1. A computer apparatus for searching an in-memory database comprising: a plurality of compute nodes each with a global combining network adapter coupled for data communications to a global combining network that connects the plurality of compute nodes in a tree structure with a parent node and a child node, each of the plurality of compute nodes having a processor and computer memory operatively coupled to the processor, the computer memory having disposed within it a portion of the in-memory database; wherein the global combining network adapter comprises a dedicated arithmetic logic unit (ALU) that operates on data from a contribution buffer and places a result in a results buffer to perform a network all reduce operation; a search mechanism in the computer memory that receives a unique search key and searches the portion of the in-memory database using the search key; if a match for the key is found, the search mechanism stores a corresponding data record in the contribution buffer and if a match is not found the search mechanism stores zeros in the contribution buffer; and the search mechanism contributes to a network all reduce operation on the global combining network using the ALU to combine data received from the child node with the contents of the contribution buffer to form a result and passing the result to the parent node and the parent node performs a search in the same manner described above so that the network all reduce operation provides a result of searching the in-memory database on the plurality of compute nodes for the unique search key.