COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE PLATFORMS FOR DIGITAL TWINS AND SIMULATION SYSTEMS IN ROBOTICS EDUCATION

Abstract

This article presents a comparative analysis of the architectural and technical characteristics of software and hardware platforms for digital twins and simulation systems used in robotics education. In this study, a three-layer robotic information system architecture was modeled, consisting of a hardware layer (microcontrollers, sensors, and actuators), a communication layer (MQTT, WebSockets, and OPC UA protocols), and a virtual simulation layer (Webots, Gazebo, Unity 3D, NVIDIA Isaac Sim, Tinkercad, and Wokwi). Technical evaluation metrics included data synchronization latency, physics engine fidelity, Hardware-in-the-Loop (HIL) support, computational resource requirements, and telemetry data acquisition capabilities. The results demonstrate that professional simulators provide high-accuracy physical modeling but possess limited hardware integration and telemetry analytics capabilities. In contrast, digital twin platforms based on Unity 3D and NVIDIA Isaac Sim support bidirectional real-time synchronization, IoT integration, and interaction with SQL/NoSQL databases, making them effective architectural solutions for robotic information systems.