Immersive co-design of digital twins—an embodied sensemaking approach

The current wave of Internet-based technologies challenges human-centred system design, as they incorporate new immersion capabilities and dynamic control of autonomy. To keep humans in-the-loop, digital sensemaking can be used to let humans participate in autonomous functions, accelerating approaches towards the ability for Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) and Internet-of-Things (IoT) applications to self-organize and self-adapt. This ability affects the creation and operation of Digital Twins (DTs). They need to capture continuous synchronization of networked actors and distributed intelligence augmenting human behaviour in CPS. We propose an immersive sensemaking approach to DT design in collaborative CPS settings. We review traditional DT design approaches and most recent advances in digital sensemaking through IoT-based bodily interaction and performance art. DTs are generated through intertwining human and machine intelligence in a multi-modal, mutually controllable interaction space. We report on a performance art piece demonstrating the feasibility from a conceptual, technological and collaborative design practice. The work thus lays ground for developing novel design techniques and technologies for DTs as design and engineering tools.