Scalable IP Routing Lookup in Next Generation Network

Abstract. Ternary content-addressable memory has been widely used to perform fast routing lookups. It is able to accomplish the best match-ing prefix problem in O(1) time without considering the number of pre-fixes and its lengths. As compared to the software-based solutions, the Ternary content-addressable memory can offer sustained throughput and simple system architecture. It is attractive for IPv6 routing lookup. How-ever, it also comes with several shortcomings, such as the limited number of entries, expansive cost and power consumption. Accordingly, we pro-pose an efficient algorithm to reduce the required size of Ternary content-addressable memory. The proposed scheme can eliminate 98 percentage of Ternary content-addressable memory entries by adding tiny DRAM. We also address related issues in supporting IPv6 anycasting.