Scientific optical 3D modeling requires the possibility to implement highly flexible and customizable mathematical models as well as high computing power. However, established ray tracing software for optical design and modeling purposes often has limitations in terms of access to underlying mathematical models and the possibility of accelerating the mostly CPU-based computation. To address these limitations, we propose the use of NVIDIA's OptiX Ray Tracing Engine as a highly flexible and high-performing alternative. OptiX offers a highly customizable ray tracing framework with onboard GPU support for parallel computing, as well as access to optimized ray tracing algorithms for accelerated computation. To demonstrate the capabilities of our approach, a realistic focus variation instrument is modeled, describing optical instrument components (light sources, lenses, detector, etc.) as well as the measuring sample surface mathematically or as meshed files. Using this focus variation instrument model, exemplary virtual measurements of arbitrary and standardized sample surfaces are carried out, generating image stacks of more than 100 images and tracing more than 1E9 light rays per image. The performance and accuracy of the simulations are qualitatively evaluated, and virtually generated detector images are compared with images acquired by a respective physical measuring device.

翻译：科学光学三维建模需要实现高度灵活且可定制的数学模型以及强大的计算能力。然而，用于光学设计与建模的现有光线追踪软件在对底层数学模型的访问权限以及加速主要基于CPU的计算方面存在局限。为解决这些问题，我们提出采用NVIDIA的OptiX光线追踪引擎作为一种高度灵活且高性能的替代方案。OptiX提供了高度可定制的光线追踪框架，其内置GPU并行计算支持能力，并可访问经优化的光线追踪算法以加速计算。为展示该方法的能力，我们构建了一个真实的聚焦变化仪器模型，以数学方式或网格文件形式描述光学仪器组件（光源、透镜、探测器等）及测量样本表面。利用该聚焦变化仪器模型，对任意及标准样本表面执行虚拟测量，生成了超过100幅图像的图像堆栈，每幅图像追踪超过1E9条光线。通过定性评估仿真的性能与精度，并将虚拟生成的探测器图像与对应物理测量设备采集的图像进行比较。