Network Digital Twin for 6G and Beyond: An End-to-End View Across Multi-Domain Network Ecosystems
Dinh-Hieu Tran, Nazar Waheed, Yuris Mulya Saputra, Xingqin Lin, Cong T. Nguyen, Tedros Salih Abdu, Van Nhan Vo, Van‐Quan Pham, Madyan Alsenwi, Abuzar B. M. Adam, Symeon Chatzinotas, Eva Lagunas, Hung Tran, Tu Dac Ho, Nguyễn Văn Huynh
Abstract
With the rapid development of technology, the number of smart mobile users is increasing, accompanied by growing demands from applications such as virtual/augmented reality (VR/XR), remote surgery, autonomous vehicles, and real-time holographic communications, all of which require high transmission rates and ultra-low latency in 6G and beyond networks (6G). This poses enormous challenges for the efficient deployment of large-scale networks, including network design, planning, troubleshooting, optimization, and maintenance, without affecting the user experience. Network Digital Twin (NDT) has emerged as a potential solution, enabling the creation of a virtual model that reflects the actual network and supports the simulation of various network designs, the application of diverse operating policies, and the reproduction complex fault scenarios under real-world conditions. This motivates us to conduct this study, where we provide a comprehensive survey of NDT in the context of 6G, covering areas such as radio access networks (RAN), transport networks, 5G core networks and beyond (5GCORE), cloud/edge computing, applications (blockchain, health system, manufacturing, security, and vehicular networks), non-terrestrial networks (NTNs), and quantum networks, from both academic and industrial perspectives. In particular, we are the first to provide an in-depth guide and usage of RAN and 5GCORE+ for NDT. Then, we provide an extensive review of foundation technologies such as transport networks, cloud/edge computing, applications, NTNs, and quantum networks in NDT. Finally, we discuss the key challenges, open issues, and future research directions for NDT in the context of 6G.