which are artificially aged using datasets to simulate current and future states, enabling predictive maintenance and proactive actions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If vendors attempt to replicate operational constraints in customer environments, then prediction accuracy improves, but access denial due to security concerns prevents implementation
Solution Approach 1:
The patent creates a digital twin - a virtual copy of the physical infrastructure - that replicates operational constraints and behavior without requiring access to the actual customer environment. This copy can be artificially aged and tested independently, achieving prediction accuracy without compromising security or requiring customer access.
Solution Approach 2:
The digital twin serves as an intermediary between the vendor and the customer's infrastructure. Instead of directly accessing the customer's environment, the vendor works with the virtual representation, which mediates all testing and analysis activities while maintaining security boundaries.
2Reliability
If digital twins are artificially aged to predict future conditions, then infrastructure reliability improves, but computational resources and time are consumed
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies artificial aging to digital twins in advance to predict future infrastructure conditions and identify potential failures before they occur in the actual system. This preliminary analysis allows proactive maintenance planning and prevents downtime without consuming resources during critical operational periods.
Solution Approach 2:
By performing all aging simulations on virtual copies rather than physical infrastructure, the patent eliminates the risk of causing actual damage while still consuming computational resources in a controlled environment. The copy absorbs the resource cost without impacting real system reliability.
Data Source
AI summary
A method obtains at least one virtual representation representing an infrastructure in a first state and applies a first dataset to the virtual representation to artificially advance the virtual representation to represent the infrastructure in a second state. The method obtains results representing the infrastructure in the second state, wherein at least a portion of the results are indicative of a predicted condition associated with the infrastructure based on usage of the infrastructure. The method applies a second dataset to the virtual representation to artificially advance the virtual representation to represent the infrastructure in a third state and obtains results representing the infrastructure in the third state, wherein at least a portion of the results are indicative of an outcome to a solution applied via the second dataset to the predicted condition associated with the infrastructure.