VaN3Twin: the Multi-Technology V2X Digital Twin with Ray-Tracing in the Loop

TL;DR

VaN3Twin is an open-source, high-fidelity digital twin framework for simulating multi-technology V2X communications with ray-tracing, enabling accurate coexistence analysis and interference modeling.

Contribution

It introduces the first open-source full-stack V2X digital twin with integrated ray tracing for realistic physical-layer modeling and coexistence analysis.

Findings

Reduces application-layer disagreement by 50% in rural environments.

Achieves over 70% reduction in urban environments compared to existing tools.

Supports realistic coexistence analysis of DSRC and C-V2X technologies.

Abstract

This paper presents VaN3Twin-the first open-source, full-stack Network Digital Twin (NDT) framework for simulating the coexistence of multiple Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) communication technologies with accurate physical-layer modeling via ray tracing. VaN3Twin extends the ms-van3t simulator by integrating Sionna Ray Tracer (RT) in the loop, enabling high-fidelity representation of wireless propagation, including diverse Line-of-Sight (LoS) conditions with focus on LoS blockage due to other vehicles' meshes, Doppler effect, and site-dependent effects-e.g., scattering and diffraction. Unlike conventional simulation tools, the proposed framework supports realistic coexistence analysis across DSRC and C-V2X technologies operating over shared spectrum. A dedicated interference tracking module captures cross-technology interference at the time-frequency resource block level and enhances signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) estimation by eliminating artifacts such as the bimodal behavior induced by separate LoS/NLoS propagation models. Compared to field measurements, VaN3Twin reduces application-layer disagreement by 50% in rural and over 70% in urban environments with respect to current state-of-the-art simulation tools, demonstrating its value for scalable and accurate digital twin-based V2X coexistence simulation.