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In addition to research papers, the Design Society is developing several valuable resources for those interested in the study of design. These include a repository of PhD theses, a library of case studies and transcripts of design activities, and an archive of our newsletters. Please note that these resources are accessible exclusively to Design Society members.

Designing digital twins: a graph-based schema to enable systematic cost-benefit analysis

McClenaghan, Adam; Gopsill, James; Hicks, Ben

Type:
Papers
DS 145: Proceedings of the DESIGN2026 19th International Design Conference
Year:
2026
Editor:
Štorga, M.; Škec, S.; Martinec, T.; Marjanović, D.; Pavković, N.
Author:
McClenaghan, Adam; Gopsill, James; Hicks, Ben
Series:
DESIGN
Institution:
University of Bristol, United Kingdom
Page(s):
707-716
DOI number:
10.1017/pds.2026.10429
ISSN:
2732-527X (Online)
Abstract:
This paper posits that a Digital Twin can be viewed as a collection of nodes and edges where nodes represent actions on/with data and edges represent the flow of data between nodes. The paper provides a schema whereby the nodes and edges can be defined and the costs and benefits can be attributed, as well as analysis techniques enabled by the schema. The potential of the schema in supporting the design of Digital Twins is then demonstrated through a worked example, in which it is shown that traditional bottom-up cost estimates significantly overestimate costs when compared with this approach.
Keywords:
digital twin, cost management, industry 4.0, cost-benefit
DESIGN2026 - The 19th International Design Conference
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