Higgs, who was awarded the Nobel prize for physics in 2013 for his work in 1964 that showed how the boson helped bind the universe together by giving particles their mass, died at home in Edinburgh on Monday.
After a series of experiments, which began in earnest in 2008, his theory was proved by physicists working at the Large Hadron Collider at Cern in Switzerland in 2012; the Nobel prize was shared with François Englert, a Belgian theoretical physicist whose work in 1964 also contributed directly to the discovery.
A member of the Royal Society and a Companion of Honour, Higgs spent the bulk of his professional life at Edinburgh University, which set up the Higgs Centre for Theoretical Physics in his honour in 2012.
Prof Peter Mathieson, the university's principal, said: "Peter Higgs was a remarkable individual - a truly gifted scientist whose vision and imagination have enriched our knowledge of the world that surrounds us.
"His pioneering work has motivated thousands of scientists, and his legacy will continue to inspire many more for generations to come."
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