Analysis of innovation and development trends in the digital twin field based on SCI papers and Inspec papers

This paper mainly quantitatively analyzes articles of basic and applied research in the field of digital twins(DT) from the perspective of the innovation chain. It mainly quantitatively evaluates the development trend and national performance of the field from several aspects such as development overview, research frontier and technological innovation influence, and international comparison. The current development status of this field and the innovation level of major countries were revealed. The research results indicate that from 2020 to 2024, both basic and applied research in the DT field had grown rapidly at an average annual growth rate of over 60%. China has a clear advantage in research in this field, with a higher output of basic and applied research papers than other countries, and the highest number of highly cited papers. But Norway has the highest proportion of highly cited papers, reaching 10 times the global average. By analysing the knowledge graph of keywords in highly cited papers, we can further understand the research hotspots and frontiers in this field. The technological innovation impact of papers in the DT field is also relatively high, with over 90% of Inspec papers closely related to technological innovation and showing a trend of increasing year by year. The comprehensive evaluation results indicate that China, the United Kingdom, and the United States have performed well in both basic and applied research, demonstrating characteristics of collaboration development. Conducting research on innovation development evaluation from the perspective of the innovation chain can not only provide researchers with a comprehensive view of the development landscape in the field, but also enable the assessment of technological innovation and transformation capabilities in this technological field, thereby continuously enhancing the innovation-driven development capabilities of the field.