Integration of digital twin and IoT for virtual greenhouse management

The convergence of Digital Twin (DT) and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies represents a key enabler of Agriculture 5.0, providing real-time synchronization between physical and virtual environments. When coupled with Virtual Reality (VR), these technologies enable immersive and interactive systems that enhance intelligent agriculture monitoring, control, and decision-making. This study proposes an advanced and fully integrated VR–DT–IoT framework for virtual greenhouse management, designed not only to simulate and visualize but also to synchronize and control the physical system in real time. The proposed framework achieves seamless cyber-physical fusion by establishing bidirectional communication among IoT sensors, DT models, and VR interfaces. This enables users to trigger actuator commands and observe instant physical feedback directly within the immersive environment. A real-world experimental greenhouse was developed as a testbed to validate the system’s architecture and functionality. IoT sensors continuously monitored environmental parameters with data streams dynamically synchronized to the DT model reproducing greenhouse dynamics. The VR interface provided context-aware interaction and spatial visualization, allowing users to explore live sensor data, analyze trends, and simulate adaptive control strategies in a realistic virtual environment. The experimental validation, conducted with 23 participants across seven training sessions, revealed a marked reduction in task completion time and error rates, along with high usability scores (SUS = 3.84/5), confirming the system’s effectiveness in improving operational performance. The findings demonstrate that the proposed system significantly advances digital agriculture by merging modeling, real-time feedback, and immersive control into a unified human-in-the-loop platform. This research highlights the technological novelty and practical value of integrating DT, IoT, and VR into a single coherent framework, bridging physical and virtual domains.