IBM and NASA are developing a digital twin of the Sun to improve the prediction of solar storms (advances that could safeguard satellites, power grids, and digital infrastructure against the next major geomagnetic disruption).

Why This Matters

The recent WIRED report on IBM and NASA’s digital twin of the Sun highlights how new simulation models can extend storm warning times from under an hour to potentially 30 hours, giving governments, militaries, and critical infrastructure operators time to act. NASA’s broader explanation in Why does the world (and NASA) need digital twins? places this project in a global context: digital twins are becoming essential tools for space exploration, climate science, and systems resilience.

A related study exploring digital twin applications and implications in renewable energy demonstrates how digital twin principles extend into communications networks (critical infrastructure that solar storms directly threaten).

Key Points

• Digital Twin of the Sun: IBM and NASA are building a high-fidelity AI model to replicate solar behavior and predict storms.
• Prediction Leap: The model could extend advanced warnings from less than 1 hour to more than a day.
• Critical Infrastructure at Risk: Solar Storms Threaten Satellites, GPS, Aviation, and Power Grids.
• NASA’s Digital Twin Strategy: Goes beyond the Sun when applied to Earth systems, human biology, spacecraft, and planetary environments.
• Communications Link: Research on the application of the digital twin in renewable energy systems. from the University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) shows how digital twin frameworks enhance network resilience, a vital complement to solar storm defenses.

For the full reports from WIRED, NASA The University of Sharjah, see:

Source Summaries

• IBM and NASA Develop a Digital Twin of the Sun to Predict Future Solar Storms | WIRED:
  Explains how the Sun twin uses AI and massive datasets to simulate solar behavior. Highlights the risk of solar storms and the leap in prediction time that could reduce global vulnerability.
• Why does the world (and NASA) need digital twins? | NASA:
  Defines digital twins as living, evolving models of physical systems. Shows their value in space exploration, Earth science, and human systems, emphasizing their role in resilience and planning.
• Connect to Wi-Fi | ScienceDirect:
  Demonstrates digital twin applications in wireless networking, showing how dynamic modeling improves reliability and efficiency. Connects directly to the need for communications resilience against solar events.

What Next?

Expect early prototypes of the Sun twin to be operational in the next few years, with incremental improvements as data quality and computing scale grow.

• NASA will continue extending digital twin projects across domains (from lunar exploration to climate modeling).
• Enterprises should anticipate cross-sector adoption: energy, telecoms, logistics, and finance will increasingly rely on digital twin–based predictive systems.

Recommendations from the Research

• For government & defense: Integrate Sun twin forecasts into continuity planning and wargaming for space weather contingencies.
• For critical infrastructure operators: Align cybersecurity and physical resilience protocols with projected solar storm scenarios.
• For enterprises: Explore digital twin adoption for internal systems (supply chains, data centers, telecoms) as predictive tools converge across domains.
• For researchers: Develop standards and interoperability frameworks for digital twin data exchange across industries.

Additional OODA Loop Resources

Spatial AI is the Future of Human-Computer Interaction and the Metaverse: Regular readers of the OODA Loop know that we cover exponential technologies daily and expect disproportionate disruption when these technologies start to converge.  In this post, we explore AI + an expanded working definition (with subcategories) of what is broadly considered “the metaverse” + blockchain technology as an example of the exponential tech stack starting to converge (a subtheme of the OODA Almanac 2024). 

Artificial Intelligence, The Metaverse, Compute, and The Future of Digital Identity Frameworks: Find here an OODA Loop original analysis of Artificial Intelligence, The Metaverse, Compute, and The Future of Digital Identity Frameworks as part of our Digital Self-Sovereignty Research Initiative.   

Building Industrial Metaverse Infrastructure in Your Organization: We continue our analysis of the categories and subsectors of the expanded metaverse, as Siemens, along with industry and media partners, the MIT Technology Review, NVIDIA, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Bentley Systems, and Youl Systems Inc., explores how businesses can assemble the industrial metaverse.