The Research Triangle, commonly referred to as simply The Triangle, is a region in the Piedmont of North Carolina in the United States, anchored by the cities of Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill. The eight-county region, officially named the Raleigh-Durham-Cary CSA, comprises two Metropolitan and one Micropolitan Statistical Area: Raleigh-Cary and Durham-Chapel Hill metropolitan area. The region's population was 1,314,589 at the 2000 census.^[1] The research universities of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina State University, and Duke University are located in this region. The "Triangle" name was cemented in the public consciousness in the 1950s with the creation of Research Triangle Park, home to numerous high-tech companies and enterprises.