Pioneer in nuclear fusion; Born February 7 1931; Died July 19 2008.

DR NICOL Peacock, who has died aged 77, was a pioneering nuclear physicist who spent his life researching nuclear fusion, the technology offering the potential of an almost limitless source of green energy through fusing light nuclei such as hydrogen isotopes to release energy.

Born in Darvel, Ayrshire, Nicol Jamieson Peacock came of a thorough local mould. His mother wove lace, the product for which the burgh has renown. Educated in the town and at Kilmarnock Academy, Peacock graduated in physics from Glasgow University. By happy chance, his tutor was Sam Curran, later Sir Samuel and first principal of Strathclyde University.

Curran went on to become chief scientist at the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) laboratory at Aldermaston, Berkshire, and in 1956, at the earliest opportunity, hired Peacock, by now at age 25 the holder of two doctorates.

Peacock's project was research into nuclear-fusion, a task to which he brought his trademark enthusiasm. His ability saw him rise swiftly, and to many colleagues, he reached his apogee when at the height of the Cold War in 1969 he pulled off the astonishing feat of leading a five-strong team of UK scientists to the Kurchatov Nuclear Fusion Institute in Moscow with the objective of examining a controversial Soviet assertion about the high performance of their nuclear fusion experiments.

Peacock's confirmation of Soviet success astonished western science. The Moscow mission confirmed Nicol Peacock's international reputation as a nuclear fusion scientist. His experience had been founded on research at what is now the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, then from 1965 to the newly established laboratory dedicated to thermonuclear fusion research at Culham in Oxfordshire. Peacock published more than 100 scientific papers solely or in co-authorship.

Peacock, who died of cancer, is survived by his wife, Maureen, and daughters Fiona and Lindsay.