About CNRS
CNRS
stands for (in french) "Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique",
which could be translated into "(French) National Scientific Research Center".
A Few Numbers
CNRS is the main research institution in France.
About 11500 researchers,
8000 engineers and technicians,
and 7000 administrative.
Budget (1993) of 11.5 billion francs.
Fields of Activity
CNRS has a wide area of activity.
It is structured into seven scientific departments
(including one on human and social sciences)
but also runs seven interdisplinary research projects
(e.g., on environment).
Examples of CNRS Research Labs
CNRS activity is distributed among numerous (about 1300)
research labs in France.
(Most of them are university research labs which are associated to CNRS.)
As for example, you may visit my own CNRS lab in France,
named LAFORIA,
which is a joint Université Pierre et Marie Curie (aka Paris VI) - CNRS
research laboratory.
It is part of a federation of research labs in computer science,
named Institut Blaise Pascal
(IBP),
and is located on the "Jussieu" campus,
right in the center of Paris,
down by the Seine river.
You may directly jump to
my home page there.
Examples of Departments
You may also visit the direction of the
Engineering Sciences Department of CNRS
(in french "sciences pour l'ingénieur").
The network department of CNRS, named
UREC, manages information and network
activity for CNRS.
It also registers french WWW servers.
Have a look through
an active map of France.
CNRS and Japan
CNRS has a bureau in Japan,
named CNRS-Japon.
my home page
or to 
the lab main page