Straintronic magneto-tunneling-junction based ternary content addressable memory

Abstract

Straintronic magneto-tunneling junction (s-MTJ) switches, whose resistances are controlled with voltage-generated strain in the magnetostrictive free layer of the MTJ, are extremely energy-efficient switches that would dissipate a few aJ of energy during switching. Unfortunately, they are also relatively error-prone and have low resistance on/off ratio. This suggests that as computing elements, they are best suited for non-Boolean architectures. Here, we propose and analyze a ternary content addressable memory implemented with s-MTJs and some transistors. It overcomes challenges encountered by traditional all-transistor implementations, resulting in exceptionally high cell density.