A New Decomposition Algorithm for Threshold Synthesis and Generalization of Boolean Functions

Abstract

A new algorithm for obtaining efficient architectures composed of threshold gates that implement arbitrary Boolean functions is introduced. The method reduces the complexity of a given target function by splitting the function according to the variable with the highest influence. The procedure is iteratively applied until a set of threshold functions is obtained, leading to reduced depth architectures, in which the obtained threshold functions form the nodes and a and or or function is the output of the architecture. The algorithm is tested on a large set of benchmark functions and the results compared to previous existing solutions, showing a considerable reduction on the number of gates and levels of the obtained architectures. An extension of the method for partially defined functions is also introduced and the generalization ability of the method is analyzed.