Geoff Cottrell obtained his PhD in Radio Astronomy at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge University. After researching contact electrification of solidified rare gases near the absolute zero of temperature at UMIST in Manchester, he joined the UKAEA Culham Laboratory, working on the Joint European Torus (JET) experiment, where he became Session Leader. He observed a new form of super-thermal radio emission (Ion Cyclotron Emission) from energetic fusion alpha particles in the plasma. From 1999, he worked on a central issue for the development of fusion energy - fusion materials, in particular calculating the effect that energetic fusion neutrons would have on the wall of a power reactor. He was Director of the Culham International Summer School for Plasma Physics from 2006-2011. He is a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society, and visiting scientist at the Oxford University Astrophysics department and at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory.
