A state-of-the-art review of digital twin-enabled human-robot collaboration in smart energy management systems

Abstract

• A review of DT-enabled HRC for smart energy management systems was studied. • A mixed-method review analysis approach was adopted. • Four mainstream research topics and existing research gaps were identified. • Potential future research directions were recommended. Digital twin (DT) and human-robot collaboration (HRC) have shown great potential in smart energy management systems (SEMS) with the development of industrial digitisation. Despite recent applications, the mainstream topics and future research directions of DT-enabled HRC in SEMS remain unexplored. Furthermore, no review study has combined a systematic literature review and science mapping analysis to comprehensively summarise this topic. This study conducts a state-of-the-art review of DT-enabled HRC in SEMS, as well as identifies mainstream topics, research gaps, and future research directions. Using Scopus as an electronic database, this study obtained 126 articles for quantitative discussion through scientometric analysis. Subsequently, a qualitative discussion that concentrated on the research objectives was conducted. The results revealed influential findings related to publication trends, journal sources, co-occurrence of keywords, countries/regions, and document analyses. Additionally, this paper highlighted four mainstream topics, including: (1) artificial Intelligence (AI) enhancement for DT-enabled HRC in SEMS, (2) optimisation and enhancement based on DT, (3) improvement of HRC, and (4) development of the Industrial Revolution. Moreover, it summarised the research gaps and future research directions based on these results. This review study could help researchers in related fields understand the progress of current research and discover directions for further study.