Advancing Digital Twin Implementation using Edge Adapters based on Containerization

Research and technologies to support Digital Twins have recently become very popular in industry and academia. Successful applications, on the other hand, are few and far between. Access to simplified, accessible, and affordable tools that support DT development and demonstrate its potential are needed. Implementing a Digital Twin often requires the capability to capture and process realtime data taken directly from machinery. To this end, edge computing may lead to some valuable breakthroughs. Edge computing is a distributed computing paradigm that brings computing power and data storage space near the data source. This paper presents an innovative edge adapter and its framework based on container technology for Digital Twin development. This paper begins by providing an overview of the state-of-the-art Digital Twin development on edge, including relevant technologies. Next, a novel approach for implementing the edge adapter is presented conceptually based on container technology for function deployment and isolation. Lastly, to demonstrate the feasibility and applicability of the idea, a prototype is developed using a Raspberry Pi.