 Nicol was the first African to graduate with first class honours from the University of Cambridge and he was also the first African elected as a of a college of Cambridge University.Davidson Nicol also contributed to medical science when he was the first to analyse the breakdown of insulin in the human body, a discovery which was a breakthrough for the treatment of diabetes.Nicol was born as Davidson Sylvester Hector Willoughby Nicol on 14 September 1924 in Bathurst, Sierra Leone, to Jonothan Josibiah Nicol.