French Scientist Leading Nuclear Fusion Project Dies at 72

Director-General of the ITER Organization Bernard Bigot speaks to representatives and journalists in the assembly hall of the ITER, where components for the ITER Tokamak will be pre-assembled before integration into the machine, in Saint-Paul-Lez-Durance, southern France, on July 28, 2020. Daniel Cole/AP Photo

PARIS—Bernard Bigot, a French scientist leading a vast international effort to demonstrate that nuclear fusion can be a viable source of energy, has died. He was 72.

The organization behind the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, or ITER, said Bigot died Saturday from an unspecified illness. The organization’s director general since March 2015, Bigot was approaching the midway point of his second term, due to end in 2025.