Reality Emulator
The world’s first large-scale, collaborative, interdisciplinary, reconfigurable, emulation facility to drive sociotechnical digital innovation.
What is it?
The Reality Emulator is a technologically advanced sector-agnostic digital twin facility for the co-creation of future digital solutions through novel experience-based, iterative and immersive approaches.
A new globally unique facility it will provide access to a rich environment of real-world research and experimentation platforms, advanced and emerging telecommunications technologies, and open data platforms from a powerful datacentre infrastructure connected to our immersive experience environments.
Local and remote teams will have the opportunity to experience and interact with digital models of physical worlds, for example a smart city, a 6G network, a digital factory, a transport infrastructure or a health system, and collaborate towards the creation of future digital solutions.
Why is it special?
The Reality Emulator is a world first sector-agnostic digital twin. It will harness ultra-high performance network connectivity, sensors and actuators together with reconfigurable, programmable computing and the additional capability to host new technologies emerging from research labs. It will offer multi-user, multipurpose, multisensory, interactive immersive capabilities that will enable the development of new experience-based innovation methodologies.
The facility will allow real-time data monitoring and analysis, and the creation of 3D visualisation models. This in turn will allow collaborative experimentation, iterative design and development of new digital technologies and the emulation of future scenarios on a scale and in a way not previously possible.
When will it be ready?
BDFI has signed contracts with Mechdyne and Fujitsu to supply the immersive suite and core infrastructure, respectively, for the new Reality Emulator. Implementation is currently underway and we are on track to have the facility available from Autumn 2024.
We are looking for pilot projects to use the Reality Emulator – please get in touch with us at bdfi-enquiries@bristol.ac.uk to discuss your project.
How does it work?
The Reality Emulator will host advanced and emerging technologies, will connect to established and new digital testbeds, and provide access to diverse real-time and historic data from a multiplicity of sources. The data it ingests could be of any type: infrastructure, financial, health, logistics, manufacturing, social media, environmental etc. Wherever it comes from, whether it is a huge or small dataset, quantitative or qualitative, the Reality Emulator can consolidate, analyse and use it to train Artificial Intelligence models and create scalable digital models of future scenarios to be experienced by end-users in our immersive spaces.
Interdisciplinary, cross-sector teams will be able to visualise and interact with these future scenarios in our multi-person shared Immersive Workspace and XR Suite. These allow real-time interaction with the digital model in a virtual multi-sensory environment. What is more, others can join in the experience by accessing the same scenarios in real time via VR headsets, whether elsewhere on campus, at partner or collaborator sites, or at other locations across in the globe.
By being fully reconfigurable and programmable teams can make changes to their new technology, system or scenario and see how it alters potential outcomes and ultimately drive design and optimisation.
The Reality Emulator’s capability does not stop there. It will be enhanced by connections to a range of physical test beds and laboratories including Smart City (Bristol City Scale Network), Highways, Ports and Freeports (M4/M5 & Avonmouth), High Value Manufacturing (Bristol and Bath Science Park), Laboratories (Smart Internet Lab Bristol, 5GUK Test Networks), and Digital Catapult (London). It will also benefit from national and international connectivity via academic networks which will bring in other academic and industry research labs.
What difference will it make?
The Reality Emulator will help us to gain new insights on the challenges and opportunities brought by future digital technologies. With its powerful ‘virtual production' capabilities, impressive data processing and analytics, ultra-high -performance networks, connections to regional and national testbeds and labs, and its multisensory immersive capabilities the Reality Emulator provides an unrivalled, infinitely flexible facility to drive digital innovation on an unprecedented scale.
From citizen co-creation of cities, future mobile networks research, test-driving the digital transformation in manufacturing, exploring the potential of smart classrooms, to helping planners understand societal responses to pandemics – the Reality Emulator offers researchers, industry, governments and communities, a potent new tool to build prosperous, inclusive and sustainable digital futures that benefit us all.
Diagram 1: Reality Emulator High Level Architecture
Get involved
Want to be involved in our pilot work or talk to us about how you might use it? We’d love to hear from you. Get in touch at bdfi-enquiries@bristol.ac.uk
Using the Reality Emulator in a proposal?
Please contact us early as possible if you are thinking of including any aspect of the Reality Emulator in a proposal. Understanding your timescales, project needs and costing these will require time for detailed consultation, well in advance of any deadline.