Abstract: Methods and systems are disclosed for traversing nodes in a BVH tree by an intersection engine. Techniques disclosed comprise receiving, by the intersection engine, a traversal instruction, including a tracing-mode, ray data, and an identifier of a node to be traversed. Where the tracing-mode includes a closest hit mode and a first hit mode. If the node to be traversed is an internal node, the intersection engine determines, based on the tracing-mode, an order in which children nodes of the node are to be next traversed and output identifiers of the children nodes in the determined order.

Abstract: A technique for building a bounding volume hierarchy is disclosed. The technique includes performing a nearest neighbor search for a set of clusters to generate a set of nearest neighbors; without performing a global barrier operation, performing a merge operation for the set of clusters, based on the set of nearest neighbors to generate merge results for the set of clusters; and without performing a global barrier operation, outputting clusters for a level of the bounding volume hierarchy, based on the merge results.

Abstract: Methods and systems are disclosed for traversing nodes in a BVH tree by an intersection engine. Techniques disclosed comprise receiving, by the intersection engine, a traversal instruction, including a tracing-mode, ray data, and an identifier of a node to be traversed. Where the tracing-mode includes a closest hit mode and a first hit mode. If the node to be traversed is an internal node, the intersection engine determines, based on the tracing-mode, an order in which children nodes of the node are to be next traversed and output identifiers of the children nodes in the determined order.

Abstract: Methods and systems are disclosed for encoding a Morton code. Techniques disclosed comprise receiving location vectors associated with primitives, where the primitives are graphical elements spatially located within a three-dimensional scene. Techniques further comprise determining a code pattern comprising a prefix pattern and a base pattern, and, then, coding each of the location vectors according to the code pattern.