{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,28]],"date-time":"2025-10-28T15:21:03Z","timestamp":1761664863560,"version":"build-2065373602"},"reference-count":31,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"9","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,2]],"date-time":"2025-09-02T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1756771200000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"Instituto de Autom\u00e1tica of the Universidad Nacional deSan Juan in collaboration with CONICET (Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cient\u00edficas y T\u00e9cnicas)"},{"name":"Universidad Indoam\u00e9rica"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Robotics"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Virtual environment simulations have gained great importance in the field of robotics by enabling the validation and optimization of control algorithms before their implementation on real platforms. However, the construction of accurate digital models is limited not only by the lack of detailed characterization of the components but also by the uncertainty introduced by the physics engine and the plugins used in the simulation. Unlike other works, which attempted to model each element of the robot in detail and rely on the physics engine to reproduce its behavior, this paper proposes a methodology based on model following. The proposed architecture forces the simulated robot to replicate the dynamics of the real robot without requiring exactly the same physical parameters. The experimental validation was carried out on two unmanned surface vehicle (USV) platforms with different dynamic parameters and, therefore, different responses to excitation signals, demonstrating that the proposed approach enables a drastic reduction in error. In particular, RMSE and MAE were reduced by more than 98%, with R2 values close to 1.0, demonstrating an almost perfect correspondence between the real and simulated dynamics.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/robotics14090124","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,2]],"date-time":"2025-09-02T14:16:55Z","timestamp":1756822615000},"page":"124","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":1,"title":["A Novel Methodology for Designing Digital Models for Mobile Robots Based on Model-Following Simulation in Virtual Environments"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"14","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0002-2901-2788","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Brayan","family":"Saldarriaga-Mesa","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute of Automation (INAUT), National University of San Juan (UNSJ), San Juan 5400, Argentina"},{"name":"Facultad de Ciencias B\u00e1sicas e Ingenier\u00eda, Universidad de los Llanos, Villavicencio 500017, Colombia"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-4084-1424","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jos\u00e9","family":"Varela-Ald\u00e1s","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Centro de Investigaci\u00f3n MIST, Facultad de Ingenier\u00edas, Universidad Tecnol\u00f3gica Indoam\u00e9rica, Ambato 180103, Ecuador"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-5047-0217","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Flavio","family":"Roberti","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute of Automation (INAUT), National University of San Juan (UNSJ), San Juan 5400, Argentina"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-9347-566X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Juan M.","family":"Toibero","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute of Automation (INAUT), National University of San Juan (UNSJ), San Juan 5400, Argentina"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,2]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1016","DOI":"10.1016\/j.ifacol.2018.08.474","article-title":"Digital Twin in Manufacturing: A Categorical Literature Review and Classification","volume":"51","author":"Kritzinger","year":"2018","journal-title":"IFAC-PapersOnLine"},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Sepasgozar, S.M.E. 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