# Unleashing the Potential of 5G for Smart Cities: A Focus on Real-Time Digital Twin Integration
## 4 Integrating 5G with Real-Time Digital Twins
These data are processed at the edge, where AI algorithms can immediately adjust traffic signals to prioritize emergency vehicles and optimize road usage,  
Figure 10: 5G network architecture for real-time digital twin infrastructure [9; 10; 67]. thereby reducing congestion [9; 10; 37]. Similarly, in disaster management, edge computing provides instant flood detection by analyzing water level sensors in real time and sending alerts to local authorities before major damage can occur. The network connections in this architecture, as depicted in Figure 10, are categorized into solid lines and dashed lines to represent the different types of data exchanges. Solid lines represent the direct connections between the Core Network, RAN, and Edge Computing, illustrating that the backbone infrastructure of 5G is stable and capable of handling high-bandwidth and low-latency communication. Dashed lines represent the real-time data flow from Edge Computing to IoT devices to enable bidirectional communication. This is critical for applications that require continuous feedback loops, such as predictive maintenance in smart factories and real-time air-quality monitoring in urban areas. This 5G-enabled architecture supports real-time data management and processing, which is a requirement for the efficient operation of digital twins. By harnessing the advanced capabilities of 5G technology, particularly its three key attributes, which consist of ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC), massive machine-type communication (mMTC), and enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB), smart cities can successfully deploy and scale real-time digital twin systems with remarkable accuracy and responsiveness [9; 10; 37; 62; 67]. Ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC) ensures that digital twin applications requiring instantaneous data transmission, such as autonomous traffic control, remote healthcare, and industrial automation, can operate with minimal delays [9; 62; 67]. This is vital in situations such as connected vehicle networks, where even milliseconds of communication delay between vehicles and traffic management systems can have a significant impact on road safety and congestion control. Massive machine-type communication (mMTC) supports the simultaneous connectivity of billions of IoT devices, such as smart sensors, surveillance cameras, environmental monitors, and infrastructure-tracking systems [9; 67]. In a smart city, this capability enables large-scale data collection from numerous sources, ensuring that digital twins can comprehensively analyze urban conditions, identify anomalies, and optimize city operations in real time. Enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) delivers high-speed, high-bandwidth connectivity, allowing digital twins to process and visualize complex datasets, 3D models, and high-definition simulations without delays [62; 67]. This is especially advantageous for virtual city planning, augmented reality (AR) applications, and overseeing infrastructure remotely, enabling urban planners and stakeholders to evaluate possible developments, model disaster situations, and make informed decisions effectively. Through the integration of these 5G features, smart cities can effortlessly link, oversee, and control extensive digital twin ecosystems, enabling proactive choices, better resource distribution, and strengthened urban resilience in multiple domains like transportation, energy, public safety, and environmental management [62; 67]. One of the key best practices in designing 5G-enabled digital twin architectures is network slicing, which partitions the 5G Core Network into multiple virtual networks, each optimized for specific use cases. High-speed, low-latency slices can be allocated to autonomous vehicle networks, providing real-time navigation and enhanced safety through the minimization of communication delays [62; 67; 69; 70].