The research groups led by Prof. Kei Sakaguchi from the School of Engineering at Tokyo Institute of Technology and Prof. Walid Saad from Virginia Tech have jointly realized a Smart Mobility Digital Twin that replicates physical space's traffic conditions in cyber space in real-time.
Using this digital twin, they successfully demonstrated a hybrid autonomous driving system that combines both self-driving and remote operation. The research is published in the journal IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Vehicles.
While digital twin technology, which replicates physical objects and systems in cyberspace, has seen rapid growth in fields like manufacturing and construction, it had not been applied to the dynamic mobility sector until now.
In this research, the Smart Mobility Education & Research Field at Tokyo Tech's Ookayama Campus was utilized to build a smart mobility digital twin. Furthermore, a demonstration system for hybrid autonomous driving, combining self-driving and remote control, was developed using this digital twin.
In the demonstration, the digital twin was able to identify safer and more efficient routes for autonomous vehicles in real-time and relay this information back to the vehicles. This confirmed that hybrid autonomous driving, integrating both local autonomy and remote guidance, is feasible.
