Low Power Implementation Of Ternary Content Addressable Memory (TCAM)

Abstract

In network routers, Ternary Content Addressable Memory (TCAM)[1] based search engines take an important role. One of the improved versions of Content Addressable Memory (CAM) is TCAM. For high speed and broader searching operation TCAM is used. Unlike normal CAM, TCAM has 3 logic states: 0, 1, ‘X’. In TCAM within one single clock cycle, search operation can be performed. That is why it is called special type of memory. Also, quick search ability is one of the popular features of TCAM. To compare the search and stored data, TCAM array acts parallel in every location. But high power dissipation is the main disadvantage of TCAM. To overcome this power dissipation in this paper we proposed a low power TCAM implementation by using Reversible logic.[2] Reversible logic has less heat dissipating characteristics property with respect to irreversible gate. Also, Reversible logic has ultra-low power characteristics feature. In recent past it has been proved that reversible gates can implement any Boolean function.