51Aes L1-L5 and W1-W5: Five Levels of Digital Twin and Five Stages of Digital Twin Application

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51WORLD

8 min readApr 25, 2023

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Digital twin technology is one of the most exciting and groundbreaking technologies of today. We are witnessing a revolution in the way we perceive and interact with physical objects, machines and environments. It is not just a fancy buzz word, but it is a term that embodies a paradigm shift in the way we approach the design, operation and optimization of everything from buildings to industrial systems. It enables us to create virtual replicas of physical assets, and use real-time data and analytics to predict future behavior, explore different scenarios, and improve performance and efficiency.

With the rapid advancement of digital twin technology, we are now able to build truly intelligent, connected and adaptive systems that can learn, evolve and make data-driven decisions. This can be a game-changing opportunity for businesses, governments and society at large, as it has the potential to unlock new levels of innovation, sustainability, and productivity.

Today, 51Aes is excited to present you the five levels of digital twin and its five stages of applications.

What is 51Aes ?

51Aes (All Element Scene), a sub-brand of 51WORLD, is a digital twin development and application platform that offers high-quality solutions to enterprise and government clients across various industries such as transportation, smart cities, manufacturing, hospitals, parks, and more.

51Aes is renowned for its advanced scene generation and development tools, making it a leading provider of digital twin products and services worldwide. It boasts nearly 1,000 clients, including prestigious companies like Huawei, Alibaba, and BMW, and has implemented benchmark projects in fields like urban planning, construction, water resources, and many more. These projects include Digital Tokyo, Xiong’an New Area’s smart city big data platform, and Haidian District’s intelligent operation command center.

With a commitment to innovation and the highest quality standards, 51Aes is well-positioned to continue leading the digital twin development and application industry globally.

How to generate digital twin with Aes?

Digital twins are becoming increasingly popular in today’s world of data-driven decision making. These virtual replicas of physical objects or systems are used to optimize performance, reduce downtime, and improve efficiency. One exciting use case for digital twins is in the construction of hyper-realistic virtual worlds using AES.

Aes, or the digital expression of everything in the world, is a powerful tool that enables the construction of fully simulated 3D dynamic scenes. To replicate the physical world in Aes, first, all data is sourced from the real world using multi-source data compatibility including GIS, OSGB, DOM/DEM, BIM, and CAD. This data is then processed by Aes to dynamically adjust physical elements such as terrain, buildings, roads, and waters to reconstruct everything in the virtual world.

The first and foremost capability of an Aes-enabled digital twin scene is to gather and manage all the elements in the real physical world with colossal data and super-efficient dynamic loading. It also provides an interactive operating system through real-time rendering, thus generating a dynamic virtual world that reflects the real one.

The construction of hyper-realistic virtual worlds using Aes is made possible by eight basic capabilities, including automated generation based on DOM and GIS data, reconstruction and generation based on OSGB data, automated generation based on BIM data, and procedural generation of specific scenes using rapid generation algorithms. Additionally, HD map-based generation, construction based on massive digital asset libraries, reconstruction and generation based on photo topology, and rapid construction based on PaaS platforms are also possible using Aes.

In summary, Aes is a powerful tool that enables the creation of hyper-realistic virtual worlds using multi-source data compatibility, and dynamic adjustments of physical elements to reconstruct everything in the virtual world. The eight basic capabilities of Aes make it possible to construct fully simulated 3D digital twin scene.

L1-L5+W1-W5

(Five Levels of Digital Twin and Five Stages of Digital Twin Applications)

51Aes has revolutionized the way industries operate by introducing digital twin technology, which seamlessly integrates elements of visual reality, geographic information, physical simulation, and free interaction. In order to establish a standard for grading digital twin scenes, the company has categorized the restoration of the physical world into five levels of visual accuracy from L1 to L5. Over the years, 51WORLD has continually improved its Aes and has now introduced five specific application stages from W1 to W5 for the first time. In keeping with industrial demands, the enterprise has developed a new scenario grading standard, incorporating multi-source data, physical parameters, and texture accuracy to provide a more refined and reliable base for digital twin technology. A video demonstration and introduction of L1-L5 and W1-W5 is available.

L1-L5: Five Levels of Digital Twin

L1. City Level

City-level simulated scenes are primarily designed for large-scale images, such as mountain ranges, topography, lakes, and city layouts, utilizing GIS data. With a coordinate accuracy of within 5 meters, scenes encompassing tens of thousands of square kilometers can be reconstructed.

L2. Region Level

Intermediate regional-level scenes go beyond the city level, providing greater detail on urban buildings, traffic flow, road information, and greenery. With a coordinate accuracy level of 500 meters, a large-scale scene encompassing thousands of square kilometers can be recreated.

L3. Scene Level

L3 simulated scenes are most commonly used and can accurately reproduce building details, lighting and shadow effects, and dynamic traffic flows through GIS and satellite data. Coordinate accuracy is at the 1-meter level and medium-sized scenes spanning hundreds of square kilometers can be reconstructed.

L4. Component Level

Super scenes with centimeter-level coordinate accuracy faithfully reproduce road markings, traffic lights, pedestrians, and vehicles in city scenes. These scenes are suited for the construction of small street scenes spanning one square kilometer.

L5. Element Level

L5 can be called the real all-element scene, in which people couldn’t tell the virtual from the real even when close-ups. With a more accurate restoration effect, even the textures of flowers and trees, and the shades of real-time lighting can be fully synchronized with those in the real world, which can be used to dynamically drive twin device model components with real-time data.

W1-W5: Five Application Stages of Digital Twin

51WORLD has categorized the application stages of Aes into five different phases, namely W1 visualization, W2 data fusion, W3 data-driven, W4 simulation, and W5 intelligent decision-making. These stages have been developed and refined over time through extensive technical experimentation and practical implementations. As a result, 51WORLD has successfully implemented various use cases in each stage to meet diverse and unique requirements.

W1. Visualization

High-quality 3D scene can be generated with Aes through real-time rendering, which can lend the users a sense of reality with realistic scenes. A wide range of applications can be categorized into this stage, including those in the metaverse scene, such as annual corporate party, meetings, interviews, etc.

W2. Data Fusion

Data fusion perfectly meets the demands of government and enterprise users, as they can converge and present a variety of data in a unified spatio-temporal model. These applications provide operators with quick and effective managing skills, which help to administer the city or park in one scene.

W3. Data-driven

At this stage, the Aes can turn static into dynamic, which can keep the virtual world in sync with the real one. For example, in a smart traffic scenario, the real-time changes of the traffic flow need to be dynamically synchronized in the digital twin scene, to achieve “what you see is what you get” for all elements.

W4. Simulation

At this stage, Aes can accurately simulate the movement of objects in the real world, and even predict the changing tendencies. Simulation is widely used in scenarios of smart factories, smart ports, and smart subway to optimize operations.

W5.Intelligent Decision-making

Intelligent decision-making is mostly applied in autonomous driving simulation tests, which can train AI on the basis of simulated environments and colossal case library. Powerful data analysis makes it possible to predict the potential trends in the physical world when circumstances change in a simulated scenario, so as to avoid risks in the real world, thus making it more efficient, safe and better.

Aes has paved the way for building a truly comprehensive digital twin world, making it possible for 51WORLD to bring its ambitious vision of cloning the earth to life. With its remarkable capacity for ultra-efficient dynamic loading and access to vast quantities of data, users can embark on a journey of exploration, discovering a world that is both rich in detail and vast in scope.

Moving forward, 51WORLD will continue to refine its Aes capabilities and collaborate with its ecological partners to deliver powerful digital twin applications that drive the digital transformation of government and enterprise globally.