Design and Control of Digital Twin Systems Based on a Unit Level Wheeled Mobile Robot

In this article, a digital twin system is designed for intelligent management of a unit level wheeled mobile robot (WMR). A framework of the digital twin system is arranged from four main parts, i.e., physical WMR, virtual WMR, data processing, and application service. To realize high-fidelity modeling of the physical WMR, a 3D model of the virtual WMR is established in Webots from aspects on geometric structures, kinematic analysis, and actuator control. Based on the digital twin system, a virtual-physical mapping control strategy is proposed for remote motion interaction between the physical WMR and the virtual WMR. Finally, effectiveness of application service is shown in a synchronous-motion experiment with the digital twin system via a Mecanum wheeled mobile robot.