Digital twins for conservation - Digital twin strategy

The digital documentation process that was addressed for the knowledge, conservation and management of Pier Luigi Nervi’s Turin Exhibition Center reflected the complexity of the object and required an immense effort to develop a novel, holistic approach, tailored to the strong, interdisciplinary nature of the research. The uniqueness of this 20th century concrete heritage site1 was an opportunity to propose and fully address the meaning and implementation of a Digital Twin. The generation of a so-called Digital Twin was not merely a visual matter. Although this assumption would seem to be commonly accepted, the real challenge was actually to go beyond the purely geometric content and ensure the partial or full implementation of information enrichment and interoperability. Digital products represent a crucial basis for geometric modelling and analysis and, more generally, for information recording related to multi-approach investigations. Multiple and combined technologies are adopted nowadays for multiscale oriented modelling, taking advantage of the contribution of different sensors and data fusion3. The integrated approach proposed in this research started from the assumption that the 3D multi-scale, multi-sensor model played a crucial role in the multiple investigations on the structural assessment of this complex, 20th century, ferrocement architecture and was effective in supporting a structural analysis, based on the achievement of the pre-established goals. The multi-scale nature of digital models is able to not only twin the physical object, but also store information and record the investigation in order to detect and analyse any deformation and anomalies, especially from a structural point of view. In fact, a combination of 3D sensing technologies and reality-based modelling strategies also permit advanced generative processes for the 3D mapping of complex geometries and information.