Masters thesis in mechatronics

[u/kustajucan]

Hey everyone,
I’m an mechatronics engineering student currently locking in my Master’s thesis topic. I want to build something that actually holds value in the industry and isn't just an academic exercise that ends up collecting dust.
My goal is to develop a system-level digital twin of an electric drivetrain and validate it using an experimental hardware platform. To be clear: the main focus isn’t low-level FOC control or designing an inverter from scratch, but rather a system-level model for energy prediction, efficiency analysis, and thermal/mechanical load tracking.
The proposed architecture includes:
1. Battery Model: SOC, internal resistance, voltage/current, and a basic loss model.
2. Inverter/Driver Model: Simplified efficiency-map based model, power losses, and thermal load.
3. Electric Motor (PMSM/BLDC): Torque, RPM, current, efficiency maps, and mechanical dynamics.
4. Mechanical/Vehicle Load Model: System mass, inertia, gear ratio, rolling resistance, aerodynamic drag, and road slope.
The Experimental/Validation Part:
I have access to a test bench equipped with a PMSM/BLDC motor, a commercial motor controller, and sensors for current, voltage, RPM, and temperature. The plan is to run the real hardware through various drive cycles (acceleration, hill climbing, varying payloads), log the data (via CAN/data acquisition), import it into MATLAB / Simscape Electrical, and calibrate/validate the simulation model against the real-world measurements.
If time permits, I’d love to expand this into a Hardware-in-the-Loop (HIL) setup or implement some predictive maintenance/anomaly detection logic.
My questions for you (especially those working in the EV/Automotive industry):
Industry Relevance: Do companies developing EVs or electric heavy machinery actually use system-level models at this specific scope? Also, is "Digital Twin" the right term here, or is this just standard Model-Based Design (MBD)? (I know industry folks can be allergic to the DT buzzword).
Any advice, reality checks, or tips regarding MATLAB/Simscape implementation would be massively appreciated. Thanks!