Developing BIM-Based Linked Data Digital Twin Architecture to Address a Key Missing Factor: Occupants

This study reviews the concept of Digital Twins (DTs) and related studies in the construction industry and identifies three key factors that is missing from the current practices. The missing factors are: (1) inadequate consideration of occupants in DT models, (2) lack of the inclusion of unstructured data, and (3) absence of Linked Data technologies. To address these issues, architecture for the design of DTs is proposed and partially implemented in a case study. The proposed architecture utilizes semantic web technologies and proposes a linked data approach to integrate different data sources of a DT. Further, the architecture leverages machine learning approaches to dynamically update and enrich the linked data platform and automate its maintenance. The case study takes the first step to integrate BIM and unstructured data generated by occupants (as work orders) using a linked-data approach. The research sets the path for future works in the domain of building DTs.