Argonne National Laboratory, research center, based in Argonne, Ill., 27 mi (43 km) SW of downtown Chicago, with other facilities at the Idaho National Engineering Laboratory, 50 mi (80 km) W of Idaho Falls, Idaho. Founded in 1946 by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission for research and development in nuclear energy, it now operates under an agreement involving the U.S. Department of Energy and the Univ. of Chicago. Much of its multidisciplinary basic research involves the use of radiation as a tool in the physical and life sciences. Recent foci have included developing new pharmaceuticals and technical devices, and studying the operation of adhesives and fertilizers.

Argonne, region of the Paris basin, NE France, in Champagne and Lorraine (Meuse, Marne, and Ardennes dept.), a hilly and woody district centering around the capital, Sainte-Menehould. Thinly populated, with unimportant cultivation and only small industries, it has been of strategic significance. There, in 1792, the French repulsed the Prussians. The sector was a battleground throughout World War I. In the Allied victory drive (Sept.-Nov., 1918), the Meuse-Argonne sector was carried by the Americans.