Professor Park Woo-chan, center, director of the Future GPU Research Institute at Sejong University, poses with researchers to mark the institute’s opening in May. Courtesy of Sejong University
The Future GPU Research Institute of Sejong University is accelerating the development of core technologies for next-generation graphics processing units (GPU) and artificial intelligence (AI) semiconductors, the university said Monday.
The institute, led by professor Park Woo-chan of the department of computer sciences and engineering, is focusing on developing technologies for real-time path tracing, the next frontier in GPU rendering beyond conventional ray tracing.
Ray tracing is a computer graphics technique that renders highly realistic images by simulating how light travels and interacts with objects in a scene. Path tracing is an advanced form of ray tracing that simulates the complete path of light as it bounces around a scene, producing images that are extremely close to real-world lighting.
While path tracing enables ultrarealistic graphics that are virtually indistinguishable from reality, the severe noise generated during real-time rendering has long remained the biggest hurdle to its commercialization.
